Burden of Proof
Dear Provers:
We’ve had a week of startling revelations about two of the latest
Fenty administration scandals. We’ve heard how the administration
manipulated city funds so that it could steer construction contracts to
cronies and hide the contracts from the city council and the public. We’ve
heard how Chancellor Rhee fiddled with the DC public schools’ budget
so that she could fire a few hundred teachers and other employees. Rhee
testified at a city council hearing that she didn’t plan the Reduction
in Force, that she didn’t intentionally hire several hundred more
teachers than she needed over the summer in order to break the union
contract. No, she insisted, she wasn’t being malicious; she had simply
been incompetent, bumbling, and unable to plan ahead. She had the right
to ignore the legal budget of DCPS that the council passed and the mayor
signed because she was the head of the agency, and that meant she had
the ultimate power. The city council had approved her nomination, so
from then on she wasn’t accountable to them or anyone else for her
actions. And she used, over and over again, the magic words, “for the
children.” As long as she was doing it “for the children,” she
could do whatever she wanted with the budget, with the staff of DCPS,
with the teachers, the principals, and the students. She didn’t have
to report to the council and her budget officer didn’t have to report
to the Chief Financial Officer. The only way she could think of to
improve management of DCPS was to make a vague promise to in some way
“improve communications.” (See Chancellor Rhee’s and Chief
Financial Officer Gandhi’s testimony at http://www.dcpswatch.com/rif,
and the video of the hearing at http://octt.dc.gov/services/on_demand_video/channel13/october2009/10_29_09_COW_1.asx,
http://octt.dc.gov/services/on_demand_video/channel13/october2009/10_29_09_COW_2.asx,
and http://octt.dc.gov/services/on_demand_video/channel13/october2009/10_29_09_COW_3.asx.
If these weren’t scary enough, we’ve had Halloween and the
transition of the trees to fall colors. We’ve had all this going on,
and yet the only thing most people have wanted to write about to themail
is the same-sex marriage bill. I’ve published replies to several
messages in this issue; if anyone wants another round on same-sex
marriage, please send your message in by Wednesday’s issue. But if you
want to write about the fall leaves, that would be even better.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
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Returning to the ’Hood
Jonetta Rose Barras, rosebook1@aol.com
A fight appears to be developing in Ward 2 over the future of public
schools in that wealthy part of town. Some parents want to end the
practice of out-of-boundary enrollment. Their position is better summed
up by the slogan, “Ward 2 schools for Ward 2 kids.” But other
parents, many of whom are black or Hispanic, assert their children would
be adversely affected by such a policy.
Ground zero appears to be Hardy Middle School, located at 34th Street
and Wisconsin Avenue. The building is brand new, although it took years
and the involvement of Allen Lew, the city’s school facilities czar,
before the renovations were completed.
“I think it’s the new building,” one source, who requested
anonymity, said, explaining that the renovations have given Hardy the
feel of a private school. “And then there is the recession. People who
once sent their children to private schools can’t afford that any
more.”
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Easy to Confuse These Two Things
Phil Shapiro, pshapiro@his.com
About twenty years after the world wide web was invented, the Washington
Post is not so sure about the difference between a web site address
and an E-mail address (see http://tinyurl.com/yjomqlj).
Admittedly, I get these confused quite often myself. Is there someone
who can explain — in simple terms — the difference between a web
site address and an E-mail address?
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Basic Rights
Malcolm Wiseman, mal@wiseman.ws
You respect human beings, not voters. Messrs. Catania, Evans, and
Gray are doing a great job in leading on same-sex legal union. I hope
they and the DC council are successful in this broadening of individual
rights. Or, let’s have a vote on whether unmarried gays can own a home
together or co-benefit tax-wise. Let’s vote to make them rent. No!
Basic rights are not something we vote on (and off). You make sure the
law acknowledges, defends, and continuously expands heretofore denied or
constrained rights. The government needs to have a damn good
justification for denying a particular human behavior or declaring it
illegitimate.
Rights is the name put on the package of family jewels that we
collectively loan to our government and allow it to administer. It’s
the list of activities we regularly enjoy and must have to be happy
individually. We already had them before the government existed. They
should protect, not restrict or even define the borders of our
activities that do not cause intentional or direct harm to others.
Let customs come from the people, not from their government. Equality
of treatment and protection, that’s all we need from them.
