Baltimore Sun: All signs point to home: Speaker Pelosi honored in Baltimore's Little Italy

[DeepModem Mom]

All signs point to home
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is honored in Little Italy, the neighborhood where she grew up, with a street of her own
By Matthew Hay Brown
Sun Reporter
January 5, 2007

Families strolled in under flags of red, white and green. Workers from La Tavola stepped out into the drizzle for a better look. A quartet played Frank Sinatra's "Nancy (With the Laughing Face)."

All of Little Italy seemed to have turned out Friday for what one observer called "The Return of the Prodigal Hon." It was here that Nancy Pelosi learned politics at the knee of her father, Mayor Thomas J. D'Alesandro Jr. On the day after she became the first female speaker of the House of Representatives, a crowd outside her childhood home welcomed her back to the neighborhood....

Pelosi returned the emotion, beaming as she addressed the well-wishers -- many of whom she had known for decades -- from a stage set up in front of 245 Albemarle St., the rowhouse from which her father once presided over the city....

***

Like other events at which Pelosi celebrated her installation this week, the visit was intended to position the liberal politician in the center of popular imagination. A tea for Democratic women, Mass at Trinity University and a reception at which Tony Bennett sang "I Left My Heart in San Francisco" had underlined her credentials as a woman, a Roman Catholic and an Italian-American....

***

Earlier in the day, Pelosi laid a bouquet of white roses at a statue of her father. Her brother, former Mayor Thomas D'Alesandro III, introduced her to the crowd in Little Italy. Mayor Martin O'Malley had renamed the 200 block of Albemarle Street Via Nancy D'Alesandro Pelosi....

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-pelosi0105,0,5582149.story?track=mostemailedlink


Mayor Martin O'Malley, right, unveils a street sign named in honor of Speaker of the House Nancy D'Alesandro Pelosi at the corner of Albemarle and Fawn streets in Little Italy, next to the house where she grew up. Looking on are (from left): Thomas J. D'Alesandro Jr. (her brother and former mayor), Rep. John Sarbanes, Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Steny Hoyer.
(Sun photo by Amy Davis)


Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi walks with her grandchildren to visit a statue of her father, former Baltimore Mayor Thomas D' Alesandro Jr.
(AP photo)

[WorseBeforeBetter]

1. Damn...now I'm jonesin' for Da Mimmo's!

(Wonder if the wingnuts have started their attacks on Baltimore.) The Granny in Armani really seems genuine and like a true class act - quite inspiring!

[DeepModem Mom]

2. She has been AMAZING! nt

[tabasco]

3. I had no idea she grew up in Baltimore!

She will make Maryland and California both proud.

[Cha]

4. Yeah, the hatemongers can

start whining about "Baltimore Values"..the lackluster no accounts can't deal in truths.

[goclark]

5. Now That is Family Values ~ A Class Act! nt

[Hekate]

6. Positioning her in the popular imagination -- so necessary, with wingnut talking points already...

Positioning her in the popular imagination -- so necessary, with wingnut talking points already spewing in full bile. The cartoonist who does the very unfunny "Mallard Fillmore" has been caricaturing Nancy P for months now. His portrait of a lunatic is unrecognizable as anything close to the real woman -- but how can anyone who's not a Californian be expected to know?

I'm really, really glad that she decided to do this media blitz to reconnect with all the non-San Franciscans who molded her values, and allow a fuller picture to emerge early on.

Hekate

[Faygo Kid]

7. Little Italy is a great neighborhood.

Went there for the first time summer before last. Free outdoor movie on one of the buildings, little old ladies sweeping off their porches, the church as the center of the neighborhood - almost a stereotype. And the food! Can't walk down the street without a most welcomed assault on the olfactory sense. Makes me hungry just thinking about it. The Rightwingnuts are such contemptible haters. Screw 'em, and bring me some bruschetta and a nice chianti.