Last night George "macacas" Allen held a free event in Norfolk, Virginia, with McCain. Touted as a Veterans for Allen event, there were more veterans protesting outside than attending inside. In fact, for this free event with two very visible Republicans as the draw, only about 100 people showed up (and many of them, by the account of someone who did attend, were Democrats hoping to be able to question Allen on his record regarding veterans if there was a QA period).
Here's is an eyewitness report:
The demonstration was great. We got no hassle from anyone (Allen's supporters are too scared to bother us right now, and our message about how Allen is no friend of veterans freaked out the young people standing outside whose job it seemed to be to hold pro-Allen signs and look Republican.)
All together just over 20 people showed up for our gathering (not bad with an announcement that went out at around 6:00 yesterday evening.) Unfortunately most of the people attending Allen's event entered through the parking garage, so we didn't get to hand out as much literature about Allen's voting record as we would have liked to. Some of us stood with our signs on the corner by Allen's shills. Most of us stood across the street.
Two news channels got us on video, and the Virginian Pilot took numerous pictures. The news crews actually asked us to stand in a row behind the reporter so that they could make sure to have us in the background.
We all had signs:
Allen is
NO FRIEND
to VETS
RETIRED
ENLISTED
ASS'N
gives
ALLEN
a ZERO (with big red letters on the ZERO)
ALLEN'S VOTES:
V.A. - UNDERFUNDED (red letters on the underfunded)
Halliburton- OVER FUNDED (red letters again)
VETS,
DON'T BET
on ALLEN-
CHECK HIS
VOTING RECORD
A guy showed up with a Veterans for Peace Banner
Another guy showed up with a poster with a yellow ribbon that said to support the troops, not Halliburton.
Another guy showed up with a sign about no war, no occupation, and something else.
Allen had about 10 people out there on the street in front of the Marriott holding Veterans for Allen signs. As I mentioned, they were pretty young, and they didn't look like veterans, so I yelled out to them, "Hey are ANY of you veterans?" No response until "Well, I'm going to be a veteran some day." To which I responded, "Well our bunch is filled with veterans." There was an older Allen staffer guy there who said "What. Are YOU a veteran?" really sarcastically. I said "No. My husband is a veteran. And she's a veteran
. And he's a veteran. And he's a veteran. And they are veterans..." The Allen staffer didn't like that answer and got really mad. In my opinion, the young people seemed a little freaked out that veterans were staging a demonstration about Allen's voting record on veterans issues.
And then the "Wow" moment happened. A 20-something East Indian American man showed up with a sign that said:
Allen is a RACIST.
"Macacas"
4
Webb
With him was another 20-something man who had a sign that read
Hey Allen, remember Vietnam?
McCain and Webb can
tell you all about it.
Then a 70-year-old East Indian American woman showed up and held a sign that read
SIDARTH is
NOT a MONKEY.
HE is a
HUMAN BEING
The TV crews didn't get pictures of those signs because they arrived too late, but the Virginian Pilot did.
The people driving by were totally for our message. People kept honking and giving us the thumbs up. Nobody, literally nobody, honked or waved at Allen's people. We had the right message with hitting Allen on his veterans votes since this was a Veterans for Allen event.
It'll be interesting to see what, if anything, shows up on the news. In any case, all of us felt very positive about what attention we did get for the cause. And, we had a blast. I don't think the same can be said about Allen's people. It must be hard to be an Allen supporter today.
I heard that Allen's event was boring, BTW.
Final note, I still have about 375 copies of information about Allen's voting record on vets issues. I am going to make sure that every single one of them is put to good use and that people get the word. Veterans should not support George Allen. It's as simple as that.
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The local newspaper, The Virginian-Pilot, in its front page article this morning chose to focus on how the Internet is influencing politics rather than on the issues: "Allen’s gaffe shows politics to be Internet feeding ground" (headline)
http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=109357&ran=126594&tref=po