Anti-Postering Update

Ann Arbor’s white knight of the anti-postering movement strikes again, this time with a letter in today’s News. “It is interesting that handbills are included in the city code under the heading of ‘littering,’” he writes. Something to ponder indeed.

28 Responses to “Anti-Postering Update”


  1. At least he kept it clean this go round.


  2. While it’s still legal, I say we post a few fliers around this guy’s neighborhood in Ann Arbor

    “Baird, Robert L
    57 Salem Cir
    Saline, MI 48176-9135
    (734) 665-1552″


  3. don’t they edit letters to the editor? My head hurts from the rambling.


  4. Wait, he lives in Saline?


  5. According to the phone company/SuperPages.com he does, anyway. Unless there are two folks of the same name in these parts…


  6. Ah, it may have been too perfect to be true. Other sources indicate an Ann Arbor address.


  7. Although, that’s actually in Ann Arbor Township, so the same issue still stands. Reminds me of the “greenway” activist from South Lyon.


  8. Googling “robert baird” “ann arbor” gets you

    Robert L Baird, (734) 665-6408, 3990 Thornwood Ct, Ann Arbor, MI 48105


  9. Or maybe that’s actually Superior Township, on 3rd thought.

    I give up.


  10. some stalker you turn out to be Brandon. ;-)


  11. Why all the speculation about where the guy lives, when it was plain from the first letter in that day’s batch?

    Sunny Day
    Tearin’ hand-bills away
    On my way to where the grouches meet
    Can you tell me how to get,
    How to get to Sesame Street

    Slicing away at a
    hand-bill is A-OK
    Crotchety old men there
    That’s where we meet
    Can you tell me how to get
    How to get to Sesame Street

    It’s a thing of civic pride
    Guys like Rob will stem the tide
    of happy people like you–
    Happy people like
    What a beautiful

    Sunny Day
    Rippin’ hand-bills away
    On my way to where the old grumps meet
    Can you tell me how to get,
    How to get to Sesame Street

    How to get to Sesame Street


  12. This guy sucks. And that’s all I have to say about that.


  13. What a swell guy.

    And that’s all I have to (tongue-in-cheek) say about that.

    Wait, one more - when he says “a majority of citizens” are “probably” against flyering, I don’t think that’s really fair. How about just polling those of us who live in the downtown area and can, say, see flyers from the window of our bedroom.

    Or maybe they can give us two votes.


  14. So that’s whos been slicing up all my SDS flyers…. *grumble* *grumble*
    If you wheat paste your flyers up, they stay up longer, it doesn’t require any tape, and the “white knight” has to work a little harder at being a jackass vigilante.


  15. I suggest a sting operation. Drop an anonymous tip to his address that there’s going to be a massive handbill posting operation downtown on Saturday, then just travel around in circles taping up flyers until he catches up to you or vice versa. Snap a photo of him waving a utility knife in your face(! have to be brave for this op…), and then charge him with brandishing a weapon. After all, _civilized_ people don’t go around waving utility knives at each other, at least not in this Beautiful City of Ours. (That kind of thing only happens in Ypsi…)


  16. I’m sending him a postcard. Although I do like Murph’s idea, anyone this psychotic about some flyers in an area he doesn’t even live in could do a little bit more than just wave a knife. I mean, he may be “frightened for his well being” when “confronted” by a bunch of “young’uns” and the knife may “slip”.

    If anyone’s down, though, I think a night at Leopold’s with a stack of postcards, roll of stamps, and colorful markers would be wonderfully entertaining.


  17. I guess this means that we’ll be back on this guy’s shit list again. Sigh.

    Of all the things in this world to spend one’s time crusading against: Concert flyers???

    So very weird.


  18. Todd -

    When were you ever on his shit list in the first place? The last time I remember seeing flyers for Leopold’s was around New Year’s…

    … although if a postcard-session does go down, it can be relocated. I was just thinking of the nice lighting/big tables/jukebox at Leopold’s. :)


  19. “When were you ever on his shit list in the first place? The last time I remember seeing flyers for Leopold’s was around New Year’s…”

    Hey, don’t think for a second that this guy doesn’t have a long, long memory when it comes these flyers…….the New Year’s flyers were probably this guy’s “last straw”. I picture ‘Office Space’s’ Milton, explaing how the “squirrels were married”, and “ok, but that’s the last straw”, when he is moved to the basement by Lumberg.

    ….but if it wasn’t obvious, I was kidding. I’ll even help lick the stamps if I can find the time….

    BTW, we have a website that is FINALLY updated, and includes a complete list of what is currently in the jukebox….it’s a subheading under ‘pub’. Quite a few new releases.


  20. Make sure you have the right guy before you send him anything.
    It turns out that the world is crawling with Bairds:
    http://www.bairdnet.com
    A surprising number are named Robert L. Baird.

    anywho.com lists a fax number for some Robert L. Baird in Ann Arbor.


  21. For the record, I don’t think we should be sending anything to the guy, but that’s just me.

    Let ‘em tilt at the windmills all he wants……


  22. Uh yeah, I just came across this and I’m not sure how I feel about people posting home addresses here.


  23. Uh, it’s apparently in whatever phone directory Google is using…

    I prefer the idea of posting fliers all over his neighborhood to keep him busy out there, anyway.


  24. Postering there so we don’t have to re-poster here, you mean?


  25. I’d love to get a photo of him and then put it on a flyer…
    He’d probably have a coronary if I went out behind him and replaced all the portraits he’s removed. He’s a grinch.


  26. I guess the only good thing I could say is at least he isn’t going onto people’s porches and hauling their couches away.


  27. Thinking of leaflets past:
    Slapped up many hundreds of flyers a long time ago, only to have a number of them taken down thru the ongoing, assiduous efforts of The Original “Dr. Diag,” — the one who would stand up on his favourite concrete bench to lecture almost daily on current affairs and on other related matters, such as why he proudly voted for Goldwater back in the day….

    Thinking of leaflets future:
    In the spirit of the Jetsons & the Simpsons, am pondering the possibility that an unexpected long-term/down-the-road benefit of Washtenaw Wireless might be the ability to digitally project leaflet information onto street poles. No need for standard paper sizes, no wheat paste — just use (let’s say) tiny unwired devices smaller than an iSight. Then social anthropologists could study the developing ethics of the “leafleters” who share the conical canvas, and how much they refrain from projecting over the projections of others. And the next-generation Bob Baird could walk around with a large mirror, claiming that his efforts to reflect these projections will reduce the growing, unseemly photon pollution on downtown streets.

    Now…. where did I put that glass of absinthe?


  28. Years ago, I was able to defeat the Baird.

    Two words: E Poxy.

    He tried to cut it down, but the shellacked announcement stayed up and legible for months until *I* took it down with a specialized solvent.

    He was PISSED.

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