Letters: Brown, Michigan

Copyright © 2009 National Public Radio®. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.

MADELEINE BRAND, host:

From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Madeleine Brand.

ROBERT SIEGEL, host:

And I'm Robert Siegel. In a moment, your letters. But first, this one correction. Yesterday, some of you may have heard a reporter on our program identify the Supreme Court nominee as Sandra Sotomayor. Of course, her name is Sonia.

BRAND: In your letters some of you were grateful for our interview with this California character.

Former Mayor WILLIE BROWN (San Francisco, California): I am Willie Brown. I am formerly the mayor of San Francisco and formerly the speaker of the California State Assembly for 15 years.

BRAND: Thank you for your interview of Willie Brown, writes Al Folker(ph) of Menlo Park, California. He is an authentic San Francisco character and very underrated as one of the shrewdest politicians in the history of California.

Mr. Folker continues: I have run into him several times recently in the city, and he really does enjoy every moment of every day. He is also the most approachable public figure I've ever met and is always ready with a sly and intuitive insight on current events, politics and the social scene.

SIEGEL: Well, Manny Poppendreas(ph) of Indianapolis was also thankful but for a different reason. He writes: I found your interview with Willie Brown yesterday most enlightening. It was a rare peek into the mind of a very powerful person. He seemed to be saying that if only he were still in power and could simply impose more taxes on the populace, there would be no problem in California. I was blown away by his arrogance and disdain for the people that he was supposed to be representing.

BRAND: In other state politics, we talked yesterday with Michigan state Representative Michael Lahti. He calls himself a Yooper. You can, too. He represents part of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The U.P. is the section that isn't the well-known mitten shape of most of Michigan.

Representative Lahti is sponsoring legislation that requires any picture of the state produced by the state to include the U.P.

SIEGEL: Well, Jeff Curry(ph) of Pullman, Washington, writes this: As a native Yooper and former resident of Representative Lahti's hometown, it's always great to hear about the Upper Peninsula in a national media. I can't tell you how many times I have noticed the U.P. missing from maps, drawn incorrectly or lumped in with Wisconsin, no offense to Wisconsin, obviously.

Mr. Curry goes on: I know several people with tattoos of the Upper Peninsula but nobody with a tattoo of the Lower Peninsula.

BRAND: Well, keep those letters coming. Please write to us by going to npr.org and clicking on contact us.

Copyright © 2009 National Public Radio®. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR's programming is the audio.