As he watched defenseless delegates from the Democratic National Convention strolling blithely along Eighth Avenue near Times Square one night last week, a native New Yorker feared for their safety. "I kept wanting to shout to them to jump in a cab and get out of there," he exclaimed. "But then I noticed that the whole street was strangely quiet. Most of the usual weird people weren't there."
Was that it? Or was it thatalong with countless cops, cabbies, countermen and other normally curmudgeonly denizens of Convention Citythe muggers, pickpockets and prostitutes who normally infest the area were on their best behavior?...