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.

Fisher was online Thursday, June 12 at noon ET to look at Bethesda's battle over housing for the homeless, the District's new anti-crime checkpoints, and the troubles facing Virginia's Republican party.

A transcript follows.

Today's Column: Liberty Takes a Holiday in Occupied Trinidad ( Post, June 12)

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

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Marc Fisher: Welcome aboard, folks -- With eight shootings around Washington overnight, does that alter the constitutionality of the city's aggressive new tactic of trying to close off dangerous neighborhoods to outsiders? Does it change your attitude about what police measures are acceptable or warranted? And what alternative solutions, if any, are coming from those of us who believe the barricades are unconstitional? Today's column looks at the cordoned-off streets of the Trinidad section of Northeast.

In Montgomery County, the battle over whether to house a homeless family in county-purchased house in the affluent Hillmead section of Bethesda appears to be over, now that the County Council has sided with residents who just want that land converted into a park--no homeless folks, please. But the issue of where to put affordable housing isn't going away--indeed, it's only getting worse.

In northern Virginia, is Gerry Connolly now a lock to win Rep. Tom Davis's seat this fall, or are Fairfax Republicans still alive and breathing? And how long can moderate northern Virginia Republicans hang on as their state party shifts sharply to the right?

Those issues plus whatever else is on your fertile minds, but first, let's call the Yay and Nay of the Day:

Yay to the Montgomery County judge who yesterday sided with opponents of the county's new law granting a wide range of protections and rights to transgendered people. Judge Robert Greenberg took a step toward allowing county voters to decide for themselves this November whether existing human rights laws already give transgendered people the protections they need or whether the county was right to pass explicit protections in the areas of housing, employment and public accommodations. Opponents of the law worry that it might be used to require public locker rooms and bathrooms to be opened so that transgendered people could use whichever gender's bathroom they feel is most appropriate for them.

Nay to Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn, who is expected yet again to lead the charge against giving Metro the money it needs to maintain tracks, buy cars and make the repairs to prevent the kinds of mishaps we're seeing all too often these days. The House yesterday finally passed a dedicated source of funding for Metro for the next decade, but the measure faces a hard road in the Senate thanks to the Oklahoma Republican who has made it his mission in life to make this region's transportation woes dramatically worse.

Your turn starts right now....

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Washington, D.C.: Why would you consider the presence of police protecting you and your children against violent predators the loss of liberty? I live in a neighborhood that is finally free of harassing, violent Maryland drug dealers after a massive police presence scared them away. I assure you that it was the criminals who caused my loss of liberty and the police who brought it back. From what you wrote today I think you think that people of certain races or income classes don't deserve in a free neighborhood to pursue their happiness without being harassed on a daily basis by commuter drug dealers who picked their block because they lived there in 1989 before their parents moved to PG County. PG County can keep these drug dealers and I'd like to see checkpoints at the border of D.C.

Marc Fisher: I think there's an important difference between a massive police presence, which is indeed sometimes justified, and a series of checkpoints that treat innocent residents as though they had done something wrong.

But any mass infusion of officers is at best a temporary measure designed more to send a message than to prevent crime or have any long- or even mid-term effect. The only tactics that work in the longer run are those that bring the police closer to the residents -- the various community policing strategies that seek to break down the insidious refusal of many residents to cooperate with investigations, to tell police what they know about the bad guys, and to become the eyes and ears of the police.

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Arlington, Va.: First of all I hate it when officials or the media press the "C" button (C for crisis), but it seems to me that Trinidad and some other D.C. neighborhoods meet the terms. That said, I think the answer lies not in abandoning the constitution but in MPD abandoning the SOP that any major initiative must be proceeded with a PR offensive. I think on selected evenings they should flood these neighborhoods with extra patrols -- maybe even ask some officers to get out of their cars (but let's not get too radical). But I don't think it helps to announce to great fanfare: "On such-and-such a date, from such-and-such time to such-and-such time MPD will have XXX extra officers in Trinidad." This might not generate a lot of arrests -- which will never hold up in court, but it might help keep a few more people alive.

