We're not sure how else to explain Miller's comment at last night's Three Parks Independent Democrats mayoral forum on the Upper West Side.

"There's no reason we can't be the school system we were 40 years ago," the 35-year-old Speaker said.

We think he was trying to conjure up a nostalgic image of public education. But forty years ago, the schools were really on the brink, building toward the Ocean Hill Brownsville fight, where racial tensions and control over schools divided minorities, the Department of Education, the teacher's union, and City Hall.

That didn't seem to bother one middle-aged woman from Three Parks who was heard whispering to a friend during Gifford's speech, "He's so cute!"