• Yeah, that’s possibly heading for DC, too: Days after the U.S. capitol felt an earthquake for probably the first time ever, they may just have to deal with a Category 2 hurricane. Hurricane Irene, which has been picking up steam for a few weeks days, looks most certain to hit North Carolina as a Category 3, and will likely go up the coast, possibly hitting such hurricane-prone locales as DC, NYC and Boston along the way. Hoping it’s just a brush, kids. source

• banned Last Saturday, there was a flashmob at the Jefferson Memorial in DC to protest a dancing ban at the national icon. About 200 people showed up to party like it’s 1999 after a court said in May that the landmark isn’t a dancefloor. There was a similar happening closer to the court ruling, but people were roughed up and arrested.
• rebellion Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes wants to declare July 30th “National Dancing Day” and move the dancing flashmob to the National mall in response to the court ruling. Norton said this whole thing was a wake up call, and DC should do more with the National Mall — like throw an awesome dance party on it. Good show. source

• I’m not a Washington figure, despite the years I’ve been here.
• Newt Gingrich • Grasping desperately at the “outsider” mantle. Similarly, we’re not bloggers, despite the fact that we blog. source

• It is unusual to have elementary school students using cocaine. However, it’s not that unusual for young students to try substances.
• National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse spokesperson Susan E. Foster • Discussing the wonderful incident in DC’s public school system today. See, some elementary student brought cocaine with him to class to share with his classmates. They tried it and got so sick that they had to be hospitalized. Meanwhile, DC’s unshakable reputation of having the worst school system in the country continues unabated. WHERE ARE YOU MICHELLE RHEE? *single tear* source

• To be honest, I always have that 5 percent of not being sure.
• Susan Levy • Expressing doubts about the conviction of Ingmar Guandique – whether he was the dude who killed her daughter, Chandra Levy, a decade ago. This didn’t stop the elder Levy from calling Guandique “lower than a cockroach” and a “hideous creature” the other day, mind you. We understand Levy’s pain, and while we hope, for both their sakes, the right man was convicted, we can understand her doubts. This case has been a freaking mess ever since the name “Gary Condit” was tied to it all those years ago. source

• 60 years in prison for convicted killer Ingmar Guandique source

• Above is a quick Compete.com chart comparing DC media outlets Wjla.com to TBD.com through December. See something notable here? Yeah, we do too. WJLA.com has slightly lower traffic than it did six months ago. But TBD has come out of nowhere to effectively triple the amount of traffic WJLA was getting. Which is pretty amazing, if you think about it – an effective rebranding greatly expanded Allbritton’s reach. (Both are effectively dwarfed by The Washington Post, but the Post has a national reach whereas the Allbritton-owned sites skew local.) And TBD’s editor Erik Wemple says January was the site’s best month ever. Despite this, though, WJLA effectively won the battle for media presence in Allbritton’s corporate structure. How did this happen?

• HoW TBD BECAME TBD Allbritton, which also owns Politico, said it planned to launch a local news site last year. They brought on Jim Brady, a former Washington Post and AOL guy, who crafted a vision of a local news brand that worked across the board – in broadcast, on cable TV and online. It launched six months ago to much industry attention for its HuffPo-like approach to local news.
• The visionary, out Unfortunately, corporate culture hurt the site right off the bat. Only a year after Brady started with Allbritton, he was out, a victim of a debate over aggregation (which TBD is really good at) vs. original reporting. “As we talked about the next phase of our growth, it seemed clear to Jim and I both that we had some stylistic differences,” wrote publisher Robert Allbritton.
• Did The TV Guys win? Now, just six months after TBD launched, it appears that the folks at WJLA control TBD’s destiny. The TBD TV component (on cable) is effectively going away. WJLA.com, the former site, is coming back alongside TBD. And WJLA’s general manager, Bill Lord, will be taking over as head of each of the local news entities. It appears the old-schoolers won. source

• » Bloodletting on Twitter: Jim Brady, an active tweeter, has been ripping his old company over the last day or so over the decision to restructure. In his harshest tweet, he offered this sentiment: “At good companies, the people who resist necessary change are pushed aside. At bad companies, they are put in charge. RIP, the old TBD.” There is a degree of universal-ness to what he has to say, and many have been made their feelings known about the matter on Twitter today. While it’s certainly not the worst decision a company has made, TBD’s restructuring reflects a debate happening in newsrooms around the world: Is change needed? Or is the status quo more effective? Allbritton appears to have chosen the latter route, despite, you know, the chart above.

