Potomac Confidential fills the midday lull with discussion by Metro columnist Marc Fisher, who looks at the latest news with a rigorous slicing and dicing of the issues that define who we are and where we live.

Today's Column: Who Among Us Would Cast the First Stone? This Guy ( Post, Sept. 6)

Fisher was online Thursday, August 30, at Noon ET to look at the local blogger who outs gay congressmen, efforts to curb illegal immigration in Virginia and the political landscape after Sen.John Warner's retirement.

Check out Marc's blog, Raw Fisher.

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

Archives: Discussion Transcripts

A transcript follows.

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Marc Fisher: Welcome aboard, folks, on a busy day--the long battle over the day labor center in Herndon is ratcheted up by the town council's decision to combat illegal immigration by sending the day laborers back to the 7-Eleven parking lot; the jostling for position in Virginia's U.S. Senate and governor races is getting rougher with the retirement of John Warner; and many of you are already bucking to take on the morality questions surrounding blogger Michael Rogers' outing of hypocrites on the Hill.

So, straight to your many comments and questions, but first, the Yay and Nay of the Day:

Yay to Washington Nationals security guards for catching the guy who robbed a vendor at RFK Stadium last night and then shot himself in the leg by mistake as he tried to get away from the guards. Turns out that the bad guy was a former employee of a stadium food vendor. Much to do on the radio this morning about how the guy got a gun into the ballpark, but it's hardly a mystery: While guards do check packages to make certain no unsanctioned beverages enter the stadium, nobody cares what you bring in in your pockets or jacket.

Nay to the parents of Virginia Tech shooting victims who are now gearing up to sue the university over the deaths of their children. As much as anyone would love to get rich, to do so by abusing the courts in the aftermath of such a devastating tragedy is appalling. To sue Virginia Tech is the equivalent of suing the state's taxpayers, for that is who will have to shell out millions and millions of dollars. It is hardly the fault of the Virginia citizenry that some combination of flawed policies at the college, overzealous federal privacy laws and misguided decisions by Cho's parents may have contributed to all those horrible deaths. To fight for reforms in the privacy laws and mental health system is a powerful tribute to those who died; to sue for a big payday is disgraceful.

Your turn starts right now...

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Marc Fisher: Well, not quite yet. This just in:

Effi Barry, the longtime, long-suffering ex-wife of former Mayor Marion Barry, has died. We'll have complete coverage here on the big site as the day progresses, but I thought you might want to know now so that those of you who have memories of Effi Barry might share them here during this hour.

As with most relationships involving Marion Barry, his years with Effi were complicated, and their son, Christopher, has had his share of troubles as well. But Effi generally managed to rise above the mayor's controversies, representing the city with class and grace. She knew that the only way she could salvage something in her own name after Marion was disgraced at the Vista Hotel was to leave town, which is what she did. But she returned often, and even stood by her ex-husband at some of his lowest hours in later years.

I saw Marion Barry Tuesday at an event he held to protest Mayor Fenty's policies on the Poplar Point development, and Barry was heading out of town, home to Mississippi to see his 90-year-old mother, who, he told me, is doing well.

More later as we hear it.

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Alexandria, Va.: Regarding today's blog, you asked, "But who elected him (Michael Rogers) moral arbiter?"

Wouldn't the obvious answer be, "Congresspeople and senators who work very hard to deny gay people their basic human rights, but turn out to be gay themselves. But congresspeople and senators are exempt from their own laws."

Since that last line defines congresspeople and senators as less moral than we, the riff-raff they consider their constituents, by simple logic we the riff-raff are more moral than they. Therefore, anybody can be moral arbiters to congresspeople.

washingtonpost.com: Who Among Us Would Cast the First Stone? This Guy ( Post, Sept. 6)

Marc Fisher: It's been a while since I studied formal logic, but I think I follow. What I don't get is the leap you've taken. If a congressman's anti-gay actions and attitudes offend voters, then those voters are certainly justified in mounting fervent opposition to those congressmen. But what justifies Rogers' vigilante approach to exposing these guys' sexual and other personal behaviors? Why not go after these guys for the positions they take, rather than hit them for what they do in private?