Marc Fisher: I generally agree, but to the credit of the MPD, they do have several officers who've been out on the streets of Trinidad each evening this week on bicycle. I've mainly seen them rolling along the streets in packs of three or four, and not stopping to chat up the many young people gathered along the sidewalks, but at least it's a start.

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PG County: Interesting article about the police checkpoints in Trinidad. The one thing you (and many other articles) left out was interviews with the residents.

What do the residents think? Do most feel safer? Is it worth the inconvenience and loss of liberty? Have crime and random gunshots in the night decreased?

Marc Fisher: Good question. My colleague Courtland Milloy devoted his column yesterday to that aspect of the story and he found a fair amount of support for the checkpoints. I've been out to the neighborhood twice so far and found a real split--some people, mainly older folks, just want as much police presence as they can get, and aren't particularly bothered by the civil liberties questions. Others, mainly younger people, see the police presence as an occupying force, an alien presence, and would vastly prefer that the police come in on a more informal basis and try to make connections and get to know who the troublemakers are and intervene there.

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Trinidad, DC: Sorry, but operating a motor vehicle on municipal streets is a privilege, not a right. For this reason, the constitutional protections are greatly reduced. That's why the MPD is not stopping pedestrians... or cyclists for that matter.

Marc Fisher: Well, that's not the explanation the police and the city's lawyers give: They say that they are going after cars because that's the means of transportation being used by the drive-by shooters. So the District is very much reserving the right to stop pedestrians and bicyclists and anyone else.

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Northeast Washington: Marc,

What can the police do? Everyone looks to the police to solve our problems, then blame them when something goes wrong. The police don't do the shootings, stabbings, stealing, or other crime. They are all we have. They try to help a neighborhood and get bashed by every side. It's time for everyone to support the police, help them, and not expect them to be the ones to solves the problems we have. If you were Chief of Police, what would you or could you do to reduce the homicide and murder rate?

Marc Fisher: Great question. The Fenty administration is very big on checking out what other cities are doing well--the whole 'best practices' mantra they use. Fine: Look at those cities that have had great success in dramatically reducing homicides. Boston for many years put a complete stop to the shootings of young people through an intensive program of engaging kids--enlisting churches, schools, community groups and police in literally going door to door, identifying the kids who were most likely to be getting into trouble and assigning each case to teams of police, social workers and others who engaged with parents and kids to find education, job training and other ways to involve the potential troublemakers in socially useful activity.

Other cities have done variations on that, with considerable success. And there are more strictly police tactics that work, including placing a much higher emphasis on enforcing gun laws, pressing the courts to take minor offenses more seriously, and attacking the school truancy problem head on.

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Washington, DC: Marc,

What boggles my mind here is that the logic of the DC government with the checkpoints falls completely apart given that you are allowed to walk into the neighborhood without question. I must have missed the memo where criminals can only commit crimes if they are driving a car. But seriously, the District is just buying themselves a temporary solution that is going to cost them millions when someone innocent is arrested for wanting to drive through the neighborhood without a "legitimate purpose" (who decides what is legitimate?) and sues.

Marc Fisher: The city is being quite careful on that point and they have emphasized throughout that they are not arresting and have not arrested anyone who is turned away at the checkpoints. Those people are simply being told they cannot drive into the area, and indeed some go and park their cars and then walk in, and that's ok by the cops.

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Anonymous: NIMBY wins again! I don't want to be elitist, as a homeowner I can understand their fears. But I think the county could have done something to allay the community's fears. Just from the looks of the house it seemed like the county could put multiple families in that house. My neighborhood in DC has halfway and transition houses. The worst thing is one child in the neighborhood was molested, the persistent thing is the eye sore the house has become and the general nuisance of the constant flow. One family may not have been a challenge but folks need to respect the quality of life within communities as well.

washingtonpost.com: From Stately Beginnings, a Not-So-Eloquent Turn as Residents Protest Using House for Homeless (Post, June 8)

Marc Fisher: Sure, the Hillmead residents are perfectly within their rights to want to make sure that the county doesn't just dump some dangerously dysfunctional family in their midst. But in the Hillmead case, the county housing department had already assured the community that it intended to put in that house a family that was carefully screened to be sure no one had drug or alcohol problems and that the family's head was either employed or well on the way to employment.

