We came to an outdoor rally in San Francisco that was filled with thousands upon thousands of people to find out what it's all about.
One thing you notice about the Soda Partiers right away is that even though they want reform in government, there's no signs, there's no screaming, and there's a real calm draped across all of them. The first Soda Partier we interviewed was Jim, who was sitting at a table playing checkers by himself.
"Checkers is all about strategy," he said, "I'm red". He had collected most of the black pieces, and that empty chair across from him obviously represented the Tea Party in all their infamous hardly existent glory.
Another Soda Partier we found was walking through the Rally area with a suit on while typing on his Blackberry. His brisk walk indicated that he was an allegory for the Soda Party itself. He was going somewhere, had it all together, and was communicating his searing distrust for Republicans in government silently, like a creeping ninja.
A third member we interviewed was coming out of a nearby mall. We asked her about her distressing feelings toward the government. "Yeah, they totally didn't have anything I wanted." On her list of civic Soda Party demands for out-of-touch conservatives in Washington D.C. was shoes, clothes, and a DVD for her boyfriend that she couldn't remember the name of.It's refreshing to be at a place with so many like-minded yet diverse and colorful individuals, all coming together in the name of a single cause. The Soda Party, on its first weekend, is already amazingly humongous, and it's growing. A dense, foggy crowd of voters such as this one surely cannot be ignored.