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Washington, D.C.: Marc --

You wrote "Journalists, too, are known for our arrogance, but what appears in a newspaper such as this one remains quite different from what Rogers does. We are more reserved -- timid, if you wish -- more likely to wait for a crime and a legal record before we report on the private lives of public people."

While I agree with your point, it really is only a matter of degree. Journalists often expose private matters whose relevance is up to debate. Once you pry into private lives, you cannot blame others for drawing the line in a different place than the august editors of The Post.

Marc Fisher: Why not? Isn't the only really important question there where to draw that line? I think you'd agree that an absolute position in either direction makes no sense: It would be silly to say we will never write a word about someone's private life, because messy private lives have a way of barging into the public space, often in ways that demand public attention. Similarly, it would be wrong to say that all private behavior is on the table--that's just unnecessary and abusive. So yes, you're right, the distinction between a Rogers and a Washington Post is one of degree. The question is where and how to draw that line.

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Washington, D.C.: This Rogers fellow makes my skin crawl. How is this any different from blackmail -- he says you're gay, and therefore you must be, whether you are or not? What splendid notions of hypocrisy! Suppose I, a hetero, support gay rights and the legalization of gay marriage. Does that make me a hypocrite? What an utterly vile human being.

Marc Fisher: I'm not sure your analogy works--there's not necessarily any contradiction between being heterosexual and supporting gay people's right to form relationships. But I take your point about blackmail--despite Rogers' efforts to construct a reasonable facsimile of a reporters' commitment to fairness, what he does really doesn't offer the politicians and staffers much of a choice.

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washingtonpost.com: Effi Barry Dies at 63 ( Post, Sept. 6)

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Who among us would cast the first stone?: Larry Craig, that's who. I'm with you that we all have our faults and public figures can have theirs. But Larry Craig was busting people for their private behavior, so it 'is' called for to bust him publicly on his behavior(even if he's not gay, but a public sex addict). So in this case the fault of hypocrisy is very relevant.

Granted, you have a point that we shouldn't rely on a single blogger looking two sources "in the eye." But in this case, that happened. Rogers's blog entry wasn't news until first the Roll Call arrest report and then the Idaho paper (who had held off until the arrest report) story came out.

Marc Fisher: Sure, the system sort of worked in this case. Rogers put out his report and it became a big deal for those who frequent his and similar blogs. Most of us didn't pay it much mind until Craig's behavior forced his private life into the public's eye, creating a legal record and a public debate. That's when the reviled mainstream media joined the conversation. I don't see much problem in how that works, except that while a senator should be able to take the heat from a blogger like Rogers, I don't think that's true of the staffers who Rogers also goes after in his blog. Nobody elected congressional staffers; they're folks doing a job and I think it's abusive to spread their private doings on the Interweb in the same way as Rogers does with elected officials.

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Boston, Mass.: The people who elected him arbiter of hypocrisy are the people who read his blog and put weight in what he says. Thanks to the Internet that sort of relationship with an audience isn't isolated to journalists at big news papers or anchors of the evening news. Also thanks to the Internet we can all see his assorted axes to grind, large ego, and spurious logic then judge how valid the information is for ourselves. He's no different than any other reporter, politician, or official whose counterpoint to an argument is a personal attack, the sex angle just makes people a little more uncomfortable.

Marc Fisher: There's no question that the web democratizes the information flow, generally in good ways. But it's also true that old notions of reputation, privacy and standards are pretty well shot in some sectors of the info speedway, while we cling to old standards in other places. A newspaper might expect a libel suit for airing someone's dirty laundry, while a blogger blithely goes much farther in slamming a target yet generally has nothing to fear from lawyers. Curious.