###############
The Voter Ballot Initiative on Marriage or
Bust
Robert “Bob” King, grassrootsdc@gmail.com
So many were terribly disappointed and surprised with Councilmember
Jack Evans’ outburst in his opening remarks at the hearing on same sex
marriage. He threatened the witnesses before the first one was even
called to the microphone. A weak person who was not as committed to the
cause may have been intimidated and possibly walk away. Having been
active in the community and in the Civil Rights Movement, I was used to
such calculated demonstrations of support to feign anger to galvanize
supporters and to look tough on the issue. He tempted many to want to
say, “Bring it on.”
The council, mayor, delegate, and maybe in the Board of Elections
leave one little choice but to go to the next steps in the legal
process. For the appointed Elections Board, it is off to the courts as
allowed by the law and outlined in the referendum and initiative
process. For the elected officials, it is to Congress. The council,
mayor, and delegate have indicated that they all support same sex
marriage. There is no recourse but to change the venue for the
discussion, as is done in the court system when a fair trial cannot be
accomplished in the current hostile environment. Councilmembers
indicated that the council was just going to revise the bill where it
touches on the domestic partnership part. The council hearing and
witness lists were stacked with gay activists presenting stories about
their lives. Two councilmembers let it be known how happy they were to
see the definition of marriage change as it affects them personally.
Like it or not, the District of Columbia is under the rule of
Congress to a degree. Home Rule is limited. What do you do in an
instance like this? Just stand? Or do you seek the right to a vote on
marriage from Congress, as individuals and groups do regularly seeking a
vote in Congress for the District of Columbia? This action does not take
away from the fight for statehood. It only demonstrates how important
the right to vote is. It shows how precious citizens take voting rights
and the institution of marriage, both the basic fabric of our society.
Also, it was disheartening to hear councilmembers say that there are
other issues that are important that citizens need to address, as if
redefining marriage without the vote of the people wasn’t one of the
most important, most contentious issues of the decade. Why else would
there be a witness list of nearly three hundred for the council hearing
and about one hundred for the Board of Elections hearing? It should be
noted that the Board is comprised of two members appointed by the mayor
and confirmed by the council, when there should be three members. That
is a situation that has existed this way for several months and should
have been resolved by now. People pick their own battles, and many feel
marriage is a war worth waging. The same effort will be applied by those
that want a ballot vote in 2010 on same sex marriage as will be needed
when forces come forth demanding equality for polygamous marriages.
The council just doesn’t get it. All citizens want is the right to
vote on the issue. Whatever the verdict is at the polls is what must be
accepted. Those eleven councilmembers that believe that same sex
marriage is the right way to go are not being challenged for their
belief system. Some others believe differently. The council refused to
do a Council Advisory Referendum to put the issue on the ballot, so the
citizens have to. And we want Congress to turn the proposed legislation
back to the city for a vote. Let the people vote. Let the people vote on
the definition of marriage. That’s all we ask. To do otherwise is a
slap against voting rights and disrespect for the citizens of the
District of Columbia. Let the people vote, one way or another, at the
ballot box on Election Day 2010.
###############
Your intro [themail, September 28] was brilliant and exposed some of
the councilmembers’ motives. This was never about civil unions,
benefits, next-of-kin hospital visits, etc. This is about a government
body sanctioning and endorsing an anti-religious construct. Marriage is
secular too, but its origins are deeply religious. How can you make
homosexual marriage, something that the majority of faiths, religions,
etc., agree against now apply to the same followers through government?
You can’t. The Constitution protects freedom of religion last time I
checked. Catania, Evans, . . . , heck, the whole bunch need to go.
Morality and religion are not things that can be legislated, amended,
etc. The respective God of each religion has defined marriage. To
redefine it is basically letting the government tell us what to believe.
If this does go to Congress for an appeal, Ms. Norton will resist the
will of the people again.
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Did you appear for the hearing and give testimony or just publish a
sneaky comments on the Internets?
#####
[I watched the hearing on the Internet tubes, but I don’t think my
comments were sneaky. they were published openly. — Gary Imhoff]
###############
[From Gary Imhoff, themail, October 28:] “If it [the city council]
really felt respect for the citizens of the District of Columbia, it
would allow them the right to vote on the definition of marriage, rather
than telling them they are too hateful, bigoted, and stupid to be
trusted with the vote.”
Really? So I assume, then, that you think a “vote on the definition
of marriage,” specifically the question of whether interracial
marriage should be legal, could and should have been put to a public
referendum in Virginia circa 1967? Indeed, many of those opposed to
interracial marriage opposed it for religious reasons. Hypocrite.
