Two gatherings

I went to two gatherings today.

The first was the "tea party" held in the Cortez city park. We got there about 11:30 a.m. and it was already windy, with another San Juaner sandstorm moving in from the west. A few people came and went, but I'd estimate the crowd was about 100 people, all White, as near as I could see. While there was an outer ring of same-sized signs that protested bail-outs and pork spending, the signs individuals carried ... and the rhetoric from the speakers ... were a little broader in outlook. 

When we got there, an official of the Republican Party's county central committee was speaking, lauding the fact that Montezuma County has three conservative county commissioner's (all present or represented in the crowd), then going on to claim that the tea party was nonpartisan. The next speaker was a devout Second Amendment advocate (I've heard him say nobody will be safe until everybody has guns) who encouraged people to sign up at the NRA table nearby. Signs and speeches reflected anti-tax, anti-immigrant, anti-gun control, anti-Obama, anti-government views, with frequent references to Christ. There were also expressions of satisfaction that Montezuma County is in conservative hands, that that perceived dominance needs to be increased and that there needs to be a conservative newspaper in the county. "Liberals" would be the simplest label for this crowd's worst fear.

I left with the impression that it was a GOP/NRA event, and that it was basically a "no" party, exploiting fears about all the "thems" who have different values and views and who are felt to threaten the freedoms of those who were there. That left me with a shudder as I considered the community they apparently would most like to see ... armed, White, Christian-only, conservative-only, patriarchal, with no roads or police or fire departments ... because there'd be no taxes to pay for them. 

This afternoon, I sat in a multi-racial, multi-ethnic crowd of about 400 people at the memorial service for 19-year-old Enrique Gutierrez. His classmates and a teacher spoke of the way Enrique loved sports and worked hard at athletics, academics and being a good friend to all who knew him. Enrique graduated from Mancos last year and was a student at Mesa State College in Grand Junction when he died in a car accident last weekend. I remember Enrique as about a fifth-grader ... and a "skater" ... addressing the Mancos Town Board and asking them to create a skate park. That takes a lot of guts for a kid that age!

I couldn't help thinking about the difference between the two crowds ... the one so uniform and so united in fear and loathing, the other so diverse and so focused on the uniting force of love, humor and hard work. I'll go with the latter! tv