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Washington, D.C.: Marc - you seem to suggest that The Post is more accurate or reliable than bloggers. But The Post frequently passes off as hard news what is in fact regurgitation of press releases from groups I never heard of. Many Post stories start out as "in a study to be released today," meaning that nobody else was even provided the opportunity to comment on it. For example, a recent story about water quality or a study about how my property taxes should keep doubling every few years.

Marc Fisher: Depends on the blogger, doesn't it? Some bloggers are every bit as careful and responsible as any professional reporter, while others aren't.

But on your point about the Post, I can't recall any story that's taken directly from a news release. Yes, many stories come to us as releases from all manner of sources--individual citizens, politicians, businesses, schools, you name it. But editors always want stories to be fleshed out, and no reporter ever feels right just printing what one source says. Nobody goes into this business to be a stenographer; the effort is always to add value, to find other perspectives, to truth squad, to build characters who can illuminate issues and ideas.

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Washington, D.C.: I think I agree with you in theory.

Yet to play devil's advocate, I wonder if it was something else besides "gay hypocrisy" if the situation was different. If you as a journalist saw Sen. A at a restaurant with someone who very obviously was not his/her wife or husband and they were very obviously not in a platonic relationship, could you just walk away from that?

If so, well good. But newspapers do expose politicians' hypocrisies on a whole number of issues, not necessarily illegal or salacious. What's the difference?

Marc Fisher: In the old days, when we all accepted an information hierarchy because we had no choice, reporters often knew about politicians' affairs and did nothing. The idea was that the extramarital business had nothing to do with the pol's execution of his duties.

In the post-Monica era, that's all gotten confused and blurry. As we saw with the Idaho Statesman sitting on its Larry Craig reporting until he got himself arrested, there's still a great reluctance to publish anything on someone's private life unless something forces the issue--bad behavior in a very public forum, legal action, striking political hypocrisy. But there are other media and non-media forces that press against that tradition of restraint, and no two news organizations react in the same way.

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Washington, D.C.: Marc -- you say The Post reports on the private lives of public people only if there is a crime and a legal record. In other words, you're willing to report that someone's merely been arrested or charged with a crime, causing them unnecessary embarrassment and humiliation when they later turn out to be innocent? (And you do this to private individuals, not just public officials.) What's your justification for that? Why is the accusation of an arresting officer or prosecutor any more authoritative, in comparison to Mr. Rogers' sources, just because it comprises a "legal record?"

Marc Fisher: I didn't say the Post only reacts if there's a legal record. I said the traditional press is more likely to wait until there's a legal fig leaf to protect our reporting.

But yes, once someone is arrested, there's no question that the reporting should go ahead. I don't believe news organizations have a moral right to withhold information that's part of the public process--an arrest, a court action, that sort of thing. Others in this business and in this newsroom disagree with me, and argue that we should not report, for example, the arrest of a 17-year-old child of a prominent politician. I see too much arrogance in that stance: It's too "we get to know and you don't" for my taste. But as I think should be clear by now, folks differ on where they draw these lines, and the debates can be very tough.

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Meridian: Your attack on Mike Rogers in this morning's Post was grossly unfair in several respects. I'll try to be brief:

1. Rogers didn't cast the first stone, the GOPers who vilify gays and use us as wedge issues did.

2. Craig was brought down by the police, his own guilty plea, and Roll Call. It's hard to understand why Rogers comes in for such criticism. His only role in this was being proved right.

3. The suggestion that The Post and other mainstream media are more careful or responsible is belied by the fact that Rogers has a 100 percent track record, has refused to publish rumor, and is personally accountable for his actions. The Post's investigative journalism, which has never shied away from casting the first stone at the hypocrisy or mendacity of our public officials and to no less an extent "plays God" in deciding whom to target, would envy such a record (or are you too young to remember Janet Cooke).

4. Rogers is not doing anything other than telling the truth. As Harry Truman used to say, "I don't give 'em hell. I just tell the truth and they think it's hell."

5. Rogers is not playing God and in particular, he is not calling for people's resignations (as the GOP is). He is only asking that they serve honestly. If they choose not to, we have no obligation to protect them with our silence.

