Potomac Confidential

Marc Fisher (The Washington Post)

Potomac Confidential fills the midday lull with discussion of the latest news and a rigorous slicing and dicing of the issues that define who we are and where we live.

In his weekly show, Washington Post Metro columnist Marc Fisher veers wildly from serious probing to silly prattle, and is open to topics local, national, personal and more.

This Week's Columns:

Not Just Police Traffic in the Numbers Game (Aug. 12)

Too Many PC Cooks Spoil da Soup (Aug. 10)

A transcript follows.

Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.

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Marc Fisher: Welcome aboard, folks. There's a storm coming, and the usual hysteria is with us. There was storm aplenty over Tuesday's column, on Washington restaurateur Gillian Clark's decision to name her new foodstuffs retail shop "da Sto," as in "I'm going to da sto." Today's column defends--sort of--the decision by Falls Church police to make officers there fulfill a three-ticket a day quota, and I'm eager to hear you out on that. We'll get into all that during this hour, and some of you are keen to talk about Peter Whoriskey's fine three-part series on sprawl that appeared in the Post earlier this week. Plus the usual array of the wild and the wacky.
But first, the Yay and Nay of the Day:
Yay to the District school board for ending, at long last, our municipal nightmare by picking a new superintendent, Clifford Janey, formerly of the Rochester, NY schools. Janey's is a mixed past--he won credit in New York for improving test scores and reforming high schools, but he was driven out of town after a colossal fiscal blunder that raises serious questions about what he might accomplish here. Sadly, the D.C. board was simply unwilling to step outside its long and dreary pattern of picking from the standard and unimpressive list of urban superintendents who roam the nation from school system to school system. Can Janey make a difference here? Of course he can--if he's willing to take on the permanent bureaucracy and break some china.
Nay to the tired old storm hysteria. Stop the Weathermen! What we need in this town is not more science, but more entertaining weathercasters. They are supposed to provide comic relief from the news of the day, not be the earnest, eager, geeky folks our local stations favor. Give us a Lloyd Lindsay Young, the truly strange fellow who handled the weather for years in Salt Lake City and then New York City and now in Sacramento. Give us someone in the grand TV news tradition of Jim O'Brien of Philadelphia or his copycat, one David Letterman, now of late night fame. Hail to the weather clowns!
And now on with the show....

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Reston, Va.: I really didn't understand your column today at all. Are the ticket quotas good or bad? Did you talk to anyone other than one city councilman? It seems ridiculous that a tiny city, which probably only has about two dozen officers, claims it needs to monitor its few officers' production by setting artificial goals. Enforcement is one thing: giving out four tickets in one stop is just wrong.

Marc Fisher: I don't mind the ticket quotas if they're set at a reasonable level, if they're flexible, and if they get cops out on the street doing what they're supposed to do. But as several people in Falls Church pointed out to me, the fact that the quotas became a flap shows that there is a deeper problem in that police department: A department that sets goals for its officers is just like any other; a department where the numerical quotas become a labor-management issue is one that has failed to get its officers on board with its program. That's the problem, more than the quotas themselves.

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Washington, D.C.: Are you really okay with your garbage men's extortion, or were you being sarcastic? I wish mine would cut me a similar deal, but I'm afraid there will be a crackdown now that you've outed yours.

Marc Fisher: I have no problem with the deal the garbageman cut me--he's willing to take more garbage than the official rules might permit, and in exchange for that extracurricular work, he expects me to reward or compensate him. You can call it graft or extortion, but I call it public service in the grand municipal tradition of patronage and back scratching.

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Washington, D.C.: Don't you mean "And now on wit da sho?"

Marc Fisher: Exactly. Speaking of which....

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Don Rockwell: Hello Marc,

This is Don Rockwell (aka "DonRocks"), forum host at www.eGullet.com, writing you regarding the August 10th article about Gillian Clark. Too Many PC Cooks Spoil da Soup (Post, Aug. 10) Since I'm the original instigator of all this, I should probably chime in.

