Some like P.J. O'Rourke and others (yourself?) can't get over the fact that when people protest they a) have a lot of fun doing it and b) have a lot of concerns they want to voice. That's the point of democracy: expressing one's views. I reserve the right to say whatever i want - even deliberately absurd - at a protest. The other assumption, the "useful idiot" assumption, is that marchers somehow serve the agenda of those who called the march. I don't think that works either. Non-marchers can't seem to get over the fact that we don't blindly follow all that is said and all that is asked at these marches. Just doesn't work that way. Go to the next march, walk inside the march, talk to people, and see for yourself. You'll find a ton of people who are having a good time exercising their constitutional right and duty to dissent from misguided government power.