While you sit there sucking your thumb and blog about whether Ben's Chili Bowl will sell hot dogs at the new ballpark, Rogers and others like him are doing real journalism and deserve credit for their courage and initiative, not envy-tinged moralizing.

washingtonpost.com: Who Among Us Would Cast the First Stone? This Guy ( Post, Sept. 6)

Marc Fisher: I agree that once the police caught Craig, there was no question about reporting the story. I also agree that Rogers is careful and conscientious about checking his facts to the extent that he can (though given the nature of his topic, he often has to choose to take one person's word over another). Where I part ways with Rogers is on his belief that outing people is an effective way to move popular opinion toward his viewpoint. I'm sure some folks are thrilled when hypocritical legislators fall, but I'm equally sure that others are pushed in the other direction because of what they view as an invasion of privacy. Remember, Rogers is an advocate, and makes no pretense of being impartial--his goal, then, is not merely to inform, but to change people's minds. That creates a different set of expectations and standards for his work.

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Gay Craig?: Marc,

I think I accept Sen. Craig's claim that he is not gay, insofar as I care about his orientation at all. He is not gay in the exact same way that Clinton did not have sex with Lewinsky. In all seriousness, a huge number of people consider sex to mean intercourse, while anything else is not labeled very clearly (petting, making out, etc.). Similarly, "gay" means wanting a mate of the same gender, not just sex. If Sen. Craig has that notion of gayness in his head, then he isn't lying.

Something he might not want to clarify is that he may have been open to activity from any kind of person in the next stall, make or female.

Of course, all of this ignores the two crimes he really committed: first, soliciting sex in a public place, with intent to commit the act in the public place, and second, assuming the gross part was the homosexuality.

Marc Fisher: The crime he was charged with is really more about invasion of another person's space than it is about any sex act. If you're in a stall in a public bathroom and someone else enters that space without your knowledge or invitation, that's a form of assault, albeit a lesser crime than a physical attack.

We'll return to this topic later, but now a change of pace for a bit....

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Greenbelt, Md.: Enough about Larry Craig already. Are you as disturbed as I am about the appearance of KKK flyers in NoVA as I am? The last thing we need is more of an incitement to hateful racism and bigotry.

washingtonpost.com: Klan Leaflets Denounced in Manassas ( Post, Sept. 6)

Marc Fisher: KKK campaigns in communities that are struggling with racial and ethnic faceoffs are an old and tired PR ploy by an extremist group that flourishes far more in the public imagination than in reality. There is an active far-right, racist movement in this country, but the KKK is hardly among its more popular members. Most such activity these days occurs online, not in cross burnings or other such actions that live on primarily in the movies. Sure, it's disturbing that the KKK shows up in Prince William, but I wouldn't expect to see marches of men in ludicrous getups.

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Takoma Park, Md.: I totally agree with you regarding the Virginia Tech families. I find it quite disgusting. Fifteen years ago, my closest friend was murdered by a carjacker here in D.C. The killer or killers were never found. No public mourning for his family, no big cash payout from the city for their failure to protect him. And you know what, the family didn't expect anything. Terrible things happen every day. Yes, work to change the privacy laws or to help the mental health system or legislation. But to sue for financial gain...again, disgusting.

Marc Fisher: The good that has come of the Virginia Tech tragedy is a serious effort to identify what changes in law and policy should be made to try to prevent such events in the future; the families of the victims played an important role in pressing the state review panel to be tough, and now those same families can play a big role in making sure that the legislature follows through. Suing the people of Virginia is a sad sideshow.

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Virginia Tech Lawsuit: I concur with your Nay of the Day. If this works, why shouldn't every murder victim (especially those killed in public places, like streets or parks) be entitled to massive payouts from the taxpayers? Or, for that matter, all victims of crime? Where does it end?

