Photo by yospyn

Good morning, Washington. Well, it’s two days after the now infamous Thundersnowtrafficpocolypse, and predictably every one has an opinion on why things went as wrong as they did. The Post’s editorial board blames local jurisdictions for not properly communicating with each other, while the Examiner’s Harry Jaffe gives local governments relatively high grades (D.C. gets an A-, Virginia a B+ and Maryland a C) and points at area drivers for the majority of the blame. He even proposes — completely implausibly — that every car in the region should have all-wheel drive. Post reporters do a good job narrowing things down a little, and they seem to point the finger directly at the federal government for its decision to let workers go at 3 p.m. Of course, local electricity companies shouldn’t be left off the hook in this circle of shame; thousands of local residents will likely remain without power through today. (Just for the record, I’m not going to join the chorus of finger-pointers for what happened on Wednesday, but I will preemptively start assigning blame for what might happen today. Cyclists, salmon, Al Qaeda, and myopic little twits — this one is on you.)

Gray Gets Twitter…Kind Of: Yesterday Mayor Vince Gray, who effectively used social media during his 2010 campaign, showed up on Twitter. OK, that’s not really him. But it’s still hilarious. Mayor Adrian Fenty also had a humorous fake Twitter account, making us wonder — how long until a fake Marion Barry shows up on the social network?

Furlough Days for D.C. Workers Announced: In the midst of all the snow hysteria, Mayor Gray announced four mandatory furlough days for D.C. workers — President’s Day, Emancipation Day, Memorial Day, and Independence Day. The furloughs were part of a plan hatched late last year to close a $188 million budget gap; by keeping the workers home for those four days, the city will save $19 million.

Republicans Gained Because President Obama is Black: Or so says Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA) in an interview this week, opining that his party had lost the House because “a lot of people in this country, I believe, don’t want to be governed by an African-American.” Moran has long been known to ignore that common filter most of us have built into our brains; feel free to agree or disagree with him in the comments.

Virginia Wants Tougher Death Penalty: There was a time when Virginia was the second-most killingy state in the union, trailing only Texas in the number of people put to death. Now it seems to want to keep, or possibly improve upon that distinction. WTOP reports that a Virginia Republican wants to expand the scope of the state’s death penalty statute so that it applies to co-conspirators of certain crimes. Opponents point out that if the death penalty were open to more crimes, more innocent people would be likely to be executed.

Briefly Noted: Gray met with Boehner, but no one knows what they spoke about … Man who stabbed snowball-thrower arrested … Seven PG County schools closed because they have no power.

This Day in DCist: Well, this is timely. Back in 2009, President Obama basically called us a bunch of wusses for how we handle winter weather. Also, the Post closed its print version of Book World. In 2008, we found more disturbing stories of youth deaths in the District.