Dave Weigel: Low Turnout At Tea Party Rally A Sign Group Sees Things ‘Going Their Way’

video

by Frances Martel | 10:58 pm, March 31st, 2011

» 42 comments

Lawrence O’Donnell smelled blood in the water today, and decided to take yet another bite out of the Tea Party. Mocking what he considered paltry numbers at a rally in Washington, D.C., O’Donnell declared it evidence of certain doom for the American right, though his guest, Dave Weigel, begged to differ: having attended the rally, he attributed the dwindling numbers to the electoral success of the Tea Party, and asserted he wasn’t reading anything too disastrous for the movement in the numbers.

Calling them “sunshine patriots,” O’Donnell argued the small numbers at the rally– attended by, among others, Reps. Michele Bachmann and Rand Paul– signaled the inconsistent levels of passion in the movement, and possibly a permanent decline in their influence by 2012. O’Donnell cited Politico‘s crowd number at 100– a number Weigel jokingly suggested was inaccurate– “I would go as high as 201, 203… but I might have counted the media that was there.”

But the “more press than patriots” turnout didn’t spell out the end of an era for Weigel the way it did for O’Donnell. In fact, he perceived it as a sign of strength. “It’s hard to get people to protest for something they think is already going their way,” he argued, noting that the post-Obama Democrats experienced the same problem in the first half of the President’s tenure, when they were “overwhelmed by Tea Partiers.” Weigel also added that some of the most influential factions of the Tea Party sat this one out, including Freedomworks, so the small numbers made sense. “I’m not too worried for the Tea Party that this wasn’t a huge hit,” he concluded, particularly since “this is a movement that fought really hard to take back Congress.”

The segment via MSNBC below:

Dave Weigel, Last Word, Lawrence O'Donnell, Michele Bachmann, msnbc, Politico, Rand Paul, Tea Party, Washington DC

Zandandido

With war and rising oil prices in the Middle East and the Ivory Coast. A screwed up energy policy in the USA. Budget battle strongly looming. Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear power catastrophe in the THIRD biggest economy in the entire world in Japan. Terrorists trying to infiltrate democracy groups. What does Larry talk about? The perception that the Tea Party may be weakening (But the “more press than patriots” turnout didn’t spell out the end of an era for Weigel the way it did for O’Donnell. In fact, he perceived it as a sign of strength) is what he talks about. This is why he will NEVER touch anyone on Fox News. Red Eye could beat Socialist O’Donnell if Red Eye was not even on.
Color Me Badd

Zandandido said:
With war and rising oil prices in the Middle East and the Ivory Coast. A screwed up energy policy in the USA. Budget battle strongly looming. Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear power catastrophe in the THIRD biggest economy in the entire world in Japan. Terrorists trying to infiltrate democracy groups. What does Larry talk about? The perception that the Tea Party may be weakening (But the “more press than patriots” turnout didn’t spell out the end of an era for Weigel the way it did for O’Donnell. In fact, he perceived it as a sign of strength) is what he talks about. This is why he will NEVER touch anyone on Fox News. Red Eye could beat Socialist O’Donnell if Red Eye was not even on.

Lawrence is right and Weigel is just nervous that the thing he has been writing about for 2 years might be on the outs.
Thelonious Funk

Must explain Glenn Beck’s ratings.
Yoda002

I heard their are a lot of Tea Party people that were back stabbed by there own Tea Party governors and they have abandoned their positions.
murf

If you lose Weigel , you’ve lost it all , Larry . Even after the biggest electoral landslide in 70 years last November, you leftists still don’t get it . Oh well I guess it will take the 2012 election , for you slow learners to get it .
Color Me Badd

murf said:
If you lose Weigel , you’ve lost it all , Larry . Even after the biggest electoral landslide in 70 years last November, you leftists still don’t get it . Oh well I guess it will take the 2012 election , for you slow learners to get it .

If you know anything about Dave Weigel’s writing you will know that Weigel is sympathetic to the tea party and even though you automatically assume since he is a regular on MSNBC he is anti tea party. He isn’t go read his stuff for WaPo.
Color Me Badd

murf said:
If you lose Weigel , you’ve lost it all , Larry . Even after the biggest electoral landslide in 70 years last November, you leftists still don’t get it . Oh well I guess it will take the 2012 election , for you slow learners to get it .

Weigel is probably one of the only journalists in the evil “librul media” that doesn’t break out in laughter whenever the tea party is mentioned. He has been writing about them for 2 years, I suggest you go read his stuff.
murf

Color Me Badd said:
Weigel is probably one of the only journalists in the evil “librul media” that doesn’t break out in laughter whenever the tea party is mentioned. He has been writing about them for 2 years, I suggest you go read his stuff.