Yes, there's always a risk when a public facility or a halfway house comes into a neighborhood, but why should all such facilities be placed in middle class or poor areas? Why shouldn't some be in affluent areas as well (as long as it doesn't mean spending public dollars on wildly expensive properties, which was a very legitimate cause for concern in the Hillmead case--though it's essential to note that the same neighbors who protested against the possible introduction of a homeless family had no particular problem when the county was spending the $2.5 million to use the house as parkland.)

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no homeless folks, please: You're right Marc, the people in Bethesda are evil. By the way, what's your address? I'm going to buy the house next door to you and donate it to the homeless. What's that? Your property values? Please Marc, it's all for the common good, we need to help those who cannot help themselves, so back to your address? You won't mind, right?

Marc Fisher: I don't see anything evil in the way the Hillmead residents reacted. In fact, I've been pleased to see that the neighbors are almost evenly divided--at least my mail has been, running about 60-40 in favor of keeping the homeless out of that property.

But it's the job of the elected officials not to follow blindly whatever the loudest constituents say, but rather to do what's best for all of the county's residents, and it seems thoroughly unfair for the overwhelming majority of county facilities for those in need to be in places such as Gaithersburg, Germantown, Wheaton and Silver Spring, but not in Bethesda, Potomac or Chevy Chase.

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Kensington: Re the Hillmead issue: how does a family with 13 homeless children get to keep the children? It seems like child protective services should be involved if these kids are on the street.

Marc Fisher: Actually, the family the county was considering putting in that house has 13 children only because the head of household, a former county employee, took in a number of children from a relative who died, and it was the addition of all that cost and responsibility that overwhelmed the family and led to their homelessness.

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Arlington, Va.: How does housing assistance work in the DC area? I had no idea it was even possible for a government to just buy a big house in a nice neighborhood and give it to someone (or lease it at well below market rates).

Can someone try for housing assistance in multiple jurisdictions? If so, isn't there a risk that if MoCo starts giving away $3 million mansions, there will be a lot more applications?

I think the Post should do more coverage of how housing assistance works, so that we can understand stories like the Hillmead saga.

Just like when the Post recently ran the stories on slumlords trying to empty their buildings to do condo conversions -- to really understand what's going on, we need to understand the rent controls that the landlords are under and why it might be "rational" for them to throw their tenants out on the street.

Marc Fisher: Good idea--actually, our area's multiple jurisdictions make it harder than in some other places to help those in need. A place like Montgomery, where property values are so enormously high, finds it ever harder to house its civil servants, let alone those who have no jobs and no homes.

The Hillmead case was an anomaly--even the MoCo government doesn't go around buying multi-million dollar mansions to house the poor. This was just a case of land purchased for a park that then turned out to have a usable house on it, and the county has a successful record of using houses in parks as facilities for those in need (or for parks workers.)

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Washington, DC: I've worked with the homeless for over 20 years, and I, too, opposed moving a single homeless family into a Potomac mansion. If there were some way it could be divided into multiple units and house several families, that would be another thing. But this would put a terrible onus on that family and provide only window dressing for dealing with the pervasive problem of homelessness in our area.

That being said, there has to be a better way to house the homeless than paying thousands of dollars a month to place them in hotel rooms. If you simply gave he families half that amount and left them to fend for their own, I think the outcome would be better. But we seem to like to see the homeless suffer, even those who work harder than we do for substantially less.

