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February 21, 2003

You Came A Long Way From St. Louis

Hooray for U. City. It’s the home of Vintage Vinyl (best record store, ever, or at least it used to be. Lots have things have changed in the old hometown, so I won’t vouch for anything that’s happened in the last ten years), former home of Burrito Brothers (r.i.p.) and the place where I spent a lot of my formative years, skipping school and worse. I saw my first punk rock show (7 Seconds and Agent Orange, circa 1988) there in Cicero’s Basement Bar (maximum occupancy: 42. And if you really need proof that things have changed, and definitely not for the better, I offer you the current incarnation of said bar, the Cicero’s Entertainment Complex, complete with Jam Basement. Shudder.) It used to be one of my favorite places to just hang out, sit, drink beer or coffee, watch people. Anyway…

This was in this week’s Post-Dispatch.

In a nutshell, the City Council just passed a resolution expressing concern that recent federal actions - including the adoption of the Homeland Security and USA Patriot acts - could infringe on Americans’ civil rights. The resolution directs city employees to refrain from taking part in activities they believe may violate constitutionally protected civil liberties. So, yay!

But then they were reprimanded by U.S. Attorney Ray Gruender. So, boo.

This is probably not of any interest to anyone but me. Or any St. Louisans who happen to be popping in. It just pleases me to see that not everyone is sitting idly by letting the, ahem, Patriot Act, become accepted.

Posted by pogo at February 21, 2003 12:22 PM