LOL you mean the leaked emails he sent trashing the Tea Party that got him fired from Washington Post ?
murf

..and yes I have seen him on MSNBC , Olbermann had him on , and every once in awhile Weigel would speak some truth , that’s not saying much when the host is a total whackjob .
Raygun

Nothing takes the life out of an activist movement like electoral success.
felixw

Hey, Larry, the Tea Party now holds meetings on Capitol Hill.
WCinWI

murf said:
..and yes I have seen him on MSNBC , Olbermann had him on , and every once in awhile Weigel would speak some truth , that’s not saying much when the host is a total whackjob .

Weigel was such a joke on Olbermann’s show. Weigel would get trounced on for the nightly Palin attack. Among all of the other “conservative” attacks.
Color Me Badd

murf said:
..and yes I have seen him on MSNBC , Olbermann had him on , and every once in awhile Weigel would speak some truth , that’s not saying much when the host is a total whackjob .

I was gonna mention the exchanges he had with Olbermann, where Keith wanted so badly for him to get on the trash the teabag train and he would always refuse,

Weigel didn’t get fired from the Post he resigned, The whole Journolist thing was a Tucker Carlson hit job without very much substance. Do you really think that the writers from the Wall Street Journal don’t talk shit about Liberals in private? If you don’t you are foolish.

Again I will say, teabaggers can complain about hyper partisan liberals writing for supposedly objective news outlets, but Weigel isn’t really one of those journalists.
Color Me Badd

WCinWI said:
Weigel was such a joke on Olbermann’s show. Weigel would get trounced on for the nightly Palin attack. Among all of the other “conservative” attacks.

Do you really think any of us believe that you have actually watched Countdown?
Sprocket

We’d better ask the Queen of the Tea Party Caucus, M. Bachmann, her opinion. You know she has one, and it is no doubt rambling, incoherent and hilarious.
WildMan

Hey Lady O’Donnell, the Election where your side got its dumpus-rumpus handed to you wacko Socialists was only 5 months ago. Nice try girlie, but no cookies for you. You are still the biggest jerk on TV.

BTW…your nightly numbers/viewers keep falling. I wonder why? Oh yeah, you spend your whole hour obsessing over Fair & Balanced FOX News, the Tea Party and talk radio. Hmmmmmmmmmm, looks like you are getting tuned out…..! Maybe take a few 12 step Anger Management classes. You are totally out of control. And yeah I know you and the others over at PMSnbc read every word posted here on Mediate. Maybe think about paying attention to us…he,he,he!
Jerps

Weigel’s right in this case.
Yoda002

I heard there is a new reformed Tea Party movement going on made up of ex teabaggers. Republicans don’t need them any more they got want they want out of them and not they will screw them over.
the real john t

WildMan said:
Hey Lady O’Donnell, the Election where your side got its dumpus-rumpus handed to you wacko Socialists was only 5 months ago. Nice try girlie, but no cookies for you. You are still the biggest jerk on TV.
BTW…your nightly numbers/viewers keep falling. I wonder why? Oh yeah, you spend your whole hour obsessing over Fair & Balanced FOX News, the Tea Party and talk radio. Hmmmmmmmmmm, looks like you are getting tuned out…..! Maybe take a few 12 step Anger Management classes. You are totally out of control. And yeah I know you and the others over at PMSnbc read every word posted here on Mediate. Maybe think about paying attention to us…he,he,he!

With a rant like that and he’s telling someone else to take Anger Management classes. Seems he could use a bunch of them himself.
WaterLoo

Ummm, who manufactured news? Lawrence, why don’t we leave projections to the financial forecasters?
http://www.sarainitalyblog.blogspot.com/ sarainitaly

Color Me Badd said:
Weigel didn’t get fired from the Post he resigned, The whole Journolist thing was a Tucker Carlson hit job without very much substance. Do you really think that the writers from the Wall Street Journal don’t talk shit about Liberals in private? If you don’t you are foolish.

no substance? carlson hit job? haha
he was forced to resign.

In late June 2010, excerpts of several of Weigel’s private emails from the liberal JournoList were posted online by the website Fishbowl DC and later by Tucker Carlson’s conservative news site, The Daily Caller.

