Third List of Lists
Dear Contributors and Readers:
Paul Dionne, below, complains that the same people write in themail
repeatedly. As Paul says, over a period of time hundreds of people
contribute to this forum. That's only a small portion of the readership,
but it is a good sampling. A few people, however, write frequently. Paul
gets tired of that, but actually that's one of the things that I enjoy
about themail.
The Internet is a step forward in publishing and distributing
information that is as important as the inventions of the printing press
and moveable type. The printing press democratized the ownership of
information. It made the mass distribution of books possible, and
eventually made it affordable for individuals to own copies of books and
even large libraries of books. The Internet has democratized publishing.
By eliminating the costs of paper, printing, and distribution, the net
has made publishing affordable for everyone. As a result, in forums like
themail the roles of reporters, columnists, and editorialists are also
available to everyone. You don't have to own a newspaper or be hired by
a newspaper in order to give information to or express your opinions to
thousands of people. Members of themail who write occasionally about
what's happening on their blocks are our reporters. Members who write
frequently about issues are our columnists. Read our columnists as you
read columnists in your newspapers, with agreement or disagreement,
trust or distrust, pleasure or disgruntlement. And if you get real tired
of somebody's invariably wrongheaded blustering nonsense, counter it in
the best way possible -- contribute regularly yourself.
This issue has leads to several more E-mail lists. Two more that I am
aware of: the Washington Peace Center publishes a monthly E-mail
activist alert that it describes as “a compilation of progressive
information and events in the D.C. metropolitan area.” You can send a
subscription request to wpc@igc.org.
The Dupont Circle Update is a newsletter that covers developments in the
commercial and residential Dupont Circle neighborhoods. Subscribe with a
request to dupont_circle@yahoo.com.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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A short item in the Washington Post on Sunday, June 10,
notified us that the Police “non-emergency” telephone lines were
finally repaired (after being down for over 24 hours). We are assured
that the 911 lines for emergencies were never down, but the Police
surely know that this is misleading. Security systems, which are
monitored by non-local telecommunications centers, cannot call 911
because the calls do not originate within the city. For this reason, the
Police tell people that alarm companies should call the non-emergency
number, 727-1010, which will properly handle emergencies. Obviously,
that would not have worked for at least 24 hours last weekend. I don’t
know about anybody else, but I now feel a little bit less safe knowing
that if I ever have an emergency at my house the Police may be off-line.
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I find it frustrating that multiple posts by one individual are
allowed in one issue, and even more frustrating that some names appear
in every issue. Frankly, there are a few people whose posts I have
simply just stopped reading. I know there are other subscribers to this
list who have done the same.
I recently heard someone joke “Ten People in themail. It certainly
seems that way. Those people who post more than once a month diminish
themail's reputation, but to themail's credit I counted well over two
hundred individuals who have posted in the past six months.
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Something I've never figured out — why does someone holler “heads
up” when something is about to fall from the sky and land on your
head, thus making you look up? It seems to me “heads down” would be
more appropriate. In any event, it is timely to worry about the demise
of the Control Board. They have been an island of sanity and stability
in the stormy seas of the D.C. government. Without the Control Board it
is likely that D.C. will slip into its old ways without notice and we
will soon be in financial hot waters again.
There has been no noticeable improvement in the running of the major
departments of the D.C. government, absolutely no fiscal constraint by
Department heads, and no real improvements in efficiency or
effectiveness in most of the agencies of the D.C. government. I hope
that the Congress will step in and appoint some form of oversight
organization to be a watchdog over the agencies in the D.C. government
that are just lazily drifting along in their own dinghies.
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If someone wants to play hardball and ensure that the World War II
Memorial will not be built as currently planned, here's a suggestion.
Write some letters, put up some posters, hand out some flyers declaring
that, given the memorial's design (pseudo-classical retro, borrowed from
the Nazi architecture of Albert Speer), given the company contracted to
construct it (a subsidiary of Philipp Holzman A.G. of Frankfurt, which
used concentration camp labor during the war), and given the strong-arm
tactics to force it through (orders from Congress to override all legal
considerations, environmental requirements, public objections, etc.),
the memorial has picked up a few nicknames.
I can't imagine that plans for a project locally christened “The
Albert Speer Memorial” or “Reichstag II” or “The Achtung
Monument” would continue to enjoy official support for very long.
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There are two little parks sort of near each other, kind of
diagonally across the street from each other near 17th and T Streets,
NW. Does anyone know who owns these parks? They are all run down. The
grass is unkempt. Some nice grass and flowers and better year park
benches would make them very nice.
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Whither “Eight Is Enough” Project?
Mark Eckenwiler, eck@ingot.org
Once upon a time, a reader of the mail announced a project to
identify bogus voter registrations, and provided a list of DC voters
(sorted by ANC SMD) at http://www.conexos.com/anc/INDEX.HTM.
