Proud to be a Washingtonian

If you live in New York, you have stories that are quintessentially New York. I don't really know what these stories are made of because I have never spent more than a few days in New York in my life. But, a place that I have spent a lot of time is my hometown of Washington, D.C. While the rest of you think that the city is Neoclassical revival lowrises, stuffy white guys in suits, brown-nosing kids who work for a little more than minimum wage, and free museums, you'd be only 10% right. You'd be forgetting about the violence, the gentrification, the drugs, and the governmental oversight. Unless you've lived it, it's nothing to really be proud of.

But, I did and I am. I like violent, crazy D.C. way more than safe, sanitized D.C. and I think that a lot of the old school Washingtonians might agree with me. I mean, I like not getting shot, but I do miss the character that all that murder brought. The carryouts were better when the city was violent. Anyway, this weekend at the yearly Unifest in SE, a quintessentially D.C. thing happened. A woman drove through the festival, harming 40 people, but that's not the best part of this story. The woman's car eventually stopped and people pulled her out of the car and proceeded to beat the crap out her. But, this is not what makes this quintessentially D.C. This whole event happened, and here's why it's D.C., because the woman was extraordinarily, stupidly high on CRACK! Yes, that's right! A woman in D.C. causes havoc because she's high on crack. From a city that was run and is still represented by a crackhead (Marion Barry, proud city councilman for Ward 8.), this is a story that could only happen in D.C. and reminds me of why I love the city because it's certainly not because of the government and the ivy leaguers who aren't people that I went to high school with.

I Need To Drink Less Soda Anyway

The United States has placed sanctions against the Sudanese government while the mass killings continue on in the state of Darfur. Dana Milbank reports on the Sudanese response to these sanctions. It is honestly one of the stranger responses that I have ever read about. It is strongly disconnected from reality, hilariously off-base, and he makes one of the strangest threats of all time: to cut off exports of gum arabic.

Gum arabic is the emulsifier used in making soft drinks. 80% of this comes from the country of Sudan. So, the minister was suggesting that if the sanctions are not lifted against the Sudan, the country would respond by working to cripple the global soda industry and blame its downfall on the actions of the United States. That's really fucking bold. Almost as bold as the best diplomatic policy of all time: brinkmanship. Days like this make me want to go take the foreign service exam so I could get into diplomacy with the State Dept.