On only three-and-a-half hours of sleep, my fiance and I made our way to the tea party on Fountain Square on this chilly grey day. The space on the square was limited because of the flower carpet that is displayed every spring but that didn't stop folks--they just hung round on the street.
I proudly wore my Obama victory shirt on the square full of angry and frustrated people. There were speakers who all said the same thing and folks clapped, shouted, touted their signs and chanted U.S.A....U.S.A.... The crowd soon marched to City Hall, with their teabags and petition of 1,700 signatures, to tell Mayor Mallory to refuse the stimulus money. Okay...quit laughing for a second. Nah, go ahead. These people who, most likely, don't even live in the City of Cincinnati are raging against the machine to tell a Democratic mayor of a city that is really financially strapped who backed President Obama from the beginning to not accept money? HA HA HA!
I digress...
I went there for several reasons. First and foremost, I wanted to show support for my president. He's trying to get something done in a very messed up time for everybody. Secondly, I wanted to really know why these people were so willing to assemble on a lousy weather day to protest something that they should have been protesting. Where were all of these people when former President Bush and Congress approved $720 billion in TARP money during his last months in office. After all, they are protesting wasteful spending, right? RIIIIIIGHT... Thirdly, I was interested in how people would react to me openly supporting President Obama. My mom read in City Beat about a lady who claimed to have been hit with nigger this nigger that while she showed her support for Obama during the first Cincinnati Tea Party. Would history repeat itself? You bet your butt it would! The final count for every n-bomb I heard was four. I got plenty of stares. Surprisingly enough, though, the kids who were forced to go really liked my shirt. It is quite colorful. (I bet those poor kids wished they were in school. Wait...the protesters were so about "think about the kids" when it came to the economy. Why weren't they in school? Don't they care about education? Truant officer, please!)
It appears to me that we are so ready for President Obama to screw up. The protesters write him off as a failure before he can even get a chance to fail. For those opposed to what President Obama is doing I have a few questions that I hope get answered here since no one at the tea party would really answer them:
1) Where was the mass protest when President Bush gave Wall Street $720 BILLION and told Congress to allow President Obama to have access to that TARP money once he was president?
2) If these same people were so concerned about the future of our kids, where was the outrage when it was discovered that Bush's "No Child Left Behind" legislation was underfunded by billions of dollars?
3) What about Iraq? With the pointless invasion, the U.S. has spent billions upon billions upon BILLIONS of dollars that could have been used here at home.
4) Why waste wonderful bags of tea? I love tea, especially green tea. Very refreshing.
I proudly wore my Obama victory shirt on the square full of angry and frustrated people. There were speakers who all said the same thing and folks clapped, shouted, touted their signs and chanted U.S.A....U.S.A.... The crowd soon marched to City Hall, with their teabags and petition of 1,700 signatures, to tell Mayor Mallory to refuse the stimulus money. Okay...quit laughing for a second. Nah, go ahead. These people who, most likely, don't even live in the City of Cincinnati are raging against the machine to tell a Democratic mayor of a city that is really financially strapped who backed President Obama from the beginning to not accept money? HA HA HA!
I digress...
I went there for several reasons. First and foremost, I wanted to show support for my president. He's trying to get something done in a very messed up time for everybody. Secondly, I wanted to really know why these people were so willing to assemble on a lousy weather day to protest something that they should have been protesting. Where were all of these people when former President Bush and Congress approved $720 billion in TARP money during his last months in office. After all, they are protesting wasteful spending, right? RIIIIIIGHT... Thirdly, I was interested in how people would react to me openly supporting President Obama. My mom read in City Beat about a lady who claimed to have been hit with nigger this nigger that while she showed her support for Obama during the first Cincinnati Tea Party. Would history repeat itself? You bet your butt it would! The final count for every n-bomb I heard was four. I got plenty of stares. Surprisingly enough, though, the kids who were forced to go really liked my shirt. It is quite colorful. (I bet those poor kids wished they were in school. Wait...the protesters were so about "think about the kids" when it came to the economy. Why weren't they in school? Don't they care about education? Truant officer, please!)
It appears to me that we are so ready for President Obama to screw up. The protesters write him off as a failure before he can even get a chance to fail. For those opposed to what President Obama is doing I have a few questions that I hope get answered here since no one at the tea party would really answer them:
1) Where was the mass protest when President Bush gave Wall Street $720 BILLION and told Congress to allow President Obama to have access to that TARP money once he was president?
2) If these same people were so concerned about the future of our kids, where was the outrage when it was discovered that Bush's "No Child Left Behind" legislation was underfunded by billions of dollars?
3) What about Iraq? With the pointless invasion, the U.S. has spent billions upon billions upon BILLIONS of dollars that could have been used here at home.
4) Why waste wonderful bags of tea? I love tea, especially green tea. Very refreshing.
2 comments:
I am sorry that anyone called you names. I went ot the party with my kids. They are on Easter break. I didn't hear or see anything vulgar. Sorry that happened to you.
Plenty of people protested against George Bush. Did you ever see the public opinion polls done one him? He wasn't well liked and that was on both sides of the spectrum. I guess you don't have a long memory.
i appreciate the apology but i expected it so...
yeah i know about the poll numbers showing bush's approval rating in the cellar--the last i saw was 34%. my main concern was the fact that so many of the people who said anything to me about their concerns (which weren't very many though i asked out of general concern and curiosity) really didn't mention bush and TARP w/the exception of one guy. it was all about obama being a socialist and pelosi et. al. being nazis. the comparison of obama to hitler is sickening and if you were at the square i know you saw those posters.
with the past eight years being absolute crap i wish, my friend, i didn't have a long-term memory.
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