150,000 Expected at U.S. Capitol Reagan Memorial

[dArKeR]

By Deborah Zabarenko

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Secret Service (news - web sites), police and other law officers geared up on Tuesday for three days of ceremonies to honor Ronald Reagan (news - web sites), with 150,000 mourners expected to view the former president's casket as it lies in state in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.

Reagan's remains were expected to arrive at the Capitol late on Wednesday from California, where tens of thousands visited his flag-draped coffin at the presidential library that bears his name. The 40th president died on Saturday at age 93.

The Washington observances will span three days, beginning with an arrival ceremony at Andrews Air Force Base outside the U.S. capital, the base that is home to the presidential aircraft Air Force One.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040608/us_nm/reagan_capital_dc_5

I don't think this is very many people! I'm sure it's not very many people.

I've been taking my own observation POLL since Reagan's passing;
1. I don't hear anyone talking about while I'm out in public
2. I don't see any, (more than usual), US Flags flying from houses or cars
3. I see every newspaper stand/box/rack blasted full with Reagan's headline and picture but I don't see people picking them up to browse.
(I'm in San Jose CA, his home turf.)
4. I haven't gotten a single email from my moral/honest friends or my Repukelican friends on the subject of Reagan. (This is one time the Gov. spying on our email could prove something. I'd like to see how many times the word 'Reagan' has been used in private email since his passing.)

ALTERMAN: 'LIBERAL MEDIA' STRIKES AGAIN
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=103&topic_id=55474

[LisaM]

1. Well, I hope it's under-reported by a factor of 10 or more

as in "tens of thousands" or just "thousands" of mourners at Reagan's funeral. And I hope they show no overhead shots of the crowd, just small groups of 50-100. You know, the same way they report anti-war protests.

[West Coast Democrat]

2. Millions of mourners visited Lenin's tomb

the lines were huge!!

[daleo]

3. More people showed up in Rome the other day to protest Bush

Last year's anti-war protests were bigger as well. I suppose the real test will be how long people are willing to stay in line to have a peek at the corpse. This could become some strange new form of political competition. I wonder how close people will actually be allowed to get to the body - probably not very, except for a select number who can be trusted implicitly.

Personally, I don't like open casket funerals, even when I really liked the deceased. But, each to his own.

[TNOE]

4. Yea - Compared to 500,000 Protesting Bush

.......... not so large a number after all. John F. Kennedy probably had 10 times that many people show.

[Emboldened Chimp]

6. Don't forget the close to 1 million in support of abortion rights

[keithyboy]

5. It will be hyped to the hilt and blown way out of proportion to reality

just like his so-called "legacy." The media makes you or breaks you.

[CO Liberal]

7. In Other Words...

...there are at least 150,000 mindless idiots in this country.

[CO Liberal]

8. Will The Freepers Be Providing Porta-Potties????

:-)

[Say_What]

9. Reagan's Dark Global Legacy

<clips>

...Cambodia. "Reagan Skull Bag." This handy Khmer Rouge carrying sack holds up to 25 skulls. The Skull Bag recognizes the Reagan administration's unstinting support for Pol Pot's assaults on Cambodians from 1981 to 1989, as well as Reagan's policy of recognizing the exiled Khmer Rouge at the U.N. as the legitimate government of Cambodia.

o Costa Rica. "El Rancho Reagan." The former "front farm" of a CIA and contra collaborator, El Rancho Reagan is preserved in its mid-1980s pristine prime. Contra killers lounge in the backyard, the safe overflows with cash to bribe Costa Rican officials to ignore violations of their nation's neutrality, and kilos of coke are on hand for transhipment.

o El Salvador. "The Reagan Missionary Position." No, not a sexual position for raping American churchwomen (for that would be in poor taste), but a position as in a stand. The Reagan Missionary Position, formulated by high officials Al Haig and Jeane Kirkpatrick, is that the three nuns and one layworker were pro-Marxist "political activists" and thus hardly innocent. Besides, their deaths were accidents, not planned executions. Haig explained that the churchwomen ran or were perceived to have run a "roadblock" and may have gotten caught in a guerrilla-National Guard "exchange of fire." Were they also raped in the crossfire? The Reagan Missionary Position's lips say no, but his eyes say yes.

o Guatemala. "The Reagan 'Bum Rap' Rap." Grandmaster Ronnie first laid down this rap in 1982 to discredit reports by Amnesty International and others of the army's slaughter of thousands of Indian villagers in the first months of General Efrain Rios Montt's rule. Ronnie rapped that Rios Montt (an evangelical minister nicknamed the "born-again butcher") was getting a "bum rap." The beauty of the bum-rap rap is that it bolsters "military impunity," regarded by Reagan as a cornerstone of client-state pseudo-democracy.

o Honduras. "Reagan's Rascals." The crazy cut-ups of Battalion 316 comprised a secret unit of CIA-backed torturers and murderers. They rid Honduras of real and imagined subversives and dissidents, assisted Reagan's beloved contras and ensured the continued rule of corrupt army thugs behind a civilian facade -- another cornerstone of client-state pseudo-democracy.

o Haiti. "Ronnie Doc." Duvalier loyalists awarded Reagan the highest degree a Haitian can steal, the Doctor of Kleptocracy. Papa Doc and Baby Doc earned theirs the hard way, while Reagan's honorary title states, "Long after the spineless State Department distanced itself from the sinking Duvalier ship, you stood steadfast. Unlike the ignorant Haitian masses, you never condemned Baby Doc's stylish extravagance."

http://www.counterpunch.org/hans06072004.html