Government

All politics is local in the most political city in America.

Key topics in this category:

RECENT POSTS

November 2, 2010 | 8:54 PM | By

Live from Busboys and Poets…Election Night!

We are here at Busboys and Poets on 14th street, where Free Speech TV is hosting a panel discussion/dinner during a live broadcast of election night coverage. Interesting tidbits from the panel, below:

Midterm elections = an older and whiter turnout?

“Race is always a huge factor in the United States.”

The racial divisions that existed before Obama was President, existed after…and in some ways, are worse.”

If 2008 was the year of Obama, is 2010 about voters “demanding a recount”?

Discussion of how Obama built a movement around himself in ’08, but not in ’10, when some may have hoped to ride his coattails.

Is America a Center-Right nation?

– they are taking a break. a panel has been lowered…over the panel. –

Panel now discussing whether Obama was progressive enough. “He could be FDR or he could be Bill Clinton…he chose ‘Bill Clinton’”.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Elections, 2010 Elections, Politics, Race and Class
November 2, 2010 | 4:52 PM | By

Get an “I Voted” badge to go with your sticker!

Hillicon Valley

This is neat. According to Hillicon Valley, a popular location-based social network is getting in the spirit of Election Day:

FourSquare, an application that allows people to broadcast their whereabouts to their friends, doles out an “I voted” badge to users who “check in” with the site when they arrive at their voting place.

But, wait! There’s more!

…swing by elections.foursquare.com to watch America vote in real-time throughout the day, with all the check-in data from polling stations across the country. Navigate the map to see where foursquare voter turnout is happening, and all the details about how and where our country performs its civic duty. [4sq]

That’s a screenshot of how many D.C.-users have checked in (plus what gender they are). Some may ask why badges or “checking in” to polling places matters for Election Day; considering how Foursquare tends to alter its users behavior, I think it’s significant. Foursquare power-users are motivated to play the game constantly– and now they’ve been given a special incentive to get out the vote.

FILED UNDER: Elections, 2010 Elections, Social Media
November 2, 2010 | 1:15 PM | By

All Quiet at Columbia Heights’ Precinct 36

Elizabeth Thomsen

Precinct 36: Latin American Youth Center, 1419 Columbia Road, NW

Just wandered down to my local polling place and heard that out of 5,333 registered voters, a total of 505 have participated in the democratic process.

There were no lines, and it was fairly quiet, which makes sense because it’s after lunch. This morning it was busy and they’re expecting traffic to pick up again at 4pm, when the apres-work crowd arrives.

If you don’t know where your polling place is, DC’s BOEE has a very useful site which asks for your address and then tells you where to go. You have until 8pm tonight, to vote.

FILED UNDER: Elections, 2010 Elections, Columbia Heights
November 1, 2010 | 1:59 PM | By

Following ABRA’s DC9 Hearing on Twitter

TBD News Editor Sommer Mathis live-tweeted the ABRA (Alcoholic Beverage Regulation Administration) hearing for the suspension of DC9′s liquor license. There are three hours of tweets, but here are two excerpts which caught my attention (read up, from the bottom):

http://twitter.com/sommermathis

The “Mohammed” Mathis is referring to is 27-year old Ali Ahmed Mohammed, who died under confusing and mysterious circumstances after being refused entry to DC9. Mohammed allegedly threw a brick through the club’s window and five DC9 employees gave chase. What happened next is unclear; police say they arrived and found Mohammed unconscious, while others insist that DC9′s employees did not batter him to death.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Government, ABRA
October 29, 2010 | 12:52 PM | By

Down-Ward Spiral

BeyondDC

Nifty!

I never noticed it until BeyondDC posted about it, but the Wards are numbered in a clockwise-pattern:

I use the trick in the image at right to keep track of wards. It’s simple: Starting with Ward One in the center of the city, drawing a clockwise spiral results in a line that goes through the wards in ascending order.

If you can remember the spiral, you can remember which ward is which.

I ended up surfing over to Wikipedia to see another map and I read that there are 127 neighborhoods in D.C.:

The District of Columbia is divided into eight wards and 37 Advisory Neighborhood Commissions (ANCs) within these wards. The total number of named neighborhoods is 127.

I’m filing that away for trivia night.

FILED UNDER: Government, City Council
October 18, 2010 | 11:11 AM | By

Maybe Teachers’ Unions aren’t the Problem

IITA Image Library

I just had a thought-provoking conversation about my Georgetown Public Policy Review/Michelle Rhee interview post with a DCentric reader who was a teacher at his high school alma mater– a “failing urban public school”:

(Jambulapati’s) post is another example of the ongoing villainization of teachers’ unions, which have increasingly become the favorite punching bag of would-be urban school reformers like Rhee. While Teach for America types may position merit pay and increased accountability as the keys to saving America’s inner city youth, my time as both a student and teacher in a failing urban public school has taught me no amount of creativity or passion can be substituted for parents that take an active interest in their parents’ education.

Put simply, America’s schools are not failing because of unions. They are failing because Americans don’t value education. If you need further evidence, just contrast the way teachers and schools are revered in places like India and China with the way many Americans take pride in their anti-elitism and disdain for academics, nerds and other pointy-headed types.

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Education, Children, Michelle Rhee, School Reform, Schools
October 15, 2010 | 3:58 PM | By

Memorable Words from Michelle Rhee

While reading for, thinking about and writing this post about the Georgetown Public Policy Review‘s interview with Michelle Rhee, I found this Washington Post piece called “Michelle Rhee’s Greatest Hits“:

D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee gave us many reasons to remember her when she is gone.

There’s the schools she closed. The teachers she fired. The contract she signed with the Washington Teachers Union. Her frequent use of the word “crap.”

Here’s some quintessential statements that Rhee made as chancellor. Thanks for many of these to my colleague, Bill Turque, who often stood alone in his strong coverage of Rhee’s tenure.

The quotes include anecdotes like the famous masking tape incident as well as excerpts from speeches and interviews. Definitely worth a read.

FILED UNDER: Education, Michelle Rhee, Schools
October 15, 2010 | 2:34 PM | By

Michelle Rhee, a “thank you” and a promise.

Angela N.

A DCentric reader who works for the Georgetown Public Policy Review helpfully sent in a link (thank you!) of an interview that they did with Michelle Rhee yesterday. The questions include, “How do you want your term as DC Chancellor to be remembered?” and “What would you say to education reformers disheartened by your resignation?”. I will admit, I am not familiar with this organization, so to get a sense of what point of view the interview/er was coming from, I surfed around– and didn’t have to go far.

The post which precedes the interview is titled, “Of Hereos (sic) and Villains: A review of the film “Waiting for Superman,” directed by David Guggenheim”. It was penned by the same person who conducted the Rhee interview by email: Padmini Jambulapati. I tripped over the last two sentences of her review:

…in light of Rhee’s resignation, one cannot help but feel that our villains have struck again. But, if the real heroes of Waiting for Superman have taught us anything, it’s that we should continue to hope and aspire for good, in spite of the bad guys.

Our villains? The bad guys? In Jambulapati’s piece, she links the words “our villains” to this Politico article by Ben Smith: “Teachers union helped unseat Fenty“. So the villains are the Teachers Union. Got it. I went back and re-read the interview with that in mind but it felt like it came from a relatively neutral place, despite that review paragraph. This is the portion of the exchange I was most interested in:
Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Education, Michelle Rhee, Schools, WAMU