GOVERNMENT BARRIERS SUPPRESSED INAUGURAL CROWDS

     The last few days have witnessed a petty and partisan media campaign to denigrate and belittle the enthusiastic crowds that attended President Trump's inauguration festivities.  Wielding various forms of photographic and statistical "evidence," the media banshees went to great lengths to demonstrate that Obama's first inauguration drew larger crowds than Trump's -- a question of no real interest to the public.

     Then, when President Trump's supporters understandably pushed back with counter-evidence (one obvious point is that Obama's crowds were artificially inflated by the hordes of Democrat federal workers who live in the DC area), the MSM pounced on them for pursuing such a petty issue -- the very issue the media snipers raised in the first place!

     But before this controversy gives way to matters of greater moment, Splashing Rocks will now get to the heart and truth of the matter -- which has heretofore escaped the focus of the MSM.

     The debate has mistakenly focused on the size of the crowds who were actually able to attend the ceremonies and parade.  But in light of the extreme government obstruction of access to these events, the proper measure is how many people came into town attempting to attend the events. 

                                                   

                 The Long and Winding Line to the Trump Inaugural . . .

     The fact is that the already large and enthusiastic crowds attending the Trump inauguration events would have been far larger if many thousands (like me) had not been prevented from gaining access to those events by a perverse array of government barriers.

     SR can testify firsthand to all this, because I was among the frustrated citizens who were stalled in miles of security lines and shunted from barrier to barrier and fence to fence in their vain efforts to gain timely access to the inaugural events. 

                                              
                                                 

                     . . . stretched endlessly on near L'Enfant Plaza

     To its great credit, though, the pro-Trump crowd retained its high spirits and enthusiasm despite all this.  But many thousands, like SR, went home early rather than spend more hours in the "long and winding lines" that the government's exaggerated (or deliberately designed?) security measures necessitated.

     SR came into town on Metro's Orange Line, hoping to decamp at one of the stations relatively convenient to the events -- Federal Triangle, Smithsonian, or Navy Memorial.  But no, all of those stations were closed for security reasons -- what proved to be the universal justification for the wall of obstruction that enmeshed the entire sector of the National Mall and Pennsylvania Avenue.

     Instead, would-be attendees were shunted to the L'Enfant Plaza station, three full blocks south of the Mall and still further from the Capital West Lawn inauguration site. 

     There, they emerged to see an enormous line of people, some  three or four abreast, the end of which was nowhere in sight, or anywhere near it. Requests for assistance in finding where one could get into the line were met with befuddled shrugs.  No one really knew where the line ended, and for good reason:  the line was not straight, but labyrinthian, like some kind of sadistic corn maze that turned first one way, and then another, only to turn again on itself.  And each segment in the seemingly endless turns was long -- very long. 

    After an interminable period with only slight forward movement, SR joined a young couple next to him in leaving the line to follow a tip they'd received of a shorter or faster-moving line closer to the Smithsonian Institute.  But here one merely moved from the Scylla of long lines to the Charybdis of cement barriers and meshed security fences.  The cement barriers running east-west adjacent to the Mall seemed endless.  Further, in order to move north toward the Smithsonian and the Mall, the barriers forced one to detour for several blocks South before turning back north.

     In short, the federal government had erected a dystopian labyrinth of lines, barriers, and fences that made it nearly impossible for all but the early arrivals to reach even the outer aprons of the Mall.  By the time SR was able to reach the far west edge of the Mall -- from which the West Lawn ceremonial platform was not even visible -- the ceremony was over.  All that remained was a replay of the lovely teenage soprano, Jackie Evancho, beautifully singing the National Anthem on the jumbotron.

     SR's attempt to get even remotely near the parade route on Pennsylvania Avenue were equally, if not more, frustrating.  All attempts to cut through to a point anywhere near the parade were met with more cement barriers, fences, or stern guards directing one to the end of another line that, again, was nowhere in sight.

     Along with thousands like him, SR gave up and headed back to the Metro.  The platform at L'Enfant Plaza station was full of early departees who had simply tired of waiting in endless security lines and being shunted from barrier to barrier and "pillar to post."  It had become evident that the federal and DC governments were more interested in providing "safe spaces" for leftist demonstrators than in enabling patriotic citizens to actually attend President Trump's inaugural events.

     All of this was obviously lost on the clueless national media "reporters" who purported to cover the inaugural events.  Not a single TV reporter was anywhere in sight on the south side of the Mall where these interminable lines formed and crawled.  So the national media outlets were simply ignorant of the reality that so many thousands attempting to attend the events were prevented from gaining timely access by the massive government security block-out.

     Consequently, once again the MSM's reporting was wrong and biased against President Trump and his supporters.  Insofar as it failed to recognize how excessive government barriers prevented so many thousands (like SR) from actually reaching the inaugural events in time, the MSM's portrayal of Saturday's crowds was seriously misleading.