#####
[I don’t understand why Phillip Spaulding thinks this would be a
hypocritical position, since I’ve already written that I don’t think
that same-sex marriage and interracial marriage are analogous. Here’s
what I wrote in themail on June 3: “Proponents of ‘marriage equality’
frequently compare same-sex marriage with interracial marriage, but that’s
not a good comparison. It’s always been the common human custom for
people to marry within their own groups, whether those groups are
defined geographically, linguistically, religiously, politically, or
racially. But marriages between people in different groups also occurred
frequently whenever and wherever groups mixed in any significant
numbers. Over history and across the world, forbidding those intergroup
marriages legally has been the exception rather than the rule (though
the taboo has been more strictly enforced across religious lines than
across geographic or racial ones). The abolition of laws in the United
States against interracial marriages confirmed common human tradition
and experience, rather than rejected it.”
In any case, considering interracial marriage as a separate
situation, it’s an interesting question whether legalizing interracial
marriages in Virginia would have been achieved more easily through a
legislative vote or a popular vote. I’m willing to speculate on that,
even though the case is counterfactual. (Loving v. Virginia settled
the case by court decision and Virginia doesn’t have an initiative and
referendum process.) My reading of the political climate of Virginia in
1967 is that the late sixties were a period of extremely rapid change in
race relations, and that Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act was an
embarrassment to a lot of Virginians. (Nationwide, the reason the Loving
case had such an impact was not that it affected the actual marriage
arrangements of a lot of people, but that it was a shock to most people
that a state still had an interracial marriage ban on the books in the
late 1960’s, and that it enforced it.) Interracial marriage would
probably have been on the cusp of acceptance in Virginia in 1967. If
there had been a year to two of political debate before the issue came
to a vote, it may very well have won a popular vote. I assume the point
of Phillip’s question is that he thinks decisions made by legislatures
are better and wiser than those made by direct vote. In this case, I
believe he would be wrong. I doubt that legalization would have won in
the legislature until several years later. In other words, I think that
a popular vote would have legalized interracial marriages before the
more cautious legislature would have. Neither legislative nor popular
vote decisions are always right (in the sense that they always agree
with me, or with you), but I trust the voters to do the right thing more
than I trust legislators. What remained of the Racial Integrity Act of
1924 after the Loving decision was overturned by the Virginia
legislature by 1975, and that was probably delayed by a few years just
to show defiance to the Supreme Court, so I think it’s fair to
speculate that without court intervention interracial marriage would
have been legalized in Virginia, even by the legislature, before 1977,
if not in 1967.
By the way, most state laws against interracial marriage were not
strictly enforced. Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act was one of the
strongest and most strictly enforced. Some religious leaders may have
supported it, but the motivation behind it was not religious, but
instead secular and in fact scientific — the theory of eugenics, which
was promoted politically mostly by liberals and progressives, and which
was also the main motivating force behind the movements to legalize
birth control and abortions. Isn’t history ironic? — Gary Imhoff]
###############
A Little Consistency and a Few Answers, Please
Martin Austermuhle, martin.austermuhle@gmail.com
Councilmember Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) made a very good — and
respectful — point when he opened the hearing on the same-sex marriage
legislation last Monday. Why all the commotion over a vote now? Why not
when Mayor Adrian Fenty proposed the school takeover? Or how about when
the DC council voted to spend $700 million on a new baseball stadium?
While opponents of same-sex marriage at the hearing called the
legislation one of the most important public policy decisions of our
times, it simply isn’t. Why? Because when you weigh the benefits
against the drawbacks for the majority of District residents, it just
doesn’t come close to rising to the level of importance of many other
issues that we trust our elected representatives to vote on. The
stadium? That was $700 million that the council put on the city’s
credit card, effectively raising our debt-to-revenue ratio, which we all
know can have an impact on the city’s financial standing and future
ability to borrow. The school takeover? Gary, I shouldn’t have to tell
you how that has affected many schools, children, teachers, and
administrators.
But same-sex marriage? Really? You’re telling me that allowing
loving same-sex couples to enter into a legal contract will somehow
negatively impact District residents? Will heterosexual couples no
longer be able to marry? Will existing heterosexual marriages be worth
less? Please. When you balance those benefits and drawbacks, allowing
same-sex couples to marry becomes one of the least important public
policy decisions of our time. That’s why it’s fundamentally
dishonest and misleading for proponents of a referendum to be yelling so
loudly for their votes to be heard, when those same cries are rarely
heard when much bigger issues have come before the council.
As for the point Councilmember Evans made, I’m actually shocked
that you’d disagree with him, Gary. He simply warned of the dangers of
running to Congress to overturn a local decision you disagree with.
