Lonely Teabags

[marmar]

via AlterNet:


Posted by stevebenen at 5:00 am
February 8, 2010

Pretty Weak Turnout at the Tea Party Convention

This post was originally published in the Washington Monthly.


The NYT briefly mentioned attendance numbers at the right-wing Tea Party convention in Nashville.

The convention had gathered here to try to turn the activism of the Tea Party rallies over the last year into actual political power. Her speech was the keynote event of the convention, and the big draw for many of the 600 people who had paid $549 to attend — another 500, organizers said, paid $349 just to see for her speech alone.

I’ve seen competing totals — ABC News said there were “nearly” 600 activists on hand for the event — but let’s just go ahead and round up, and say there were 600 people who showed up.

Maybe it’s just me, but doesn’t that seem like pretty weak turnout?

Granted, there was a controversy within the “movement” about the nature of the event, its organizers, and its profit margin. It seems likely that the crowd could have been larger were it not for ticket prices and the “sketchy” nature of the convention.

But even after acknowledging this relevant context, what we’re left with is an event with 600 participants and a grand total of zero current House members, senators, or governors. There were, by some estimates, 200 journalists on hand to cover this convention, creating a bizarre dynamic — one reporter for every three participants.

It’s all terribly odd. The first Netroots Nation gathering (the conference formally known as Yearly Kos) had 1,400 attendees. The Tea Party convention had less than half this total.

The media attention seems a little disproportionate to what, by all appearances, was an underwhelming get-together.


http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/02/08/pretty-weak-turnout-at-the-tea-party-convention/

[Xipe Totec]

1. Oh, say can you steep?

Oh, say can you steep by the stove's early light
What so proudly we boiled at the teabag's last squeezing?
Whose brew bags and large cups kept the strainer's busy,
O'er the teacups we watched were so gallantly dripping?
And the tea drip's red glare, the bags bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our tea was still there.
Oh, say does that tea-cup brimmingly yet wave
O'er the land of the freeps and the home of the crazed?

[liberal N proud]

2. lol

:rofl:

[livetohike]

4. Perfect

:rofl: and :toast:

[murielm99]

3. Your title reminded me of a Jackie Wilson song,

"Lonely Teardrops."

Maybe someone can compose a song parody based on that called "Lonely Teabags."

Shooby do wop wop wop
Shooby do wop wop wop

[zbdent]

5. Didn't Glenn Beck claim there were 67 billion attendees there?

[Frustratedlady]

6. Where was Glenn Beck? Was he there?

They could have tripled their attendance if they'd had him as a speaker. Grinning gorilla.

[zbdent]

7. tripled? Are you also counting the 50 percent that were media "reporters"

covering it?

[lunatica]

8. That's why I call it the Tempest in a Teacup Party

[mzmolly]

9. I too have wondered why the media is so fascinated with the Tea Party

hoopla.

[OneBlueSky]

10. Lonely Teabags . . . didn't Jackie Wilson have a hit record of this? . . . n/t

.