Matthew Yglesias » Of Local Interest

Jan 5th, 2009 at 4:22 pm

Of Local Interest

The District Chatter, a neighborhood blog written by someone a couple of blocks from me, offers for your amusement a post “Setting the Scene for The Real Trannie Hookers of MVT“, about some of the local entrepreneurs in our neighborhood. There’s nothing like a little old fashioned streetwalking happening in the neighborhood to make you appreciate that there would probably be something to be said for letting these folks perhaps operate a discrete indoor business.

Comments
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29 Responses to “Of Local Interest”

live Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
No one could have predicted you’d blow “discreet.”
Steve Sailer Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
The new property owner now finds himself less pleased about living in a “vibrant” neighborhood.
phil Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
Or “MTV”.
LaFollette Progressive Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
No one could have predicted Steve Sailer would show up and make an asinine comment.
tom veil Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
I have definitely noticed them while on my way to Safeway — K St between 5th and 4th is quite the catwalk on weekend afternoons. In my innocence, though, I assumed they were amateurs.
Jonathan Daniels Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Ah yes, the transvestite prostitutes on 4th and K. I used to walk from just north of New York Avenue (3rd and M) down to 4th and Massachusetts and lo! transvestite hookers would be perched right outside of the housing complex there. What a joy to behold! They would sit on blankets as if they were having a picnic, though it appeared that they were instead using drugs. Lots of them. Anyway, point of the story is that since the Safeway opened, I haven’t seen them there (but I also don’t walk along that route.) I assume though by the post that the genderbender practitioners of the world’s oldest profession are still hanging tough, then? What a bizarre neighborhood corner.
laurel Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:22 pm
Dear Matt,

Could you recommend where the best prostitutes in DC are? Thanks! Perhaps someone should also consider submitting reviews of the best hookers to the Washingtonian.

Thanks,

Spitzer “the Duke” Cunningham
rapier Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
Ann Coulter’s new book isn’t selling too well so she has to hook on the side? What does she do with all her money. She isn’t spending it on food. Blow I suppose.
abby jean Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Ha ha and all, but I’m a bit offended by your (re)use of the term “trannie.” See these posts for a bit of background on why it’s considered offensive. You may want to avoid it.
BuhBuh Ray Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:06 pm
Provided, of course, that the discrete indoor business is nowhere near Yggy’s neighborhood.
AD Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:16 pm
Israel’s Policy Is Perfectly ‘Proportionate’
Hamas are the real war criminals in this conflict.

By ALAN M. DERSHOWITZ

Israel’s actions in Gaza are justified under international law, and Israel should be commended for its self-defense against terrorism. Article 51 of the United Nations Charter reserves to every nation the right to engage in self-defense against armed attacks. The only limitation international law places on a democracy is that its actions must satisfy the principle of proportionality.

Since Israel ended its occupation of Gaza, Hamas has fired thousands of rockets designed to kill civilians into southern Israel. The residents of Sderot — which have borne the brunt of the attacks — have approximately 15 seconds from launch time to run into a shelter. Although deliberately targeting civilians is a war crime, terrorists firing at Sderot are so proud of their actions that they sign their weapons.

When Barack Obama visited Sderot this summer and saw the remnants of these rockets, he reacted by saying that if his two daughters were exposed to rocket attacks in their home, he would do everything in his power to stop such attacks. He understands how the terrorists exploit the morality of democracies.

In a recent incident related to me by the former head of the Israeli air force, Israeli intelligence learned that a family’s house in Gaza was being used to manufacture rockets. The Israeli military gave the residents 30 minutes to leave. Instead, the owner called Hamas, which sent mothers carrying babies to the house.

Hamas knew that Israel would never fire at a home with civilians in it. They also knew that if Israeli authorities did not learn there were civilians in the house and fired on it, Hamas would win a public relations victory by displaying the dead. Israel held its fire. The Hamas rockets that were protected by the human shields were then used against Israeli civilians.

These despicable tactics — targeting Israeli civilians while hiding behind Palestinian civilians — can only work against moral democracies that care deeply about minimizing civilian casualties. They never work against amoral nations such as Russia, whose military has few inhibitions against killing civilians among whom enemy combatants are hiding.

The claim that Israel has violated the principle of proportionality — by killing more Hamas terrorists than the number of Israeli civilians killed by Hamas rockets — is absurd. First, there is no legal equivalence between the deliberate killing of innocent civilians and the deliberate killings of Hamas combatants. Under the laws of war, any number of combatants can be killed to prevent the killing of even one innocent civilian.

Second, proportionality is not measured by the number of civilians actually killed, but rather by the risk posed. This is illustrated by what happened on Tuesday, when a Hamas rocket hit a kindergarten in Beer Sheva, though no students were there at the time. Under international law, Israel is not required to allow Hamas to play Russian roulette with its children’s lives.

While Israel installs warning systems and builds shelters, Hamas refuses to do so, precisely because it wants to maximize the number of Palestinian civilians inadvertently killed by Israel’s military actions. Hamas knows from experience that even a small number of innocent Palestinian civilians killed inadvertently will result in bitter condemnation of Israel by many in the international community.

Israel understands this as well. It goes to enormous lengths to reduce the number of civilian casualties — even to the point of foregoing legitimate targets that are too close to civilians.

Until the world recognizes that Hamas is committing three war crimes — targeting Israeli civilians, using Palestinian civilians as human shields, and seeking the destruction of a member state of the United Nations — and that Israel is acting in self-defense and out of military necessity, the conflict will continue.
Ed Marshall Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
Why are all of Dershowitz’s client’s scum?
wiley Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:28 pm
My impression is that men solicit street prostitutes for convenience and low overhead. An indoor business—especially one marketing itself as tranny—would be less discrete for the customers.
Pablo Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
I like how the linked blog also has its share of typos. Something in the water?
cmholm Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 8:08 pm
Re: Abby, For better or for worse, transgendered folks aren’t quite to the point where they have the power to make a preferred descriptive term stick. So, nice try, but they’re still “trannies” in casual discussion.

Re: Steve, Cute shot over the urban pioneer bow, but having people sitting on the street engaging in felonies doesn’t give “color” to the neighborhood. Back when Matt Groening was selling “Life In Hell” cartoons in Westwood without a business permit, *that* was vibrant. If Matt was in the same spot doing crack, not so much.
Skeptic Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 8:51 pm
AD, I can only assume you posted that article there because Allan Dershowitz is a transvestite prostitute and all his talk of Israel is simply code for various sexual services he provides and drugs he ingests.

That or you’re an obnoxious goof.
symeon Says:
January 5th, 2009 at 9:19 pm
“No one could have predicted you’d blow ‘discreet.’”

Matt’s a man who means what he says: he wants a trannie brothel on every corner rather than having them consolidated into some kind of super-brothel.
live / dfw Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 1:37 am
Matt’s a man who means what he says: he wants a trannie brothel on every corner rather than having them consolidated into some kind of super-brothel.

My other hypothesis was that it’s some kind of super-nerdy math-logic discrete vs. continuous joke that none of us non-Ivy plebes could be expected to fully get. But probably he just first-order blew it.
live Says:
January 6th, 2009 at 2:12 am
re Pablo at 14: I like how the linked blog also has its share of typos. Something in the water?

That is a good point; see e.g.:

“They also have been scene taking their johns behind a storage unit located where the exclamation point is on the map.”

That typo sounds so much like MY that I wonder whether it isn’t in fact MY writing that other blog.
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Of Local Interest

29 Responses to “Of Local Interest”

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