To his opposing left stands the embattled City Council, backed into constitutional oblivion and organized neglect. What a mess: a brittle governing infrastructure broken and falling into logistical, legal and legislative disrepair. They claw for dear life. The fuzzy fracas abound known as DC General failed to re-affirm the Council's relevance in an overbearing Federalist scheme peeling away any sense of autonomy. "This control board hasn't done it," boasted Georgia Ave. Kid Wonder Adrian M. Fent y (D-Ward 4) in The Washington Post ("Council Launches Fight for Hospital," 4.12.2001). " … in the end, they will not do it. It takes a lot of nerve to go against democracy."

So much for that …

The Washington City Paper's unleashed Loose Lips cannon Jonetta Rose Barras links Council defiance to longstanding racial insecurities flowing through the Chocolate City's veins ("A Question of Authenticity," 4.20.01). "In other words, the D.C. General debate is another round in the District's most pernicious game: Who is black, or liberal, enough?" Loose Lips got props for dropping the dime on what legal scholar Lani Guinier coined the "authenticity assumption." Yet, Barras' subsequent Black middle-class elite diatribe, albeit strongly put, is only half-right. Even Black folks and liberals lust for the eventual prize in any political game: power. That's human - and Black people are human, too. The ideological side aligned is ammunition in that special quest. The difference between liberals and conservatives is that self-described righteous warriors of the right admit to a thirst for control. Rising tempers and seat posturing have as little to do with Black politicians searching for authenticity as Congress had anything to do with DC General's generation-old chronic budget shortfalls fueled by overspending, lax oversight and rampant hook-ups. It's really not that deep …

"Black Power" aside, human error is … well … human. It wears no exclusive, limited version of a chocolate brown, beige or yellow mask … nor does it really have a political face to hide behind, because it's just there. The Chocolate City's problems, like the Chocolate City's permanently displaced and permeating poor are all an unforgiving fact of Chocolate City life, more so than its potholes and carcinogenic drinking water. The fact remains that, for better or for worse, Chocolate City government is managed by a "Chocolate" majority, disregarding - for the moment - the presence of auricular Vanilla hands.

However, there is a fascination with the sometimes unnecessary role race plays in allowing certain key players to determine who the key players will be - all the while playing the true interests of their constituents. Lost in the vicious verbal salvos lobbed across the cotton field are intelligent discussions concerning fundamental issues. Let's pontificate the Republican contradiction between raving "local control" freaks simultaneously encouraging GOP-backed, control board-fronted Federal intervention into municipal affairs. Or: as the District builds a much needed alternative health care "Alliance" network spanning eight prominent, private city hospitals (George Washington University, Washington Health Center, Howard University, Children's, etc.), will strapped DC residents have to face embedded institutional malice towards the uninsured? Children's Hospital is one horrifying example.

And what, specifically, constitutes "comprehensive care?" Time to take activists to task. No doubt: DC needs a new plan - DC General is wrecked. Now that final decisions have been made, how can they best serve communities in desperate need of public safety and health? What steps to take in the prevention of trauma-induced violence? AIDS? Diabetes? Heart disease? Can Union Temple Baptist Church head and Anacostia asphalt prophet Willie Wilson blow as loud about preventive and holistic healthcare measures as he can about loss of Statehood, Home Rule and his piece of the political pie?

A difficult pursuit indeed - staging protests on U Street are much easier. Dress radically or in "revolutionary" poise; stage poetic, grandiloquent rebellion without the weapons required; and threaten uprising resplendent in showy, pretentious, custom tailored Kente, not knowing exactly what the colors stand for. Wear your culture on a make-believe sleeve until the White man's eyes water. It isn't necessarily Nat Turner or a Huey Newton look posing on a bamboo throne. It's not like jumping off the slave ship, or better yet, burning it - but it has its planned effect. It continues to rally votes, bodies, minds, picket signs and Sunday tithes. It continues to reinforce the notion, the image … the symbolism of upstanding public servants and Great Black Hopes working in the best interest of "the people," and working as "authentically" Black as Black can be. The detail, the motives, the compelling plots, twists and themes are always h idden between the lines. Lights. Camera. Action.

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