Stewart Turns ‘em Out, But Can’t Turn It Up

Ladies and gentlemen, the numbers are in and it’s official: Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert outdid Glenn Beck nearly three times over.  According to CBS News, the only organization doing a systematic count, some 215,000 people armed with signs, costumes, and a whole lot of sanity showed up to the Comedy Central-sponsored rally on Saturday, as compared to only 87,000 for Beck in his August rally.

For the millions who tuned in to C-Span, news shows, or the live internet stream, the rally’s comedic appeals and musical performances were surely entertaining, perhaps even thought-provoking. But many of the die-hard fans who made the journey to the nation’s capital had no such luck.  Standing among the huddled masses, they couldn’t hear or see a thing.

Perhaps because they are inexperienced rally organizers, or perhaps because they were far too modest in projecting turnout, Comedy Central failed to set up jumbo-tron screens and speakers along the national mall.  The inadequate electronics surrounding the stage were visible and audible to only a small percentage of the crowd.  Flustered participants chanted “Louder, Louder!” and “Turn it up!” to no avail.  Without a view of the stage or a way to hear the speeches, many retreated to nearby bars and coffee shops instead. 

“I couldn’t see or hear anything,” said Ellen Roche, a 26-year-old DC resident who ended up watching the rally from a coffee shop.  ”It didn’t seem like it was very well planned.”  

Despite lacking access to the planned stage antics, participants found a worthy focus within the crowd itself.  Aside from its awesome size, the assembly was punctuated with costumes (thanks to the rally falling on Halloween weekend) and saturated with clever, sarcastic, and witty signs satirizing political sloganeering. For weeks, the Daily Show and Colbert Report encouraged people to prepare, photograph, and share their Sanity/Fear signs.  One man held high a yellow poster reading “My Arms Are Tired.”  Another said, “I’m mad as hell, but mostly in a passive aggressive way.”  Nearby, a colorful sign read “God Hates These Signs.” 

While the majority of the signs were playful, befitting the rally’s spirit, a significant minority were pointedly aimed at denouncing the Tea Party.  ”Don’t Tea On My Leg And Tell Me It’s Raining,’ read one.  Another, set by a trash can, advertised the receptacle as a place to recycle Tea Bags.  Parodying the seemingly endless comparisons of politicians to Hitler, one sign painted a somewhat less inflammatory mustache on Sarah Palin’s visage: That of Groucho Marx.

Ironically, a handful of people toted incendiary political signs, seemingly missing the rally’s message of moderation.  One woman dressed in a devil costume brought a poster depicting former Vice President Dick Cheney burning in Hell.  

While many of the people present were, strangely, the last to learn what happened on the rally’s central stage, they at least enjoyed taking part in an event intended to be equally entertaining and political.  To these parody activists and zealots of moderation, outshining Glenn Beck was itself a statement worth making.  But when it comes to the technical stuff, Comedy Central could learn a thing or two from Fox News.

-Niv Elis

Rally? What Rally?

Context is everything. 

Normally, tens of thousands of citizens gathering in the nation’s capital would be considered a victorious display of strength.  But in the wake of the recent Glenn Beck Rally and Tea Parties in Washington, the union-organized One Nation Working Together rally seemed woefully under-attended.  Intended to demonstrate that the American left is still alive and kicking, the rally instead landed with a muffled thud on the national mall.

Whereas Beck attracted throngs of people impassioned by fiery rhetoric, big names, and audacious theatricality, One Nation’s response seemed merely a blip.  The mall’s spacious lawns displayed their full greenery, having recovered from some serious Tea Party treading just weeks before.   DC residents confronted with activists en route to the Lincoln Memorial quizzically muttered, “Rally?  What Rally?” 

The unions’ inability to produce the hype or headlines already surrounding the forthcoming Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert rallies uncomfortably belied the event.  Were the obvious comparison points absent, and had the organizers not been such powerful national groups, the thousands of assembled marchers would have been impressive.

