i've been to DC a few times. one for a work thing nearby where i could take the metro in and play walk-around tourist for a day. the metro is incredible and all those free museums, the rail access to bus services to move around the region was nice too, by american standards. in that, there was a convenient bus station i could take to get to the absurdly out of the way place i was going without a car... though the bus part of the station was pretty fucked up and clearly underfunded/understaffed, confusingly organized due to some ongoing long term (stalled) remodeling. could just be bad timing, but i bet it was a multiyear cock up.
i liked my time there, but i could not really imagine trying to live there especially as the power structure grows increasingly contested between factions, neither of which seem to be accountable to working class people. it just reads unstable to me, and has too many cowboys dressing up as too many lawmen from too many agencies all eager to make an example of somebody, just so they find patronage to jump ranks.
a lot of big cities and strategic towns in the US suffer from something similar, but DC feels exceptional in this way as we stumble face first into The Cool Zone. not to mention, the panopticon there has to be state of the art and completely integrated. might as well realize you're an actor on stage playing a role everywhere you go in public.