Marc Fisher: A lot of families of victims do sue, and that's one reason insurance rates are so high. In this case, the state insures itself, so it's the taxpayers who stand to lose megabucks. Indeed, it's easy to imagine a settlement in the Virginia Tech case in the $100 million-plus range, which, by the way, is vastly more than it would cost to pay for Gov. Kaine's proposal to create pre-kindergarten classes for all four-year-olds in Virginia. To my mind, the latter is a heck of a better investment.

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Reston, Va.: Can we talk about the Herndon day labor situation? Now that they are closing the official site, doesn't that mean it's all going to go back to the way it was with the 7-Eleven, etc.? How does that solve anything?

washingtonpost.com: Herndon to Shut Down Center for Day Laborers ( Post, Sept. 6)

Marc Fisher: It sure looks like the day laborers will head back to the 7-Eleven. Where else can they go? The whole idea of the day labor center was to save Herndon from the mess of having dozens of men lurking around the parking lots of the main business strip. If folks don't want to hire illegal immigrants, then by all means they ought not hire them. But shutting down the day labor center does nothing to change who comes into the community or who decides to hire them.

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Fairfax, Va.: Do you see a connection to the various NVA counties' efforts to curb the influx of illegals with the Fairfax County "strike force" effort? Is this "strike force" their soft way of handling illegals without actually saying so?

Marc Fisher: Local governments are under increasing pressure to do something about illegal immigrants, specifically about the impact of having large groups of unrelated people crowding into houses, filling up neighborhood curbs with cars, etc. So those communities that are more interested in solving the quality of life problems than in playing federal immigration agent are focusing on code enforcement, using zoning and other laws to crack down on the abuses that drive neighbors nuts. Makes sense to me.

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McLean, Va.: As I was pulling into the parking garage at work this morning, I put on a CD, Pavarotti singing Nessun Dorma. I parked the car, turned off the engine, and listened through the last "Vincero!" It seemed appropriate.

Marc Fisher: As a non-opera fan, I never quite bought the whole Three Tenors shtick. But Pavarotti was a great showman, one of the last popularizers of classical music. Now that there is virtually no place for classical music on broadcast television and now that music instruction has largely vanished from the schools, the ability of new generations to fall in love with complex music is greatly diminished. Every generation needs a Leonard Bernstein to teach us how to listen, or an Aaron Copland to inspire us, or a Pavarotti to thrill us. Such artists exist today, but it's enormously harder for them to break through all the noise.

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washingtonpost.com: We will correct the spelling of Effie in the link to the story after this discussion is over.

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Washington, D.C.: I was a camp counselor about 15 years ago at a camp that Christopher Barry attended one summer. It was in the middle of his father's drug charge problems, and it was clear that he needed a solid male role model in his life. One of the black male counselors in particular tried to take him under his wing, but we could see that his problems were more than a few loving young adults could solve in a summer.

His mother would come to pick him up and always held her head high and carried herself with dignity, even though it must have been an especially hard time for her. We could tell she was doing her best with her son -- made him dress appropriately, wouldn't put up with any backtalk, etc.

I will remember her as a classy woman who tried to make the best of a terrible situation.

Any word on how Christopher is doing now?

Marc Fisher: Thanks for that recollection. Christopher Barry had a run-in with police a couple of years ago, and a link to that story is coming right up. At the time, Christopher was working for a D.C. government agency; I don't know if that's still the case.

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washingtonpost.com: Opera World Loses a Leading Ambassadors ( Post, Sept. 6)

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washingtonpost.com: Barry's Son Charged With Assaulting Police ( Post, Feb. 20, 2005)

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washingtonpost.com: Opera World Loses a Leading Ambassadors ( Post, Sept. 6)

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Washington, D.C.: Wow, I couldn't disagree more with your "Nay" of the day. You say that the parents are suing to "get rich" and to "abuse the courts." How dare you. You have no idea what their motives may be. Years ago a student died at my university, and the parents sued. They obtained serious changes at the university as part of the settlement of that suit, and sought and obtained federal legislation that provides greater protection of student safety.

