I know the Spanish-American War was, like, a long time ago and — let’s face it — it wasn’t exactly one of the most glorious episodes in the American record of bringing freedom to the oppressed, but still, if you’ve got a war memorial made out of the mast of the USS Oregon in the middle of the Rose Festival Waterfront Village where presumably tens of thousands of people are going to be passing by, is it really necessary to clamp stands selling pizza and elephant ears onto it?
[UPDATE] I’d actually forgotten reading about this, but Jack Bogdanski mentioned it when he linked to this post yesterday. Apparently, sticking inappropriate stuff in memorials is just accepted practice in the Tom McCall Waterfront Park. Last year’s Navy fleet’s security zone chopped through the Japanese internment memorial garden, and during the huge Obama rally last year the city set up portable toilets in the memorial to fallen police officers; during the week dedicated to honoring cops killed in the line of duty.