"One might look at that as inconsistencies, but not really," Brown said. "It just covers all the bases."
An innocent digit?
Mayor Dixon appeared on the front page of yesterday's Daily Record with one finger - the middle one - sticking straight in the air.
Rich Dennison snapped the picture for the paper just after he and other photographers who'd been ejected from a public meeting at City Hall were allowed back in.
Is Her Honor flipping the bird?
"I think the picture speaks for itself, which is what we let it do," said Daily Record Managing Editor Ed Waldman. (Full disclosure: Waldman used to work for The Sun.)
But Dixon spokesman Ian Brennan said the mayor was not letting the media know what she thinks of them.
"She is fixing her glasses. It is utterly preposterous that they would choose that of all the photographs taken," Brennan said. "That is how she, along with many people, adjust their glasses. They use one of their fingers."
Rally 'round the flag
For some reason, a lot of Maryland lawmakers return to work today with flags on their minds.
Del. Wayne Norman has pre-filed a bill requiring that any U.S. or Maryland flag displayed on state property be made in the United States.
State Sen. Nancy Jacobs' bill would go further, outlawing private retailers in Maryland from selling foreign-made U.S. or Maryland flags to anyone.
What's with the sudden burst of star-spangled protectionism?
Fort McHenry ranger-historian Scott Sheads offers a theory that sounds a little like Obama's old "cling to guns or religion" remark, but in a good way.
"When times get tough, people go to the flag," he said. "The flag is the one fabric in our lives that never changes."
State Sen. Barry Glassman, who cross-filed Norman's bill in the Senate, had a more practical explanation: "When the economy's bad and the state budget's in a shambles like it is right now, you'll see more peculiar bills, symbolic bills that don't require the expenditure of money."
Indeed, Norman's bill might not cost the state a cent, since it would merely codify the flag-buying habits of the General Services Administration, which manages 50-plus state buildings.
Flags flown at those buildings are already made in the U.S.A. - by prisoners at Jessup.
Nothing says "Land of the Free" like prison labor!
"It's basically a feel-good bill," Norman said.
But Norman didn't feel good about banning Wal-Mart and other retailers from selling imported flags, as Jacobs' bill would.
"I think she may run into a little bit of trouble with the Commerce Clause on that one," Glassman said.
But Jacobs stands by her bill.
"We're talking about being patriots here with the flag," she said.
Why stop at flags? How about banning all those lead toys from China?
"I think that's probably a little unrealistic," she said.