However, The Washington Post ombudsman said the apology could not save his job because “the damage was too severe”. Jim Geraghty of the National Review Online hinted at another reason for the dismissal, saying “there was definitely a perception that his blog was designed to make conservatives look bad”

The executive editor of The Washington Post said the paper “can’t have any tolerance for the perception that people are conflicted or bring a bias to their work.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Weigel#Controversy_over_leaked_e-mails_and_resignation_from_The_Washington_Post
Barack Must Go

I hope the Obama regime and their civilian army ( MSM ) talking heads chatter away about this falsehood regarding the Tea Party People.It will be at their own peril, coming back like a Trojen Horse to destroy them.

They will never understand the Tea Party is actually real Americans with jobs, families, and lives of their own, as opposed to todays paranoid liberal / progressive / socialist wannabe who yearn for that life, while at the same time disparage & vilify others for attaining it.
malissagx

Down at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, a parade of potential 2012 GOP nominees, plus some other rising stars have addressed what Washington Post blogger Dave Weigel calls “the Republican wing of the tea party movement.”

African Mango Plus
Davo

Barack Must Go said:
I hope the Obama regime and their civilian army ( MSM ) talking heads chatter away about this falsehood regarding the Tea Party People.It will be at their own peril, coming back like a Trojen Horse to destroy them.

They will never understand the Tea Party is actually real Americans with jobs, families, and lives of their own, as opposed to todays paranoid liberal / progressive / socialist wannabe who yearn for that life, while at the same time disparage & vilify others for attaining it.

Great post……….I hope you’re right. There IS the chance, however, that with the predictable back-stabbing Boehner and the business-as-usual Republicans are doing to the voters from last November, that the Tea Party people are getting somewhat disheartened at seeing the bad guys apparently winning in their determination to keep America on our present course to dissolution of sovereigntyand subjugation to a one-world government……………..the dream of the anti-American Liberals.

The good news is that the negative reporting and polling is being done by the DCMPN (Democrat Campaign Media Posing as News) and is usually proven extremely wrong on election day.
Barack Must Go

Davo said:
Great post……….I hope you’re right. There IS the chance, however, that with the predictable back-stabbing Boehner and the business-as-usual Republicans are doing to the voters from last November, that the Tea Party people are getting somewhat disheartened at seeing the bad guys apparently winning in their determination to keep America on our present course to dissolution of sovereigntyand subjugation to a one-world government……………..the dream of the anti-American Liberals. The good news is that the negative reporting and polling is being done by the DCMPN (Democrat Campaign Media Posing as News) and is usually proven extremely wrong on election day.

I believe with Trump, Cain and to a lesser degree Palin ( for now ) out there exposing the presidents seedy underbelly the ” real ” American people, whether Tea Party, independant, or dissatisfied democrats, even if the rallies, marches on Washington etc. deminish, ill be out en masse for the Republicans, more to the point against Obama in 2012.

The ever disappointing Boehner will be scared ( for his job ) enough to act on behalf of his party rather than his own self preservation. He needs to go, sooner than later, as is the case with much of our current leadership in Washington.

Darrell Issa is a perfect example. He was out before the American people almost on a daily basis, until he got the job, now barely a peep……unacceptable. We need to throw a few of them out to remind the others they work for us too, not just the special interests.

The best news for America is that as screwed up as the Republicans seem to be, they’ve really only been in charge of the House for two months, not to mention the democrat party is n the verge of imploding in upon itself.
ChrisNH

Obamo’s Historically Low Approval Numbers A Sign for Tea Party That Things ‘Going Their Way’
Penguin60

Looks like Crazy Larry got the DNC memo, try to trash the TEA Party anyway you can. Harry Reid got it, he just mixed up his hyperbole in his alzheimer stupor. I thought lemmings had poor eyesight but a good sense of smell, guess not.
THE REAL ROYAL KING

sarainitaly said:
The executive editor of The Washington Post said the paper “can’t have any tolerance for the perception that people are conflicted or bring a bias to their work.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Weigel#Controversy_over_leaked_e-

Thank All the Marys in Heaven FOX “News” doesn’t have such a policy. 75% of its “talent” would be out the door. Among the losess, Greta O’Van Susteren, Gretchen O’Van Karlsen, Hapless Harrigan, Kampain Karl Kameron, Mean Megyn Kelly ….

As for the Tea Party, it takes lots of sustained anger, hatred and unhappiness to sustain that movement. Americans, even Amerikans by and large tire of all of that in short order. Perhaps as an Eye-Tie, you don’t realize that Tumbleweed.

Happy Googling! Give my best to Bonzo.
Penguin60

THE REAL ROYAL KING said:
As for the Tea Party, it takes lots of sustained anger, hatred and unhappiness to sustain that movement

You really are clueless, aren’t you? Most don’t put it on display as vehemently as you do. Thanks for sharing.
THE REAL ROYAL KING

Penguin60 said:
You really are clueless, aren’t you? Most don’t put it on display as vehemently as you do. Thanks for sharing.

