From MainToday.com



    For a moment or two, right around the time he heard himself called a "fascist" and a "Nazi," Bill Whitten began to wonder if it was all worth it.

    The ex-Marine from Yarmouth had tirelessly spent the last 18 months raising what now stands at $14,000 and counting to erect a U.S. flag over Fort Gorges. Now here he sat Monday evening seeking final approval from the Portland City Council and, right out of the red, white and blue, a young man stood up to the microphone and linked Whitten's good name to the likes of Mussolini and Hitler.

    "I couldn't believe what I was hearing," Whitten said after the council unanimously approved his plan. "I was just totally dumfounded."

    And with good reason. For all we hear these days about the political rantings of Rush Limbaugh and the rest of the Rabid Right, this week's City Council meeting offered a glimpse at the opposite - but equally mind-numbing - end of the spectrum.

    Call them the Livid Left.

    "Fort Gorges is at the entrance to Portland Harbor - it's the first thing people see coming in on the Scotia Prince. What's wrong with flying an American flag out there?" Whitten said. "I just can't comprehend how someone could hate something so much - when that same thing has given them so much."

    That someone would be Shawn Loura. You may have seen him in recent months standing atop the rounded stone barriers on the edge of Monument Square, flashing the peace sign to motorists as they wait at the Congress Street stop light and wonder if he ever loses his balance.

    Make no mistake about it. Monday evening, Loura took a tumble.

    While a handful of others objected to the Fort Gorges flag for reasons ranging from the practical (the city needs a formal policy for accepting gifts) to the political (the Bush administration has so co-opted the flag that it is now synonymous with support for the war), it was Loura who left everyone slack-jawed with his two-cents worth: Whitten's flag doesn't signify democracy and freedom. It reflects Nazism and fascism.

    "I'm sitting there thinking, 'Gosh, sometimes we make things more complicated than they are.' " recalled City Councilor Peter O'Donnell, who opposes the war himself but had no problem telling Loura he'd gone "way over the line."