Heiliger Strohsack! CNN sure seems to have trouble with its estimates. First, they confuse a regular cold and flu season with the bubonic plague. Then they confuse a massive protest as being merely a “large crowd of far-right groups gathered for a ‘sit-in’ at Berlin’s iconic Brandenburg Gate on Saturday to protest against the German government’s coronavirus restrictions.”

The protestors referred to themselves as “The Second Wave.” And, you need only take a look at the the photos to see it was a tidal wave. Sure looks like more than the 17,000 the CNN estimates, wouldn’t you agree?

Called the “Day of Freedom: The End of the Pandemic,” clearly this protest was more than just a large gathering consisting of “anti-vaccine groups and some far-right and neo-Nazi organizations.”

“Organizers said up to 1.3 million people took part,” says the Guardian, “a figure that police denied.”

A friend in Germany, however, tells me that “police were reporting around 800,000.” (With two officers speaking out on stage in support of the protest).

The Guardian was a little more generous than the CNN, estimating 20,000 protesters. Both media sources must have trouble counting, so busy filling their articles with admonishments about the “participants’ failure to wear face coverings or keep a 1.5-metre distance from each other.” They are sure missing the point. That’s exactly what they are protesting against: using unproven methods to stop an unproven pandemic.

Scanning the news, it seems most German politicians decried the protestors for spreading COVID-19 by congregating (in a group certainly larger than five) to protest their own government. However, Tino Chrupalla, a co-chair of the Alternative for German party, told The Guardian: “I followed the demonstration, which was peaceful. The people went on to the streets to defend their basic rights and their civil liberties, and that’s something one can only welcome.”