I need journalists to hold Swizzler to account for not doing fancy hot dogs anymore

My dude, I said "our courts are understaffed" which you somehow took to mean that I was only talking about federal court and talking about money.

There's obviously been a vacancy problem in DC Superior Court. Maybe you just didn't know that we have a non-federal court system here that handles criminal cases? Is that the problem? They don't talk about those sorts of pesky details on Nextdoor and so they just elide you?

> the last time anyone looked they had the largest budget by far of any federal court. And they aren’t saying they need more anywhere.

They are saying they need more resources, but maybe not on the Citizen app, Nextdoor, or OANN, which is probably why you missed it.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/01/01/dc-judges-vacancy-senate/

https://www.npr.org/local/305/2022/12/16/1143595613/senate-confirms-seven-judges-for-d-c-courts-addressing-vacancy-crisis (this one notes some recent confirmations to DC superior court, which is good, but there are still a bunch more vacancies)

> I’m deeply frustrated and disappointed with the Council because they are doing NOTHING

I guess I just think it is silly to focus your ire on the Council, especially to the exclusion of everyone else responsible for public safety in this city. The Council voted last year to approve $20,000 signing bonuses for new MPD officers to hire 350 more officers. And despite the extremely stupid debate surrounding the RCCA, it really was not designed to be some soft on crime giveaway, and in many ways was supposed to make it more straightforward and easy to prosecute a variety of crimes, including gun crimes that are currently difficult to prosecute. It's just false that the Council is trying to turn the city into some soft on crime communist utopia. If your main reason for being angry at the Council is that they aren't pursuing policies to just wantonly lock people away and throw the key away for the rest of their lives, fine, but then stop talking shit about the GOP because you're sounding an awful lot like Nixon & Reagan.

I think it's pretty hard to argue that the Council is the main or biggest problem. It's a huge problem for the city if almost 2/3 of MPD arrests don't get prosecuted by the USAO. Maybe that's a problem with MPD officers doing a shitty job of collecting evidence that will hold up in court, maybe that's a problem with DC's forensic lab being a shitshow that lost its accreditation and being unable to process evidence to make cases, maybe that's a problem with many MPD officers being shitheads who the USAO can't credibly put on the stand, maybe that's a problem with USAO not pursuing crimes that they consider too low-level. Almost certainly it's a combination of all of those things. But - while surely the Council can play some role in fixing those problems, there are a bunch of people who are more directly responsible for fixing them who aren't being hauled in front of Congress for a stupid fucking fascist circus this week - unless you want to count the president of DC's police union, lol. It's also a huge problem if, as many of the crimepost idiots on this sub love to claim, USAO not papering MPD arrests is leading MPD officers to just not actually do police work anymore.

Similarly, it's a huge problem that our courts are understaffed and that USAO resources are stretched too thin to give local DC prosecutions adequate time and attention. The Council can't do much about those things. Maybe they can be better advocates for DC, maybe they could help raise public awareness of the ways federal policy could help make things better in DC / the ways federal policy is a bottleneck, and maybe that would create more energy for positive change at the federal level. But again, Council members are going to be "grilled" this week by fascist fuckheads who don't actually give a shit about improving public safety in DC and will not be interested in the slightest in hearing about anything constructive they could be doing besides a televised clown show.

Edit and, ask any police officer in this city, and they will tell you that one of the biggest changes they have seen is the number of guns in this city in the last few years. The crimebrained idiots on this sub will never admit it, nor of course will the fascist monsters holding the hearing this week, but our national addiction to guns and aversion to actually curbing gun supply in this country is a gigantic cause of violence in the District. The Council can also do absolutely nothing about that.

The "worst" thing the Council has done is to propose that some criminal sentences get marginally shorter than they were, and make it possible for some people who have already been in jail for many years to get out of jail. On the first point - again, that's now a policy that never took effect, was never going to take effect before 2025, and now will never take effect at all, so blaming DC's crime problems on it is a stupid. On the second point, OK, I understand if you think it's bad for some people to get out of prison earlier than what they were originally sentenced to. I'll agree to disagree. But I'd remind you that if you are anywhere to the left of, say, Sean Hannity, as of like two years ago you probably would have admitted that our country has an insane problem with mass incarceration, driven by decades of politicians pandering to citizens who mindlessly demanded harsher sentences whenever given the option. That continues to be the case today, and personally I think it's embarrassing for so many people to quickly fall into the trap of sentencing can only move in one direction, it can never get shorter than what it has historically been. That sort of thinking is just so dis-spiriting, our country has actually learned absolutely nothing from the failures and moral atrocities of mass incarceration. I'm not a prison abolitionist, but American mass incarceration is a monstrous and destructive approach to public safety; and the DC Council never proposed ending mass incarceration, they just proposed and implemented some very modest reductions in criminal sentences that absolutely do not deserve the breathless outrage that they receive.