Marc Fisher: The county officials felt strongly that they did not want to create a group home and chop the house into multiple pieces. The great advantage of this house was that it could accommodate a very large family, and those are the most difficult cases the government has to handle because obviously motel rooms are a terrible solution for families with many kids.

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Northeast DC: Hi, Marc, I'm wondering if you have heard anything from MPD or city hall about the pending Supreme Court ruling on the handgun ban. Is there a plan for a course of action assuming the ban is struck down? Or does MPD even think eliminating the ban will have an effect on crime?

Marc Fisher: The immediate impact of a decision overturning the District's ban on handguns would be minimal--the D.C. Council would have to start crafting new gun laws regulating possession, sale and so on. It's not like gun shops would open on Day Two. But some months down the road, yes, depending on exactly how the ruling lays out the path, the city would have to create rules for gun owners, sellers, buyers, and regulators.

The police say they think opening up the city to gun sales and possession will create more casual shootings, and perhaps marginally less in the way of underground gun sales--but only marginally.

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Washington, D.C.:"Nay to Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn" ? What about Nay to Metro from having a labor contract that pays most bus drivers and train conductors over 100K...plus overtime where they don't have to work. Then, after 30 years, they can retire on 90 percent of that with health care each year for the rest of their life. That is the problem...Metro has dedicated funding. But it is run by people who gave it all away to the employees.

Marc Fisher: I agree--and so does Metro's top boss--that the work rules and other union issues do make it hard to run the system as efficiently as it ought to be run. But in fact there is no dedicated source of funding for Metro--it is entirely dependent on fares and on payments from local governments that vary each year with the ability and inclination of those governments to support transit. This makes Metro almost unique in the country, and I've yet to meet anyone in any Washington area government who believes that Metro shouldn't have a dedicated source of funding. The House measure would create that, using both federal and local money. But the Senate may well not go there, thanks to Coburn.

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Mclean, Va.: From Tom Coburn's Web site:

"the average Oklahoman, who earns $40,000 a year, subsidizes the Metro rides of federal workers in D.C. who earn $90,000 a year. Those federal workers who earn very good money make up nearly half of Metro's riders. Asking them to pay a little more would hardly be unfair or burdensome."

Typical exaggeration. I'd like to know where Coburn gets his $90K figure. Also, while the median family income in Oklahoma is a little more than half that of the national median family income, the median home price in Oklahoma City is LESS than half that of the national median home price. In other words, when it comes to housing, the median Oklahoma City family has it BETTER than average. Source:

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/moneymag/bplive/2006/snapshots/PL4055000.html

Unlike Coburn, I am honest enough to cite my data source.

Marc Fisher: You're absolutely right. Yes, Fairfax has the highest average income in the nation, but as we all know, it also costs a lot more to live in the county than it does in Coburn Country. The senator is smart enough to know that his rhetoric is dishonest, but of course that doesn't stop him.

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Hilleast: I'm curious who you spoke to for your article on the traffic checkpoints. From reading neighborhood forums like frozentropics (the local Trinidad blog), residents seem like they're pretty ambivalent about the whole thing.

Marc Fisher: I agree: There is a considerable split in the neighborhood, which I spelled out earlier in this hour. But again, the constitutionality of the police tactic should not be a matter of public referendum. The basic freedoms we are guaranteed are not or should not be subject to bargaining based on how frustrated citizens or authorities may be.

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what would you or could you do to reduce the homicide and murder rate?: I know you hate New York (funny that you grew up there like me though) but the best way to address the issues DC has is (and I'm sure you hate him too) the broken windows theory. Arrest and prosecute harshly for the small crimes that the thugs commit and that will end the larger crimes (murder). You may not like it, Al Sharpton might not like it, but it works.

Marc Fisher: Hate New York? Not this guy. I love the place. I don't always love all of its policies, but actually, I have always been a huge fan of the broken windows approach and its various successors. The District has several times announced over the years that it was going to get tough on small-scale infractions, but the city has never managed to get the necessary follow through in the rest of the criminal justice system. And the politicians in the District are forever undermining such efforts by getting all dewy eyed about the number of people in jail and basically encouraging the system to let people out or not punish them in the first place.

