Dear Questioners:
Bruce Johnson’s interview with Mayor Vince Gray,
http://tinyurl.com/pzf129q, is
must viewing as the mayoral campaign picks up speed. Mayor Gray will
have to face the same questions repeatedly, from much more hostile
interviewers, during the campaign. What did he know about his own
campaign in 2010, and when did he know it? His answers will have to be
more forthcoming, and he will have to face questioners who will not
accept evasions.
The councilmembers who entered the mayor’s race did so, by and large,
on the assumption that the mayor would not run for reelection, and that
they would be running to fill an empty seat. With the mayor in the race,
his opponents will have to run quite different campaigns, and will have
to hit Gray hard, and demand better answers.
#####
One of the most cutting commentaries that I’ve read on Delegate
Eleanor Holmes Norton was posted by Clayton Cramer on December 30,
http://tinyurl.com/qzgxd92:
It is certainly a novel (in the sense of fictional) explanation,
from DC's delegate to Congress. From December 30, 2013, Mediaite:
“The goal as has been said, it’s seven million people signed up by
the end of March,” Lui observed. “Can that happena
“Oh, sure,” Norton replied. “When that fine is going to kick in,
you’re going to see people trotting to sign on like you’ve never
seen it before.
“What we have been battling now is, first, every time the House
couldn’t think of anything else to do, it had a big debate on
repealing Obamacare,” Norton continued. “So, there are millions of
people out there who think it was repealed.”
I have been pretty harsh on low information voters — but now a
Democrat is essentially saying, ‘Our constituents are so stupid and
ill-informed that they mistook Republican criticism of Obamacare as
being a repeal.’ The only good news for Norton is that none of her
constituents are well enough informed to realize how stupid she
thinks they are. Welcome to Idiocracy.
#####
Paul Basken and Clyde Howard debate each other on the responsibility
of bicyclists and automobile drivers below. I do encourage you to follow
the link to Howard’s original posting in themail to decide for yourself
whether Basken characterizes Howard’s attitude fairly and accurately.
But I do have to question Paul’s conclusion that car drivers are at
fault in every accident between cars and bicycles, and that bicyclists
don’t have the same responsibility as drivers to follow traffic laws and
use the roads carefully, because bicycles weigh less than cars.
Gary Imhoff
themail@dcwatch.com
###############
Countdown to the April Primary Election
Dorothy Brizill, dorothy@dcwatch.com
Early vote centers. Since 2010, the DC Board of Elections (BOE) has
adapted several new procedures that seek to help voters cast their
ballots. These new procedures include streamlining the process for
requesting a mail-in absentee ballot and opening early voting centers in
each of the eight wards around the District so that voters would not
have to wait until election day to cast their votes. At the BOE’s
January 8 meeting, the Board approved plans for the early voting sites
for the April 2014 primary election. With virtually no discussion or
justification, and no explanation regarding the budgeting and management
implications, the BOE voted to approve the recommendation of its
Executive Director, Clifford Tatum, that thirteen early voting sites be
opened in the District prior to election day, April 1, 2014. According
to the BOE, “The Board plans to operate the early voting site at ‘One
Judiciary Square’ located at 441 4th street, NW, from Monday, March 17,
through Saturday, March 29, 2014. All sites will be open from 8:30 a.m.
to 7:00 p.m. and will be closed Sundays.” The thirteen sites chosen as
early voting sites are: Ward 1, Columbia Heights Community Center; Ward
2, One Judiciary Square; Ward 3, Chevy Chase Community Center and
Stoddert Recreation Center; Ward 4, Takoma Community Center and Emery
Recreation Center; Ward 5, Turkey Thicket Recreation Center; Ward 6,
King Greenleaf Recreation Center, Sherwood Recreation Center, and
Kennedy Recreation Center; Ward 7, Dorothy I. Height/Benning Library and
Hillcrest Recreation Center; and Ward 8, Bald eagle Recreation Center.
While it is commendable that the BOE takes reasonable steps to ensure
that every voter can case his or her ballot, the decision to open
thirteen early voting centers raises concerns. There will likely be a
low turnout for the April primary. (At the April 3, 2012, primary, a
total of 64,361 votes were case by 16.98 percent of all registered DC
voters.) The BOE’s decision to open thirteen sites, five more than just
one in each ward, raises the question of how much the sites will cost in
money and manpower, given that between twelve to twenty poll workers
will be needed to man each voting site. Moreover, why does Ward 6 have
three early voting sites, and Wards 3, 4, and 7 get two early voting
sites (one in Ward 7 around the corner from Mayor Gray’s home).
