I haven’t noticed anything but optimism among my traditionalist friends about the selection; perhaps some wariness but certainly not the hostility that I’ve seen from commenters on Rorate or even, sadly, Ann Barnhardt’s blog.
Traditionalism, to my mind, is less a political statement of “I’m more Catholic than anyone else” than simply a way of living out the faith. We love the traditional liturgy, the season of Septuagesima, the Ember Days, the Asperges. I prefer to read the Confraternity version of the Douay Rhiems over any modern translation; I use prayers with “thee” and “thou”.
But we can be our own worst enemies sometimes!
I love the old rite, too. You mentioned the old calendar, something that I think is vitally important. Changing it did great harm to people’s conception of the liturgical patterns and this expression of the Faith.
I agree that the nasty, foaming at the mouth, I’m-more- Catholic-than-the-Pope types are a minority. However, in some areas they seem to be quite dominant among the people who participate in the old rite masses and it’s one of the reasons that regular Novus Ordo attendees are sometimes timid about going to an EF mass and also why the EF mass attendance rarely grows very much. This varies from diocese to diocese, of course; in places where it has been accepted and encouraged and the FSSP is present, I think you’ll find much less of it.
Probably the reason it’s more pronounced in hostile dioceses is that the old rite people feel they have fought long and hard to get the mass and now they must defend it. But they end up creating a closed and exclusive community given to shrill criticisms and vicious internal fights between groups that have different conceptions of how the old rite should be celebrated. And this justifies every bad opinion the bishops had of them and certainly discourages the growth of the rite.
It probably does depend largely upon the diocese (mine isn’t particularly good, and there has been much infighting among the Latin Mass groups). It’s just unfortunate that some of the more hysterical of these people managed to get on the internet and spew their venom in front of an international audience, and I agree that it’s not going to be helpful to the cause at all.