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Washington, D.C.: Assuming the operation is a success (however that is measured), what is the exit strategy? Will police officers now be permanently designated to man these areas? What were these officers doing before? What if the officers leave and it starts back up, what then? Are there enough police anywhere to provide this type of constant presence?

Marc Fisher: You hit on one of the most gaping flaws in this strategy. It is by definition a five or ten-day operation. Then what? The officers I've spoken to consider this a huge waste of time and money that detracts from their ability to go in and get to know people and work cases.

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Arlington, Va.: What the ACLU needs to do is have 4 white guys in a S-Class Mercedes try to drive through the Trinidad area in business suits and see what the D.C. cops do? Then repeat with 4 similarly attired African Americans, Asians and Latinos. My bet is the white and Asian guys get through no problem.

Marc Fisher: That's usually a safe enough bet, but not this time: The city has put all the officers manning those checkpoints through a training that hits hard on the idea that there is no discretion here, that this is only constitutional if, like at a drunk driving checkpoint, every single car is stopped and subjected to the same rules.

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Southeast, DC: Can the Post run a retrospective of the Gulianni years in NYC, so we can get a perspective on what's next on the Fenty agenda?

Some of these policing tactics make me question Fenty's legal and political background. Looking at some of his approaches, is Fenty really a Republican in the Democratic party? Is he beholden to certain groups? He obviously is not a liberal. And choosing a right-wing think tank to evaluate his school takeover smells to me.

Marc Fisher: Fenty takes a certain pride in positioning himself as a practical, post-ideological mayor and certainly he can be criticized for some very traditionally liberal positions and actions, just as he gets hit from others for these infringements on personal liberties.

But the usual liberal-conservative labels really don't help much in the debates and issues a big city mayor faces. Is it liberal or conservative to radically revamp the city's schools? If it's conservative to smash through union rules that keep bad teachers in place, is it liberal to insist that the new teachers who come in be assigned to restore arts, music and PE to schools that have been grimly focused on basics?

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Triangle, Va.: As a former Montgomery County resident (Rockville, Wheaton and Gaithersburg, at one time or another), it's no surprise to me that the homeless family's move into the Bethesda house was rejected. There is a certain segment of the county (Bethesda, Chevy Chase, Potomac) that's long been protected by county officials. (Remember a few years ago when exclusive colleges held a college fair strictly for the B-CC/Whitman crowd before a public outcry forced them to open it to all county students?) Sorry, but Montgomery still has a double standard where well-to-do areas control the agenda. I fully expect to see the Purple Line scuttled entirely, or relegated to the inefficient bus rapid transit, to satisfy Columbia Country Club members.

Marc Fisher: The Purple Line will be an excellent test of the political will to stand up to the NIMBYism of the rich. But so was the Hillmead case, and the rich folk won that one.

On the other hand, the county has done an unusually good job of maintaining high quality in some of its schools in affluent areas even as it pours resources into improving schools in its most economically stressed areas.

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Bethesda, MD: We have no dog in the Hillmead fight, but believe it would be a great question to ask those who oppose the homeless in their neighborhood if they support the County's pro-illegal-immigrant policy. We suspect they do, so it is a NIMBY hypocrisy.

P.S. If CASA of Maryland had been involved for the homeless, we're sure Council would have come out the other way!

Marc Fisher: I don't see why it would have come out any differently--there were indeed advocates for the homeless working the issue, though the Action in Montgomery coalition of churches backed away from getting involved in the issue after its members turned out to be split on the Hillmead house.

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Not-from-the-block Party: I think the "undesirable" residents from the rest of MoCo should organize and chronically crowd the Hillmeade park. If I'm gonna get stuck with part of the $2.5M bill for what is essentially a gift to an already privileged community, I'm gonna make sure I get my money's worth dammit.

I've got a little kettle grill and charcoal, now we just need drinks, hot dogs, and buns - any takers?

