DCentric

Good morning, DCentric readers! It’s link-time!

A Culture of Poverty, Ctd. “A relatively straightforward decision, like opening a bank account, makes a lot of sense if you’re middle class and trying to save, but it may actually be counterproductive if you’re poor. It’s really hard to get people to make the leap from thinking their values and behavior will translate to other social locations, to hammer home the idea hat the things that are important to middle class foodies might not be the same things that inform the choices made by the food stamp recipient in Section 8 housing.” (postbourgie.com)

ABRA Report Says Ali Ahmed Mohammed Was Chased by DC9 Employees “As more details emerge, the culture clash that seems to be happening in the wake of the incident is likely to intensify. Though a coming autopsy report could clear up a lot about what happened the night Mohammed died, it might not do much to resolve the tensions that emerged afterward. One man, speaking at the vigil Tuesday night, yelled that “America was built on the backbones of immigrants.” Later on, as the mostly East African vigil participants milled around, the mostly white patrons at Nellie’s Sports Bar on the corner seemed not to notice the grievers, and no one from the vigil seemed to want to wander into Nellie’s for a drink.” (Washington City Paper)

More, still, on the meaning of Rhee “Fenty, who was elected by winning every voting precinct in the city, needed to take the case for reform to the neighborhood meetings with all the energy that had characterized his campaign for office…He needed to compensate for Rhee’s inexperience and modulate her natural belligerence–for example by not allowing her to appear on the cover of Time magazine clad in black and holding a broom, looking for all the world like the 21st century version of the wicked witch of the west.” (voices.washingtonpost.com)

Juan Williams’s NPR Contract Is Ended NPR has terminated its contract with Juan Williams, one of its senior news analysts, after he made comments about Muslims on the Fox News Channel….“I mean, look, Bill, I’m not a bigot. You know the kind of books I’ve written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous.” (The New York Times)

Charles County family finds burning cross at their front door “A Charles County neighborhood is on edge tonight after someone burned a cross in one family’s front yard…He is white, his wife is black, and they have two kids. He told Brad Bell the symbol of racial hatred was set up right outside his front door. “I have two children, a 12 year old and a one year old daughter,” he said. “This is nothing to play with and I’ll leave it at that.” (tbd.com)

Does a Luxury Hotel Project Really Need $61 Million in Tax Breaks? Why Isn’t Anyone Asking? “…it’s key to ask why this hotel needs a subsidy. The Mayor and DC Council have scrubbed the expenditure side of DC’s budget in recent years, looking for savings in the midst of a huge drop in tax collections. This has forced DC programs to justify every penny of expenses and have led to cuts down to the bone and “into the marrow,” according to Chairman Gray. Yet our elected leaders rarely ask the same hard questions when it comes to tax incentives.” (dcfpi.org)