Full Tires, Spare Liars

What’s the difference between a hippie and a politician? A politician lies and steals to get to high places, and a hippie lies and steals to get high. Don’t trust either group? Then this week, rise up when the 76th United States Conference of Mayors comes to downtown Miami. The angry underground Florida youth contingent will protest the occasion with A March on the Mayors, featuring a weekend of “food sharing, marching, dancing,” and a “bike-riding extravaganza!” — their description, not ours.

Cough up a five-dollar entrance fee and pedal through our urban gauntlet with the rest of the fixed-gear-bike-crazed, Rick Rubin-bearded, anti-petrol, anarchist folk punks in a politically motivated Alley Cat race. At 9:30 p.m., while the mayors attend a late-night event at the Havana Club in the Wachovia Tower, racers will meet 55 stories below at the Government Center. Where’s the finish line? Find out as you go by making it through a series of bike-messenger-inspired checkpoints. Winner gets a vintage Dutch Gazelle bicycle. Be at the Government Center, 101 NW First St., Miami, by 9 p.m. Visit myspace.com/305criticalmass or www.righttothecity.org for more details about the organized protest, or call 305-510-9852.
Sat., June 21, 2008