Marc Fisher: Please send me an invitation when you get that going. I'd love to see that.

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Kensington, again: Thanks for humanizing this family. I haven't seen anyone attempt to give them some kind of face. My image of a homeless person (I work downtown) is the type I see down here. And I am not sure that I would want them living next to me. But if the public knew more about the family, those who were opposed to this might soften their stance.

Marc Fisher: At least some of the Hillmead residents fighting against keeping the house standing indeed knew about the family the county had in mind, but that made no difference to them. As some Hillmead residents have been discussing on their neighborhood listserve, the whole campaign to "Save Our Park" was a consciously misleading and phony bit of sloganeering when the real agenda was to keep low-income people out of the neighborhood.

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S. Arlington, Va. (formerly in Silver Spring, Md.): Mark,

Now that we know it was a county employee, who had taken in additional children because a relative had died, it is just shameful that some in Hillmead would protest. Projecting that this is not a family with drug/alcohol abuse issues, it is a shame and a waste that this family not be allowed to live in that Bethesda house. Too bad their former congresswoman, Connie Morella, wasn't in town to remind them of the circumstances that she and her husband went through when taking in six of her nieces and nephews.

Marc Fisher: I'd like to think that indeed Morella would have been vocal in support of the housing of the homeless there. Her successor was characteristically silent on this local issue, as he devotes himself almost entirely to national and foreign issues. More important, the county executive took no position on the Hillmead question, ducking the tough one and sending an aide to tell the council that the ball was entirely in their court.

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Falls Church: Over 40 years ago in San Francisco, a judge was deciding a case in San Francisco where neighbors were trying to keep out a home for unwed mothers (isn't that a quaint phrase these days?) and decided in favor of the home, saying that it was better to walk in the sun of human values than in the shade of property values. Unfortunately many of the Hillmead residents seem to be hung up on keeping out those "others" (poverty seemingly a mark of unworthiness) so as to maintain their property values. The Golden Rule is definitely not of interest to them. Never mind "whatsoever you do to the least of my brethren..."

Marc Fisher: The theory behind scatter-site public housing or halfway houses is always troublesome to those who have plunked their life's savings down on an expensive house in a fancy area, but the fact is that when those facilities are well-managed, the surrounding neighborhood suffers hardly at all. I've seen this work well in affluent areas of the District, and I've also seen it not work at all when an agency fails to assert a firm hand in making certain that the homeless or the returning offenders conform to neighborhood standards.

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Alexandria, Va.: If Oklahoma won't subsidize Metro, how about shipping us some of those pigs that my tax dollars underwrite? I could ride one to work.

Marc Fisher: Indeed, but you'd very soon run afoul of our strict environmental regs. Though you could hire scoopers to follow you wherever you go.

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Washington, DC: Aside from the earlier good point about the difference in the cost of living between OK and DC, if Coburn's problem is that federal employees get too big a subsidy, the way to address that is to change the transit subsidy program for federal employees, not to underfund the entire city's transportation system. And I say that as a federal employee.

Marc Fisher: Right, but Coburn doesn't really care about the federal workers' subsidies--his agenda is to send the message that transit is bad, urban areas are bad, and if we dig our heads deep enough into the sand, we can pretend it's 1962 and keep on building highways and big cars and trust that $1 gas will miraculously return.

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Oklahoma and transit: Full article: http://money.cnn.com/2008/06/12/news/economy/cities_oil/index.htm?cnn=yes

"(Oklahoma City Mayor) Couch said improving public transportation is a priority. The city is several years into a study of a rail transit system in the hopes of attracting federal money for it."

I wonder how Coburn will respond to that prospect.

Marc Fisher: Poorly, I imagine.

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Coburn serves a function that most don't like: Most here decry the "bridge to no where," yet fail to see that someone in Alaska might see the metro as DC's "Bridge to no where" We can't build everything for everyone. While I view Metro as a priority, I can see where some people don't.