And how is filing a lawsuit "abusing the courts"? While it would be just swell if these parents just asked the State politely to enact all sorts of reforms and the State said, "Sure, no problem," we, unlike you, live in the real world. And filing a lawsuit gives these parents leverage, and access to discovery.

You say, "To sue Virginia Tech is the equivalent of suing the state's taxpayers, for that is who will have to shell out millions and millions of dollars." Do you advocate that no one should ever be allowed to sue a State because taxpayers will have to pay? Do you advocate that no one should sue a doctor, because we will have to pay because insurance prices rise? Do you think no one should sue a company that makes defective products because consumers of those products will have to pay higher prices? Why don't we just close up the courts entirely?

Who provides your talking points -- the tort reform lobby?

Marc Fisher: Nice rant, but luckily, we have a system that does not require us to sue our fellow citizens in order to press for reforms in laws and policies. There are very effective avenues for that, and the Virginia Tech families have already shown themselves to be well organized and very good at pushing political buttons, which is exactly what they should be doing. Suing the state's taxpayers can serve only two purposes: Getting hugely rich as a means of ameliorating the pain of a devastating loss, and creating an us vs. them dynamic in which the families put themselves in opposition to the great mass of taxpayers who, up until this point, were very much in their corner.

And yes, I would largely shut down the civil courts by requiring businesses to take their disputes with one another to a privatized arbitration system.

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Re: Virginia Tech: I take issue with your "questionable choices by Cho's family." Family members of people with mental illness often find it near-impossible to intervene when an adult is in a downward spiral IF they are even aware of it. You have to prove that the person is a threat to himself or to the public to have a person involuntarily committed.

I'm not even sure it's appropriate to blame them for "letting" him attend Virginia Tech. He was over 18. What were they supposed to do to prevent him from going to his school of choice?

It sounds to me like they responded appropriately at every opportunity they had. They had no idea he'd go off the deep end away from home -- or that his school wouldn't share his problems with Virginia Tech.

Let's give these poor people a break.

Marc Fisher: The decisions by the Cho family appear to have played a role in the information dam that was well documented by the state review panel. Remember, the Chos did well by their son when he was in middle and high schools, working with the Fairfax schools to get him the treatment that allowed him to function in school. But while you're right that the parents may not have been able to force their son to go to a more appropriate college, there was no barrier to them alerting the college officials about their son's past--yet they failed to do that.

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McLean, Va.: Mark: What's the status of Dulles rail? Is the tunnel out for good? Is the money still there for the project? Bid/no-bid? Where's the whole thing at?

Marc Fisher: The tunnel appears to be pretty much out of the question. Indeed, the whole project, even with the less expensive above-ground construction plan, is in some jeopardy as federal transit officials question the soaring cost of rail to Dulles. There doesn't appear to be a drop-dead deadline for acquiring the funding and starting construction, but most of the politicians working on the project believe that every passing month is a bad sign for the rail extension. The price of steel only goes up of late, as you may have noticed.

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Silver Spring, Md.: It's not just you -- as an opera fan, 'I' never got the Three Tenor schtick, either. But Pavarotti had a lovely voice! (All three of them do. It's just, together? Cheese-o-rama.)

Marc Fisher: And the staging and the whole cultish thing around them--oy!

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Arlington, Va.: I am so excited for football season! I love when the local news decides to start their broadcasts, not with, you know, actual news, but with what happened with the Redskins! Gooooooo Washington!

Marc Fisher: My portable irony detection kit is bouncing all over the desk here.

What, you don't like it when the first four stories on the local news are Redskins-related, even after the team loses by 28 points?

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Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C.: Marc,

Can't we just talk about baseball? The Nats are unstoppable -- 5 wins in a row and only 13 1/2 back in the wild card. The allegations of steroids and and umpire payoffs can't be far behind. I mean, teams just can't be this dominant without the ugly side of increased scrutiny raining down upon their parade of prominence. I assume we will have to contend with a whole host of talking heads speculating on what completely unforeseen illegality permitted the Nats to not be as bad as was predicted by aforementioned talking heads. I mean, they couldn't have just been wrong, could they?