“I’m not a very big proponent of ordinary marches like this, so I’m just gonna put that right out there,” says Nadine Bloch, who works for the Washington Peace Center.  Instead, Bloch believes in using creative forms of resistance, cultural work, and direct action.  Towering over her, a 12-foot paper mache “Goddess of Peace and Liberation” demonstrates her views.  Covered with slogans such as “Fund Jobs, Not War” and “Build Schools, Not Bombs,” the Goddess is the creation of a consortium of social justice movements called The Peace Table.  “Marches are important for bringing communities together, showing strength to each other, perhaps sending a message to the White House, if you get really lucky.  So we’re here just to add color and creative expression.”

Close by, dressed in a snazzy suit and smoking a pretzel cigar, Harold Gotbucks III of the Buffalo Billionaires flashes a winning smile.  “The Billionaires decided we need to come down here and counteract these proletarian working people, running around and causing trouble,” he explains.  “They should just shut up and stop complaining!”  The satirical character is in reality Eric Gallion, a part-time engineer who bussed down with his local unions (shunning his private jet).  Gallion believes that humor adds an additional dimension to political debate, a notion that, once again, will come to the fore in the Stewart/Colbert rally.  “I think it makes it more fun and at the same time more real to people.  It’s too easy to just kind of blank out the people with signs.”

As with all large political events, the One Nation rally attracted a variety of like-minded groups hoping to capitalize on the event.  Exemplifying the plethora of causes, four women strolled through the crowd covered in bumper stickers collected from the myriad organizers.  “We just went to everybody, just meeting everybody and hearing their causes.”  The women, who traveled 14-hours by bus from Georgia, came to support the International Longshoreman’s Association/Local 1414 union, whose office is across the way from their restaurant Mama T’s.

For all its good causes, the One Nation rally may have ultimately been counter-productive for the unions.  Given the context, they may have inadvertently proved that they are no longer the backbone of the left. 

-Niv Elis

The Prayer Warriors

The Pray at the Pump group believes that there’s a solution for all of the nation’s problems.  Put politics aside, let go of silly policy ideas, and focus on a more powerful avenue of fixing the world: prayer.  It works with any religion, as long as you’re praying.  “It doesn’t matter to us.  It can be Muslim or whatever,”  says Rocky Twyman, the group’s founder.  

In fact, the members of the group are mostly Seventh-Day Adventists, a Protestant-like denomination that celebrates Saturday as the Sabbath, and their philosophy draws heavily on the Christian bible. “If you go to the Bible it says ‘God is a jealous god,’ and He wants us to give Him credit.”  Not doing so has brought about the collapse of kings and kingdoms time and time again, says Twyman.

While prayer is important for all, the group has recently set its focus on one man, whose prayers are, perhaps, closer to God’s ears.  Twyman believes that President Barack Obama could get a great deal more done if he were to only engage in public prayer, both to ask for help and give thanks.  “After all, God is the one who made it possible for him to even become President,” Twyman sermonizes, explaining that God went to great lengths to position Obama for the Presidency, bringing about, among other things, well-timed economic turmoil.

Twyman’s beliefs motivate him and several of his co-religionists toward numerous acts of protest, each aimed at raising awareness of faith, prayer, and its importance to public policy outcomes.  Before the Glenn Beck Rally in Washington, they gathered outside the White House to demand that Obama bring Beck and Al Sharpton, who was manning a counter-rally, together in prayer.  On Labor Day weekend, he and his self-proclaimed “Prayer Warriors” gathered at an unemployment center near Union Station to pray, sing, circulate a petition, and, according to their press release, “pass out candies of hope to help soften the blow” of unemployment.  They hope Obama is paying attention and will find some humility in the face of the great creator.  ”HARVARD WISDOM IS FOLLY TO THE RULER OF THE UNIVERSE,” their petition reads.

Unemployment and Glenn Beck are not the only problems prayer can tackle.  It can work on anything from war to natural disaster. The BP oil spill could have been cleaned up much sooner with a little help from God, says Twyman.  ”Cuz he made the Earth!  He knows, man!  He knows what to do!”

But Twyman isn’t just acting on faith.  He’s had confirmation from his previous experiences that prayer works.  The Pray at the Pump movement started, as its name indicates, by conducting prayer vigils at gas stations in the summer of 2008, when the price of oil hit a record high.  “We prayed and God blessed our efforts and the prices started coming down whenever we prayed!”  

