More than 2,000 people showed up for the Las Vegas Tax Day Tea Party which Citizen Outreach participated in today – and that doesn’t include the hundreds of people who continued to walk up and down the sidewalks outside the park during the event.
A lot will be written about this and other Tea parties held in communities all across the country today, but let me just throw out a few quick observations about the one in Vegas.
First, I want to thank the fine folks at KXNT 840 AM who provided both a professional sound system for our event, as well as three of their boffo talk-show hosts as speakers.
As Alan Stock of KXNT noted in his remarks, if this had been an anti-Bush protest where only a half-dozen people had showed up, the press would have built it up as a massive demonstration of opposition to the president. It will be interesting to see how the mainstream press downplays the fact that a ton of people showed up today for a true massive demonstration against current public policies on taxes, spending and bailouts.
The Las Vegas event, like most of those around the rest of the country, was not “organized” or funded by professionals or directed by any one group. Indeed, Citizen Outreach’s involvement was pretty much limited to paying the government-mandated “fee” to rent a public area in a public park to hold a public rally to protest public policies.
No, this was purely a grassroots-organized event driven by the Internet and talk radio. The mass of people who showed up for this rally in the middle of a work day are fed up and have had enough. As the bumper sticker reads: “Taxation WITH representation ain’t so hot either.”
Carson City politicians better take note. If you vote for higher taxes this session you can pretty much count on a challenge next year by a credible opponent backed by “the people” you claim to represent. Especially Republicans. You will very likely draw a primary challenger. And while such a GOP primary challenge may or may not be successful, just ask Senate Minority Leader Bill Raggio how much fun it is and how much money it costs to defend yourself against a no-new-taxes fiscal conservative.
Tax pirates, ye be warned!
Now, some thanks and recognition…
Thanks again to KXNT for helping promote the Las Vegas Tax Day Tea Party – as well as hosts Alan Stock, Casey Hendrickson and Heather Kydd for showing up and speaking.
Thanks to FOX News contributor Herman Cain, who came all the way in from Atlanta, Georgia, and fired up the crowd like nobody’s business.
Thanks to our other speakers – Geoffrey Lawrence of the Nevada Policy Research Institute, award-winning blogger Elizabeth Crum of “E!! The True Conservative Story,” Chris Hansen of the Independent American Party and Wayne Allyn Root of the Libertarian Party
Thanks to the Metro police officers who showed up after the overflow crowd clogged the street entrance to the park and provided some much-needed traffic direction and relief.
Thanks to Robert Sulliman of ISS Security Services for providing professional security guards for the event just in case some ACORN nuts showed up, as threatened, and tried to disrupt the event.
Mega-kudos and thanks to volunteer Susane Crawford, the individual who served as point-person for the Vegas event and brought the whole thing together. The rally wouldn’t have been such a huge success without her.
But most of all, thanks to the thousands of average, everyday Nevada citizens who took time from their personal and professional lives to exercise their God-given rights to peacefully assemble, speak freely and petition their government and elected representatives. You folks are true, modern-day American patriots.
Now let’s get ready for a Million Tea Bag March on Washington in July. If it’s not already in the works, I suspect it will be soon.