Marc Fisher: Give the pundits a break--nobody could have predicted that the insane pile-up of washed-up, injured and discarded pitchers that Trader Jim assembled for spring training would result in a quite decent rotating rotation throughout the season. Amazingly, the Nats have several of the elements they need to field an above-.500 team next year. But a very weak free agent market this winter will make it very tough to take the next steps, even if the Lerners do turn out to be freewheeling with their checkbook.

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Dupont, Washington, D.C.: While out at the Seven Corners Home Depot yesterday, I realized it's been five years since the sniper shootings. Is The Post planning on any articles this fall? I still remember the fear everywhere back then -- people afraid to get gas, or worried about white box trucks. I had just graduated college and moved to D.C. to teach, and I remember the weeks of indoor recess throughout the fall. It really was a crazy time that's hard to describe to people who weren't here then.

Marc Fisher: I can still close my eyes and feel the tension that surrounded schools and outdoor activities during those weeks. I don't know what we have in the works, but that's a good idea--thanks.

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Hardhearted Fisher?: You don't usually issue harsh pronouncements, why start with those suffering VT families?

Marc Fisher: Me, hardhearted?! Why, the very idea!

Sorry, but I don't think we have an obligation to agree with anything the families of the victims may decide to do or say. They deserve compassion and support, and advocacy for the reforms they are fighting for. But if and when they take a wrong turn, it's any citizen's right and obligation to say so.

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Requiring businesses to take their disputes with one another to a privatized arbitration system.: This may, in fact, kill all the lawyers.

Marc Fisher: Oh, weep not for our esquired friends. For even in my won't -ever-happen fantasy, the lawyers would come out just fine--heck, they'd be able to charge the same outlandish fees they do now to represent folks in whatever privatized system replaced the civil courts. It's just that we as taxpayers wouldn't have to pay the lawyers quite as much directly.

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Re: How dare you. : The problem is EVERY single family of a tragic victim feels pain. Why do we now have the precedent that they can sue the government for failing to protect them? Does every single murder victim's family deserve millions of dollars? No doubt that money could never ease their pain, but where do we draw the line? How could any government survive those expenses?

Marc Fisher: Right, so it's just the victims who garner huge publicity who then get the big payday--and surely that's not fair, no?

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Crystal City, Va.: Since Bob Levy is no longer chatting, please provide us with your official prognostication for the Redskin's 2007 season record -- I'm guessing (and betting on) an 8-8 season.

Marc Fisher: Sorry, but I don't see nearly enough improvement to justify that prediction. I have to go with 6-10.

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Arlington, Va.: Marc, I also have high hopes for the food at the new ballpark. After reading Calvin Trillin write about Singaporestreet food, any sports facility could turn out high quality food if management and ownership were so inclined. Maybe this new crew will pull it off, maybe not. But a Ben's Chili Bowl would be a good start. And batting helmet sundaes. And maybe some Jamaician jerk chicken. Beef brisket sandwiches at Red Hot and Blue would be good as well. When we were at Saturday's game, all the pork sandwiches were actually chicken.

Marc Fisher: Red Hot and Blue is already the best food at RFK--a more extensive menu at the new park would be a great idea.

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Thank You For The Chats: These chats are really a public service. Thank you very much. I often wonder how you organize and respond to the traffic. Most of us can't manage the amount of incoming items you get in the hour you're on in a days time or more. Do you have help with screening the questions? How do you do it?

Marc Fisher: Thanks very much--I just scroll through all the good questions and comments and look for those that are smart, pithy, and especially those that hit my arguments hard. And then, to end the show, I must admit that a little compliment can't hurt your chances.

It's a fun, fast hour for me, and I'm glad to have you come along. But now, it's off to lunch....

More in the paper and online Sunday, and more on the blog every day. Thanks for coming along....

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