ROSS NORDEEN has a page of photos from a pro-liberation rally in Melbourne, Florida.

UPDATE: Matt Crandall has pictures from a pro-war rally in Cleveland that reportedly drew 10,000 people. And there are more pictures here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Still more pictures from Cleveland! Looking at these pics, I can’t swear that there weren’t 10,000 people there, but the number looks maybe a shade optimistic to me. But, as I noted in an earlier post, organizers tend to overestimate.

But hey, if it was really just 6,500 people, that’s one-tenth as many as turned out for the huge-huge-huge rally in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago. And this was Cleveland, in the winter. And without the undisputed organizational talents of Stalinists. But as I wrote last week, the pro-liberation protest movement is just getting off the ground. The antis have 40 years worth of cadre, experience, and infrastructure to draw on.

But with this rally, and the Houston rally of comparable size, as well as events in Nashville, etc., the movement is clearly growing.

OKAY, ONE MORE: Cinderella says that calling ’em “Stalinists” is letting them off the hook.

LAST ONE: Blogger Jack Burton, whose pictures are linked above, says that I’m wrong to be skeptical of the Cleveland attendance estimates:

Thanks for the link to jackburton.blogspot.com – just wanted to let you know that the Cleveland rally was at least 10,000 – some of those pictures were taken early. About 30 minutes after the rally started, the people were still trying to get to it, the Cleveland flats area where the rally was had only two-lane streets for access. The people had spilled over into the parking lot and all the way up to the river (you can’t see it in the pics). The ‘center’ area held 5,000 – which was packed. I’d say there was at least 10,000 – if not more.

Well, he was there, and I wasn’t — but crowd estimates are notoriously tricky. Still, it was obviously a large turnout. And — as another reader suggests — it was all on one issue, without a bunch of “Free Mumia,” “Legalize Hemp,” etc., etc., hangers-on.