Screw Waxman: DC residents deserve democracy

NPR just ran a story on how Waxman is trying to block the DC representation bill. WTF? Isn't 200 years of taxation without representation enough for him? Does he want us to pay our dues a little longer first?

that it would require a constitutional amendement. D.C. isn't a state.

It's a question of Congressional rules, and since many of the actual framers were in Congress when DC's delegates voted, clearly it wasn't against the framers intent.

It's a nasty, ugly, awful reason, but I do think that the reason that this effort keeps getting shot down, despite your cogent point that the framers wouldn't be spinning in the graves, has to do with "Chocolate Clout." There was a bitter unwillingness to hand any clout over in the segregation era, and that unwillingness continues to this day. And it's wrong.

I don't care how they make it happen, they need to make it happen. It is long overdue.

Taxation without representation IS tyranny...and this is the United States of America. It's reprehensible.

It would involve ceding a shitload of land to Virginia and Maryland, and it would entail recreating and redefining what actually "is" DC. My plan would entail splitting DC down the middle, and handing the residents over to those two states. A small area that encompasses the Capitol, the Federal Buildings and any other chunks of land that the 'gubmint' wants to keep remains, in essence "DC." And if the government wants to expand and build new federal buildings, they reserve the right to snatch up any chunk of property within the old DC square (paying for it, of course) and creating another piece of "DC" as needed.

My point is that DC should be the place where the government WORKS, not lives. The only "resident" of DC should be the one at 1600 Penn.

If you have no residents, you really don't need a mayor or a city council. You do, however, need basic services, like public works, roads, sewers and so forth. A Congressional subcommittee can oversee that, and hire contractors to do the work, and coordinate with MD or VA when responsibilities overlap. The DC police force would get much smaller, in fact, it would merge with the Capitol Police and the remainder of the force would transition to MD and VA departments.

But....but....but!!! What about the DC CULTURE!!! Well, those chunks of property that were ceded could be termed District of Columbia, MD, and District of Columbia, VA, and keep their same zip codes. So the inhabitants, and the businesses, would still have a "DC" address, but it would be affiliated with a state.

The end result would put a couple more representatives in the Congress. It would not increase the Senate, but at least there wouldn't be taxation without representation.

There would be a few issues to work out, for example EMBASSIES--In or out of "DC?" but if everyone thought about it, they could work it out. And then, we'd have no more of this bullshit where the Congress acts like they're so put out and they're doing such a FAVOR to DC residents by "overseeing" them, and DC residents wouldn't have to continue to be sick of taxation without representation.

It's a different way of looking at it, but if you look at the "Arlington Military District" that's not terribly contiguous, either, but it remains an entity on ACOE maps.

...based on a low population...but after checking, if DC was granted full statehood it would be only the second smallest of the (then) 8 states with populations of less than one million....guess I'll have to rethink this....

And we're not even asking for Senators like they have (yet)

Find a big old outhouse and paint it white, tell him it's his new "DC" home!

I'm a DC area resident too, but I don't want another hardcore Republican in Congress. This shouldn't be a negotiation, quite frankly - we should just get voting rights.

That's the thing: Utah gets a seat for the next 3 years, but then that seat goes into the normal allocation pool for the 2010 census, and it looks like Massachussetts would get it.

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He fought against the Metro subway in Los Angeles for years.