Sparty

One of the best decisions I made was to move into Washington so I would not have to deal with the long commutes–though the trade-off is living in a city with an incompetent government.  Last Friday reinforced this feeling.  It was the first day back to work for most people since the back-to-back snow storms hit the [...]

This week the Senate held hearings on the safety problems of the subway system in Washington.  Naturally, politicians like Senator Mikulski (D-MD) blamed Metro officials for the problems.  Yet if one looks at things objectively they would realize many of the problems are not the fault of Metro officials, but of the politicians, who over the years, made bad public [...]

In Friday’s The Washington Post  Petula Dvorak’s column criticised the Archdiocese of Washington and Catholic Charities for opposing the gay marriage bill before the city council and that as a result many poor and needy will go without as a result.  None of this is true.  The objection of the bill was that there was no [...]

The other day The Washington Post had an article about the number of empty stores in my neighborhood of DC.  One thing I learned from the story was that there is a zoning law which says that only 25% of the store frontage in the three block area can be zoned for restaurants and bars.  I guess [...]

Yesterday while walking my dog I saw a flier which advocated people to help get the District of Columbia’s rent control laws extended from five to ten years.  I didn’t get a chance to get the website, so I not exactly sure what this involves.  All I remember was it said that over half the District’s [...]

As a resident of the District of Columbia I noticed the past few weeks an uptick in campaign style posters advocating “Statehood for DC Now.”  I guess with the election of Barack Obama and the Democratic control of Congress, proponents of statehood think they have a good chance of success.  The whole problem with this [...]

It took me about 55 minutes to vote this morning.  A rational person would say why bother (see Tyler Cowen’s comments at Marginal Revolution)?  As a Republican in the District of Columbia I was I believe one of about five residents who voted for Senator McCain.  In addition, the only other real race in the city [...]

Recently I received an memo from the higher ups where I work (Washington, DC) about the need to recycle.  It said in the coming days, city workers would stop by the offices to inspect the recycling procedures.  The reason it was a priority is we could be fined up to $1,000 if we don’t properly recycle. My [...]

I agreed with yesterday’s Supreme Court ruling which struck down the District of Columbia’s gun ban.  Opponents argue it will increase gun crimes in the city.  I doubt the crime problem can get much worse.  The reason is the current gun ban is a farce.  In last month’s edition of Washingtonian magazine, there was an [...]