I want to say that you captured the essence of what occurred very accurately, and that you also did a good job representing both sides -- correctly pointing out that some of the posters on the "daSto" thread were (in my opinion) unreasonably attacking Gillian, but balancing that by mentioning a post that likened what she was doing to Bill Cosby.

It was a good article, a fair article, and I also hope you've noticed that it has a happy ending: in another thread, Gillian has agreed to open Colorado Kitchen for the eGullet crowd on an evening when her restaurant is usually closed, for a private dinner. This is proving in advance to be wildly successful, and there will be a waiting list to sign up for it (gotta give the eGullet posters credit for listening to reason).

I like Gillian and Robin very much, and they deserve whatever success they earn. Personally, I will continue to do my small part in supporting what I see to be an important addition to the D.C. culinary scene.

Kind regards,
Don Rockwell

Forum Host
DC & DelMarVa Forum
www.eGullet.com

Marc Fisher: Thanks, Don--Those who can't get enough of da storm over da Sto can read the whole megillah at egullet.com on the fine DC/DelMarVa message board that DonRocks edits.

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Arlington, Va.: By the way, "Da sto" means "yes one hundred" in Russian. If anyone should be offended it would be the Russian-American community for this nonsensical, commercial ploy.

Marc Fisher: Right! Da Sto will carry one hundred items. Or maybe the name is the faux-Swedish that those Jewish guys from the Bronx used when they started up Haagen Dazs, and da Sto will carry bits of Scandinavian design. Whatever.
Speaking of silly racial stories that are Only in Washington specials, here's another one....

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washingtonpost.com: The Daily Gullet

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Silver Spring, Md.: I was shocked at the flyer passed out by those opposing the Korean T-shirt manufacturer (Tempest in A T-Shirt ) (Post, Aug. 10) The exaggerated racial caricatures reminded me of cartoons of African-Americans, with wide lips, etc., so popular decades ago, drawings of Japanese seen here during World War II, or caricatures of Jews seen in the German press of the 1930s. The story didn't touch on racial stereotypes. The black entrepreneurs have some valid points about survival of small businesses, but resorting to racism (remember Germans blaming Jews for taking away their businesses?), is shameful. If anyone's taking advantage of the local population, it's all of the people who have convinced people without much money that they need to buy overpriced apparel in order to be hip. A follow-up story is called for.

Marc Fisher: The Style story in question was about another case of backlash against Korean merchants in a black part of town--in this case, blacks in Prince George's County protesting against a Korean-American guy who runs a t-shirt company that specializes in designs and themes of particular interest to young black customers. It's another unfortunate case of resentments and jealousies being expressed in the form of bigotry rather than the right response, which would be to take up the challenge of competition and beat Mr. Kang at his own biz.

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Arlington, Va.: What's the latest on the Expos? I heard that MLB met with the NoVa group last week but now apparently there is some balking in Richmond on the proposed funding for a Dulles stadium?

Marc Fisher: It's all tea-leaf reading right now. There's clearly movement on the part of Major League Baseball--they've been meeting with officials here and elsewhere and they're getting ready to do something, reportedly next month. There was a fascinating turnabout in yesterday's New York Times, where baseball columnist Murray Chass, who only a couple of weeks earlier declared the Washington and Virginia bids to be dead dead dead, now reports that we're the presumptive winner of the Expos sweepstakes, but for the lingering and large hurdle posed by Peter Angelos, the Orioles owner.
Chass is clearly hearing that we are still very much in the game and he felt the need to get himself on the record reflecting our strong chance of success. But the outlines of a deal remain very hazy--obviously Angelos is playing for advantage, both in the money he gets upfront and in some share of the TV revenue from the Washington or Virginia team. This story calls for a squadron of reporters in various cities.

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Washington, D.C.: Marc-

Why haven't local baseball officials begun organizing season ticket drives to exhibit interest in a team? I'd certainly plunk down a $100 if asked just to get my name on a list. I don't understand some of the moves (or lack thereof) made by these officials.

