By John Solomon
How the government's punishing of the exposure of official wrongdoing can linger for years
Beyond the sheer size and cachet that the Rolling Thunder rally now carries, there remains at the heart of the gathering a tight-knit community of veterans, family and friends of former POWs and those still missing.
Rolling Thunder's imprint on Washington goes far beyond the roar of hundreds of thousands of bikes on city streets each Memorial Day weekend. The organization has aggressively pushed a broad legislative agenda, with several of its priorities now the law of the land.
"I went to every office, and when I got done, I went back and started all over again. It took 10 years, but I got the bill passed," he said. "I'm glad I did it. I've had people tell me there are lobbyists who make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year just to maybe get one bill passed."
"I don't particularly like dealing with these people up here," he said. "But what I do, I do from my heart."
