Thanks to Ken Cuccinelli and Rush Limbaugh, there are a lot of people out there who seem to be convinced that D.C. is smuggling its rats into Virginia. more ›

While you're busy wondering about Attorney General Peter Nickles's political future, don't forget our city's other least trustworthy public servant! Reviving the local story that rocked early July, the Washington Post has obtained a bunch of old emails from the office of Ward 8 D.C. Council member Marion Barry, which show that Barry and his staff complained about the quality of the work his ex-girlfriend, Donna Watts-Brighthaupt, was doing for them at the time.

Barry's complaints included Watts-Brighthaupt's spelling, grammar, tendency to fall behind schedule and failure to be available during business hours. The e-mails appear to confirm that Barry and Watts-Brighthaupt traveled together to Las Vegas and Memphis. Although the city paid for Barry's airfare, the government did not foot the bill for Watts-Brighthaupt and did not pay for a $736 spa visit at the Paris hotel during their May trip to Las Vegas, travel records show.

D.C. Wire has a fantastic tidbit from a series of internal Office of Tax and Revenue emails between District CFO Natwar Gandhi and embezzler of $50 million Harriette Walters. The emails, written in April of 2007, about seven months before the scandal broke, came about after Gandhi sent out an announcement to his employees letting them know that had decided not to accept an offer to become Amtrak’s CFO. Walters replied to Gandhi's staff-wide email with a brown-nosing note full of bad grammar: “Sir, I would like to say thank you for keeping us inform [sic] of a decision that would have impacted the employees within the CFO Cluster. I appreciate that you respected us to provide follow up to the recent news reports that we read and heard over the pat [sic] week. Thank You!” Gandhi then wrote back to Walters: “Thank you. Keep up the good work.” more ›

The Examiner's Bill Myers managed to get a hold of a bunch of internal MPD emails concerning last summer's controversial "Neighborhood Safety Zone" checkpoints in Trinidad, and the resulting story paints a chaotic picture of disagreement and confusion over the tactic within the department. A series of emails written by Assistant Chief Diane Groomes complained that the additional officers sent to staff the Trinidad checkpoint had left areas of the city under-protected. You can download the emails here (PDF). more ›