Marc Fisher: It's utterly mystifying. You'd think that the DC and Virginia groups would be going into overdrive to show the depth of support among fans here, yet all we get is silence. Downright bizarre.

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Washington, D.C.: Don't you think that unless MLB promised that D.C. wasn't getting the Expos, the Virginia congressional delegation, including its senators, would have introduced legislation prohibiting the District from using public funds to pay for a new stadium?

Marc Fisher: Man, you are a cynical bunch. I join you in suspecting Congress of every evil intent when it comes to the District, but that one's a bit too far even for me, mainly because there are plenty of folks in Congress who would like to see baseball here, but also because lots of congressfolk come from places that have been jerked around by MLB and so they are not keen to cut deals with Selig and Company.

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15th and L Sts., NW, Washington, D.C.: Hey Marc, what did you think of Roxanne Roberts' piece about breast feeding in Starbucks? (Do Me a Favor, Keep a Lid on Your Double Latte ) (Post, Aug. 11) I say Amen, sister! Keep it covered!

Marc Fisher: I'm with my friend Rox, though perhaps not quite as strongly as she put it in her fine rant in yesterday's Style section. Our daughter spent her nursing years in Europe, where letting it all hang out is the standard. So I have no objection to public breast feeding, but I agree with Rox that a bit of discretion is part of the price we pay for living together in a community, and a nice soft cotton cover is something that makes breast feeding a happy time for all involved.
But I don't get why nursing mothers are in Starbucks in the first place--caffeine isn't exactly the recommended diet for nursing babes.

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Takoma Park, Md.: I agree with you to bring back the funny weatherman! I remember growing up in St. Paul, Minn., where we had Barry Zevan the weatherman. I thought he was hilarious and was even a member of his fan club. Granted I was ten years old -- this was the late 60s, early 70s! I keep wondering what he is up to these days.

Marc Fisher: Thanks--a quick search indicates the weatherman of your dreams is reviewing movies online and doing some narration work.

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HHHHeeellllllllllllllllllloooooo!: Yeah, I miss Lloyd Lindsay Young as well. He was great entertainment every evening after Mets games.

Marc Fisher: Hellllloooooooooooooooooooooo Secaucus, or whatever little burg he summoned that evening! That was the great LLY's sign-on.
The last true weather wacko we had in DC was Michelle Leigh, who spent a bizarre couple of years at NewsChannel8 and is now the weather lady on a station in Chicago--see www.michelle-leigh.com

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Arlington, Va.: Marc, thank you for your column today. I'll take the quotas any day -- there are so many traffic abuses around that one could write thirty tickets, never mind three. To paraphrase John Edwards, where is it proper to discuss the plague of "lazy police" infesting our society: everywhere, everywhere, EVERYWHERE!

Marc Fisher: Why, you can discuss it right here!

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Rockville, Md.: I don't like quotas but I especially don't like them where all tickets and arrests are equal. For instance, it's much easier for an officer to hide by a stop sign and catch drivers who don't come to complete stops than it is to look for agressive drivers or bank robbers. They're all illegal but they're of different levels of importance and require different levels of effort. Yet an officer gets 1 point no matter how much effort he puts in or how much safer he makes the city.

Marc Fisher: Exactly--if departments can't think of any more creative way to motivate officers other than numbers on a board, then at least they could specify that the cops have to go after violations that indicate road rage or other such dangerous behavior, rather than technical violations like rolling stops.

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washingtonpost.com: Michelle Leigh.com

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Washington, D.C.: Marc-
Again you come so close only to fall prey to your contrarian nature. Alas, are quotas wrong for departments? Sure, the Supreme Court has already said so. Should officers focus on traffic concerns? Sure. But if you had been pulled over you would be decrying the practice, and if someone had carved a racial slur onto the hood of your car or stolen money out of your console you would be complaining of wasted resources.
As for "Da Sto", hasn't anyone figured it out yet? Ostensibly, yes, it can be used as tongue in cheek, but be very, very wary. "Ebonics" is not about empowerment. Its about classist white society labeling the African-American community too stupid, ignorant, or unteachable to learn and speak the same language. Thye humor may be a dangerous joke.
As always, I will continue to read and chat. We may not agree, but you still have one of the best columns in the Rag! Thanks for your time!