Meanwhile, the two wards with the densest population, Wards 1 and 2, and
the largest ward geographically, Ward 7, will still have one voting site
each. Moreover, since a voter can case a ballot at any early voting site
in the District, not just at a site in his or her own ward, it would
seem reasonable that the BOE should have simply adhered to the
requirement set forth in the District’s Municipal Regulations (Volume 3,
Elections and Ethics, Section 703.3), which states that “early voting
centers shall be equitable distributed geographically throughout the
District.”
###############
Two Wheels Versus Four Wheels Debate
Paul Basken, paul@basken.com
[To Clyde Howard] Aren't you the same guy who suggested on this blog
not too long ago (themail, October 9, 2013) that it would be appropriate
for car drivers to intentionally kill bicyclists whose behavior the car
driver deems inappropriate?
And now you're back [themail, December 29, 2013] asking why the
police chief dedicates so much attention to protecting the citizenry
from people like you?
DC's network of traffic cameras does seem excessive, and pretty
clearly oriented more toward revenue than safety, but knowing there are
people like you out there is a good reminder of why videotaping our
roads might actually have some overriding value to humanity. How much
more dangerous — to others — is unmitigated anger like yours when it
sits behind the wheel of a car than when it is found on the seat of a
bike? Fortunately most people, including the police chief, appear to
recognize the answer to that question.
###############
Clyde E. Howard, Jr., ceohoward@hotmail.com
First of all, you have misquoted what I have said and I do not intend
to repeat it for you. Lanier is only doing what newcomers like you want,
yet some of you have no idea of what it takes to obey the traffic rules
of law in this city. Allow me to suggest that if you are one of those
cyclists, please obey the traffic laws, as they apply to you as well.
For your information, I rode bicycles in this city before you were born,
and we always obeyed the traffic laws as they applied to us.
###############
Paul Basken, paul@basken.com
Dear Clyde, there's no need to repeat it for me — it remains
available at
http://www.dcwatch.com/themail/2013/13-10-09.htm, and anyone who
chooses to review your angry hateful words can read them there. I admire
your military service and longevity but neither gives you any
justification whatsoever to suggest treating bicyclists as enemy
combatants. That kind of violent antagonistic relationship is in your
mind, and I've seen enough drivers deranged enough to act upon such
thoughts that I take seriously anyone going around glibly giving public
voice to them.
Yes, laws are meant to be obeyed, but you were addressing the police
chief, and there are simply more laws and more violations of them than
her department can be reasonably expected to address. That means she and
her department must set priorities, and in this case she appears to be
making a wise decision that laws violated by car drivers can cause far
greater death and destruction than laws violated by others out there on
the roads. The data on that fact is simply irrefutable, even for someone
such as yourself who appears to be letting blind rage outweigh rational
common sense.
Just look at the table at
http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Main/index.aspx, and think about it
for a moment. It shows annual traffic deaths in this country in the
range of about thirty thousand or more, with drivers usually
representing a bit more than half of them. That means that, along with
themselves, car drivers are killing well more than ten thousand other
people each year in this country. Now look for the statistics on how
many people are killed each year by bicyclists. Are there any such
cases? I'm sure it happens, on occasion, but it is an event so
exceedingly rare that it doesn't even warrant a statistic.
The data makes clear that it's sheer lunacy for you to say the things
you say in your blog postings. Why should the chief of police of DC, or
any law enforcement official anywhere, waste any significant portion of
scarce public dollars on trying to "catch the crazy cyclists that
totally disregard traffic rules or laws," when in fact it's the car
drivers disregarding traffic rules or laws or even common courtesies who
by far are the ones causing the mayhem out there? There's simply no
statistical evidence whatsoever to back up your position. On the
contrary, your untempered anger makes clear that you, when behind the
wheel, should regarded by the police in DC and other jurisdictions in
this country as exactly the type of person they should be monitoring as
closely as humanly possible.
I sincerely wish that in the new year, you might somehow find a
moment for calm reflection and contemplation about the anger and danger
you are spreading in this world. We badly need less of it.
###############
Clyde Howard, Jr., ceohoward@hotmail.com
You have an elitist view on what this city should have to satisfy
your position. It is the view of a fool. Perhaps you may find glory in
the city as portrayed in the movie Things to Come.
###############
Paul Basken, paul@basken.com
Sir, I responded to you with facts and data — do you have any of your
own, or have you reached the point in your life where you are good for
nothing more than uninformed rants, name calling and incitements to
murder?
You also appear badly confused about the moral of the movie you
reference, which decidedly was not a paean to your belief in placing
more value on modern mechanical devices than on humanity).
###############
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