But Who's Counting Anyway?

Given the mainstream media's almost deafening silence when protests are against the issues they champion, it is little wonder that Steven Pearlstein over at the Washington Post doesn't know that people are angry with the bill that passed last night:

If, as Republicans would have us believe, Americans are so up in arms about the prospect of "Obamacare," why aren't there angry hordes marching on the Mall or jamming the halls of the Rayburn Building?

As if in answer to Pearlstein's query, several thousand tea-partiers filled the west lawn of the Capitol this Saturday.  Despite the size of the crowd, the mainstream media had difficulty getting an accurate count.  As the AP reported that evening, "Clogging the sidewalks and streets of Capitol Hill were at least hundreds - no official estimate was yet available - of loud, furious protesters, many of them tea party opponents of the health care overhaul."

What does several hundred people look like to the mainstream media?  I went down to the anti-Obamacare protest on Saturday, and took these photos.

While technically true, "hundreds" seems to be an awfully low-ball estimate given the size of the crowd.  Meanwhile, numerous press accounts of other protests this past weekend report numbers in the thousands and even tens of thousands:

• Washington Post - "D.C. antiwar march draws thousands"
• New York Times - "Thousands Call for Immigration Reform in Capital"
• New York Times - "Tens of thousands of immigrants and activists rallied here on Sunday"

To be fair, the Washington Post did run an article on Saturday which reported that "several thousand people" attended the rally pictured above.  However, the article mainly focused on the actions of a few bad people in the crowd who apparently shouted racial epithets later in the day.

During the floor speeches last night, Republicans accused the Democrats of being deaf to the will of the people.  However, if Democrats only get their news from the Washington Post and the New York Times, it's possible they are genuinely unaware of the growing popular anger at this legislation.

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