Michael: All of which makes me wonder if this astroturf/authentic movement question is really best thought of as an either/or thing.
Thailand is another recent example that comes to mind.
Somebody: Come on. The Red Shirts may have been funded in part by the exile tycoon Thaksin but they reflected genuine pro-democracy sentiments of the working class and peasantry of Northern Thailand and Bangkok slums. There's little comparison between poor folks in Thailand fighting against a dictatorship for the right to vote and an upper middle class, anti-tax movement in the U.S. storming the Bastille against stimulus spending and universal health care. There's a reason why one movement was drowned in blood and the other is given endless airtime on the corporate media. Having said all that, I agree with your larger point that there's not a clear distinction between elite orchestrated protests and authentic mass actions. The U.S. government's successful covert actions and regime changes tend to fall somewhere in between.