Tick Tock Sheptock

DC MAYOR MURIEL BOWSER is indeed a beautiful woman. I can't take that away from her -- no matter how many OTHER men might say that she's not (always) voluptuous or bodacious enough for their taste. With regard to her physical appearance, I can't honestly say, " [S] he-a look-a like a man". However, her policies and mannerisms hearken back to those of other male mayors and bring to mind the words of the Asian woman on Mad TV -- " [S]He-a look-a like a man " . I noticed on December 29th, 2014 -- just four days before her inauguration -- that many of the cabinet members that Ms. Bowser had chosen were women -- several of whom flanked her during an Event at Miriam's Kitchen (which serves the homeless and where Michelle Obama visited in 2009). That was fine with me; as, I'm all for gender equality, so long as we don't lower the bar when a job that has hereto now been done by men is opened to women. Some would argue that I'm not true to...

I would like to congratulate all homeless advocates, non-profits, council members and administration officials who had anything to do with the city committing at least $22.16M to housing at least 2,431 homeless DC residents in Fiscal Year 2017. If the calculations that I list below are correct AND if we were to maintain the same level of funding through the end of Fiscal Year 2020 (adjusting the baseline budget for inflation) , then the city could conceivably house 9,724 homeless people in the next four fiscal years (FY 17 thru 20). That's 1,374 more than the 8,350 homeless people that DC had as of January 2016. THAT'S PROGRESS!!!!! I calculated that as many as 1,122 of the 2,431 people that the city could house in FY 17 are able-bodied adults. Most or all of these adults would need to use the services of the Dept. Of Employment Services ' Project Empowerment program. However, Project Empowerment served 585 people in FY 15 and not all of them were homeless. This re...

Let's start with a little word smithing. “Administrato-prudence” (as opposed to “Jurisprudence”): The pragmatic sum or totality of the efforts of an administration as indicated by empirical evidence. How a combination of laws, policies and administrative efforts actually improve or worsen the lives of that administration's constituents. OK. Now that we have a working definition for "administrato-prudence", we can proceed with a discourse on DC's efforts to end homelessness, efforts that began [in earnest?] in 2004 and were supposed to end homelessness in the Capital by December 31 st , 2014. We had 7,298 homeless people onJanuary 28th, 2015 – a drop of 450 or 5.8% from the previous year. The city didn't end homelessness by the set date; however, the story doesn't end there – fortunately. During the quarterly meeting of the DC Inter-agency Council on Homelessness (ICH) on June 2 nd , 2015 Tom Fredericksen of The Community Part...

I've often been bothered by how people distort scripture, science and the words of historic figures or deities in order to make the case for supporting their chosen lifestyle. I tell people to self-validate rather than twisting the words of God, Jesus, Martin Luther King, Jr. or the forefathers. After all, if you're already Hell-bent on living a certain way, why do you seek another opinion??? Your mind is already made up. I also worry that, when I've gone on to the next life, people will attribute beliefs and ideas to me that I never supported or that I was indifferent to. In this blog post, I intend to make my views very clear and unmistakable while creating a permanent record that will outlive me. Spirituality: I believe that God can best be described as the “God of Necessary Evils”. He told people to do good, swayed our circumstances in favor of us doing evil, came down hard on those who lived before Christ for not living up to His standard, required the blood...

Councilwoman Muriel Bowser won DC's Democratic mayoral primary yesterday. She will face off with Councilman David Catania (Independent – at-large) in November with him being a strong contender for the mayor's seat. I'm inclined to believe that Catania will do less harm to and possibly more good for the poor of our nation's capital than Bowser will do. But this is a Democratic city and since “Home Rule” was passed in 1973, the winner of the Democratic primary has become mayor. Pity. But, as I said in my blog post yesterday, who becomes the chief executive doesn't determine the direction of the city. In much the same way that the primary job of the sheriff of Philadelphia is to evict people from their homes, the primary job of the mayor of Washington, DC is to push poor people out of the city through a mix of draconian policies. I see a 20-year plan which was devised by the business community behind closed doors coming to fruition. Mayor Anthony Williams (1999-2007...