There are real problems with public safety in this city, caused by a lot of different things. Training all the anger on the Council is for people who have an irrational, single-minded, and destructive hard-on for maximizing prison sentences and have little interest in using any other tools, including good policing, to improve safety.

If Congress wants to have a productive conversation about public safety in DC that's one thing, but that ain't what this is. It's weird to have a hearing about public safety in DC where the only executive branch official is the city's CFO - not the mayor, not the deputy mayor for public safety, not any leadership from MPD. I get that some people had complaints about the RCCA, but if you're worried about the current state of public safety in this city, it might be worth doing something other than hauling up councilmembers to yell at them for a bill that never took effect and no longer exists.

If I was really concerned about public safety in this city, I might ask officials to testify before me who could explain why MPD murder cases are getting summarily dropped, or why the majority of MPD arrests aren't getting prosecuted by USAO. And no, I don't think the person to answer those questions is the head of the fucking police union.

If I was really concerned about public safety in this city, maybe I wouldn't be pushing for gigantic cuts to USAO staff.

This thing is a clown show. From the bottom of my heart, fuck all of you who keep cheering on Republicans in Congress for this sideshow bullshit that isn't going to make a single person in this city more safe.

Lots more bike lanes!

I mean, I don't think it's like servers are living large now

Cyclists ride where they feel least likely to die. If there's something blocking a bike lane, yes, they will either bike in the street or on the sidewalk.

Nonsense distinction that is mostly just a right-wing rhetorical device.

> The city is incapable of fixing this issue unless they start a zero-tolerance impound policy.

Idk about zero tolerance but I am fine with more aggressive impounding, towing, booting, license suspensions, etc.

> Virginia and Maryland don't have any sort of reciprocal punishment for DC initiated fines.

Note that that's just for camera fines, which DC also now has virtually no punishments for.

> In the story above, the driver was not fleeing a chase, he was fleeing a traffic stop

Right, and killed a pedestrian within like a block of beginning to flee. The whole point of a no chase policy is to avoid drivers doing crazy shit that kills bystanders to get away from police. As I note every time this comes up, 1/3 of the people who die in chases are bystanders, who are 3x more likely to die in a chase than officers. You really don't want high speed chase going on through a city.

> I know some people are trying to end police traffic stops altogether, which will be another dangerous step in our descent into rampant criminality.

I don't have really strong views on how the costs & benefits of traffic stops net out. But I would love it if the city took easier steps that don't involve police confrontations to suspend driver's licenses and impound vehicles.

Secret Service clearly identified someone who has no business behind the wheel of a car. The results were just tragic.

Fleeing drivers kill bystanders: see story above.

The problem isn't the no-chase policy, it's that the city doesn't do nearly enough to get terrible and dangerous drivers off the road, because they are concerned about the equity effects of doing so.

Yeah. One viral tweet when people couldn't get Popeyes sent RR to the moon

No, Lucky Buns & Hot Lola's were always better

100%, the Popeyes spicy chicken sandwich is glorious

I don't think the Roaming Rooster sandwich is actually a Nashville hot chicken sandwich, they're just one of the many places that have used that to mean "spicy chicken sandwich"

Lucky Buns is great but I feel like Lucky Buns has turned down their heat recently. The last couple of times I've gone the Hot Tiger Bun has barely made me break a sweat; it used to have me panting hard.

IMO Hot Lola's is the clear king based on my most recent experiences.

> I sent some feedback and suggestions to management and haven't heard back.

Bold move, considering Alamo's reputation

This would be very helpful anytime I'm driving in the left lane only to realize that the person in front of me has decided to make an illegal left turn at the coming intersection.

Or anytime I'm in a bike lane and the car to my left is slowing down inexplicably

Thank you for your helpful PSA, OP. Car technology is changing so rapidly these days with all the fancy computers etc., so it's helpful to have an explainer for one of these great new safety features

Or outside them, really

"Piggybacking" a post about pedestrian safety with a comment complaining about pedestrians getting in your way is just as shitty as when people respond to posts about cyclists being hit by whining about cyclists biking through stop signs.

It's one of my great fears in life when I'm driving around DC that I'm going to get someone killed in this situation - stopping to let a pedestrian cross in front of me and giving them a false sense of security while the person behind me zooms around.

Of course it's theoretically possible to create a third pedal that is programmed to feel exactly like a clutch, with tangible resistance at the friction point and the feel of stalling out if you aren't timing it properly. It's just a pretty complicated engineering task, especially given that it's not just a software question it's a physical engineering question, an it has an audience of uncertain size. But maybe we will see a niche enthusiast EV in the future that tries to fake the feel of a manual.

I would avoid all the places you list, none of them are going to be particularly good (unless you love raw seafood, in which case you can get yourself an enjoyable meal at Old Ebbitt), and I don't think they will feel as special as you hope. Note that the Hamilton isn't even old or classic.

If you want to try DC restaurants that are local institutions and also actually have good food, maybe try Iron Gate, Tabard Inn for brunch, 1789 in Georgetown, Le Diplomate, or Rasika.