The only generalization I'm comfortable making is, if a guy is going to get stopped on a
motorcycle, he should try to arrange it so that the officer is an off-duty motorcyclist.
Although extreme (okay, nauseating) politeness has on rare occasions managed to get me
out of a fine for minor infractions on four wheels, every single time I've been stopped on
a bike (geez, what're those odds?), the cop was a rider (I have no experience regarding stops
by motorcycle-mounted cops). I promptly removed my helmet and gloves, produced the
prerequisite paperwork, nodded "yes, sir" agreeably (even the time I'd blipped the gas a bit and
wheelied over some railroad tracks when there was a cop right behind me: "Son, I don't mind if
you're enclined to engage in that sort of thing now and then, but keep it off my streets, okay?"),
and got off with a warning -- even once when the cop was a confirmed Harley guy who took
umbrage at my hanging a knee off an old ZX600. As soon as he was assured I wasn't quite as
squidly as he first thought, he was cool.
Oh, man. If only half the moral is "Be nice, and maybe it'll save you some cash," I'm
sounding way too much like my dad.