Official Not So Random Thoughts Thread Version 2.2

[Dat2U]

Found out I passed my Chinese exam for the foreign service. Barring a disaster (like failing my ongoing security check), I'm pretty sure all I have to do is wait for my name to be called and I'll be getting sworn in by Hillary Clinton sometime next year!

Sadly you'll see no more unofficial posts from me on the world politics thread, although I haven't posted there recently anyway.

Congrats man!

[verbal8]

I guess coming out and logging a few minutes in the NBA qualifies one as a "basketball star" these days.

My wife reads intellectual magazines like US weekly and it assumes me how much of a scrub a guy can be and still be described as an "NBA star...".

[Scabs304]

I'm 27 I've known some of you for a decade and a half.

[willbcocks]

"Kahn Promises 'Singular' Move To Improve Wolves" <-- wiretap headline

Kahn: I know you want to be the village idiot, but singular is not the word you're looking for. Singular describes your tenure as GM.

[verbal8]

"Kahn Promises 'Singular' Move To Improve Wolves" <-- wiretap headline

Kahn: I know you want to be the village idiot, but singular is not the word you're looking for. Singular describes your tenure as GM.

From dictionary.com:

sin·gu·lar –adjective
1. extraordinary; remarkable; exceptional: a singular success.
2. unusual or strange; odd; different: singular behavior.

I think the second is a good description of Kahn's tenure as GM.

[Rafael122]

I think DC will regret electing Gray as Mayor. Just my two cents.

[Wizards2Lottery]

I think DC will regret electing Gray as Mayor. Just my two cents.

Fenty did things the way they should have been but rubbed off a lot of people in the wrong way. DC took a major step back with this.

[20MexicanosIn1Van]

I just realized John Wall is younger than me. This is the first time this is the case for incoming NBA rookies. I will be worshiping a 19 year old who is given the keys to a multi-millionaire dollar franchise. Scary.

Seraphin is a month older than I am - how is he 270 pounds and 20 years old?

[willbcocks]

For me, Lebron James was that player younger than me (by a couple years, I think). But as long as he's still an active player, I can feel young, right?

[verbal8]

For me, Lebron James was that player younger than me (by a couple years, I think). But as long as he's still an active player, I can feel young, right?

Does him acting immature help you still feel young? If so I have a feelling you will feel young for a long time.

[montestewart]

I think DC will regret electing Gray as Mayor. Just my two cents.

Fenty did things the way they should have been but rubbed off a lot of people in the wrong way. DC took a major step back with this.

As a nominal Fenty supporter (I voted for him in 2006) I would say that the thing he did best was manage the perception of his performance among his supporters. I don't know how Vincent Gray will do, but he's 67 and he won't last long. Fenty was overrated and received credit for stated intentions as well as trends that were in place prior to his arrival. Interviewed during the snowstorm this year, Fenty seemed aghast that any journalist would have the nerve to ask him when the snow would be cleared. He's testy and autocatic, and he's not irreplaceable.

Not that I would support or that he could win, but maybe Fenty could still run as a Republican or Independent. Gray may not have won just yet.

[Rafael122]

I think DC will regret electing Gray as Mayor. Just my two cents.

Fenty did things the way they should have been but rubbed off a lot of people in the wrong way. DC took a major step back with this.

As a nominal Fenty supporter (I voted for him in 2006) I would say that the thing he did best was manage the perception of his performance among his supporters. I don't know how Vincent Gray will do, but he's 67 and he won't last long. Fenty was overrated and received credit for stated intentions as well as trends that were in place prior to his arrival. Interviewed during the snowstorm this year, Fenty seemed aghast that any journalist would have the nerve to ask him when the snow would be cleared. He's testy and autocatic, and he's not irreplaceable.

Not that I would support or that he could win, but maybe Fenty could still run as a Republican or Independent. Gray may not have won just yet.

The first thing people say about him is how big of a douche he is, but no one is knocking his policies. They complain about Rhee, but she's trying to get **** down. If I were a parent with a kid in a DCPS school, hell yeah I'd want the teachers who are not performing ot be fired. That's my kids education we're talking about here.With Gray, I have no idea who he is, and he's 67 years old so he's probably one and done. Fenty said he's not going to run again, but he'll be what...43 by the time 2014 rolls around? There's still a chance.

