Protesting the RNC

  Like hundreds of thousands of other people, I was   marching in the blazing hot sun through the streets   of New York yesterday. Well, for the first two hours   marching would have been a vast overstatement, as   it took an hour and a half to move from 16th to 18th   St up 7th Ave. Luckily, we came prepared with   granola bars and water, and even managed to take a short lunch break at better burger before continuing to press on. At one point I found myself sandwiched between over a dozen coffins draped with American flags and a sparkly marching band playing the opening lines of "Crazy in Love" with some lyrics about getting Dubya out in '04. There were Canadians, anarchists, and this women with nothing on but red underwear over pink fishnets. I was glad that, despite the heat, we stuck with it all the way up to Madison Square Garden, where the irony of the neon "Thank You New York" sign hanging over the convention center had me laughing for a couple more blocks. Media outlets (well, probably except for FOX News, but I didn't check) were reporting well over 125,000 folks in attendance, making it the largest rally at a political convention in history.   Some people were saying that there were over half a   million. It's really cool to see such an overwhelming   response to the Republican presence in the city,   and even though those 100,000 or so New Yorkers   voting for Kerry won't guarantee victory in   November, it does give me hope that we're on the   right track for this election.