Marc Fisher: Sure, some people will always look at the enormous infrastructure costs of heavy rail and recoil in shock. But any honest assessment of the benefits to the entire metro area of having those millions of Metro users off the streets and highways results in a recognition that public support for transit is more than justified, and that that support is not a subsidy for the riders, but a policy aimed at making life work for drivers and transit users alike.

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Washington, D.C.: So, how about those 14 year olds who kicked some poor guy to his death? Unbelievable.

washingtonpost.com: Pr. George's Slaying Suspects May Be in Gang, Police Say (Post, June 12)

Marc Fisher: The mindset and internal compass of a 14-year-old is so wildly variable that the number, the age can seem almost meaningless. Most of the 14-year-olds I know are more comfortable hanging around with nine-year-olds and playing games, but there are also 14-year-olds who have been exposed to so much inappropriate behavior and material for so long that they seem as hardened and soiled as a 22-year-old. We live in society that is even more divided culturally than it is economically.

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Rockville, Md.: Yay to judge Greenberg?? Yay to allowing bigots to put a referendum on the ballot where misleading, incorrect information will be poured onto the airwaves prior to the election. In things like this, the facts are boring and not "sexy" so nobody hears them. The lies used by the bigots get people's attention.

I took one of their fliers when they had the petition. Half the things in there were false.

Marc Fisher: Whether or not you consider them bigots, the people who collected signatures to put the transgendered issue on the ballot have heartfelt concerns about their local government going well beyond what other governments are doing and creating a set of legal protections that they believe unnecessarily surpass the guarantees for all that are already in the law. If enough people agree with them that this law should be put to public consideration, then they should be allowed to make their case.

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Arlington, Va.: Got here late so sorry this is late. As a gay man, I have to ask if you even know anyone transgendered? Your Yay of the week is horribly offensive. You show a complete lack of understanding for the issue. Why should any minorities rights ever be decided by a majority vote? You're usually very liberal and I'm shocked at your stated opinion.

Marc Fisher: I generally don't see much reason for laws to be determined by referendum. The republican form of government works best when the people we elect rise above the clamor of the crowd and do what their principles demand. But we have safeguards in our system that let the people rise up when government has gone too far, and the initiative and referendum processes do serve a purpose. Only 13 states have taken the actions that Montgomery has on transgendered rights--if this law doesn't meet with the community's standards, then why shouldn't it be the subject of a county-wide debate?

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PG County: Nay to the pointlessly divisive comment about so-called PG County drug dealers. Is the chatter taking the time to check drivers' licenses of those selling drugs in their neighborhood? I am confident that there are plenty of drug dealers and drug buyers in NE, SE, PG County, not to mention NW, SW, Montgomery, Fairfax, etc.

Making ignorant generalizations about other neighborhoods isn't going to stop murders in your own.

Marc Fisher: In most D.C. open air drug markets, the majority of the buyers are from the suburbs, and no one county has anything close to a monopoly on customers or dealers.

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Washington, D.C.: Marc,

What's that Web site that allows you to give to public school classrooms directly? The site allows teachers in D.C. to post things they need and then the public gets to help out as they see fit. My company is looking into potential places to donate money and time, and I thought that would be a good place to start, but I can't remember the Web site.

Thanks.

washingtonpost.com: Do you mean this? www.adoptaclassroom.com

Marc Fisher: There's also supportyourteacher.org

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"Police Union": What police union is that? Is it the FOP? If so why do you not name it as such? The Post has long done this, and as a son of a cop who was involved with the FOP it is very annoying. Should we refer to the Post as "the newspaper?" It may seem small but to cops and family of police officers it is viewed as a slight by the media. Call it what it is, the Fraternal Order of Police. Thank you.

Marc Fisher: I don't see any pattern of refraining from using the union's name; in fact, I just checked our last dozen references to the union and the Fraternal Order of Police name was used in 10 of the 12 stories.