Never mind that the price of oil came tumbling down due to reduced demand, caused by the fast deterioration of the American economy.  As you’ll recall, that was part of the plan to get Obama into power in the first place.

God works in mysterious ways.

-Niv Elis

Glenn Hearts Barack - A Love Story

If imitation is the highest form of flattery, then Glenn Beck has a huge man-crush on a figure he regularly tears apart on his show: President Barack Obama.

In addition to “taking back” the civil rights movement, Beck also appears to be “taking back” Obama’s Change movement.  Take, for example, the images that Beck uses on his show (and on his merchandise) to promote his values:

They are religious, conservative variations of the Shepard Fairey-designed Obama logos used in the 2008 Presidential campaign.  Instead of Obama, they feature past presidents and the values Beck cites as the essential teaching of Jesus: Faith, Hope, and Charity.  The Obama icons, instead, promoted Change, Progress and Hope, the one value they share.

Some commentators have noticed a parallel between Beck’s current speeches and Obama’s campaign speeches.  In 2008, Obama told crowds that “One voice can change a room, and if one voice can change a room, then it can change a city, and if it can change a city, it can change a state, and if it change a state, it can change a nation, and if it can change a nation, it can change the world. Your voice can change the world.”  Beck, at his “Rally to Restore Honor,” said “One man can change the world…That man or woman is you. You make the difference.”

Both try to mobilize their audiences by appealing to the American ideal of individual participation as a means of improving society.  For example, which of these two quotes was Glenn Beck, and which was Barack Obama?  

We have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world; duties that we do not grudgingly accept, but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character than giving our all to a difficult task.  This is the price and the promise of citizenship.  This is the source of our confidence — the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

vs.  

We as individuals must be good so America can be great!  America is at a crossroads…Do we do what every great generation has done in America in times of trouble: look ahead, dream about what we are going to become, not what we are?  Look forward, look West, look to the heavens, look to God, and make your choice.

Hard to tell, right?  The first was Obama’s inauguration speech, the second was Beck at his Rally.

Obama notably invoked the image of Lincoln in his campaign, taking the same train ride from Illinois to Washington for his inauguration and being sworn in on Lincoln’s bible.  Beck, standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial, went as far as to reread the Gettysburg Address, noting its continuing resonance.

But why in the world would Glenn Beck, the demagogue of the religious right, follow in the footsteps of Barack Obama?  The reason is that he is playing to an audience motivated by similar emotions as the electorate in 2008.  The Tea Party movement, despite vastly different politics, is really a mirror image of Obama’s Change movement. 

Obama was vaulted to power on the momentum of a populace disillusioned with a dysfunctional government, seeking change from the misadventurous George W. Bush administration that led to two wars and an economic crisis.  In the Tea Party, the political doppelganger of the Change movement, Beck sees the same features: idealistic activists who believe that the country is on the wrong track politically and desperately want things to change.  

All that Tea Party anger the media is so fond of citing is built on a desire for different politics, albeit from a conservative perspective, seeking to restore fonder, simpler times.  Guy Miconi, an Italian immigrant and Glenn Beck supporter from New Jersey longs for such a restoration to America’s glory days. “This was the Mecca. People wanted to come.  People spoke so highly of the United States.  Go to America, and you work hard, and you’ll earn anything you want to do.  But guess what, you can’t do that anymore.”

Even with a copycat political strategy, Beck will continue to use his unique brand of fear mongering, religion, and apocalyptic rhetoric to motivate his followers. Don’t be too surprised if his next book is called “The Hope of Audacity.”

-Niv Elis

A Mad Tea Party

When is a Tea Party not a Tea Party?  When is a political event not a political event?

“I haven’t the slightest idea,” the Mad Hatter would reply.  

The Hatter of this event, of course, would be Glenn Beck, the Fox News rhetorician who has built his career on controversy.  On Saturday, August 28th, he descended upon the Nation’s capital with an estimated 87,000 of his supporters in tow, spearheading an event called “The Rally to Restore Honor.”  

Despite claiming to be an apolitical event and lacking official affiliation with any Tea Party movements, the rally was unmistakably targeted at mobilizing and energizing Tea Party constituencies politically.

