Sort of a Round Up of the Indy Tea Party

First, let me do this ted nugent "star spangled banner" video ... nevr thought I'd say this "Even better than Jimi!"
Outstanding...Now I wonder why I never liked Nugent?
Here we go...
The Yahoo! version of the national story was entitled "Thousands rally with 'tea parties' on tax day" but I've read elsewhere that there were over 550,000 participants across the country. The photos on this page are all mine from the statehouse lawn.



The lead paragraph is predictably snarly...

ATLANTA – Whipped up by conservative commentators and bloggers, tens of thousands of protesters staged "tea parties" around the country Wednesday to tap into the collective angst stirred up by a bad economy, government spending and bailouts. The rallies were directed at President Barack Obama's new administration on a symbolic day: the deadline to file income taxes. Protesters even threw what appeared to be a box of tea bags toward the White House, causing a brief lockdown at the compound.

Can't speak for others, but what "whipped" me up to attend was the ceaseless repititious criticism from D.C. about the Bush administration while promoting policies that are even worse. If Bush's deficit spending was SO bad - and no one is saying they were any good - then why isn't the Obama administration's four times worse?

Over at the Indianapolis Tea Party website, they are saying ...

Although the local media would have us believe we only had around 2,000 attendees at the event (which would be correct if you were counting 2 hours before the event even started!), those trained in crowd control AND the IMPD estimated our rally had somewhere between 12,000 - 15,000 Peaceful Patriots!!!! In fact, the Capital Police remarked that they were amazed at how well behaved our crowd was!! AND, what's more, our volunteers expected to spend a few hours after the event, picking up trash and cleaning the area, BUT, there was hardly ANY evidence that 15,000 people were just there!! We Patriots sure know how to party AND not make a mess!!!

Richard and I want to thank each one of you who braved the crowds, the parking, the chilly temps AND rearranged your schedules to be a part of the rally to have our voices heard together! We really were the ROARING LION!! I know most of you did not have the vantage point that we had and could not see the crowd fully, but I want to tell you I was moved to tears on a number of occasions yesterday as I looked out at the sea of faces, the signs, the red, white and blue, ....friends, we most assuredly are NOT ALONE!

.........a few paragraphs later, the article closes...

Again, on behalf of the over 100 Tea Party volunteers, THANK YOU Freedom-Loving Americans for joining us in having our voices heard. Let the non-representing representatives in Washington say, as Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto said after his attack on Pearl Harbor, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve."

We are asleep no longer.

FREEDOM!!!

Richard & Laura Behney
Indianapolis Tea Party Coordinators

The website includes links for further action...
Indy Defenders of Liberty

...and......
The Independence Caucus

A Citizen's movement* to take
our government back from the
"Big Money" Special Interests groups...

*(...And the first to defeat a compromised incumbent!)

Someone started a comment thread for the Indy Tea at
free republic with some pictures...

related RCB post Indianapolis Tea Party

Indianapolis Tea Party

This event was well put together. My congratulations to those involved, WELL done! The local press is saying the crowd numbered about two thousand. I would have been happy with two hundred, and thought the predictions by organizers of 8,000 had some other, possibly marketing, motives. I was ecstatic at the crowd. It was kind of like realizing that we really aren't alone.






I felt as natural and welcome here as I would at a church cook-out. Honestly, the only thing missing was the grill, barbeque sauce and the the buns.




It was a little cool, probably about fifty degrees, but some were on fire, some were just supplying some friendly warmth. Even "Satan" wore a hearty smile! The event organizershad printed signs that read "ENOUGH" (I got one of those - for the wife of course. Poor dear couldn't make it, flu.) But the signs were, for the most part, hand written. Some were very catchy, some caught me by surprise, all were right on the money. I saw a couple of Libertarian Party signs, otherwise, there was no party politicking.







Got some pretty cool photos - I'm gonna put together a slide show, but wanted to get some pictures up quick - blogger is threatening a "scheduled outage" soon.




I was especially surprised and pleased at the turnout among younger adults. Some brought their own young children with them. Made it all the more homey feeling.
















I had a great time wandering the crowd. Everyone was very polite, and there wasn't an unfriendly vibe on the whole block. You could sense the boredom in the faces of the police crowd hanging out. We used to call that kinda' gig "easy money!"






Indianapolis
Tax Day Tea Party
April 15th

ENOUGH!

Congress, Repeal the Stimulus Packages
& uphold the Constitution of
the United States
NOW
OR we will replace every
Member of Congress starting in 2010!

Cincinnati Tea Party

From the Right Wing Nut Job blog, a refreshing video of the protest. Though it's a different experience for me to admire "protesters!"