Marc Fisher: Ah, but any reading of the police blotter shows that it's not an either/or game here--pulling drivers over for real violations is a common and extremely useful gateway for picking up wanted felons, finding drug dealers and all sorts of other useful police work. Luckily, it seems that the same people who routinely violate traffic laws have a habit of committing more serious crimes as well.
I don't agree that there is such a thing as a dangerous joke (I don't even buy the notion that joking about security in the airport is any of the security officers' business). Jokes are a window on our true anxieties and beliefs, and to suppress them is to pretend that we don't have the divisions and dislikes that we really do have. Jokes can be a great way to get at what really pulls us apart, and only then can we have a real conversation about those issues. But thanks for the kind comments about the column.

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Wheaton, Md.: Today's column on traffic safety was spot-on. Earlier this week the "Post" had an article on teenagers who had a lot of accidents while driving. Certainly a serious subject. However, the headline and photos gave the piece a rather frivolous tone. One photo showed two of the girls discussed in the topic smiling and leaning against their cars, looking like underaged models at a car show. I can imagine them showing these really cool photos to their friends at school, perhaps without serious comments on the dangers of driving recklessly. The article did, I thought, downplay the impact on the public at large of reckless drivers, ranging from personal injury to higher insurance rates. I hope the photographer sticks to "lighter" topics for a while.

Marc Fisher: I thought the piece was pretty serious myself, but my question is how can people afford the insurance for these teen drivers? Paying insurance for a teenager in my house to drive would be about item #643 on my spending list.

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Summer in the City: For deeply moving insight into -- among other things -- the black-Korean enterprise conflict, rent Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing". Also great poignant scenes in the old Italian pizzaria on the block. The phrase, "Why ain't you got no brothers on the wall?", uttered by Lee's character re the pizzaria's gallery of Sinatra and similar Italians, has become a watchword of hubby and mine, e.g., the gallery of board members at our corporations ..."why ain't they got no brothers on the wall?!"

Marc Fisher: Yes, that's one of Lee's best, and he captures that tension with a lot of power. He seems to have lost his way in the more recent work.

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Maryland: Of course, on the flip side, Washington, D.C. area independent dry cleaners, mostly Korean, have worked pretty hard to try to get Dry Clean Depot banned saying THAT competition was unfair. You see it on both sides. Hope they all remember that free trade and commerce is for EVERYONE.

Marc Fisher: Exactly--and I've heard next to zero support for the Korean dry cleaners. Dry Clean Depot seems to have won that battle, though the Korean cleaners still seek to use local governments to save themselves from competition. Speaking of which....

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Washington, D.C.: Hi Marc, Please help me understand why D.C. is brining Wal-Mart to the lot on Rhode Island Avenue near the Giant and Home Depot? This is an outrage!

Marc Fisher: Why is that an outrage? Why shouldn't Wal Mart be able to build a store in the District? I'm no fan of Wal Mart's impact on small towns or the countryside, but it's not as if the District has a healthy small business sector that would suffer from Wal Mart's presence. People who live in the city have to travel great distances to Maryland or Virginia to find the basics that suburbanites take for granted--hardware stores, clothing shops, etc. I can't believe I'm defending Wal Mart, but I'd welcome any retail that moves into the city.

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Alexandria, Va: So the homeowners won their appeal and can now do the garage makeover -- good for them. Do you know if they happened to think to apologize for playing the race card when they were originally turned down? That kind of kneejerk reaction turns a lot of people off and makes it more difficult to draw attention to instances of genuine discrimination.

Marc Fisher: I wasn't terribly impressed when the couple accused the homeowners association of ruling against them because Mr. de la Barra is Hispanic, but there may have been a morsel of truth to the idea that the association was less inclined to help out a family that lived in one of the development's "affordable" units. But I've not heard either side in that battle return to the class/race issue. Things seem fairly well resolved now.

