Alaskan women organized a protest of close to 1500* people this weekend, all demonstrating against Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin.
"The whole thing grew out of frustration," said Charla Sterne, one of the organizers, who like several people at the rally declined to say where they worked (several said they were state employees and feared retribution)."Last week this was just ten women sitting around talking about this perception that all of Alaska supports Sarah Palin. We apparently hit a nerve and started a movement," Sterne said.
One local blogger, from Mudflats, had this to say:
Never, have I seen anything like it in my 17 and a half years living in Anchorage. The organizers had someone walk the rally with a counter, and they clicked off well over 1400 people (not including the 90 counter-demonstrators). This was the biggest political rally ever, in the history of the state. I was absolutely stunned. The second most amazing thing is how many people honked and gave the thumbs up as they drove by. And even those that didn't honk looked wide-eyed and awe-struck at the huge crowd that was growing by the minute. This just doesn't happen here.
You can see a ton of great photos from the demonstration at Mudflats, here and at Adventures in AK.
Thanks, Alaskan activists!
*WaPo says close to a thousand, protesters say about 1500 people were there.
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Very cool! Does anybody know, have there ever been other protests in the home states of VP candidates? Or at least, any of this size?
This gives me a little more hope that this "Everyone is enchanted by Palin" stuff is more bullshit than fact.
Do it up Alaskans!!! =)
Elizabeth-on the contrary many of us are disenchanted by Palin.
We just linked this from a post at the CA NOW blog: http://www.canow.org/canoworg/2008/09/we-arent-the-on.html
woohoo!!
There's my Mom with her hot pink
"Sarah doesn't speak for THIS Alaskan Woman" sign.
So proud!
So sad I couldn't be there, instead I had to drive a tour bus of 32 Oklahomans, one of their first comments to me that morning was "we're really impressed by your governor". Ya, it was a long day.
I also love knowing that 1500 ppl came out for the "Alaskan Women Reject Palin" rally. [Community] organizers were hoping for a handful. Earlier that morning 1500 ppl came out for the McPalin rally. Campaign organizers booked a room for 5,000. Can we get a new poll on that approval rating?