[montestewart]

^
The schools here are truly effed, and fixing them will take stepping on toes for sure. I taught briefly in DC schools part time (not in the union or anything, so I have no allegience there) and from my perspective, the teachers were among the least of the problems, and it wasn't hard to come to that conclusion. I think many parents and kids are aware of that as well, and I think that's part of the reason why the current approach that puts teachers on the chopping block, and makes the many other problems in schools seem like an afterthought, is receiving so much flak. I hope the focus on schools continues, but it will take many years to turn it around, and possibly requires more diplomacy (and I don't mean comprimise) than Fenty and Rhee possess.

[Rafael122]

Born and raised in DC, went to private schools all my life. So I'm happy that my parents didn't put me in the public school system. I have no idea where I'd be today.

I could go on a rant about how this election was based on race, but I'm not. I just think it's BS that the voters "punished" a guy who, along with Tony Williams, have been responsible for so much urban development.

[montestewart]

^
If there's one thing that Mayor Barry taught DC, it's that in this town, personality goes a long way. I liked a lot of the things that Williams and Fenty did, but I'm not surprised at the backlash. Maybe the next reform-minded mayor will be able to navigate those waters better.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

monte, word on the street was out about Mayor Barry using drugs at least a year before the sting in which he got busted. (Allegedly) he had a girlfriend who told a lot of people about the two of them getting high together. Those people repeated what they heard to folks like myself. Nobody came forward to implicate Barry before the sting, but I knew and so did a lot of others. (I even told people I was in the service with back in Nebraska about the DC mayor on drugs and they didn't believe me.) Barry got really reckless with his behavior.

When Barry said "Catch me if you can" it didn't surprise me at all later on when he did get caught!

monte, you are on point that popularity goes a long way. Even after being caught on film, commiting adultery and doing cocaine, Mayor Barry got reelected.

We should all have such loyal friends as Barry's constituents that stuck by him. We should all be so popular.

[montestewart]

^
CCJ, word on the street was that Mayor Barry snorted coke openly off tabletops at This Is It and others strip clubs on 14th Street for many, many years before he was "stung." He was arrested just a block from my house (I had nothing to do with that) and in the year previous, he was connected in print with a variety of drug, sex, and other generally sordid scenarios just in that immediate neighborhood. I saw him at a public event in the mid-80s...really high. His was a delusional recklessness that assumed some level of immunity beyond the electorate, but he surely could have been arrested long before he finally was, had federal authorities wanted to do so. My theory is that the federal government thought Barry as mayor was the best way to deny statehood. Still, the few times I saw him in person, even when he was high, he oozed charisma.

Where to find a mayor that's both reform minded, forward looking, unafraid to step on a few toes, but still possessing the charm, diplomacy, and communication skills to work with warring interests, sell a vision to the public, remain popular (and maybe get statehood)? I don't see much on the horizon.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

You knew way more than I did.

I remember those strip clubs on 14th street and women being out on every back corner on a Saturday night. Cruising around 14th and T on a Saturday night was what my PG county friends and I did back around 1978-1979. monte I just remember hos, hos, and more hos. In the clubs ... on the street ... everywhere, man.

For a charismatic, powerful dude like Mayor Barry, there was just all kinds of temptation back in the day. Also, the early 80s was when coke wasn't crack--not yet. It was more of a glamour drug of the rich and famous then. The mayor was freebasing IIRC from the sting bust vid and snorting his drug of choice.

Like you, monte, I avoided that altogether.

[Zerocious]

In other news.....i am still alive!

going 10-8 tonight in J1 beat in Oxon Hill!

Thanks for all the support, encouraging words, cards and visits!






















yeah right.......

[montestewart]

In other news.....i am still alive!

going 10-8 tonight in J1 beat in Oxon Hill!

Thanks for all the support, encouraging words, cards and visits!






















yeah right.......

Make sure to get the bad guys rather than the other way around.