In other words, you have no relevant, substantive post?
More Liberty5

More government corruption….

Obviously Mediaite won’t report it, but it’s now just coming out that investigators have found a hidden bailout in the sum of $2 billion in Obamacare.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/03/uncovered-new-2-billion-bailout-obamacare

“Investigators for the House Energy and Commerce Committee have discovered that a little-known provision in the national health care law has allowed the federal government to pay nearly $2 billion to unions, state public employee systems, and big corporations to subsidize health coverage costs for early retirees.”

So far the money has went to the” United Auto Workers, which has so far received $206,798,086. Other big recipients include AT&T, which received $140,022,949, and Verizon, which received $91,702,538. GENERAL ELECTRIC(my emphasis added), in the news recently for not paying any U.S. taxes last year, received $36,607,818. General Motors, recipient of a massive government bailout, received $19,002,669.”

So General Electric paid no taxes to the USA, yet they received tax payer dollars. This is corruption. I’m not solely blaming Obama – he didn’t write it – I’m blaming these corrupt politicians.
Penguin60

THE REAL ROYAL KING said:
In other words, you have no relevant, substantive post?

As much as this is “relevent”. LOL

THE REAL ROYAL KING said:
Thank All the Marys in Heaven FOX “News” doesn’t have such a policy. 75% of its “talent” would be out the door. Among the losess, Greta O’Van Susteren, Gretchen O’Van Karlsen, Hapless Harrigan, Kampain Karl Kameron, Mean Megyn Kelly …. As for the Tea Party, it takes lots of sustained anger, hatred and unhappiness to sustain that movement. Americans, even Amerikans by and large tire of all of that in short order. Perhaps as an Eye-Tie, you don’t realize that Tumbleweed. Happy Googling! Give my best to Bonzo.
The Tea Weasel®

LOL the Liberal Media sabotaged the Tea Party Rally by showing a “Golden GIrls” marathon that day.
Pablo

THE REAL ROYAL KING said:
In other words, you have no relevant, substantive post?

In replying to you? That would be like reading Shakespeare to a urinal cake.
http://www.sarainitalyblog.blogspot.com/ sarainitaly

Penguin60 said:
As much as this is “relevent”. LOL

I was just going to do the same thing! LOL! he’s such a dolt!
sootsme

Duh, the money to go to Washington can be better spent at home, defeating the present gang of lost causes who claim to represent us. It’s also one phase of the “give ‘em enough rope” theory. Watch & learn, Grasshopper.

INCUMBENTS- the “POLITICALLY CORRECT” ENDANGERED SPECIES!

Run, Herman, Run!
george L

I would not say the TEA Party folks are happy with current situation. They got some of their favorites elected, but there has been no legislative gain for them yet. They should be putting the pressure on now, but they aren’t gathering in Washington to do it. Like it or not, the low turnout does not look good for them.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Bob-Hubble/100001340708758 caconservative

Low number turnout by the Tea-Party is do to…WORK…YES, most of them work!! They actually hold jobs, and pay the taxes the Liberal parasite entitlement crowd lives off of. But, don’t worry, when the time is right, they’ll be back in numbers far greater than in the 2010 elections. Yes Sir, we’re going to be astro-turfing many more useless political beggars.
Stratdude

So typical. Weigel knows people who are dumb enough to vote for a repug, especially a tea-bagging one, will buy his bullshit explanation.
felixw

MSNBC must conclude that lower attendance at tea party events signals a lessening of racism, hatred and violence in America. Certainly MSNBC interpreted the RISE of the tea parties as a sign of those sentiments, so of course they will now be consistent and stop playing the race card every night on our TV screens, etc. etc. etc.
X-3

A low turnout to a rally does not bode well for the Tea Party but a couple of things worthy of note serve to explain why:

1. It was a weekday. Unlike the union louts who are instructed to attend by their thug bosses, the Tea Party folk cannot take off work and use their scarce money they need to pay the mortgage and buy the groceries to attend a rally that is hundreds or thousands of miles away.

2. The weather is still lousy in DC.

3. The really scary possibility is they were assured by their representatives that those representatives would stand firm on their promise to reduce debt, cut spending, and all the other promises they made for the votes they were given. One is foolish to trust ANY politician anymore.
MrTPar_taY

I’ll bet the average 7th grader has gotten more dates than these two Mopes put together ever had.