Felix: As always, excellent post. Cogent and to the point.
One of the things I found most infuriating and largely from the left wing chattering class, was the implication that these protesters were “racist” and “extremist” and didn’t represent “real America”.
By and large, nearly every one of the folks that I saw interviewed were average, middle class Americans. They were justifiably concerned about the direction of this country, the policies of this Administration (and the Bush Administration, as well) and the general sense of things going into the ditch.
While I’m certain that there were elements of the lunatic fringe in attendance (with gatherings this large, its going to happen), these protests were civil, and behaved. It seems like either elitist arrogance or desperation to somehow accuse these average citizens, who are exercising their First Amendment rights, of racism and extremism (“Nazism” has been thrown out more than once).