Nick Espinosa, a "gay rights" protester, dumped a box of glittery confetti on presidential candidate Newt Gingrich while he was holding a book signing with his wife, Callista.
From ABC News:
The Gingriches were participating in a book signing before the Minnesota Family Council’s annual dinner in Minneapolis when a protestor by the name of Nick Espinosa opened a box containing glitter and dumped it over the two of them.
“Feel the rainbow, Newt,” Espinosa said as he poured the box of glitter over Gingrich’s head. “Stop the hate. Stop anti-gay politics. It’s dividing our country and it’s not fixing our economy."
ABC News rewarded Espinosa's childish assault on Gingrich by giving the guy a forum.
The glitter culprit is Nick Espinosa, a 24 year old unemployed non profit worker turned social activist from Minneapolis, Minn. Espinosa worked with a non-profit helping unemployed people for two years before being laid off due to budget cuts. His encounter with Newt on Tuesday was in protest to Gingrich’s stance on gay marriage.
“Today, I invited Newt to feel the rainbow because he decided to bring his anti-gay politics to my state,” Espinosa told ABC News Tuesday night. “Newt has a long history of anti-gay politics and has chosen to focus on divisive social issues instead of working to fix our economy. I don’t think a free will adulterer like Newt has any ground to stand up while telling others who they can and can’t love.”
Gingrich isn’t the only Republican candidate with whom Espinosa has a problem. He also has some beef with potential candidate and former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty.
“His playbook is one that we see across the board with Republicans, focusing on divisive social issues like gay marriage that don’t do anything to fix our economy and then proposing as a solution to our budget crisis, cuts in social spending for the working families in Minnesota and across the country, and I don’t think that’s the way to solve our budget crisis either.”
This wasn’t the first prank styled protest Espinosa conducted. His first protest came in 2009 when he infiltrated a Tea Party rally against immigration, in which he developed a fake name, Robert Erickson, to obtain a spot on the speaker’s list. Espinosa delivered a speech focused on anti-European immigration in which he talked about Christopher Columbus and chanted “Columbus Go Home!” In July 2009, he dumped 2,000 pennies on Tom Emmer, a Republican candidate for governor of Minnesota, as a “tip” in protest against a proposal to cut wages for servers and bartenders. See the video here.
“It’s one of many tactics that can be used to create social change. You’ve seen examples of pranks having a lot of success recently,” Espinosa said. “Adding this bit of humor into the political debate and I think it’s a really good way to get people’s attention when they might not otherwise pay attention.”
So why did he pick glitter for Newt?
“I think glitter’s fun. I think it was a nice makeover for his campaign. And in fact if he needs anymore glitter, I have some left over.”
I get the feeling that ABC News thinks the glitter dump was fun, too.
Contrary to what Espinosa believes, dumping a box of glitter on a public figure is NOT "one of many tactics that can be used to create social change."
It's an entirely inappropriate and completely ineffective tactic.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. employed effective tactics. He wasn't disrespectful. He made appeals that influenced the consciences of people. He appealed to their goodness. He didn't do something lame like toss glitter on someone to bring about social change.
Espinosa needs to grow up.
Here's raw video of the incident:
Really lame.
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