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Photo of the Day: November 27, 2009
On Tuesday, the Post's D.C. Wire blog reported that Ward 1 D.C. Council member Jim Graham's proposal to name the recently renovated park at 14th and Girard Streets NW "Barack Hussein Obama Park," wasn't allowed under D.C. law, which prohibits the city from naming things after people who are still alive. Not so, according to Graham. He wrote in an email to constituents today:
While the Washington Post accurately quoted law, it did not accurately state the legal situation. For years, the Council has been naming "public spaces" after living persons. The Council in the last year "renamed" roadways to honor Kathy Hughes and Chuck Brown. One of my first acts as a Councilmember in 1999 was to successfully sponsor a bill naming the alley next to Ben's Chili Bowl "Ben Ali Way" to honor the restaurant's founders. All these folks are happily still with us! There are other examples.
This is possible due to an interpretation by our legal counsel that each time the Council acts in this fashion it is implicitly creating an exception to the law that the Council, itself, passed.
Having sponsored these prior measures, I was and am aware of the legal approach.
It's fascinating to learn that such a legal interpretation exists which allows the Council to contradict any law it itself passes whenever it wants! The implications would presumably far-reaching, wouldn't they? Perhaps a new slogan is in order: D.C. government: We do whatever the heck we feel like™.
UPDATE: Also read this great stuff from Gary Imhoff in themail:
The bill doesn’t really rename the park; instead, it “symbolically designates” it as Obama Park. It’s not a new name; it’s a nickname, a play name, a pretend name. Obama will be honored, I’m sure. But that’s not the punch line. I wrote about the park that it was difficult to see where the $1.6 million was spent, and that “we’ll never find out how the city managed to spend so much money to so little effect.” On Monday morning, the future Obama Park failed city inspections. It was closed to redo a substantial amount of the work that has been done; it’s expected to be closed for several weeks.
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This is fully within Council precedent. The Council has long exempted itself from laws related to parking, conflict of interest, sodomy, cannibalism, and the interstate traffic of campaign contributors for immoral purposes.
If that slogan is good enough for District residents, why not the Council?
Um, you do realize that this is the way every legislative body works, right? It wouldn't exactly be democracy if elected representatives couldn't overrule previously passed laws by the same body. Otherwise, we'd still be living with Jim Crow laws and under the gold standard.
But they're not drafting a new law (and overruling is a strange way to frame it), they're just ignoring laws on an ad hoc basis.
Ok Mr. Graham, so let me get this straight, it's not a Council that thinks it has the ability to disregard any rule it makes that we should fear, it's the Jumbo Slice? Riiight.
Given Jim Graham's penchant for tacking-on names to Metro stations, I christen thee "DC Voting Rights/Jumbo Slice®/Super Magical Black POTUS Symbolically Redesignated Dog Park/Vodka Bottle Recycling Station/Homeless Latrine/Chicken Bone Deposit Greenspace."
So Graham's argument is basically "we've done it before and gotten away with it."?
I have an alternative suggestion for the renaming of Girard Street Park that doesn't go against code and goes along with Graham's sentiment: http://wordsofwitte.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/whats-in-a-name-anyway-hope/I have an alternative suggestion for the renaming of Girard Street Park: http://wordsofwitte.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/whats-in-a-name-anyway-hope/
I have an alternative suggestion for the renaming of Girard Street Park that doesn't go against code and goes along with Graham's sentiment: http://wordsofwitte.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/whats-in-a-name-anyway-hope/
Ooooh, I love "symbolically redesignates." Kinda like how older residents call it "Malcolm X Park" but new transplants call it "Meridian Hill Park." Some of us will always remember it as "On the Down-Low Late Night Sodomy and Junkie Park." I can still smell the loveboat and feel the squish of used condoms under my Chucks. It was a simpler time; when men were men and women didn't shave down there.Good times.
I'm not sure that Obama would want to be associated with a park with which biggest changes included the cutting down a bunch of old trees, and that it's now fenced off most of the time.
Where are NewHCE and Martin? YOU KNOW WHAT THIS SMELLS LIKE, RIGHT?
GUNS GUNS GUNS!
Too obvious. At some point, beating up on the Council is like making fun of a retarded Monkey
Oh yeah, Medo and gun rights lawyer Alan Gura are on the Kwame show at 12:25 today on WAMU. Hope they are taking call in questions.
They shouldn't name it after him until he stops being a pussy about putting the Taxation plates on his limo.
He should just put temporary DC plates on the limo. Nobody pays any attention to those.
My suggestion is to name it MICHELLE Obama Park.
Given his long history of Congressional advocacy, they should name it Tongsun Park.
Molly's Park.
Don't you people have jobs?
I'm still waiting approval for the work release program. So no. I don't have a job right now.
No. We're the idle rich. Everyone here was an initial investor in Cash4Gold. We all live in a commune on the Isle of Man and spend our days sipping arnold palmers, grooming sheep, and commenting on internet websites. It's a nice life.
Jobs! We don't need no stinking jobs! Oh work...i thought you meant Steve Jobs.
Is Graham catholic? He sounds like a jesuit arguing for the infallibility of the Pope. He's infallible because he's the Pope, god's representative on Earth, because he says so, and he can't be wrong because he's the Pope, God's representative on Earth.
Congress regularly uses a similar "single exception" legislative procedure to approve the building of another museum or memorial on the National Mall, even though there's existing Federal law that prohibits such.
See the "National Coalition to Save Our Mall" website for more information: http://www.savethemall.org
Kiss kiss-- hey Grahm stop sucking up!
This is just silly! I support our President and he's by far the best we've had in a looooong time!
-BUT-
Come on people, since when do we start honoring people in their prime? If we'd done that, who knows how many "George H. W. Bush Jr" schools and parks we'd be stuck with... Naming something after someone who is a) still alive, b) less than a year into his first term of office, and c) still young enough to screw up and leave a sour legacy behind him; is just crazy!
When he's done with his two terms, and he's setup a nice little legacy of change and leadership and placed himself in history, then start naming the parks and schools... I think it's foolish to stroke someone's ego by memorializing them while they're around to see it... that's asking for trouble!
Hey I know a pothole in SE filled with crack and hos they can name after Marion Barry.
just sent to the Columbia Heights email list ( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/columbia_heights/messages )
Failed inspections or time to fix the shoddy work which is normal for all DC projects.
6 of one, half dozen of the other.
Obamaland Park's rides are not open yet. You must be THIS tall to ride.
I think naming a park after President Obama is great. I just wish we'd use his name for a nicer park.
A park with a nickname which has almost displaced its official name is not new in DC. Friendship Park at Friendship Recreation Center near AU is always known as Turtle Park. On paper it's Friendship "Turtle" Park or Friendship Park aka Turtle Park. It's Girard aka Obama Park as soon as enough people start to refer to it that way.
It's no surprise that Graham, retard extraordinaire, disregards laws he doesn't feel like following.
I hate politicians, but I really hate DC politicians.
"Well, when the president does it that means that it is not illegal."