″For the most part, the targeted killings and drug activity take place in a small section of the city…Except for the killings, Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the country.″ – Marion Barry, Mayor for Life
Trump called out the National Guard and took over law enforcement in Washington DC. It’s all over. Even bloggers have commented. I’m late to the party, it seems. And no, he’s not taking over the blue city near you. Just DC, because he can. It’s a federal city. Used to be run by the feds. It went to shit after “home rule” was instituted. It’s in the law that he’s allowed.
I grew up in the DC area. I spend a couple decades working as a field tech in one industry or another and have been in quite a bit more of the area’s underbelly than most. Pre-cable, I installed HBO decoders on apartment antenna systems. I can say, with some authority, I’ve been in some woefully shitty and dangerous areas. First to install the service, then to take it out when they didn’t pay. Disconnects made for a shitty day.
For the most part, although I could see crappiness all around, I was rarely fucked with. 6 foot, or so, long beard, longest hair (I had some then) in my life, an angry young man, I looked like 220 pounds of absolute trouble.
Also looked like I didn’t have more than a few nickels on me.
For awhile, I installed and serviced commercial sound systems. The office was at Thomas Circle, back in the day where that’s where the working women could be found. Leaving the office on a payday was special. Large population of hookers out in the morning those days. I dropped a truck off to be repaired a few blocks north and had a crack ho follow me for a block for simply telling her hello.
I’ve been stopped by the cops walking west down “L” street, heading to the subway at the end of a long day. They wanted to know what a white dude was doing at that time of night on that block. Unless you worked there and were hoping to hit the subway with your presence going unnoticed, you’d be there for women and/or drugs. FWIW, I’ve been in some really sketchy clubs in that area. That was before I was sainted.
Crime is something no one admits about DC that tourists find out quickly. I used to feel bad for the families leaving the Holiday Inn near my office, only to walk past the hookers to the Metro to start their day. Back before the web, you wouldn’t know what the area was like when you rented a hotel. You’d look at the price, the fact it’s a few blocks from K street and all the restaurants and whatnot. You’d check in, waddle out at night and…uh-oh. I’m surely not in Kansas anymore.
In a capital city, an observer will nearly always find two zones:
- The political zone;
- The rest of the city.
The political zone is distinct from the rest. It’s typically clean and orderly. Nice, well-tended buildings with door guards and metal detectors. It’s well policed. And the people you’ll find there are predominantly white and directly associated with the government, either as office holders, appointees, employees, or lobbyists. (Neglect the tourists; they’re a transient crowd.)
The rest of the city tends toward squalor. It’s dirty. The buildings are ratty-looking. The police are few and sparse. In the case of Washington D.C., the population is predominantly black and heavily dependent on government assistance. – Frances Porretto
That is, except the Northwest. That’s where the upper crust lives. The rest? Notsomuch.
And, those political areas aren’t always well policed, if at all.
Back in the day, the X evil sister-in-law had gone to training in an adjacent Maryland suburb, Riverdale. So she was, of course, and expert on real estate in the area. She had a friend looking for a place in DC and was looking on Capitol Hill (a perimeter of blocks around the US Capital). Listening to the conversation, I chimed in and said that was an unsafe area, and her single female friend would be better off looking elsewhere. That earned me the shit-eye, and told I didn’t know what I was talking about.
Sure.
Only been around the area in businesses and apartments for years, early in the morning, late at night. I’ve literally smoked weed in the shadow of the supreme court.
Right on queue, not a few weeks later, in that area a woman congressional staffer was beaten to death so badly they had to use dental records to ID her.
Most of the touristy areas are safe during daylight. But where Frances is wrong in that quote is that there’s a Metro Rail, and goblins can and do ride it nearly anywhere in the city. I’ve been accosted whilst on a date on Constitution ave, literally on the Washington Monument grounds. My girlfriend badly wanted to skedaddle. I didn’t care. I figured I’d demolish the guy if he came closer. She didn’t know it, but I had a Gerber Mark 1 on me, my usual EDC when there.
FWIW, most of the goblins are in the NE section of the city, and SE (A.K.A Anacostia)
Barry said the quiet part out loud with “Congress is safe; everyone is safe.”
Everyone that counts, he meant. So much for Black Lives Matter. – James David Dickson
My brother lived there when he was first married. Had his car stolen. He found it when they called him to pay up the storage fees. The thieves ditched it in the middle of an intersection when it ran out of gas. No “Hey we found your car”. Nope. Pay up, this one’s yours.
The place is run like a Caribbean island. Probably not as well.
Every winter, we’d get snowstorms. For the most part, I’d still have to work. One year, there was one path plowed in DC – from the mayor’s residence to city hall. They did fuck-all everywhere else. It was a miserable week having to drive to customers there.
I spent a few years working across Lafayette Park from the Whitehouse, most of it taking Rail or the commuter train to and from my home in Virginia. I’ve spent years on the ground in and amongst the Indigenous Population.
Last time I was up there and rode the metro, I was gobsmacked at how dirty and shabby the train was, as well as some of the areas I passed through. Back when I commuted there, the rail was pretty clean.
Trump did the right thing. Take it over, sort it out.
You know, most don’t understand that people [in these cities] save all their lives to buy a house in these cities that in most parts of the country would be considered squalor. – Rush Limbaugh
(I may have mangled that quote. I heard it live and remember it to this day)
Inspected By Pat 