Criminals Commute Too

Apparently it is not just lawyers and lobbyists who come into D.C. from Virginia and Maryland. Clearly since the FBI has pulled much of its anti-gang efforts from D.C., the gangs have found the city a good place to do their business. This goes back to the issues of wasting the D.C. police's time doing Federal government work (escorting officials around town and proving securitiy for events) as well as the inability to tax the residents of VA and MD that work in D.C. Of course the D.C. police could be doing a better job, but the article does mention changes they are making.

"Police said officers in an unmarked vehicle saw the shooting and later arrested Franklin Gomez, 29, a Hyattsville man believed to be a member of Mara R. About 7 p.m. Monday, gunmen in a vehicle with North Carolina license plates shot four men in the Nehemiah Center strip mall at 14th and Chapin, killing Erlin Noe Gutierrez, 22, of Rockville." D.C. Fears Upsurge in Gang Feuds

They did it again!!

Republicans using police force to get Democrats to vote. Is this (21st century) America? washingtonpost.com: House Democrats Storm Out of Ways and Means Committee

Let them Die

Today's Washington Post provides a great example how short-sighted and self-serving the Republicans approach to D.C. is. On one hand you have Orrin Hatch proposing to repeal the law that prohibits hand guns in D.C., and on the other a report shows D.C. to have the highest rate of AIDS cases among U.S. cities. So you have a "problem" where the NRA and some D.C. residents want to be able to own handguns in D.C., and a major public health crisis which is killing hundreds of people.

You would almost think that they want more people to die in the District. First, providing easier access to guns is only go to make gun violence worse. If the goal is to reduce crime, than provide more police, give the Capitol Police more jurisdiction, and stop requiring D.C. police escort administration officials and diplomats around town. Second, Congress continues to prevent the city from spending its own money for the distribution of clean needles (the rider is in this again in year's budget bill). According to CDC "Intravenous drug use and sexual contact are the chief modes of HIV transmission ... and this ... is highly correlated with intravenous drug use."

Congress has exclusive legislative control over D.C., and if they are going to use it, than they must be held accountable for it. People are dying in D.C. from handguns and from the use of dirty needles. It seems clear to me that the approach the Republicans are taking on these issues only makes the problem worse. But they can raise money by taking these positions (from the NRA) and get support in their own districts (by declaring they are trying to stop illegal drug use), so they act in their own self interest, instead of the interest, safety and lives of D.C. residents.

washingtonpost.com: Repeal Of D.C. Gun Ban Urged

washingtonpost.com: Incidence Of AIDS In District Tops Study

Leave the Park Open

Norton's plan to keep Rock Creek Park open during the week (the Beach Drive section) and build a bike path instead is definitely the right way to go about this issue. I don't think there is a great deal of desire among people to use Beach drive during the day (while many people do rely on it). Building a bike path has far more benefits than just closing Beach drive. For one you would encourage more commuting by bike - while many brave people do it now, it is not very safe, and tends to piss off a lot of people in their cars who don't like getting slowed down because of bikers on the road. But many other people don't want to deal with cars driving right behind them (and honking), then speeding past as they try to get to and from work by bike.

I also disagree with the idea that closing beach Drive would improve air quality. The Sierra Club would like the NPS to have it closed at all times (the NPS preferred is just closed 9:30-3:30), stating in part that it would "reduc[e] localized air pollution." But considering that closing off the Park would just move people onto other streets (which the Club recognizes), and at best have a only few people decide to take metro, I don't see how there would be improved air quality. I think it would actually lead to worse air pollution because Beach Drive, unlike Connecticut, Wisconsin and 16th St., has few stop signs. And as the Sierra Club people should know, cars emit more pollution when accelerating and idling, than when they are moving. Also there is the issue of ground level ozone (smog), which I think would be higher because of the shady conditions within the Park - instead of the direct sunlight and its heat, which causes the smog, at least some of the exhaust would be absorbed by the vegetation of the Park's trees. While I can't say exactly how much more or less air pollution would result from moving cars off of Beach drive, one thing is for certain that moving them onto Connecticut Ave., Wisconsin Ave., and 16th St., would obviously increase the air pollution specifically along those routes, where people live, as opposed to pollution being within the Park (where deer live).

