HE stood at the door--a medium built man with an angry brow, which, in hindsight, seemed the most threatening thing about him. Certainly, he wasn’t an imposing figure that would send anyone quaking. He had been at the house before, lodging some complaint about TBR.
Then, she was a professional, paid community organizer and volunteer political activist. Her friends were mostly subversives, intent on overthrowing the government or at least radically changing it. Sometimes the neighbors wondered about the dark sedan permanently parked whose occupants rotated and frequently took pictures of people going in and out of the house on California St. in Jackson, Ms.
That night he showed up, something got into TBR. She was tired of it all. When he came with yet another complaint at nearly 11 pm, she left him at the door, telling him to wait a minute, as if she had forgot something she wanted to give to him. Her boyfriend was drifting off to sleep. She walked calmly in the bedroom, opened the dresser drawer and pulled out the .22 pistol.
She had purchased the gun for protection. Her job and activism caused her to travel late nights on the Mississippi highways, often alone. But she had never really used it on those solitary journeys. Instead, she had pulled up on a side street one day on the way home and saw a man in the car next to her beating the hell out of a woman. When she caught sight of the woman’s face, she realized it was her friend Allison.
TBR reached into the glove compartment, retrieved her pistol and jumped out of the car in what seemed one fluid movement. She pointed the .22 at Henry’s head—a guy she’d met only once, misjudging him as a decent man. “If you don’t leave her alone, I am going to shoot you right here. I won’t kill you but I will maim you--hopefully for life.”
Allison, face battered and covered with a mixture of tears and snot, opened the passenger door. Henry pushed her out. TBR caught her before she hit the ground and walked her to the car—a scruffy Volkswagen Bug. The two women watched as Henry pulled off. A week later, Allison’s father drove from New York to collect his daughter--before she was killed or TBR was imprisoned.
The second time TBR used her .22 was when her roommate, Becky, thought someone was trying to climb into a window in the house. TBR fired into the dark, sending the person scampering among the leaves.
But that night with her neighbor was different. There was no imminent threat. No case of domestic violence or potential robbery. She was simply tired of this guy. She calmly raised the gun and pointed at him, pledging to kill him if he came back. By that time, thankfully, her boyfriend was at the door, reaching for the gun as the neighbor stood frozen unable to move. Eventually, sanity returned. The neighbor left. The gun was return to its place in the dresser drawer.
Days later, TBR reflected on the incident. She realized there was no bluff in her voice or mannerism. She was prepared to kill someone simply because he had rubbed her the wrong way and had invaded her space. In a few seconds, something she had bought for self-defense and become an offensive weapon, and a man was poised to lose his life.
It only takes a second, really. Those five Supreme Court Justices who ruled the DC handgun ban violates the Second Amendment don’t understand how quickly an available loaded gun becomes the solution for everything. An irritation is magnified in the presence of a loaded gun; and a gun, if it is to have weight and influence in a situation, should always be loaded. Not unlike TBR back in Mississippi, a handgun user seeking power over an opponent never thinks of some well-armed militia and probably couldn’t name two of the signers of the U.S. Constitution.
Of course, the lack of historical information isn’t reason enough to have sustained the law. But the reality that more lives undoubtedly will be loss might be sufficient. D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, reacting to Thursday’s Supreme Court decision, was right when she said it is likely “the ruling will produce an increase in accidents and gun violence among family members and even neighbors, as some in the rush of anger, fetch the guns to escalate or settle a dispute.”
TBR eventually sold her gun; her hair-trigger temper has been tempered. But there are thousands residents like her in the District. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty, Interim Attorney General Peter Nickles and the D.C. Council should act quickly to save those people, and other residents from them.
PICTURE, ID CARD, SWIMMING LESSON
FIRST, the Fenty administration pushed to link more than 5200 surveillance cameras around the city, allowing for real-time monitoring. Were it not for public uproar and concerns raised by the council including At-Large Member Phil Mendelson, residents may have seen a government lens in every kitchen.
Now, the mayor has introduced “One Card,” which is the closest thing to a universal identification card for the nation’s capital. Already the program is in operation at 17 recreation centers, according to Department of Parks and Recreation spokesperson John Stokes.
At a cost of $66,000, the DPR has printed and/or distributed more than 8,000 cards for users of its facilities. The cards will be scanned each time a resident enters, regardless of the number of repeat visits, which makes it difficult to accurately track usage—one of the reasons officials have given for the card. And while individuals will enter via the card, there isn’t anyway to accurately determine what program (s) they are using. These deficiencies in the system, as confirmed by DPR’s Stokes, raise questions about its efficacy.
Fenty and his City Administrator Dan Tangherlini are numbers men. They have never seen a statistic they didn’t want to repeat or use in service to their cause—never mind that those numbers maybe inaccurate or meaningless.
Instead of spending time trying to figure how to track usage, the administration may want to invest more in guaranteeing the quality of personnel, programs, and facilities. It may want to ensure that tax dollars aren’t being squandered or wasted on cameras that don’t really prevent crime or magnetic cards that might seem cool and totally 21st Century but are mostly worthless.
SIDESHOWS AND SOUVENIRS
SING a song for the D. C. Republican Party’s desire to reform D.C.’s estate and capital gains tax laws. That may be the only thing on its local platform that seems remotely in tune with traditional conservative public policy and politics.
Earlier this month, TBR accused the DCGOP of acting like Democrats. All right, conservative Democrats.
The party platform approved on June 16, reinforces that assertion. Take for example its obsession with opportunities for small, disadvantaged and ethnically diverse businesses, and all things affordable—housing, drug treatment, health care.
TBR shouldn’t be so hard on the DCGOP. What can it do? Democrats outnumber it more than 10 to 1; if the party is going to grow, it has to launch a massive conversion program to wind over Democrats or independents. That means being all things to all people, which usually translates into one big blur.
SPEAKING of the DCGOP: TBR congratulates Paul Craney, the party’s executive director, on his recent marriage to the former Laurie Belsito, who is taking her husband’s name. The wedding took place in Rockport, Massachusetts. Then, the happy couple was off to honeymoon in Martha’s Vineyard.
FOLLOW THAT STORY
TWO weeks ago, a TBR alert noted that the mayor had issued Executive Order 2008-81, which provided the delegation of personnel authority to 23 agencies. D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray responding to a question from TBR said he knew nothing of the order. AT-Large Member Carol Schwartz, whose committee oversees the mayor’s office, did not return repeated calls to her office.
Carrie Brooks, communications director for the mayor, after promising to provide details of why the order was issued and what problem Fenty sought to solve, did not return repeated telephone calls to her office.
Residents should be concerned about a system that places in the hands of relatively inexperience managers the power to hire, fire and set salaries without oversight. This could usher in the return of those days of cronyism and nepotism when the city was principally an employment center and citizens crossed their fingers hoping they would receive the services they desired or needed.
Sources tell TBR the mayor’s next step is to delegate contracting and procurement authority.
Help!
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