Sure, the constitution grants Congress executive authority over the
District, but that does not mean that every single one of our local
decisions should be vetted or second-guessed by representatives that do
not live here, do not respond to our concerns and cannot be voted out of
office by us. Period. It was disheartening to see opponents of same-sex
marriage threaten to take their case to Congress. Why? Because that move
would signal in what low esteem they truly hold the District, its
residents, and its locally elected representatives. Did you advocate
having Congress overturn the school takeover? The stadium funding? Why
not? The principle of Home Rule here is more important than the politics
of whether or not you agree with a decision made by our duly elected
representatives to extend the legal benefits of marriage to same-sex
couples.
Finally, I’d like to close with an opinion on the hearing. We
apparently saw very different hearings, Gary. I saw proponents of
same-sex marriage — black and white, religious and secular — speak
of love, equality, and devotion. They rarely raised their voices, and
generally refrained from insulting or attacking their opponents. (Which
was in stark contrast to the sparsely attended public rally the Sunday
prior at Freedom Plaza, where some same-sex marriage opponents made it
clear where their opinions are coming from. See for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHpvIK295TA&feature=player_embedded).
Supporters of same-sex marriage asked a simple question that I believe
you and the opposition have yet to answer: why not? Without citing the
Bible, which assumes that our government follows only Biblical mandates,
can someone tell me what harm can come from the District allowing
same-sex marriages?
#####
[I can see how Councilmember Mendelson’s comments may mislead some
people who don’t know much about or who don’t remember DC’s
political history. However, they’re wrong. Mayor Williams’ plan to
reconstitute the Board of Education so that he appointed half its
members was quite unpopular with the public, although it was supported
by the mayor and a majority of councilmembers. There was a referendum
vote to overturn it; that referendum lost by only a few hundred votes.
Phil and Martin and I may agree that Mayor Fenty’s takeover of the
school system was a bad idea that has worked out badly, but the DC Board
of Elections and Ethics, which initially accepted a proposed referendum
to overturn it, then did a turnaround and decided it was ineligible for
the ballot; that decision was upheld by the Superior Court. Phil has
been unable to convince his fellow councilmembers to overturn it (every
councilmember who spoke at Chancellor Rhee’s hearing on Thursday
pledged fealty to it); Martin has not been able to convince his
colleagues at DCIst to criticize Rhee’s bumbling; and all of us
together have not convinced enough people that the city would be better
off if the schools were controlled by a publicly elected school board
instead of a dictatorial mayor and a Chancellor who believes herself to
be above the law. As for the baseball stadium, the great majority of the
public, along with Phil, Martin, and I, believed that it was a wasteful
misuse of public funds, but no amount of public outrage could overturn
the city council’s decision; the city’s law on initiatives and
referenda does not allow ballot measures on budgetary matters. But
thanks to Martin for pointing out that a public vote by referendum would
have arrived at a better decision than the legislature reached.
Martin’s attempt to pass off same-sex marriage as an unimportant
and trivial issue is surely not meant to be taken seriously. If he
believed that, he would not argue about it so persistently and
passionately. Councilmember Cheh said of it that, “This is the most
important civil rights issue of our era,” leaving it unclear whether
she thinks that the Civil Rights Movement was less important than
same-sex marriage or whether she believes that the Civil Rights Movement
was before her era. Regardless, I believe that families and the
marriages that define them have been the main building block of
civilizations and societies, the foundation of their stability,
throughout millennia and around the globe. (There are those who
disagree, of course; one of the people who testified in favor of
same-sex marriage said that as a feminist lesbian since the 1960’s,
she was not sure that she approved of the institution of marriage at
all.) Marriages have taken a few different forms, the main variants
being monogamous and polygamous, but no society has existed without
families and marriages, and same-sex marriages have never been given
formal societal recognition anywhere. It may be that history has nothing
to teach us about families, and that we are indeed wiser than all former
generations and free to remake marriage as we will, without consequence.
It may be true, as Communists believed, that there is no human nature,
but that “human nature” is malleable and simply a product of the
state, and the state can make a “new man.” It may be that Andrew
Sullivan, who first proposed formal legal recognition of same-sex
marriage in the 1990’s (Virtually Normal, 1996), is the
most insightful and well-balanced philosopher of human nature, law, and
sociology who ever lived. But, absent further evidence of any of these
being true, I’m not ready to accept Martin’s assumption that the
burden of proof is on those who oppose an unprecedented and fundamental
change in human society, rather than on those who propose the change.
With regards to appealing a city council decision to Congress, Martin
is just wrong. Citizens should always have the right to appeal a
government decision to a higher authority. Citizens of St. Louis, if
they disagree with a decision by their city council, can try have to the
Missouri state legislature overturn it, even though most of those
legislators do not live in St. Louis and cannot be voted out by
residents of St. Louis. Why should citizens of DC have less right than
citizens of St. Louis or of any other city to appeal decisions made by
their city governments? Congress is in the position of our state
government. It shows no disrespect to this city or its citizens to
appeal a city government decision to Congress; it doesn’t even show
low esteem for the city government (though Martin may admit with me that
our city government hasn’t always earned high esteem); it simply shows
disagreement with that decision.
