One has to assume with such a flippant observation of such a separate reality, that you never served in the military.

Only someone willfully ignorant of the soul of the gathering -and its participants - could look at such a gathering and denigrate it. Clearly it's not about the moto Vets, it's about you and your rather effete sensibilities.

Gazing at turn of the century art - which has nothing to do with commemorating those who came before and sacrificed - while complaining about those who have come together to "make a joyful noise", as the old testament enjoined us to do while praying, was probably the only disrespect generated that day(with your "Monday I'm a fundamentalist, Tuesday I'm a Lutheran" approach to belief systems you may recall the admonition).

This isn't about the disaffected as one of the postings posited. This is about men and women who wish to call immediate attention to veteran affairs and celebrate the lives of those who sacrificed so much, so that you could be so wrong. I'm Old, Bald, not too fat, no pony tail(obviously), a rider for over 40 years and not disaffected in anyway...and my 1600cc Bike makes no more noise than a car while getting a heck of a lot better mileage than most autos.

...and an awful lot of the Prairie Home Companion would have been scoffed at by the impressionists as bourgeois.... with the same dismissive tone you established in your piece!

I have to assume that many of the letters posted were themselves satires being over-the-top politically correct testaments to Stalinist thinking.

Tempests in teapots. This inane furor reminds me of the response to Randy Newman's satire "Short People" which starts

"Short People got no reason To live" and hurtles down the satirical tracks thereafter. The politically correct humorless fools at that time were agog. Clearly such folks lost their sense of wit long before W, bred, and created more humorless twits. After all, people without the ability to recognize satire generally aren't too bright....

V

There is no more radical, fundamental church/pastor than Rev Wright. It is a mistake to focus on her church, or imply that because her church is extreme, she is extreme "de facto". To do so begs the issue that if this is the case then, since Obama's church is clearly extreme, even considered racist at some levels, then "de facto" he is as well. This campaign has been peeing down its leg since Palin was announced and this type of focus just makes the stain more visible.

~V~