Any reliable reports of the actual number of protestors? I refuse to believe the DBM's count and doubt seriously if it was close to 100k.
"..Organizers had hoped that 100,000 would attend. They claimed even more afterward, but police, who no longer give official estimates, said privately that the crowd was under 100,000..."
That is all I have heard.
I was in DC for a business meeting yesterday at lunch only a few blocks from the protest site. Everyone in our group was a conservative. Afterwards we decided to take a long route back to the metro station to see the freak show underway. I'd say it was about 12:30 or 1 PM - right at the rally's peak.
My non-expert crowd size estimate: 7,000-8,000 tops.
If you look at the map on this link you can see roughly where they were. They occupied the space from the pond in front of the capitol to about half way in front of the Air and Space Museum.
http://www.wikimapia.org/#y=38889880&x=-77017878&z=18&l=0&m=a&v=2
If you zoom out you'll see very quickly that it's only a fourth of the national mall! And they couldn't even fill that much compactly.
To give you an example of just how few they were versus what they claimed to be, we passed the ice rink about a block back from their furthest reach. Aside from a 2 or 3 hippie stragglers, it was just your normal crowd of tourists having a good time.