Finally, Martin stacks the deck in comparing the good behavior of
same-sex marriage proponents who were celebrating getting what they
wanted at a formal council hearing (but who still used condescending and
dismissive language toward their opponents), to the raucous behavior of
traditional marriage proponents at an outdoor public rally. Would he
compare the language that same-sex proponents use on Internet bulletin
boards about their opponents (overwhelmingly insulting and attacking,
often vile and ugly, certainly never loving) to the generally respectful
language that traditional marriage proponents used at the city council
hearing? — Gary Imhoff]
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CLASSIFIEDS — EVENTS
Dupont Circle Park: A Great Urban Green Space,
November 2
Robin Diener, president@dupont-circle.org
Please join us to hear Susan C. Piedmont-Palladino speak about the
significance of Dupont Circle as an urban green space. Monday, November
2, 7:30 p.m., at St. Thomas Episcopal Church, 1772 Church Street, NW.
Susan serves as a curator to the National Building Museum and is also
an architect and Professor of Architecture at Virginia Tech’s
Washington/Alexandria Architecture Consortium (WAAC), the College’s
urban campus. She received her Master of Architecture from Virginia Tech
and her Bachelor of Arts in the History of Art from The College of
William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. Before joining Virginia
Tech, she taught at the University of Maryland and the Catholic
University of America.
Susan is the former national president of
Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility, served on the
design committee for the National Peace Garden Foundation, and has been
a consultant to the Department of Energy for the Solar Decathlon. Light
refreshments will follow the meeting.
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National Building Museum Events, November 3-5
Sara Kabakoff, skabakoff@nbm.org
November 3, 10:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m., Book of the Month: Jacob
Lawrence in the City. Join us in the Building Zone for an
interactive reading of Susan Goldman Rubin’s Jacob Lawrence in the
City. Readings at 10:30 and 11:30 am. Free, drop-in program.
Recommended for ages 3 to 5.
November 3, 12:30-2:00 p.m., Community in the Aftermath: Bayou La
Batre Project. Bayou La Batre, Alabama, won a $15.6 million FEMA grant
to build one hundred furnished housing units for victims of Hurricane
Katrina. Janey Galbraith, the city’s grants consultant, discusses the
project’s progress, and its overall impact on area recovery efforts.
Vince LaCoste, Polysurveying, and Chris Sylvester, The Mitchell Company,
discuss the design and construction of this new neighborhood. Free,
registration required. Walk-in registration based on availability.
November 4, 12:30-1:30 p.m., Building in the 21st Century: Human
Responses to Green Design. While LEED criteria certify the “green”
status of a building, standards are not yet in place to measure the
impact of “green” design on human neurological, psychological, and
physiological behavior. Frederick Marks, director of science and
technology at AC Martin Partners, Inc. discusses and analyzes human
responses to the built environment. Free, registration required. Walk-in
registration based on availability.
November 5, 6:30-8:00 p.m., Vincent Scully Prize: Christopher
Alexander. Architect, builder, and scholar Christopher Alexander accepts
the eleventh Vincent Scully Prize and presents an original talk that
explores the need for a new production system for buildings,
communities, and neighborhoods. The presentation concludes with a panel
featuring Mr. Alexander, Boston Globe architecture critic Robert
Campbell, and Michael Mehaffy, research associate at the Center for
Environmental Structure. $12 member, $12 students, $20 nonmembers;
prepaid registration required. Walk-in registration based on
availability.
All events at the National Building Museum, 401 F Street, NW,
Judiciary Square Metro station. Register for events at http://www.nbm.org.
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Gray at Ward 4 Democrats, November 4
Deborah M. Royster, deborah.royster@comcast.net
I am writing to remind you that the next monthly meeting of the Ward
4 Democrats will be held on Wednesday, November 4, at 7:00 p.m. at Emery
Recreation Center, 5701 Georgia Avenue, NW. DC Council Chairman Vincent
Gray will be our guest speaker for the evening, and he will discuss
legislative issues pending before the Council of the District of
Columbia. In addition, Ward 4 Councilmember Muriel Bowser will provide
her regular monthly update of key legislative and other community issues
affecting Ward 4 citizens. The meeting will begin promptly at 7:00 p.m.
If you would like to receive regular notice of monthly meetings, please
join the Ward 4 Democrats listserv at: ward4democrats@yahoogroups.com.
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