Lastly, building a trail would allow people to use the Park more during the week. As it is frustrating to try to commute on Beach Drive on bike, it is not much fun to try to exercise there either. While building a trail would require the removal of trees, and the possible temporary disruption of the creek flow, the overall impact would be minimal. Besides, we are in the middle of a city, it is not a pristine wild lands area, or crucial habitat for any endangered species. As populations increase, the greatest environmental challenges are going to be resolved by getting man to co-exist and work with natural systems, not trying to separate man from them. Norton to seek funding for trail

Ignoring the Problem

The City Paper has an excellent article on the failure of D.C., like most States, to deal with the mentally ill. They usually don't have much money, probably aren't big campaign contributors, and if you pretend they don't exist, you might be fine. Until, of course, they kill someone. If a mentally ill person just kills one person, than maybe you got off lucky. As the article points out, there is also the possibility of mass murder being committed by the neglected mentally ill. But that is just the most horrific part of the problem. There are thousands of people who need help, and many of them would be able to function if they got the help they needed. But when it comes time to cut a budget, the ones who lose out are the ones with the least power.

Part of the problem is that too much emphasis is put on how the government is serving those who really don't need its help. Of course government is needs to ensure basic services, but it cannot ignore the problems of those you can't help themselves. One of the main purposes of government is to "promote the general Welfare" of its people (to quote the Constitution). While it might present more of a challenge, and expense, to provide for the mentally ill, it is no less the government's duty.

Washington, Maryland, and Virginia had a grand total of about 5,100 patients in mental hospitals in 1998, with fewer than 600 of those at St. Elizabeths. That's down from almost 28,000 at the end of 1955. Washington City Paper Cover Story: The Sick and the Dead

Grand Old Pirates

I saw Pirates of the Caribbean the other night (for my wife's birthday), and there is a line in movie of one the pirates that made me think of the Republican party. "Grab everything you can, and give nothing back" (I'm not sure if that is the exact quote, but you get the idea). To be fair, Republicans (the politicians and their supporters) are not the only ones that act like that, and I guess not all Republicans act like that. But that seems to me to be consistent with the policies that they support.

In business, the greedy executives take great amounts of wealth out of companies at the expense of the company itself, and all the people who make it work on a day to day basis. Many corporations try to avoid any regulations that, while protecting workers and the environment, cost them money. When they can't avoid the regulations, they support politicians who can get rid of them. Of course the Republicans will just say that these things are all a part of a "free market" and democracy. But in fact the market is largely rigged, and the democracy is in many ways controlled by a powerful minority. So the GOP, or Grand Old Pirates as I now think of them, will take all they can and give nothing back.

Independence Day for D.C.?

Today is the day we celebrate our independence from Britain. As a colony we chafed under the unfair conditions that the king imposed upon us, and the Declaration spelled out exactly the situation that we found deplorable. The situation was so bad we were willing to risk human life to get out from under the King's rule.

Today in D.C., we still have no representation in the Federal legislature. This, of course, was exactly the type of thing that the founding fathers of this country despised. So I find it very hard to believe that the same people who wrote the Declaration, and then later wrote the Constitution, would intend to re-create the exact same conditions which were so detested just years before*.

The declaration reads: [The king] has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

A recent court decision claims that the founding fathers intended to make the District, in effect, another colony. But reading the Declaration of Independence, that seems very odd. Of course the Constitution say absolutely nothing about whether or not the residents of D.C. should or should not have representation in Congress. The court divines that intent from various sections of the Constitution, and attempts to make whole cloth out of it. I believe the framers of the Constitution did what most politician do today when they get to an issue that they don't want to deal with - they ignore it. It is well known that the "great compromise" was what allowed the creation of the make up of House and Senate, and I think that trying to figure out what to do with some 6000 people at the time was not worth risking the compromise. Tragically, it has been over two hundred years, and many in Congress are still willing to ignore the issue.

* Of course it was not exactly the same set of people who authored both documents, but several were involved with both.

Google top search result (yes it works): Cannot find Weapons of Mass Destruction

How are we safer?

The republicans have the great ability to make people believe something is true, even though it is not, if they just repeat it enough times ("Bush won the election"). The administration and the republicans are doing it now with the idea that we are safer today than we were before the war in Iraq. While the administration had several stated reasons for going to war, the most important was that Saddam had WMDs, and so he was a threat to the U.S. and the world. Bush has since declared that the war is essentially over ("Mission Accomplished" read the big banner). But two very, very important things are still missing: the WMDs (or any evidence that they were destroyed) and Saddam himself. Bush has said over and over that we have rid the world of Saddam, and that he won't be trouble anymore. Usually someone needs some sort of evidence to support what they are saying in order for people to believe them. But we don't know where Saddam is or where the WMDs are - so how exactly was the mission a success?

p.s. One of the funniest suggestions for where the WMDs are is that Saddam destroyed them as we entered Iraq. Why in the hell would he do that - to do us a favor? Maybe he was concerned that they would get into the hands of bad people, and he was worried that somebody might get hurt. The guy who allegedly spent millions developing these awful weapons would just decide that he would get rid of them instead of use them, or move them to a safe place. It's like a little kid who would save up his money for months for to get a great new toy, and when he finally had enough money he would buy it, take it home ... and throw it away without unwrapping it.