Whaaa?

Hi folks, this is Truxtonian, not Mari. Mari was on my case for not posting in a long time, so I feel compelled. Anyways, this is probably going to raise the webmistress’s ire. But, Mari, it’s a post– so remember that.

Well, the primaries came and went. Comments are flowing on previous posts about ANC elections. Very interesting. Very interesting, indeed. All I have to say now is that I got a message from the Eckington listserv, which reposts from the Bloomingdale listserv (yes, this is 3rd or 4th-hand), about ANC Commissioner Robert Brannum being endorsed by Senator John Kerry for the DC Board of Education. To that I say an emphatic, WHAT?!?

Ok folks, look forward to the “real” election on November 7th. Maybe the mayor has been more or less decided, but there are a lot more more interesting elections that will greatly impact us DC folk forthcoming.

11 thoughts on “Whaaa?”

  2. T,
    The Eckington list is a member’s only list so it may be helpful to fill in those who can’t read the messages to explain the bruhaha. My summary of the msgs is blame Brannum for slowing down the E-12 firehouse progress.

  3. Well, there’s definitely that bruhahaha; the whole slowing down EC-12’s development. But there’s also the peculiarity that a sitting senator would endorse a ANC commissioner. Isn’t that kinda like mayor endorsing a high school class president? Kinda odd, in my opinion.

    (No offense to ANC Commissioners or aspiring high school class presidents. Both are very important roles to fill in volunteer positions.)

  5. ok, even though you closed the subject, I will not let myself fail to defend my previous post since Scotttac obviously thinks (and implied) I’m a racist and called me stupid twice. Sorry about the book, but I take this issue more seriously than most (although I am NOT upset in any way). Nothing I said in my blog was untrue. I completely agree that there are a lot of non-white professionals gentrifying the neighborhood (whether they mean to or not). I have made that point many times on blogs when folks start saying that gentrification is bad, and it is all about white people (and A LOT of people support that notion). The statements Scotttac made implying that I must think anyone who isn’t white is a part of the crime or other problems the community faces are wholly untrue. In fact I assure you that for one, I don’t think my non-white wife is part of the problem. Scotttac is right, it would have been a better choice to say professionals instead of white folks (although professional does not equal gentrifier, and most people labeled gentrifiers happen to be white, and if none were white, I’m not sure gentrification would be such a divisive issue here, which means whites take the brunt of the criticism, simply for being white). But the fact that I failed to use a more inclusive term doesn’t make my statement wrong, and doesn’t make me stupid or racist. I think I used my choice of words because when I start writing a post like that, I think back to when I actually used to attend some of Leroy’s meetings (years ago). I think even farther back to the first block I moved into in this neighborhood (’97), and I remember how starkly black and white it was, in terms of people and opinions. How the handful of white folks, and one black gentleman organized against the thugs/drug dealers (interestingly, the black gentlman started the organizing, and unlike the other black folks on the block, he wasn’t from DC, and he eventually became frustrated and said these people in DC will never change, which included the cops who grew up with the thugs and helped them more than us. He then moved to California. Of course his statement wouldn’t be construed as racist because he was black). Anyway, I remember being told I shouldn’t be allowed to live there. I remember a lot of racist statements made to me like a time a black gentlman who didn’t live there coming out of CHURCH on Sunday saying to me, “what are you doing around here. Don’t you belong over on Connecticut Avenue somewhere.” I remember my tires getting knifed regularly. I remember my car windows getting smashed in regulary. I remember bricks coming through my bedroom windows at 2:00 AM. I remember coming home from work one day and finding out the guys two doors down had taken the back door and security gate of the hinges and emptied the contents of the house into their house (even microwave oven, telephones, steak knives…packed it up and moved it out). I remember the drug dealers and the other young people of the neighborhood throwing trash at my then girlfriend and I whenever we walked out of our house because the police told them that we were helping the vice squad to make a case against the drug dealers. Oh, yes, I have been failing to acknowledge my then girlfriend – a non-white Peruvian professional whom I lived with (it was actually her house). She remembers all of the above, and she especially remembers thugs driving next to her at 2mph in their car while she walked the dog, repeatedly saying things like, “Don’t be scared girl. I like you. I like you a whole lot.” And through all of this, not one bit of help or words of support from any of the non-drug dealing, long-time resident black folks on the block. We organized a block meeting to talk to everyone about the drug dealers. At that meeting, NO black folks were willing to help the white folks trying to work with the Councilman and MPD to get rid of the dealers (who had been there for 13 years in ’97). It turns out the the black folks had banned together because they believed the white people had some sort of master plan whereby once we got rid of the criminals, we were going to focus on getting rid of black folks all together. Mind you, it wasn’t the professionals were going to drive out the non-professionals. It was the whites were going to drive out everyone else. Black folks on that block back then were basically saying I was a racist taking part in some sort of master racist plan, just because I was white and I moved into the neighborhood (and I don’t think white racists generally chose to live in Shaw in ’97, unless you’re of the opinion all whites are racist and just don’t know it). I realize that things have changed in Shaw and most people probably don’t experience what I did when I first moved to Shaw, but I think my experience in Shaw (and in college where most of my roommates and friends were black), where I have been a part of or listened to so many conversations where black folks speak freely and starkly about race in manner a lot of people might find uncomfortable, has resulted in my tendency tend to speak in a similar manner.

    So I apologize for my calling out white gentrification while failing to recognize all of the non-white professionals (and non-professionals for that matter) who are also gentrifying the neighborhood. I will try to be as inclusive as possible in the future, and please hold me to it.

    KS

  8. I feel you, KS. I actually read your post as if you were a brother (w/o evidence one way or another); and you are, just of another color.

    It was fascinating to watch how Betty and Mary and others curbed all their race talk when Jack, Chief Ramsey, and other city officials were around at the crime meeting last night. But then we had someone one more fair minded moderating the meeting. It was even more interesting to witness one gentleman, who spoke out articulately and vehemently against bad cops, do so without playing the race card to make his message crystal clear.

    Leroy couldn’t help but take innacurate snipes at Alex, but that’s to be expected. I cannot to see the end of that manure.

  9. Brevity.
    Brevity.
    Brevity.
    Please try to avoid lengthy comments that make me want to delete them before I even read them because they fill my window completely.
    Okay people, have a good and peaceful weekend.

  10. I have the PDF of the Kerry endorsement of Brannum. Send me an email and I’ll forward it to you. James underscore Engelhardt at Yahoo.

    The endorsement reads like a restatement of Brannum’s bio. Sort of form letter-esque. He may have done all those good things.
    I just don’t know why he went and testified untruths to attempt to derail the EC-12 plan (EC-12 is the new bar/restaurant that will be the result of an historic renovation of the old Firehouse at North Capitol and Quincy Place). He was ultimately unsuccessful, but his charges were simply not true; and it angered me–that Firehouse is a huge advance, by any measure; and it’s a shining example of a responsive government giving the community what it requested.

    Evidence:

    His testimony is about 15 minutes into the video at the link below.

    http://octt.dc.gov/services/on_demand_video/on_demand_june_2006_week_1.shtm
    6/1/2006 Part 1
    PUBLIC HEARING COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS, Vincent B. Orange, Sr., Chairman

  11. Sorry, I didn’t sign my email. That link to Brannum’s testimony was also too long.

    You can get to it from here:

    http://octt.dc.gov/main.shtm

    Then go to On Demand Video.
    Then go to June. Then go to the description in my last post–if Mari didn’t delete it for either a brevity violation or no signature.

    JT

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