On the one hand, many facets of the rally were as expected.  The crowd was a mostly-white, largely rural population, representing the finest of Sarah Palin’s “Real America.”  But surprises abounded around every corner as well, adding an unexpected madness to the Tea Party.

Most striking about the rally participants was the marked difference between their reputation and their demeanor.  The rally felt more like a giant Fourth of July picnic, complete with lawn chairs and wistful Americana, than a gathering storm of political revolution.

The much vaunted anger that supposedly fueled Tea Party activists had either been checked at the door, ebbed, or was not their primary driver to begin with.  A pair of participants from North Carolina (who refused to give their names) insisted that their motivation was “not anger,” but rather “love for our country.”  Karen Freeman, a 26-year old activist from Philadelphia (and one of the few African Americans in the crowd) insisted that the media, which gets a better story from highlighting the angriest and most offensive people, was to blame for such misconceptions.  “You’ll always have those hateful people in there.  Just like any group.  You’ll always have the bad egg to spoil the batch.”  But Freeman, who has traveled with the Tea Party from California to the District selling merchandise, believed that “the policy itself is good.” 

However, the inflammatory rhetoric of Mr. Beck and other Tea Party pundits and politicians was not so easily brushed aside by all.  Among the crowd, armed with her trusty signs, stood Lori Thomas, the teacher from Rochester who spent July Schooling the White House on education.  This time, she came to urge people in both the Glenn Beck rally and the Al Sharpton “Reclaim The Dream” counter-rally across the way to converse constructively.  “We have in this country one of the greatest constitutions in the world and that constitution guarantees us freedom of speech, and we have to respect that in one another.  Everyone has the right to come out and say how they feel.  But not in hate,” said Thomas, eliciting approving nods from nearby ralliers. 

Interestingly, Thomas found herself in agreement with some of the Tea Party’s principles as well.  “The message of the Tea Party is a good one.  We do have to change our government, we have to find people of integrity to lead our nation.  We can’t keep going status quo.  But you don’t put people in who are just as bad as the people who are in.”  

Finally, the political diversity of the rallying hoards was, within conservative limits, fairly broad.  Throughout the crowd, political organizations of remarkably different stripes sought an audience.  Members of DCVote, a group advocating full voting rights for residents of the District of Columbia, attempted to capitalize on the Tea Party imagery.  Their slogan, “No Taxation Without Representation,” is borrowed from the original Boston Tea Party, and drew mixed responses from the passersby, eliciting everything from smiling approval to contempt.  Another organization, called GOOOH (pronounced “go”), sought to gather support for a new political system, free of special interests.  An ultra-conservative group claiming to defend “Tradition, Family, and Property” distributed pamphlets outlining 10 reasons to reject socialism.  A libertarian from New Jersey lamented the struggle for the Tea Party’s soul, represented by the socially conservative Sarah Palin and the traditional “small government”  views of Ron Paul.  “We’re not republican, we’re not democrats, we’re constitutionalists.  That’s all we care about,” affirmed Michaelina and Guy Miconi, Italian immigrants who moved to New Jersey in the 1950’s.

While people clearly took issue with President Obama and his policies, few pointed to him or his administration as the cause of the “lost honor” the rally claimed to restore.  “It started during Bush, maybe even before that, some of Clinton,” the anonymous North Carolinians said of the country’s downward trajectory.  The Miconi couple saw the problems extending even further back.  “We have veered off incrementally from the Roosevelt Era,” said Michaelina.  “We’re trying to restore our country back to what it was: constitutional government, fiscal responsibility, and we the people rule.”

Appropriately, this Mad Tea party recalls another scene from Alice in Wonderland.  Standing at a crossroads, Alice asks the Cheshire Cat for directions, but admits she is not sure where she wants to arrive.  “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” replies the Cat. 

Given that the movement is based upon vague and lofty principals that do not easily translate into one particular policy or another, the attendant political diversity makes sense.  But the only clear thing about which path the Tea Party will end up choosing is that it will lead Rightward.

(Special Thanks to Thomas Sanchez for the first and fourth photos)

-Niv Elis