It says several times that the author of the letter was a 5th grade teacher - from the sentences they quote, it sure would take an extremely precocious 5th grader to write a letter like that (or, you know, parents who ghostwrite the whole thing). Moreover, they also seem to state, though it would've been clearer with the original letter as well as the reply, that Ritter brought up the word "tea-bagger" himself, albeit presumably only to complain about it. So okay, the diplomatic option would've been to use a more neutral term (though really, what is the official term? Tea Party activist?) when responding to that charge. But if you're going to nitpick every single less-than-ideal phrasing in every handwritten letter from the president, well, good luck with that. I guess everyone needs a hobby.

And as for him taking the time to reply, well, I'm inclined to agree that based on the excerpts and summaries made of the original letter in your article, there was really very little point in replying as Mr. Ritter seems to be, shall we say, rather fixed in his notion that he's being persecuted for his beliefs; Obama denying that hardly changes it one way or the other. That probably wasn't actually what you meant, though.