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Fairfax, Va.: In many places, homeowners associations can be good and bad, but in Florida, where I'm from, they're almost universally awful. A bunch of retired old people with nothing to do, many of whom have been business owners or high-ranking military or some such, all deciding they need to be boss and that people should naturally do what they say. There was one case in my hometown where someone in a condo wanted to hang an American flag for the 4th of July, but his downstairs neighbor took the matter up with the condo board, which told the offending flag-displayer he had to take the flag down because it was visible from his downstairs neighbor's porch, and was "interfering" with the view.

Marc Fisher: Amazingly, flag battles are a mainstay in the homeowners association wars. True enough, far too many HOAs are run by people with way too much time on their hands, and quite a number are dominated by a class of folks whom we should really think about subjecting to very limited civil rights--retired lawyers.

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Washington, D.C.: Hey Marc,

I grew up in Falls Church and worked for them for a few years while in grad school. The entire city govt. has gone to pay for performance but for most offices that means quotas or a number of some sort to determine your raise.

I didn't have a problem with setting standards -- I thought that was a good thing. The problem was for us (and I wasn't with the police dept.) they were so inflexible that nothing else matters. Also the number of people who could get a certain pay raise was fixed as well -- so if you could have only two people getting the top raise, and three people did great work it didn't matter -- only two people got the top amount. I was told my last year there I wasn't getting the raise I deserved because they knew I was leaving soon and didn't want to waste it when there were so many others just as deserving (a move I completely agreed with because I wanted my coworkers to benefit).

The city is small and the residents are rightfuly demanding -- they pay huge taxes and want great service -- but the inflexible number system means that cops or other public servants are going to start focusing on numbers more than service. Its a bad, bad cycle they're in. Hopefully they'll be able to get out.

Honestly -- crime is low -- the cops should be most concerned with making sure that crime stays low, first and speeding/traffic tickets second. But they have to write their tickets (which has always been that way) because otherwise the city can't balance their budget - its just bad.

Marc Fisher: Thanks for that insider view. If you look hard enough, you'll find evidence of numerical quotas in almost any business, so the real issue is how managers apply those quotas--how fairly, how flexibly--and how successful they are at persuading workers that it's the quality of their work, rather than the number of flanges processed, that really matters.

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Alexandria, Va.: I wholeheartedly agree with the breast-feeding rant in the Post the other day, too. My entire problem with the, eh, "lactators' protest" at Starbucks was that they did it en masse -- one woman breastfeeding, I can avoid. But dozens? To where, pray tell, should I avert my eyes if there are bare breasts at every turn? This is not a way to engender support for their cause.

Marc Fisher: Mass breast feed-ins are apparently the fashionable form of protest against any establishment that dares to set some rules. I don't really know whether the Starbucks folks were in the right--generally, when these things get out of hand, it's fair to say that someone overreacted. There are always quiet, discreet ways to handle problems rather than tossing people out of the store. But managers of a public place should have the right to tell folks, you know, we have a certain standard of behavior here and we'd like you to follow it. A restaurant or theater has a right to set a dress code, and this is no different, as long as the woman's right to feed her baby is protected.

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Maryland: The nursing mother at Starbucks lost me when she refused to use a small blanket to cover herself. Public nursing is not shameful, but you still shouldn't "let it all hang out" if you are in public.

Another case of "my rights trump yours" from that lady.

Marc Fisher: Right...

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Arlington, Va.: I don't know how Starbucks makes money by allowing people to buy some coffee, plug in their computers, and hang around all day. I remember when the S and W cafeteria downtown closed in the early sixties and the excuse was all of those retired old ladies bought a cup of coffee and, with the aid of free refills, hung around all day and created little turnover.

Marc Fisher: I haven't seen their research, of course, but I'd be willing to bet that it shows that having those folks hang out all day is far more of a magnet than a turnoff for potential customers. The whole "third space" idea rests on the notion that there is some community in having a place where people go to hang out, do some work, perhaps even speak to a stranger, and so I wouldn't be shocked if Starbucks even pays some people to sit there and tap away at their laptop all afternoon, just to prime the pump. But apparently not the breast pump.

