Around Town Around Town (January 19, 2005)

STICKER SHOCK . . . In today's Weekly, letter writer Joel Henner complains about a pickup truck he saw recently on University Avenue, saying it crossed "the line of public decency." The vehicle was plastered with dozens of anti-war, pro-human rights bumper stickers, including many that criticized the Bush administration using a particular four-letter word. "I'm no prude, but I find repeated prominent display of the 'F' work in this downtown setting offensive," Henner wrote. It turns out the truck belongs to outspoken Palo Alto resident Aram James , a former public defender who calls his vehicle a "bumper sticker mobile." For the last year, James has been on the offensive against the Palo Alto Police Department, accusing officers of racial profiling and using excessive force in a few incidents. Now on the defensive, James admitted he is used to critics of his controversial stickers, including some who've slashed his tires and stolen his antenna. "There's obviously a cost to free speech," he said. Even his fiancé expressed concerns, worried about the effect on her son, Jameel Douglas, who is at the center of one of the police-related incidents. (The Gunn High School student was allegedly shaken "like a rag doll" by Officer Brad Kilpatrick, who was giving him a ticket for riding his skateboard without a helmet. The District Attorney cleared the officer, noting that one witness said the student was trying to get away.) But James said he's also had people praise the stickers, requesting copies of the ones he's created, and giving him thumbs up. Many of James' less-offensive bumper stickers, which also protest U.S. aid to Israel and ask for Three Strikes reform, can be viewed on his Web site, www.electpd.org/Bumper_Page.htm. "The first amendment wasn't designed to protect popular speech; it was designed to protect unpopular speech," he said.

NAKED NEWS . . . Yup, sex sells: "Speaker to 8th-graders: Try stripping;" "Bump, grind your way to riches, students told," "Career Tip For Schoolgirls: Strip;" "Career Day Speaker Tells Children Stripping Is Lucrative Career." Palo Alto's Jane Lathrop Stanford Middle School made the news big time last week. By Friday afternoon, more than 250 news Web sites, from Wires News to The Scotsman in the UK to CNN, had the story of the career day gone raunchy. "William Fried told eighth-graders at Jane Lathrop Stanford Middle School that stripping and exotic dancing could be lucrative career moves for girls, offering as much as $250,000 or more per year, depending on their bust size," one AP report stated. Bloggers also put their own spin on the tale, with one renaming the school "Jane Lapdance Stanford Middle School." On "Painfully Cool," a former exotic dancer wrote that she too would be upset if the speech was given at her children's school. "It is unfair to tell a child exotic dancing is glamorous and a lot of money can be made. A person owes it to a young person to tell the whole story of exotic dancing." At "Common Sense Runs Wild," one woman with the name Janette gave Fried mock praise, noting: "Thank goodness he saves the 'you could be a porn star' speech for the juniors and seniors." Right-wing bloggers, of course, had a field day presenting the narrative as another "California-gone-crazy" story. "Area parents were thrilled at Fried's openness about sexual matters," parodied "Right Thinking from the Left Coast." "'It makes me feel like I'm living in Europe,' remarked one excited mother." The speech got a friendlier response from "Diaz: King of Mass Media," who argued that stripping is indeed a viable career choice. "It's probably not one that a parent may want for their child, but it does pay well for the most part. I've been to my share of strip joints and have even spoken to many strippers. Some are trapped in the lifestyle, addicted to the money and such, but some are just single moms trying to make it."

SCAREDY CATS . . . While police were searching for the mountain lion in Midtown last Thursday, resident Paul Taylor had other felines on his mind: His two domestic cats. "They are not brave cats." It was Taylor's tree in which the cougar had been spotted. After police concluded the mountain lion had slipped away, Taylor was allowed to enter his home, where he was relieved to find one cat in view and the other in hiding. Meanwhile, his neighbors took the spectacle - in which police cordoned off the area for more than two hours -- in stride, joking that they wanted a picture of themselves with Taylor, the big-cat celebrity. Meanwhile, two residents in the neighborhood called the Weekly last week to report hearing nighttime noises on the flat roofs of their Eichler-style homes. "I definitely heard something louder than a squirrel up there," one reported.

WILD LIFE . . . "People are looking up more these days," city wildlife expert Deborah Bartens said of people's reactions to the cougar reports. It's definitely possible that a small lion could subsist on the kind of prey, such as raccoons or skunks, available in a residential area, she said. So if someone smells skunk, it may be a lion. The youthful cougar spotted last week is estimated to weigh 50 pounds, but it looked bigger to the residents who spotted it. And the lions could travel back and forth to the hills via the creeks, she said. Bartens just returned from a mountain lion symposium in Boulder, Colo., where participants were given a tour of residential areas and shown where lions can hide -- in some "remarkably small spaces. It was amazing. We were saying, 'This could be Palo Alto,' except it was 12 degrees with blizzard conditions." Another difference: In Colorado, they can follow lion tracks through the snow.

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