Weekly Columnist Roundup: Goodbye, RFK
Harry Jaffe: In writing something of a goodbye column to RFK Stadium, Jaffe recounts the many struggles the District overcame to attract a baseball team. And though plenty of people played important roles, he feels that one deserves extra attention -- former Mayor Anthony Williams. "The hero of the piece has to be Williams, an unpopular mayor who — despite his wandering attention span — kept swinging away at an unpopular crusade to use public funds for the new ballpark. Williams should get a permanent seat, if not a section in his name," he writes of the new stadium.
Marc Fisher: So, is it flip-flopping or merely a political compromise? That's the question Fisher asks about Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, whose recent comments on both slot machine gambling and gay marriage differ significantly from past pronouncements. "Bottom line: Words matter, especially for a politician who's built his career on his ability to inspire," writes Fisher. "'Believe,' said the billboards Mayor O'Malley erected in Baltimore to instill hope in a dying city. It'd be a shame if voters watching Gov. O'Malley had to conclude that they just don't know what to believe."
Jonetta Rose Barras: In the second of her columns relating a visit to New Orleans, Rose Barras argues that the struggling city can learn a thing or two from the District. "Think seventh Street NW before Douglas Jemal helped initiate its transformation. New Orleans is similar to the District in the early 1990s: the business community suffered an incompetent government that faced a nearly $1 billion shortfall," she writes. "President Bill Clinton and Congress rescued D.C., taking over select state functions while creating a control board to oversee daily operations. Is this the recovery model for New Orleans?" As long as they don't follow our lead on public schools, why the heck not?
Tom Knott: Knott's column takes a turn for the reasonable this week as he makes a point many elected officials are all to aware off -- unless you fix the schools, you'll spend plenty of time and resources fighting crime and other social ills. Of course, it wouldn't be Tom Knott unless there was a least one quixotic claim thrown in the mix. "Somewhere along the way, America's intellectuals and loony-left element decided that women raising children on their own was not such a bad thing. In fact, maybe it was a good thing, men being almost unnecessary and certainly barbaric, as Sally Field would attest," he claims. "Men have gladly gone along with the new social order, eschewing their parental role while moving on to other feminine charms. Too many women are no longer the civilizing force of men."
Loose Lips: This week LL finds that even the most obscure of political appointments in the District can be derailed by the D.C. Council, and that Mayor Adrian Fenty might have lost the PR battle over the shooting death of DeOnté Rawlings.