West Virginia Belly Dancers for Single Pay': See Today's Strangest Supreme Court Protesters

There are many ways to exercise one's right to protest and peaceably assemble, and we at the Blaze are certainly not interested in stopping any nonviolent means. However, sometimes a form of protest comes along that compels us to ponder just what on earth it has to do with the issue it's supposedly set up to protest. A very good example of this variety of political action showed up today on the Supreme Court steps -- a group of belly dancers who support single payers.

What belly dancing has to do with single payer health care, we do not feel qualified to comment. However, apparently the stunt paid off, as the two women involved (pictured above) got a lot of attention, both from Twitter and from CNN.

First, the Twitter reactions:

Then there was CNN's coverage:

So just who were these strange dancing sirens for socialized medicine? The viral news site Buzzfeed explains:

Russell Mokhiber, the founder of Single Payer Action, a group that's calling for a complete elimination of insurance companies and a switch to a single payer system like those in Canada or the U.K., says one of the women was his wife, Angela Petry and the other was her friend, Jennifer Carpenter-Peak. Both are belly dancing teachers.

"The idea was to draw attention to the cause," Mokhiber says. "When you have belly dancers, people pay attention."

Yes, indeed they do. Now, based on their ideological affiliation, you might be thinking these two women were happy with the eventual result. Actually, despite being raging socialists, they didn't get what they wanted either:

The dancers, who call themselves The West Virginia Belly Dancers For Single Pay, have put on this act before. In 2009, they danced outside the office of congresswoman who doesn't support single payer. Later that year, a group of Seattle belly dancers adopted the idea and staged a "Shake It Up For Single Payer" event of their own.

The group was hoping that the Supreme Court would strike down "Obamacare" and rule it unconstitutional, with the (slightly far-fetched) notion that policymakers might as a result, consider a single payer system void of insurance companies.[...]

And the only connection these fiery walking non sequiturs offer for their connection to the cause they support? One of their husbands thinks "most belly dancers would support single-payer." Well, then.