The American Spectator

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EXCUSE ME, WHILE I KISS OVERINDULGED HEDONS
Re: George Neumayr 's Woodstock Authoritarians:

George Neumayr writes: "Today, thanks to its (Woodstock's) ethos, a girl who accepts a "loosely tendered" invitation from a stranger is more likely to end up as an ongoing segment on Greta VanSusteren than a carefree attendee at a concert."

Bummer. Jeanne McManus didn't get laid at Woodstock. But Mr. Neumayr shouldn't segue from the misfortune of a dozen or so unshaven hippies to conclusions about the relative evil of our time. Just think what misfortune might have visited Mrs.McManus had she been on Chappaquiddick Island a few weeks earlier.
-- Dan Martin
Pittsburgh, Pennsyvlania

Your column was the best interpretation of the Woodstock wave that capitalized the generation of which I am a member. It was a silly era populated by upper middle-class, overindulged children, celebrated for nothing more than its youth and heedless recklessness. Though I did not participate in body or spirit, I witnessed the inanity and aimless posturing of too many contemporaries who believed that rebellion against anything was purpose enough. In spite of the fact that ninety-nine percent eventually embraced the morés of adult life and became productive, its original nonsensical take on how humanity should proceed infected national thinking, leading us to the mess we encounter today.

Celebrating wanton destruction of a once-proud nation is not the legacy that should be memorialized. Thank you for dissection and writing so eloquently about an era best buried.
-- Laney Bormel

I thought as a studying musician, I would sit down with Gimme Shelter, the Rolling Stones movie about their 1969 American tour and the free concert at Altamont Speedway outside of San Francisco.

My goal was to cop guitar licks, instead I saw the Clinton Administration in the audience and the Obama Administration as law enforcement.

The chaos of shirtless males and females (some of whom should be given free shirts upon request...FOREVER) stoned out of their minds (audience), being beat senselessly by the Hells Angels (law enforcement) but still wanting the concert to go on even after the bloody beatings and the shooting. They were oblivious to what their mayhem had caused without proper rules or codes of conduct. I saw all of the future protesters of the last eight years of the Bush Administration, I saw Cindy Sheehan (when war protests were "in"), I saw ACORN, Code PINK, ANSWER, and probably a hundred future college professors and faculty.

It was akin to government-run health care: the audience wanted the concert to go on at continued risk to the band even as the quality of the music declined.

My wife walked in at the very end, she said: "That looks just like Nancy Pelosi's Congress."

She's right.
--P. Aaron Jones
Huntington Woods, Michigan

Reading the subtext of Jeanne McManus' statement gives an indication of the mentality of the Woodstock generation and it does not reflect well on them. "We could show up without tickets to see The Who and somehow find ourselves at the front of the crowd, near the stage." Initially, Woodstock was, like most concerts, a venue for profit-making. Thousands of people did purchase tickets with their hard earned money (or monies that were hard earned by someone ended up in their hands to purchase tickets). Hundreds of thousands of non-ticket holders showed up; without any regard for people who had paid for the right to attend the concert safely and securely, the gate crashers showed up and usurped those rights. The free-loving, anti-establishment hippies felt an entitlement to the concert. They have not lost their sense of entitlement. The consequences of the party crashers' actions included a great time for the concertgoers but included measurable damage to the city of Bethel, New York. Further, while the concert promoters planned out security, sanitation, food and other accommodation for a set number of people, this was ignored by the masses. Fortunately, God takes special care of madmen and fools, no one was seriously hurt. (That would happen later at Altamont -- even God loses patience.) The majority of those who attended Woodstock did so with no regards to anyone who had a vested interest in the production. Their actions were selfish and demonstrated no concern for consequence.

The liberal thinking that went into hijacking the concert continues today. Want a new car? The government will subsidies that purchase. Free health care for all? Raise the taxes of the top earners in America. When people don't agree with the new Socialist in Chief, call them Nazis. The thought of consequence of these actions is absent.

Being anti-establishment was viewed as cool and hip in the Sixties, but now that many of those counter culture crew have grown up and have power, and they don't want people challenging their authority. To quote the Grateful Dead, "What a long strange trip it has been."
-- I.M. Kessel 

NOT SO DARK AFTER ALL
Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr.'s Robert Novak, RIP: