the Georgetowner Editorial Board • August 17, 2015

August 6 is the 70th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb by the United States on Hiroshima, Japan. That nuclear explosion continues to reverberate all around us, as much because of what didn’t follow as because of what did.

Today, in the Japanese cities of Hiroshima — where the first bomb was dropped — and Nagasaki — where the second was dropped, on August 15 — people are still dying from radiation and its attendant cancers. Some 200,000 survivors of the two attacks remain alive.

The atomic attacks are stark reminders of a horrible war and of all sorts of inhuman sufferings, both inflicted on the Japanese and inflicted by the Japanese. In the United States, the dropping of the atomic bombs, blithely nicknamed “Little Boy” and “Fat Man,” can still spark heated arguments and nuanced intellectual and moral debates. Many members of the Greatest Generation who fought in the Pacific — and remember the high American casualties at Iwo Jima, Tarawa and Okinawa — see the bombings as a tactic that short-circuited the huge American losses certain to result from a U.S. invasion of Japan.

To American leaders, including President Harry Truman, the bombings ended the war.

To historians, the bombings marked the start of an atomic arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union, even the early beginnings of the Cold War.

It wasn’t too long after the bombings that the world’s nuclear powers had enough bombs to destroy life on earth (they still do). The bomb echoes. Witness the heated debate over the U.S.-Iran nuclear treaty and the fear that terrorist groups might get the technology to make a nuclear weapon.

After 50 years, the world is no safer than it was when the mushroom cloud appeared in reality and lingered in our nightmares. The bomb became a part of our cinematic and pop culture dreams.

Amazingly — even with the harrowing Cuban Missile Crisis, which barely avoided nuclear war — nuclear weapons have never been used by any of the nuclear powers. It hasn’t happened.

Which is not to say that it will never happen.

For an instructive portrait of what even such a low-grade bomb as was used in Japan could do, read John Hersey’s classic and emotionally powerful book “Hiroshima.” You’ll feel the emotional heat that remains, even 70 years after the horrific actual heat of that world-changing day.

the Georgetowner Editorial Board • August 7, 2015

These hot summer days are disquieting days in the District of Columbia.

The sound of gunfire is beginning to become noticeable throughout the city. Crime, it’s being said in some quarters, is up, especially violent crime, especially homicide.

There is disagreement about the causes of this uptick in shootings and killings. Mayor Muriel Bowser and Chief Cathy Lanier posited that the growing availability and use of synthetic marijuana and other synthetic drugs are behind it. D.C. police union members — as well as Ward 2 Council member Jack Evans — have pointed to a manpower shortage.

One thing is for sure: the violence, often characteristic of hot summers in big cities, is on the rise. Just this past weekend, three more people were killed in separate incidents in different parts of the city, raising the homicide count in the District to 87, a number that puts us on track to reach numbers not seen since 2008. It may not be the bad old days of the 1990s and earlier, but the violence appears steady and widespread. D.C. is not alone in this — Baltimore experienced a major upsurge in violent deaths and shootings, and Chicago’s troubles have not abated.

But what’s been happening in the District, where both the chief of police and the mayor are popular, is troubling. It isn’t just the numbers themselves, but the persistent, unabated reports of incidents — some major and fatal, some less so —that get under people’s skin.

If you read the D.C. Police Union’s regular crime reports, the notations are startling: the waste of life, the continuous pain and the stretching of resources. The shootings took place in Congress Heights, Benning Ridge and Carver Langston, with an 18-year-old youth starting his senior year at Ballou High School dying of several gunshot wounds on Saturday morning, a 22-year-old man fatally shot, also on Saturday morning, and a man robbed and shot to death while preparing to celebrate his birthday on Sunday morning.

The prosaic crime alerts don’t begin to hint at the disruptions and fear engendered in people’s lives. The Aug. 1 crime alert listed an armed robbery, a robbery, a robbery, an armed robbery, a robbery, a shooting, a shooting. In all, according to the Washington Post, there were ten shootings as well as ten stabbings in the District over the weekend.

It may be the synthetic marijuana, the drugs, the manpower shortage, the heat.

Crime overall may be on the decline.

But it sure doesn’t feel like it.

the Georgetowner Editorial Board •

With Jeb Bush now solidly and officially in the field of presidential candidates, the two front-runners are solidly and officially on board.

It’s the Hillary and Jeb show, Clinton II and Bush III. Bush, the former Republican governor of Florida, announced his candidacy for the presidency Monday, promising to erase dysfunction in Washington, making him yet another Washington insider who’s an outsider.

He promised to be “on the side of free enterprise,” “to fix this thing, because I’ve done it,” “to get things moving our way in the world.”

“I will run with heart and I will run to win,” he said.

What with Clinton emphatically saying the other day, “If there’s one thing I’m not, it’s a quitter,” it could be quite the shoving match among the two clear favorites.

Except maybe it’s not all that clear that they’re favorites.

Bush is bidding to be the third Bush to become president — father and brother preceded, if you hadn’t noticed — and Hilary is still trying to be the second Clinton, after husband Bill, and the first woman.

They’re odd front-runners. Clinton was in the same position eight years ago, when a very junior senator from Illinois, named Barack Obama, entered the race. She is already running a cautious campaign, although, looking over her shoulder, she might not see much competition — at least not for the Democratic nomination. (Sorry, Bernie, Martin and the other guy.)

Bush, on the other hand, can’t even look over his shoulder. He can barely cross the street without running into a Republican rival, some of whom I’m sure he’s never heard of. He is a man among many, plus one woman.

The response to the Clinton and Bush candidacies has so far been underwhelming. It’s true, folks. Familiarity does indeed sometimes breed, if not contempt, then disinterest.

the Georgetowner Editorial Board • April 30, 2015

We miss you, Joe. It has been just about 10 years since reserve police officer Joe Pozell was struck by a distracted driver as he was directing traffic in the intersection of Wisconsin Avenue and M Street and later died of his injuries at the hospital. Joe was a true master at his job, and the traffic flow was the better for his efforts. No, driving through Georgetown back then was not a breeze, but it was a bit more manageable. Today, it is safe to call the intersection an absolute nightmare that is damaging the local business community as well as squeezing every drop of joy from commuters and tourists, whether they are behind the wheel of a car, on a bus, bike or on foot.

Traversing this intersection – recognized as one of the best dangerous in the city — can sometimes mean as many as five full light cycles to move a block or so to clear the intersection. It matters little if the driver is going straight, making a left or right turn.

The “why” of the situation is clear. Traffic flow through the intersection is constantly hampered by selfish and inconsiderate drivers blocking the box, distracted pedestrians walking against lights, taxis slowing to a crawl before making a turn as they hunt for customers, buses making their wide turns while everyone works to navigate around double-parked cars and trucks.

A fix that works can be seen the few times a year when traffic cops are on-hand to guide the throngs through this vital intersection. Their presence makes a real difference. A whistle blow and stern look from these traffic officers has the effect of stopping even the aggressive driver from trying to muck things up. Finding a way to fund those cops on a daily basis – at least at the busiest times – must be found, and quickly. It is an all too easy to simply throw in the towel and say traffic in the District is just bad. There’s no argument there; it is bad. But looking back to Joe Pozell with his arms out and directing traffic, as if conducting an orchestra proves that the traffic cop in the street makes all of the difference.

the Georgetowner Editorial Board • April 28, 2015

The college entrance to the Corcoran, on New York Avenue just in from 17th Street, leads to the semicircular Frances and Armand Hammer Auditorium. With its Doric-columned perimeter, it is one of the loveliest small auditoriums in the District.

Above the Hammer, sharing its D-shaped plan, is an inviting exhibition space -– for some years the Corcoran’s art library -– known as the Hemicycle Gallery. A longer climb up the New York Avenue stairs takes you to painting studios under the roof, with copper-framed skylights. It could easily be late-19th-century Paris.

Which makes sense, because Ernest Flagg (1857-1947), architect of the 1897 Corcoran Gallery of Art, knew late-19th-century Paris well. Based on his École des Beaux-Arts training, he designed sequences of amazingly inventive, sometimes breathtaking spaces behind the Corcoran’s formidable marble façade.

Only the most obviously ceremonial of these spaces, and those in the 1925 addition by Charles Platt (1861-1933) –- not the Hammer Auditorium, not the Hemicycle Gallery, not the rooftop painting studios, not the progression of galleries that National Gallery of Art Director Earl “Rusty” Powell famously called “arguably the most beautiful galleries of any museum in the United States” -– are marked in blue on the floor plan that the George Washington University submitted on March 26 to the D.C. Historic Preservation Review Board.

Blue shading indicated the spaces that the university considers acceptable for historic designation. At the March meeting, the nine-member board, chaired by Gretchen Pfaehler, postponed until April 23 the decision whether to extend the designation to part or all of the Corcoran’s interior. (The building’s exterior is already landmarked.)

The Corcoran gave up its independence last year in the face of long-standing financial challenges. GW acquired the 17th Street and Fillmore School buildings and assumed the operations of the Corcoran College of Art and Design (It was announced this week that Fillmore, in Georgetown, is under contract to be purchased by S&R Foundation).

The National Gallery of Art took control of the collection. In the Corcoran’s galleries, it plans to show both contemporary art and works representative of the Corcoran legacy.

This Solomonic division of an important cultural institution was tragic, but not as tragic as if the Corcoran’s landmark building had been sold for commercial development and its collection entirely dispersed. GW and the National Gallery have the potential to be outstanding stewards of the Corcoran’s treasures: the art collection, the 17th Street building and the scholars, studio faculty, art educators and others who made the college a uniquely stimulating place to study art.

We call upon GW, now moving on several fronts to expand its activity in the arts, to respect the 17th Street building as a great work of American architecture, inside and out, while investing in its future as a educational facility for its students and the public.

the Georgetowner Editorial Board • April 9, 2015

This Earth Day, let’s get rid of greenwashing. We’re fed up with companies pretending their products are green to dupe paying customers. Examples abound for all types of greenwashed products in the U.S., from shampoos and detergents, to meats and vegetables, to electronics and clothes, to cars and oil products, and even to plastics (water bottles and trash bags!) and paper products(!).

American consumers are all too eager to buy products with a green sheen, and companies are happy to serve the market with products that deceive with “green” or “natural” labels or packaging design. Consumers are being “greenmailed,” if you will, into buying products that claim to be more environmentally friendly than competitors. Well, they aren’t.

“Natural” and “all natural” mean nothing. Plastics aren’t green. Paper products, unless made primarily with recycled material, are not green. (For example, the super soft toilet paper increasingly found in grocery stores is so soft because it is made from ancient trees that are hundreds of years old.) Shampoos, conditioners, lotions and makeup made with petroleum or coal products are not “natural.” Laundry and dish detergents that contain countless toxic chemicals cannot be “green.” There’s not such thing as a “green” car. Even Priuses and electric cars run on fossil fuel and are manufactured with precious metals often ripped from the earth. Home appliances that save energy are better for the environment than clunker predecessors, but they still use substantial amounts of energy, usually made by burning fossil fuels. The list goes on and on.

As consumers, we expect more from these companies than the way they shamelessly hawk their environmentally degrading products. Companies, please drop the pretenses and be honest about your products’ impact on the environment. Show us a little transparency for the customers who spend millions on your products.

We know companies are hesitant to do this on their own because of American capitalism’s twisted incentives. So, let’s urge them on. Large companies are increasingly responsive through Twitter and other social media outlets. So, let’s call them out and tell them that their “all-natural” dish soaps and pesticides are ruining our waterways, that their paper products are crushing our most pristine forests, that their plastic is poisoning our sea life and that their appliances are burning up our atmosphere. It’s time to kill greenwashing.