• 49 separate murder charges for the infamous Green River Killer source

• » Why he’ll probably plead guilty this time, too: Infamous serial killer Gary Ridgeway has a large incentive to just nod his head and accept a guilty plea. Back in 2003, Ridgeway made a plea to avoid the death penalty, and is instead spending life in prison for the many murders he’s been convicted for. Today, he was charged in the death of Rebecca Marrero, who was declared missing back in 1982 but whose remains were only found in December. Ridgeway admitted to her death but there was not enough evidence to convict him until now.

• After another losing season in which your recently acquired $78 million over-the-hill quarterback got benched and your corpulent $100 million defensive lineman simply refused to play, it is heartening to see you focusing your resources on trying to punish a newspaper. Yes, it may be a dreadfully arrogant and stupid thing to do. But the point is, you seem to want to do it. And believe me, what makes you happy makes me happy.
• Washington Post columnist (and supergenius) Gene Weingarten • Writing about Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder’s decision to sue the Washington City Paper for publishing this article about him. The piece, a mostly-hilarious thing that suggests severe mismanagement of a beloved franchise, angered Snyder so much that he fought for the firing of the person who wrote the article about him. So… just to be clear, guys, Snyder just sued an alt-weekly for writing an article about him nobody outside of DC would’ve seen, or anyone inside of DC would have remembered, had he just taken it for what it was – an attempt to poke fun at an unpopular sports personality. Streisand effect, 1, Dan Snyder, 0.  source

• Inside this backpack was a bomb. Not just any kind of bomb. An incredibly sophisticated bomb the likes of which law enforcement officials haven’t seen, loaded with shrapnel that was designed to hurt people. Worse, the bomb was placed in a position that was designed to attack a parade route in Spokane, Wash. The bomb was designed to be remotely controlled. And wanna know what that parade route was for? That’s right, an MLK Day parade. So why is this story getting underplayed? By, well, everybody? A few examples:

Buried a little

• CNN: Buried in a listPerhaps it hasn’t caught the full attention of the network that this might perhaps have been a huge terror attack. Ricky Gervais is in the infamous features slot. Also, the story’s short.
• MSNBC: A video teaseNot a top news item, and further down the page than CNN. Considering the nature of the attack, doesn’t this seem like underplay? But at least they have a photo of the thing, right?

Further down the list …

• Washington Post: Also buriedEven lower on the page than MSNBC, the Post’s coverage of the incident is just a link to an AP story, rather than any unique coverage from a local angle.
• 
  Fox news: also buriedSo, according to this list here, domestic terrorism ranks at a similar level as “Drug-Smuggling Pigeon Caught in Colombia.” Check. Great job.

Basically nonexistent

• WSJ: Near the bottomBelow such stories as “Is the NFL Telegraphing Drug Tests” and “Pandas Can Stay in D.C. 5 More Years” is a story about the incident. It’s short, but written by WSJ staffers.
• 
  NY Times: Hah! Yeah, it’s not hereThe Times appears not to have given the story any play on its front page at all today. You have to go all the way to the bottom of the National page to even find it. It’s also from yesterday.

• » Why this might be: We think there are a few factors at play here. First of all, since the bomb was caught before anyone was hurt, it effectively dulled its “immediate danger” factor. But the firepower of the bomb suggests a much more sinister danger and motive that should increase the story’s play, but isn’t due to its lack of obvious eye-catching imagery and clear motive. There’s a motive suggested by the situation and the nature of the bomb, but few details to back this up. The lack of details make it hard to play it up. (Even the Spokane Spokesman-Review has played it down at this point.) Finally, there has simply been a lot of news in the last two days – the health care repeal, Giffords, Joe Lieberman, Steve Jobs, etc., and it’s the kind of thing that might get buried. None of these are excuses for underplaying it, but just a thought process as to why this happened. source