:
"Study: DC the least affordable city in America. According to Zip
Realty, Washington, DC, is the least affordable city in America! The
study showed the city’s median home prices are nearly seventeen times
the median income. Another study by the Washington Business Journal
shows the average rent for a two bedroom apartment is about $1400 a
month. In order to afford that, without paying more than 30 percent of
income on housing, a person must make $56,000 a year. Also topping the
list of expensive cities were Brooklyn, Minneapolis, Orlando and Las
Vegas."
No further comments are needed, but if you want to comment on it,
please do.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
###############
Honestly
Gabe Goldberg, gabe at gabegold dot com
Being honest is doing the right thing whether or not anyone’s
watching. Being transparent is doing things openly, visibly, with full
disclosure so people can watch. Someone can be honest and still leave
others wondering. And, of course, dishonesty is usually practiced
covertly. So honesty/transparency are neither contradictory nor
redundant and transparency encourages honesty and assures others.
On March 28, Gary Imhoff wrote: "Transparent? When did ‘transparent’
replace ‘honest?’ When was the last time someone said, ‘Just be
honest?’"
###############
I was glad to see the comment on using the word transparency instead
of honesty. I remember in years past when specifically Marion Barry —
but also other officials under investigation — have said they couldn’t
comment on the allegations against them on advice of counsel. But why
couldn’t they just answer the questions honestly? The way I interpreted
their demurrers it must have been because they were guilty as charged
but didn’t want to accept the consequences of betraying the public
trust. Is that a reasonable interpretation? Is there another plausible
interpretation?
###############
What a novel concept, pointing out the difference between
transparency and honesty. I agree, to a large extent, it’s semantics.
The question for you is, have you picked up the Oxford Dictionary
lately? One could say that Oxford is to blame about our overall
ever-changing meanings assigned to words and increasing our descriptive
analysis and documentation of our language. I could "hear’’ a copy and
paste set of how Oxford describes transparency and honesty, and you
would soon see there is somehow an acceptable difference tied to a
logical explanation. But this too somewhat is unimportant because, as
you know, we like our rules and we trust Oxford, but we rely mostly on
our societal connotations. Our belief in what we want to believe is
greater than and more acceptable than what the truth is. This, is the
truth: we believe what we want to believe. Hence, transparency or
truthfulness are irrelevant to our outcome. I believe we should not be
transparent or truthful, because our society’s definition and
connotation are both lies. We should, therefore stick to reality, the
factual outcomes. If everyone stated and believed what reality dictates,
Oxford descriptions would be quite different and so would be the
outcomes. Would it actually be a "better world"? We will never find out
because we do not give ourselves that chance, we are indeed all afraid
of the actual "truth."
###############
What Is the Definition of Transparent?
Tom Grahame,
tgrahame@mindspring.com
Gary, I wonder if one possible meaning of "transparent" is "plausibly
honest"?
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