Had a rather hot exchange with my Arch enemy friend Chris back at my post, he got there earlier than me and had a different perspective, check out his comments and the updates.
It’s a good lesson on not judging. I figured he was calling me a liar and he thought I was lowballing numbers. He didn’t know I was counting only crowd members allowed in the main room (6600) and I didn’t know his perspective was ALL the guys in the room including security, the people on stage, the people working the event etc. (a lot more)
See how misunderstandings on motives can come simply from a different perspective? That’s why comments and talking are so important, if he hadn’t questioned me on the blog I wouldn’t have answered and we would have both thought each other couldn’t be trusted.
There is an important lesson there about people with different political perspectives there and getting along. One should always try to assume good faith because apparently both of us saw what we saw at slightly different times.
Update: Chris tell us in comments that he was one of 3000 fans bussed in from all over the state. Well I’m sure that news reinforces the idea that Democrats can generate a crowd for the president in Boston on a Saturday without a problem.
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I don’t understand why you aren’t understanding what I’m writing. Perhaps I’m not being clear. We are not “both right,” and you’re not understanding what I’m saying. I’ll try to make this more clear:
I arrived with over 3,000 SUPPORTERS who were bused in ahead of time from all over the state (our bus left Fitchburg at about 10am.) We were not people involved in the production in any way.
After we were allowed in and passed through security, they then started to let in an ADDITIONAL 6,600 people who were waiting outside.
After seeing how you misunderstood my original post, it really makes clear to me how you could have gotten the fire marshall’s quote wrong. Especially seeing as the “facts” you were working with at the time were completely wrong.
You still claim there were only union members standing in support outside of the line, yet even in your own photos you have a picture of a couple of the members of Haitian Americans for Deval Patrick. THEY WEREN’T ALL UNION. There were many groups standing in support, some holding signs.
Anyone who thinks that a comic book not selling is a good gauge of the interest in voting for Patrick doesn’t have their thinking cap on straight. It’s that kind of A to B reasoning that results in ridiculous statements being made. If someone was going to buy a keepsake of their trip, I would imagine it would be a pin, or something more relevant, not an old, unrelated comic about SPIDERMAN. Or is it that Tea Party-ers are so quick to buy manipulative garbage at these types of events that you think every party is like that?
I never accused you of lying – you were misrepresenting elements in your commentary, and you just got the facts wrong. What can I expect, it’s what most pundits do.
I spoke directly with a gentleman from the campaign named Jason Smith and he game me that number. I wrote it down with his name.
I had people in line asking if the place was full so I went over to find out how many were allowed, that is when the campaign game me the specific number, I asked the gentleman directly wrote it down along with him name. My number is correct.
I was unaware of the people organized and bussed in but that is a story in itself as the April 14th Boston Common rally didn’t have people bussed in.
If you want to maintain that I got it wrong, fine you do that. I know what I saw and what was there. How did you judge that there was an “additional” 6600? I’m presuming that as you were bussed in you were in the main viewing area where the Prez and Gov was THAT is the room I was told allowed 6600 in.
Is it possible that it meant 6600 IN ADDITION TO the bussed in crew? Could be , I wasn’t aware of people bussed in to help the numbers, but I tell you what, once I’m back in Massachusetts I’ll contact the campaign later this week and see what they have to say.
All the comments and links are up, my readers and your listeners can check it all out both my words and your counters. I trust them to make up their minds.
Did you get my last comment, Pete? I haven’t seen it approved. Understandable if you’re travelling today, just checking that it went through.
Not only was I traveling but for some reason my spam filter grabbed your last comments which is kinda odd. it’s been doing that for several people lately so I’ve had to double check.
FYI to all readers, if your comments don’t show up, drop me a line and I’ll double check my filter.
OK, that can happen. I work with WordPress with many clients, and it can be flakey sometimes. Here’s the gist of my last post:
A quick 2 minute Google search revealed that there were people bussed in to the Palin rally in Boston in April, from even as far as Maine:
http://mainepatriots.ning.com/events/tea-party-express-and-sarah
http://www.pressherald.com/news/tea-party-express-rallying-in-boston-today_2010-04-14.html
Again, it’s not that you’re lying, you’re just getting basic facts wrong in your reporting, and you’re making dramatic statements that are incorrect because they are based on incorrect assumptions.
So this statement with commentary/assumption you made is wrong: “As I recall this wasn’t done for the April 14th Rally with the Tea Party express and Sarah Palin. So I guess things are even worse then I thought if they had to bus people in to make sure they had numbers.”
And BTW, THEY (the campaign) did not bus us in, it was individual groups. I don’t know about every other bus, but I know ours was our own idea.
I will concede the main patriots bus that I wasn’t aware of, but comparing 75 people coming from Maine in a crowd of 10k organized by a small tea party group vs 3000 bussed in via the campaign from a crowd that had 8000 (or 11,000 if we assume your 3000 were already counted before letting in the foot crowd) is a significant difference, particularly when you compare a Saturday to a Wednesday.
But as I said, I’ll approve your stuff and the readers can compare and draw their conclusions as they wish
Ok, you seriously are going to say there was only one bus? You are going to make me do the actual research, instead of yourself? Interesting approach to reporting. Your readers will hopefully see through this.
I’m saying you have provided evidence of one tea party group providing one bus for 75 people. Feel free to provide as much other evidence as you can for the April 14th event, you get the links and I’ll approve them