The enduring politics of noise

Thinking about L'il Liddy and the Teabuggers, and the general nature of political discourse in this country, I was struck by a quote I just came across. Try to place it...

"It was impossible in the tumult and the shouting to hear much that was said from the platform or to deduce the essential ideology of this great crusade. But one thing came out strong and clear. It was the promise, reiterated to deafening applause, 'to get the liberal termites' out of Washington and out of the conduct of American affairs. John F. Kennedy, you have been warned."

That's Alistair Cooke, writing about a rally for Young Americans for Freedom ("which only two years ago was a defiant underground of odd-men-out and is now a national organisation") in the Manchester Guardian Weekly, March 9, 1961.