Alas, that page is no longer accessible. Can the author please identify
him/herself and provide information on the project's current status (as
well as a URL to the most current voter rolls)?
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Why Aren’t They Speeding?
Sid Booth, SidBooth1@aol.com
My wife and I were driving back to San Jose, CA, to catch our flights
back to Washington this week when what we found different about highway
traffic there became apparent. I hadn't noticed at first, being more
involved with the scenery and finding our way around. We had enjoyed
nearly two weeks of leisurely driving along the Pacific Coast below San
Francisco, over small highways and great freeways as well. What I
suddenly realized on the trip to San Jose was that -- in contrast to a
drive along our Routes 395, 95, 270 or even 66 — heck, Connecticut
Avenue for that matter -- is that we were driving the posted limit and
almost no one passed us! Oh, sure, there was an occasional speeder, but
he or she was a rarity in our brief experience. We wondered what
accounted for the difference between our traffic experiences here and
there (I won't even mention the Californians' respect for pedestrians in
crosswalks). Could it be that they have credible law enforcement out
there? What a concept!
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A City Can Clean the Streets
Phil Carney, philnopus@erols.com
Just back from a trip to Pittsburgh, PA. I can't help myself. When
out of town, I check to see how a city handles things like graffiti,
trash, and basic city services. For example, mechanized street cleaning
stops during the winter because the water used in cleaning would freeze
and be a hazard. Pittsburgh has street cleaning street signs that
include the annual dates for cleaning (I think it was April 1 to
November something.)
Washington, DC, informs us with a one-time one-sentence announcement
in the Washington Post sometime in the early winter and again
sometime in the early spring. Which city is doing a better job of
informing the public about street cleaning? PS: In Pittsburgh's
commercial areas without BIDs, sidewalks and streets were clean of
trash. What an interesting idea.
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The Second-Most Debased Word in English
David Sobelsohn, dsobelso@capaccess.org
Remember “Freedom is Slavery,” from 1984? The contemporary
parallel is “'Free' means You Must Pay Money.” A recurring example:
Safeway's annual “Barbecue Battle” to benefit the DCPD (and promote
Safeway products). A full-page flyer promises “Free Children's
Rides,” “Free BBQ & Grilled Food Samples,” and “One Adult
Admission Free.” In all, the word “free” appears six times on the
flyer. Yet nowhere does this full-page ad warn that you must pay $7 to
get these “free” benefits. Once upon a time, “free” meant you
didn't have to pay money. Now, apparently, it means just the opposite.
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Re: Ed Barron's last posting about UDC. I think I've mentioned my
ideas on higher education in DC on this list before, but maybe not. The
"State University of New York" is the master organization for
state-supported higher education in that state. SUNY directly runs most
of the state supported higher education institutions. However, SUNY
funds “state” colleges at least two different private universities
in New York state. At Cornell, the state funds a few schools —
agriculture, labor, and home ecology. In-state students who go to these
schools pay a “state-level” tuition that is much less than that of
the "private" Cornell University. Similarly, SUNY funds a
forestry school at Syracuse University. It operates similarly to the
“SUNY schools” at Cornell.
We could do the same in DC, and contract for an undergraduate liberal
arts college with any of the private universities in DC — maybe a
joint urban studies/architecture program with Catholic University, for
example. What would have to be determined is what types of academic
programs we would want to have available as “state-supported
undergraduate or graduate education programs.” Similarly, maybe we
could contract with Montgomery College to create a combined
DC/Montgomery County community college district to offer courses at that
level.
Finally, with regards to access to state-supported higher education
for DC residents, the federal program mentioned by Mr. Barron only
covers undergraduate education. For those of us who want to pursue
higher education, but prefer a state-supported option, comparable to the
University of Maryland at College Park or even George Mason, we're out
of luck. I wish the federal government would develop a comparable
program whereby DC residents could pursue graduate education at state
tuition rates at public universities in Virginia and Maryland. I sent
and E-mail to Delegate Norton's office about this, but never received a
response.
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Moving from DC
Connie Ridgway, kaniru@aol.com
This is to Richard who is considering moving to Arlington: you might
consider that, in moving to Arlington, you are moving to a state that
has a very different political history and philosophy than DC. When you
move to Arlington you move to a fairly progressive area, but it is still
in Virginia, which is very conservative. I work in Alexandria and have
encountered lots of examples of such differences both in the city and in
the state regulations for businesses, zoning etc. Remember, Jim Gilmore
chided “Northern Virginia” by calling them “the north part of
Virginia” to remind them from whence the decisions about their lives
come.
I'm sure there are a lot of plusses too. It depends on what's
important to you.
