> Being tightly wound must be an East-coast thing.

To some degree, yes. Boston is just 4-5 hrs away from NYC, where just 6 years earlier two commercial passenger jets (from Boston) crashed into the WTC in the deadliest terrorist attack in US history. If you think police departments in Portland or LA felt the 9/11 attacks as acutely as such a nearby place as Boston, then you'd be mistaken.

(Please note that I'm not arguing that our freedom should go away because we need to be protected from terrorists. I'm just trying to show you the mindset of a law enforcement officer in Boston at the time, and that mindset was indeed to be suspicious of things that looked suspicious.)

Give me a break, Lite Brites of a cartoon alien displaying a rude gesture were also placed in New York City without incident.