People's Republic, the

Another name for Cambridge, the only community in Massachusetts to ever hire a full-time peace commissioner (presumably to keep the city out of any nuclear exchanges). In 1997, somebody posted signs reading "Welcome to the People's Republic of Cambridge. Passport control next right" at the end of a bridge into the city.

The term was sometimes also used to refer to Brookline, especially after it erected a wall in the mid-1980s to keep out Brighton residents, but that town has since become more conservative and you rarely hear it described that way any more.

Meanwhile, Cambridge itself now has the notoriety of having the nation's highest per-capita concentration of million-dollar homes.

Still, Chameleon Tatoo and Body Piercing is proud to be the "First and Finest licensed Tattoo and Body Piercing shop of the People's Republic of Cambridge, Massachusetts."

Kim writes:

As I was driving home yesterday, I saw a billboard about a block from where I work, with the words "Legalize and Tax Marijuana" in six-foot-high big block letters. I am so happy to be in the People's Republic of Cambridge.