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Northwest D.C.: In many respects aggressive tactics against the murders in the urban cities are long overdue. As simpleminded and offensive as the checkpoint is, don't you think the biggest factor is the mere presence of police? Now those folks know there are "x" number of cops just 2-3 blocks away and the nonsense stops.

It seems that the this police chief thinks criminals are dumb and padding their stats with dumb petty criminals is good police work. Only the world's dumbest criminals would kill somebody in a neighborhood, go back and get caught at a police checkpoint.

Marc Fisher: Ok, but the nonsense stops only for as long as the massive presence is maintained, which is just a few hours. What good is it if the mayhem resumes moments later?

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Oakland, Calif.: Hi, Marc. I was one of the first students at H.D. Woodson and I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Whoever heard of a school with escalators and a swimming pool? They set high standards and we pretty much met them. It's almost unbelievable how quickly things went south.

But, in a "small world" twist, one of my co-workers here attended Walt Whitman HS in Bethesda in the mid-1960s. Like Woodson, it was state of the art for its time; and he was stunned when it was torn down and rebuilt from scratch in the late 1990s. The difference, however, is that Whitman never reached the decrepitude of Woodson, and continued to meet high academic standards.

I still have friends and relatives in the area and hope the new Woodson does it better on all fronts.

Marc Fisher: I hope so too, but the age and condition of a school building has next to nothing to do with the quality of what goes on inside. I was in a school building this morning that was built in 1892 and looks like nobody's put any real money into it since then, yet the building was abuzz with effective learning. Whereas some new school buildings descend into warehouse status within a couple of years of opening. It's all about the culture and expectations you create within the walls, not what those walls look like.

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Virginia: I hope Obama noticed the need for more federal transportation funding during his recent trip to the Nissan Pavilion. Odd that so many members of Congress essentially live in the area, many plan to live here after they retire, the vast majority of the federal workforce is in the area, and yet it always feels like this region is last on the list when it comes to federal attention to transit needs. I know Virginia needs to step up to the plate but it still feels like we get much less funding than states like Arkansas or Idaho.

Marc Fisher: It feels that way because it's true. In general, smaller states get disproportionately high shares of federal largesse, in good part tracing back to the constitutional guarantee of parity for states in the Senate.

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Washington, D.C.: What do you know about the D.C. Board of Real Property Assessment Appeals? Given the recent Tax Office scandals, do you think it is wise to allow this Administrative Board -- which handles thousands of D.C. real estate assessment appeals -- to operate in near-complete secrecy. It seems to me that the present lack of oversight is a disaster waiting to happen and could make the Harriette Walters debacle seem like small potatoes.

Marc Fisher: Their meetings should be as open to the public as those of any board. Are they not?

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The city has put all the officers manning those checkpoints through... : a training that hits hard on the idea that there is no discretion here

Well, there goes my big business plan. As a middle-class white woman I thought I'd be able to get in there and start up a nice drug business for myself.

Marc Fisher: Let us know how that works out for you.

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Bethesda, Md.: What is the standard for road construction crews working in summer hot temperatures? This week I saw workers resurfacing the road for Montrose Parkway (as well as people working on several other locations) when it is 96 degrees and very sunny. This seems very unhealthy. At what point do they call a too-hot-to-work day?

Marc Fisher: I doubt there's an upper limit--think about roofers who work through the summer up on rooftops where the temps are way above those down on the ground. Then again, I've had a devil of a time getting repair workers to come do an attic job--they don't work past noon during the summer because of the heat. I guess each craft has its own set of expectations for its workers.

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Donating to classrooms: The chatter might also be referring to DonorsChoose, a very transparent and well-run organization.

Marc Fisher: Yes, I was trying to recall that name--apparently there are a slew of such sites.

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Marc Fisher: That has to kick things in the head for today. Thanks very much for coming along. More in the column on Sunday and every day on the big blog. Come on back next Thursday for more conversation, and listen in Tuesday (or any day) for debates on hot local issues on Raw Fisher Radio right here on the big web site.

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