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United Kingdom: Hey, Marc -- Europe is a big place, and there are many places where people don't "let it all hang out." I live in the U.K., which, last time I checked, is part of Europe. We have just about the lowest breast feeding rates in the world. I even have friends who are doctors and nurses who don't breast feed because it's not the accepted thing.

That said, I certainly wouldn't sit somewhere breast feeding with my breast hanging out. That's what little blankets are for.

Marc Fisher: Britain excepted, of course. But isn't that true in any discussion of Europe? If God had wanted Britain to be part of Europe, He wouldn't have invented the Channel, would He?

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Washington, D.C.: The other item that bugged me about the mother who started this whole thing about breast feeding at Starbucks is that the baby in question was 15 months old - over one year! Newborns must be fed every 2 hours, sure, but making all this ruckus over a one-year old who could have sucked on cheerios while his mom had her latte? Please.

Marc Fisher: Yeah, well, feeding a 15-month-old could have any number of purposes. Lots of folks use it as a way to get the little critter to sleep. That's how it was done in our family.

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Old Timer: Hey, we did have Willard Scott for a long time here ...

Marc Fisher: Quite true, and we still have his ads for some car dealer, if nothing else. Bring back Willard the Weatherman!

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Adams Morgan, Washington, D.C.: That Michelle Leigh site is great. Tennis, anyone?

Marc Fisher: She has a refreshing knack for getting herself in trouble with really dumb comments on the air.
Maybe Rocci can give us a link to my Jan. 9, 1996 Style piece on our local weathercasters. There's a fabulous Michelle Leigh moment in there.

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Annandale, Va.: I take Mother Nature very seriously -- my neighbor had a tree fall on her house yesterday and I lost 9 trees to Isabelle last year. Nay to hype but Yay to sensible precaution -- Charley will still be a tropical storm when he comes through here this weekend according to the NWS.

Marc Fisher: And when Charley comes through, I'll turn to Bob Ryan and Topper Shutt (at least he has an entertaining name) for all the serious details. But for the other 355 days a year, I want a clown.

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Please bring Wal-Mart in!: It really angers me that the NIMBYists are again up in arms over Wal- Mart coming to town. Honestly, would these nuts rather live in the middle of the woods with no goods or services nearby? I don't know what it is they want. To me, this is an ideal location for Wal-Mart. We really need some more stores like this in the area, I am tired of traveling to Maryland to do my shopping.

Why is it that NIMBYists move into the big city, but then want to ban new development and regulate it as if we live in a remote suburb? Stay in the sticks if that's where you want to live!

Marc Fisher: And here's the other side....

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Defending Wal-Mart?: Wow, I have read everything. Although I agree that the District needs retail (I too make my way out Route 1 every week), I cannot bring myself to welcome the anti-Christ of retail. Not only are their labor practices deplorable, but it seems that merely being 'in' the store brings out the worse in people (think Wacko Jacko recently).

However, if this goes through I am hoping it will lead to more retail coming into the District in the future (can I endorse Target here?).

Marc Fisher: I should start with the caveat that I have not actually been inside a Wal Mart--maybe I'll save that experience for when they open in the District--but I fail to understand why the same people who are appalled by the very concept of Wal Mart are often big fans of Target. Stylistic differences aside, aren't the social and economic effects of any and all big box stores identical?

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Washington, D.C.: When I was growing up in Charlotte a few decades ago, one of the weather broadcasts was sponsored by Texaco, and the weatherman wore a Texaco station attendant's uniform. Not very funny, but pretty odd by today's standards.

Marc Fisher: Excellent. The weathercasts should be riddled with inappropriate sponsorships.

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Rockville, Md: I grew up on the Washington Post and am familiar with most of the bylines. Where is Vernon Loeb?

Marc Fisher: Sadly, Vernon left us to try life on the wrong coast, where he is a big deal editor at the Los Angeles Times.

