I too applaud the Minneapolis spirit of free speech and lots of it. David Wilson's post sparked a couple memories:
1. A few years ago I saw a Minneapolis-made independent film on cable TV. What clued me in that it was shot here wasn't a skyway scene or a recognizable building. Something caught my eye in the background, in the corner of the screen, ruffling in the cold winter wind as characters shuffled in and out of a coffeeshop: stacks and racks of free newspapers, nearly blocking the doorway, a sight that somehow announced that this is Minneapolis. 2. Sometime in the very early 1980s I got hold of a paintstick which I gather is used to mark cattle and on a railroad girder along a Dinkytown sidewalk scrawled: REAGAN IS SMARTER THAN YOU. The intent was to offend passing intellectuals and incite a revolution, or something. Anyway, someone soon blacked out the first letter so that for at least a decade, until Dinkytown's old exposed-steel railroad bridges were torn out, it read: EAGAN IS SMARTER THAN YOU. That phrase, which seemed delightfully absurd at the time, has often come to mind since the dawning of the age of Awada and Pawlenty. Chris Steller Nicollet Island-East Bank TEMPORARY REMINDER: 1. Send all posts in plain-text format. 2. Cut as much of the post you're responding to as possible. ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