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Asking the Post to Be Clear Is Not
Being Unfair
Larry Seftor, Larry_Seftor@compuserve.com
Peter Luger thinks that I’m being unfair to the Washington Post because
I’d like them to use their public voice to clearly identify D.C.
Council Members who nullified a voter mandate, rather than have readers
deduce that information. The argument is that the Post does not
have the space to print a list of those who voted in the affirmative.
The fact of the matter is that the 672-word article being discussed here
would have been lengthened by 10 words by printing the list of Council
members who acted unethically, rather than the list of those who opposed
the action. The Post clearly could have indulged in a 1.5 percent
increase in the length of the article for the sake of a clearer
presentation. Anyone who has read the Post for 25 years, as I
have, knows that the ratio of fluff to news has increased greatly over
the years. In each issue of the paper there are thousands of words that
can be eliminated before any actual news would be cut. Saying that the
Post has not the space to print ten extra words to provide the names of
those who blew off the voters is, in a word, absurd.
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Foxhall Community Citizens’ Association
Bob Andrew, rdandrew@erols.com
http://www.foxhall.org serves
members of our association. The header of each web-page contains a link
to our Ultimate Bulletin Board moderated by FCCA Secretary Spencer
Hollis, who also is editor of the monthly Foxhall News. A short weekly
print column for the Georgetown Current newspaper is linked
on-line as Neighborhood Notes, covering Foxhall items of wider relevance
to ANC2E area residents (Burleith/Georgetown/Hillandale/Foxhall).
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Why just lists? Usenet isn't dead (yet). At one time dc.general was a
great place. Is there anything left of the dc.* hierarchy? As far as
discussions that are professional, DC is full of economists. So I'll
take the chance to make a shameless plug for sci.econ.research, which I
moderate. If your ISP doesn't provide good Usenet access, you can always
read groups by pointing a browser at http://www.deja.com
(which redirects you to a part of Google — it's a long story).
[Kelly is right; Usenet is great, since it remains the last untamed
frontier of what was once the wild and woolly Internet. I can't
recommend any of the dc.* newsgroups wholeheartedly, but the postings in
dc.general would be of the most interest to themail subscribers.
DC.politics sounds like a relevant topic, but it is about national
politics, not local. — Gary Imhoff]
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The DC Independent Media Center maintains a web site in which anyone
can be a participant in making the news. Submit your news story, photo,
audio, or video over the web and have it instantly available to your
community. Do you ever yell at the mainstream news for not telling the
real story? Then make the news yourself. It could be: an audio recording
of a dialogue between a police officer and activists about police
brutality, http://dc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=7843;
a picture making a point about the lack of affordable housing in the DC,
http://dc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=7827;
a video of a hunger striker for DC General, http://dc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=9045&group=webcast;
or a story about saving community gardens, http://dc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=8907&group=webcast;.
The DC IMC also puts out a weekly newsletter that you can sign up for
at http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/listinfo/imc-dc-announce.
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I live in Adams Morgan and I have a new group listing for you:
Friends of Adams Mill, or FOAM. You can check us out at http://www.yahoogroups.com/group/adamsmillfriends.
We're part of a community effort focused on improving traffic conditions
on Adams Mill Road. We've drafted a “traffic calming master plan”
and are working with MPD, DPW, and our local ANC to move things along.
If you have any questions let me know!
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You can get connected with Reel Affirmations, Washington, DC's
International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival by joining the Reel
Affirmations listserv today! It's the quickest and most inexpensive way
to get find out what's happening at Reel Affirmations and One In Ten.
Get E-mails on a weekly basis with brief news of upcoming screenings,
projects and/or events. So don't miss out, sign up today. Go to http://www.reelaffirmations.org/filmfest/lists.cfm.
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CLASSIFIEDS — HOUSING
4707 Connecticut Ave., NW, one-bedroom renovated apartment with
modern kitchen, oak hardwood floors, high ceilings, storage space, in
premier "Old World" building, near Metro, $1795/month,
244-8598.
###############
CLASSIFIEDS — FOR SALE
Klingle Road Bumper Stickers Now Available
Laurie Collins, lauriec@lcsystems.com
Repair and Reopen Klingle Road bumper stickers are now available for
your door, windows, recycling bins, trash cans, bicycle and even your
car! Please send your mailing address to repairklingleroad@yahoo.com,
and we will mail one to you. Last week, another Ward 1 ANC voted to
repair and reopen Klingle Road. ANC 1-A in Columbia Heights now joins
the many ANCs in Wards 1 and 4 supporting the reopening of Klingle Road.
In addition, the ANC Assembly, which consists of ANC Commissioners
representing SMDs around the entire city, joined us and passed a
resolution urging the Mayor to repair and reopen Klingle Road without
further delay. Please visit our site http://www.repairklingleroad.org.
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