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Washington, D.C.: I want Willard to tell me the weather forecast for a baseball game at RFK!

(And then I want Glenn Brenner to show me the highlights later ... but you can't have everything.)

Marc Fisher: No, you can't have it all, but you could hope to bring Warner Wolf back to town, now that he's been sacked yet again in New York.

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Clifton, Va.: About two years ago there was a rash of burglaries in the Clifton/Centerville area.
I walk my dog in back of my house where the power line and pipline is. There is an access road. While walking my dog I saw four police cruisers back there way out of few of traffic on a Saturday afternoon. I asked the wonderful Fairfax County police what they were doing. An officer got out of the car, pulled the donut out of his mouth and said, discussing the rash of burglaries. This wasn't the first time I saw cops hiding back there that month and wasn't the last time either. Three days later my house was broken into. I asked my the wonderfully inept officers to check my neighbor's townhouse next to me and see if it had been broken into. They said no. I was out for a while when I returned my neighbor stated her house was broken into too. Just then the Fairfax PD showed up. I said a few choice things to the officer and was cited for disorderly conduct by lazy cop! Cops are only good at generating revenue. Nice to know our tax dollars spent on law enforcement are worth it.

Marc Fisher: Some enterprising reporter should take a few months and dive into a few thousand "disorderly conduct" files and see what kinds of situations and behaviors come up. Would be very interesting.

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Annapolis, Md.: Maryland state law gives the mother the right to breast feed in public. The sit-in was in response to Starbucks breaking the law by demanding that the mother not breast feed in public. Most of the breast is not visible if the baby is feeding. If she was sitting there not feeding her baby with her breast hanging out then I agree with the rant, otherwise she was doing what is her right.

Marc Fisher: Seems fair enough.

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Washington, D.C.: I don't know, I thought the Style breast feeding rant read like the writer was just hoping to generate enough reader e-mail to catch her editor's attention.

I don't know that I'd find drinking a cappuccino with a blanket on my head all that great.

Marc Fisher: Actually, I would very much appreciate having the privilege of wearing a blanket over my head while enjoying a refreshing beverage in a place of public accommodation.

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Starbucks: Starbucks does not offer free refills. So they are delighted if someone hangs around all day and drinks coffee.

Marc Fisher: True, but quite a few of those folks who seem to live in Starbucks manage to ride out the afternoon on a single purchase. It's an art form.

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Washington, D.C.: Re: Sprawl.

Why do these folks insist upon saying they were simply "priced out" of places like Fairfax or Mont. Co.? The reality is that a good deal of Americans simply like living in a big, new house on a big, new lot with all the trimmings in a cloistered development. Not my cup of tea, but understandable.

Marc Fisher: Bugs me, too. Just because you cannot afford a huge house on a huge plot of land does not mean you have been priced out of an entire county. I happen to far prefer apartment life to the single-family house, though I live in the latter because I am outvoted in my family. But there are all sorts of options, and the idea that everyone should live surrounded by an expanse of untouched grass is not only anti-community, but also bad for our economy, environment and psychological wellbeing.

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Please not Warner Wolf: You have got to be kidding.

Marc Fisher: He's bad as he wants to be. Hey, have you been watching ESPN's SportsCenter OldSchool this week? Fabulous stuff--best pairing: Greg Gumbel and Chris Berman.

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20011: "Stylistic differences aside, aren't the social and economic effects of any and all big box stores identical?"

No, not at all. I admit, I don't like any of the big box stores, and I wouldn't like Target to go in there either. But I wouldn't protest Target's arrival. The differences are Wal-Mart's labor practices, their deliberate destruction of local retail (they undercut prices until other stores leave then raise prices), their constant "Made in the USA" advertising while really selling sweatshop products from the Third World and their practice of building a store and then abandoning it soon after leaving a mess behind.

Marc Fisher: I'm with you on all that--they are a pestilence. But the way to combat their ill effects is to not patronize them, not to concoct phony legal categories to get local governments to exclude them.

