Curious to know how the media were...or were not...covering the event, I had earlier checked the Raleigh News & Observer's web site over my first cup of coffee in our kitchen's pre-dawn darkness. A brief below-the-fold list of weekend events in town gave top billing to the annual Krispy Kreme Challenge, a 5 mile fun-run with a break at the mid-point for runners to eat a dozen doughnuts each. The Moral March earned just two terse sentences. Clearly, the News & Observer's editors have their priorities straight.
Picking up our pastor along the way, then wheeling onto the freeway for Raleigh, we wondered what the turnout would be like this year. Last year's had been variously estimated at from 20,000 to 80,000 (the former being by far the more plausible number). But that was then, and this is now. Today was as cold as a Koch's heart - not exactly auspicious marching weather. Even more significantly, this would be the NC NAACP's first mass event since last November's election had cruelly dashed the hopes of North Carolina progressives, sending a flock murder of new teapublicans to Washington. I, myself, had been sorely tempted this morning to just punch the alarm clock, pull the comforter over my head, and slip back to sleep...the march would do just fine without me. All over the state that same scene was playing out in ten thousand bedrooms. Are the Tarheel State's better angels still strong enough to beat such cruel odds?
Why, as it happens, yes, they are. Please join me below the fold for some scenes from this inspiring event.