Now that it's cold again, let's remember Saturday...

Saturday was a beautiful day, which was a good thing, because if it had been as cold on Saturday as it was on Friday (and as it was again on Monday), we wouldn't have ventured out with the kids to the anti-escalation, anti-war rally down on the Mall (though it's also highly doubtful we'd have hit the indoor car show either). We're coming up on the 4-year anniversary of Bush's Boondoggle, and there's no end in sight, despite Bush's assertion (repeated faithfully by the Washington Post this morning) that the Iraqis are "showing initiative," although it's unclear on what that really means. After all, the big news story from Iraq this weekend was the thwarting of an attempt by insurgents to take out the top Shiite clerics, and now it seems to turn out that this was a wacky cult -- meaning it's more like the ATF suppressing the Branch Davidians in Waco than it is a clash between the government and "insurgents."

At any rate, the march was tremendous, even though the little one got tired of the slow pace and we had to bail out and watch most of it. Here are some photos, first looking west toward the East Wing of the National Gallery of Art, where the rally was held:

Then looking east toward the Capitol.

I don't trust crowd estimates, because the government usually lowballs and the organizers usually inflate, but the Mall from the West Wing of the NGA to the East Wing of the NGA was packed with people, and there was spillover on the lawns adjacent, as well as on Museum steps:

Apparently, the Freepers, a truly sad lot who during the American Revolution would have been Tories and then would have argued against every single one of the amendments that became the Bill of Rights, held a counter-rally that netted around 40 wackjobs. If military recruiters were smart, they'd have been at that counter-rally looking to pick up a few new recruits (or re-enlist a few). Although no doubt most of them, like our tough-talking VP, "Five Deferment Dick" Cheney, would have told the recruiters they "have other priorities."