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Resident lives near Da Sto: No offense to anyone that read the article, but maybe the problem is people have no idea what goes on in my neighborhood. This is how our young sons and daughters are talking -- for better or for worse. Blame TV, or the parents or the crumbling libraries/schools, but the facts are what they are. As a black resident of her neighborhood, I didn't find this offensive at all, moreover I see it as a reflection of the neighborhood she lives and works in.

What's insulting to me is folks that don't live here or, bluntly, have never ventured outside of NW Washington or their cushy local suburbs -- have no idea what life is like in the "real" inner city. I hope her ventures are a huge success.

Marc Fisher: Nicely said, and Colorado Kitchen is well worth the visit.

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Northwest D.C.: Marc,

I am writing to you about a local story that, unfortunately, the Post

has not yet covered. On August 6, two reporters for the Common

Denominator, a small newspaper based in Northeast D.C. which publishes

every two weeks, were detained by the Capitol Police after taking

pictures of the security roadblocks set up on Capitol Hill. Although

one of the reporters, a summer intern who is also a student at American

University, was told by an officer that he had done "nothing that was

illegal" (a quote from the paper's story), he nonetheless had his

driver's license taken, as well as his notebook and camera. The license

and equipment were later returned.

The other reporter, who is editor of the paper was was working

separately in another area of the Hill and was detained at about the

same time. She had her license and press card taken. She asked the

officer if she was being detained or arrested, and the officer could

not answer the question so he called a supervisor. Although the

supervisor apparently knew of both detentions, he did not tell the

officers that they were happening simultaneously.

The article in the Common Denominator about the event did not say

whether the reporters asked permission to take the pictures, or whether

they had Capitol Hill press passes along with their Common Denominator

ID cards.

I understand the need for increased security on the Hill, and I

understand that you can't do a lot of things as a journalist there

without a Hill press pass, but this story strikes me as being a pretty

big potential First Amendment problem -- not to mention another

indictment of Terry Gainer's heavy-handed tactics over the last week.

Do you think that the reporters, who were covering what was for them a

local story, were mistreated? Furthermore, do you think that any of

the following people would have been treated differently: a family that

could be clearly seen as tourists; someone wearing a Bush-Cheney

T-shirt; someone wearing a Kerry-Edwards T-shirt; or (perhaps most

importantly as far as double standards may be concerned) a Washington

Post reporter or photographer?

Thank you very much for taking, and answering, the questions.

Marc Fisher: From what I've heard, it sounds as if the reporter and editor were victims of overzealous officers. Alas, there's all too much of that going on, and not just against reporters. There are more and more tales of people who are stopped and treated rudely just for taking photos of the Capitol or other gov't buildings. The faux-security surrounding those buildings has gotten completely out of hand.

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Springfield, Va.: What's up with this new rule/law the city is working on regarding folks must completely come to a stop if someone is in a crosswalk. I car pool and getting out of the city in the afternoon/evening is a challenge. If someone is in the crosswalk on the northside and we're turning right on the south side I don't see the point. We're very concerned about the safety of walkers -- even the foolish one -- but this will just create gridlock. Has the city thought about this?

Marc Fisher: I didn't know that was a new rule--as I understood it, that's always been the law in any place. You stop when someone is in the crosswalk, period. I don't have a problem with that.

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Arlington, Va.: Marc:

How about a thumbs down for Metro and the slap on the wrist they gave to a Metro driver who decided that since her shift ended, she'd leave a train load of passengers in a station without a driver. They said they'd have to "re-train" her. What would that entail? "Don't strand passengers in a station?" How ridiculous is the situation with deteriorating service getting?

Marc Fisher: A good Nay. Absolutely.

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Marc Fisher: We're well over our hour, so I'll wrap it up here. Apologies to all who didn't get in. This concludes the final Potomac Confidential for the season--the show goes on its annual break and will return right after Labor Day with more action-packed episodes. So save your wisdom and your venom for then, and stay dry. Helllooooooooo, Hyattsville.
And write if you get work.

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