The ULA and HOWL

So, what's all this ULA Howl Protest business and how come we never get to hear about it, either in the mainstream media or in the writings/ websites etc. of people who make a living out of the Beats?
Well, I said all along that the idea of civic celebrations of the author of "Howl" were ridiculous. As are sedate literary events. You can't sit on a panel somewhere and discuss a poem about people "burning for that ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night" or whatever it is; the best way to celebrate "Howl" is to get mad raging drunk, walk home through the cold night under brilliant stars and write whatever bold, brave lines come from the top and bottom of your mind without fear or premeditation.
Which is really, essentially, what the ULA have been saying. "Free the Beats" (their slogan) from the starched shirts who are claiming ownership of them (though they still don't like Jack so much), and understand them for what they are: a vital link in the revolutionary chain that started God knows when--probably, in America, with Rexroth, though I'm sure there are others I don't know about--and continues today in the person/s of a thousand underground poets and writers, including the good folk at the ULA.
Why fear or revile them? Everything they have done and said seems thoroughly reasonable to me; and yet the denunciations of the ULA from the quaint and the comfortable on lecture hall stages and in magazines/ on websites created all over America border on the rabid. They're reminiscent, incidentally, of the denunciations of the Beats that were widespread in the 50s and 60s (continuing today only really in right wing media).
It's especially ironic to see people who associate themselves with the Beats putting down the ULA. Ask yourself this: if Ginsberg were alive today, where do you think he would be in the event of a ULA protest? Inside the hall, or outside? Up on the podium or down in the melee with the guy dressed up as a clown?
I don't know about your Allen Ginsberg but I'm pretty damn sure about mine.
Read King Wenclas' report about the ULA Howl protests here http://www.literaryrevolution.com