A Tufts University study finds that while the District and 20 states do discuss the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in their high school social studies curricula, they don't have much context or detail. Fourteen states don't mention the attacks at all in texts that have been updated since 2001.

While the researchers don't want states that exclude 9/11 from their texts to be considered "negligent," they praise the states that include the attacks, writing:

We do, however, recognize the power of these standards in guiding what is taught in high school social studies classrooms and as a form of "official knowledge" that becomes part of the historical narrative.

District of Columbia Public Schools' high schoolers study 9/11 in the 11th grade, and are asked to "describe America’s response to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, including the intervention in Afghanistan and invasion of Iraq."

The DCPS choice of curriculum makes sense. Take the wide variety of opinion pieces posted in local and national media over the weekend. Unlike Pearl Harbor, to which the researchers compared 9/11, the lessons of the day are anything but settled. America is still examining and re-examining its feelings about the attacks and their aftermath. For the time being, standardizing those feelings into "official knowledge" seems like something that should be held off.

Photo by Darrow Montgomery

Over the weekend, Postie Marc Fisher lamented the fact that the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon doesn’t get as much attention as the 10th anniversary approaches as the attack on New York does. Yet Fisher writes the piece with a pretty keen awareness of why this is so. His 1,700-word essay is full of hedging statements:

Comparing one person’s pain with another’s, or one city’s with another’s, can feel disturbing, even petty.

There are good, natural reasons for the imbalance between the New York and Pentagon stories...

Even the Pentagon’s efficiency militated against public memory of the attack there.

It is possible to recognize the dominance of the New York story without resenting it.

Fisher actually spends more time explaining why New York gets more coverage—the number of casualties (more than 2,700 to the Pentagon's 184), more news media coverage and video, the fact that the World Trade Center was located in the middle of New York City—and quoting sources who agree that such coverage is reasonable, than he does explaining why it's wrong.

At best, he offers up a limp defense of something we already know: The Pentagon attack matters. The lives lost there matter, too. And, for that matter, so do the lives of the 44 people Fisher doesn't mention: those who died when United Airlines flight 93 hit the ground in a Pennsylvania field. And what about the thousands of New York first responders who have sickened in the 10 years since—hundreds of whom have died?

I can't help but pick up on a bit of regional defensiveness, or what some may call D.C.'s inferiority complex regarding New York. But why? It's all bad. There's no sense in playing "me too" when the stakes were so high.

Photo by U.S. Navy Specialist 1st Class Brandan W. Schulze via Wikimedia Commons

Today: An ad for an Amnesty International event that, considering Abu Ghraib, Guantánamo, and extraordinary rendition, feels a little too eerily prescient in retrospect.

University of Winning: Charlie Sheen is on a drug, as you may have heard; it's called Charlie Sheen. And he may be bringing his "quest to claim absolute victory on every front" to D.C. A group of George Washington University students have launched a tongue-in-cheek (we hope) effort to make Sheen the commencement speaker at graduation this spring. The graduation speaker when we graduated from college was Jimmy Carter; we presume his tiger blood level is a bit lower than Sheen's. +2

Can You Hear Me Now?: Calling 911 in D.C., on the last furlough day for government workers, led to delays and problems. But that was predictable—after all, there were fewer operators working. Calling 911 in Montgomery, Fairfax, and Prince George's counties lately, on the other hand, led to glitches that only Verizon knew about. At this point, the next time you have an emergency, you're probably better off just posting a desperate message on Facebook and hoping for the best. -1

Sharing is Caring: The last few months have been cold. But not, apparently, cold enough to deter people from using DDOT's Capital Bikeshare system—which posted a 30 percent increase in ridership since October. Among members, 99 percent of trips last fewer than 30 minutes, which makes them free. And new legislation in the works could allow advertising on the stations, which could bring in millions of dollars in revenue. Which, of course, probably means it won't happen. +1

New Haircut?: Those of you who haven't been chained to your desks all day long may have noticed something different about the latest print edition of Washington City Paper—and even if you've only stopped by our website, the color scheme and logos should seem new. (If not, make an eye doctor appointment, pronto.) This week marks the launch of our new design, which we promise will soon look as familiar and beloved as the old one. Tell your friends! +4

Yesterday's Needle rating: 30 Today's score: +6 Today's Needle rating: 36

A Dec. 5 Page One article incorrectly said that Ben Edwards is the only doctor within a 45-mile radius of Post, Tex. Edwards is the only doctor within a 25-mile radius.

That treatment leaves unanswered who made the mistake. And at a place like the Post, that could be any number of people—a line editor, a copy editor, the reporter, Marcus Brauchli.

It's just this reticence that is right now biting Akeya Dickson on the ass. She's the author of a recent piece that produced one of the all-time great Washington Post corrections:

A Nov. 26 article in the District edition of Local Living incorrectly said a Public Enemy song declared 9/11 a joke. The song refers to 911, the emergency phone number.

Published last week, that little nostra culpa got tons of rotation on Twitter and elsewhere. And since there's no specificity in the correction about the error's origin, the presumption is that Dickson is the one plagued with tone deafness on pop culture.

A few inquiries, however, turn up a rumor that it wasn't Dickson who made the mistake but rather a copy editor. Post spokesperson Kris Coratti confirms the scuttlebutt. Efforts to ID the copy editor who made the mistake have thus far been unsuccessful.

Dickson declined to comment on the matter—and why would she react any differently? After all, telling the truth would entail ratting out an editor. That's the job of a good correction. Hasn't the Post ever heard of the term "Due to an editing error....."?

"Yes, officer."

"So you are aware that this is a no-standing zone?"

"Yes, officer."

"And you are aware that it's five days after 9/11?"

"Um...yes, officer."*

"And that our country is at war right now?"

This pleasant exchange went down at Dulles yesterday evening between a vindictive TSA officer and yours truly. Went down at length, too—I was accused of terrorism, detained outside the terminal at which I'd dropped a friend, offered cuffs, and informed that I would "never see [my] car again." All of which struck me as, you know, overkill: My crime was standing in a no-standing zone for five minutes after entering the terminal to say goodbye.

Now, sure, I had blatantly disregarded a traffic sign and dithered slightly longer in the airport than I'd planned. But I'm not, nor have I ever been, a terrorist. And I'm usually good with cops.

This fucker was mean, though—and out to prove a point. First, he insisted that my car had been driven by a mystery individual, who—after parking illegally—had leaped into a cab and disappeared into the night. After that narrative tanked, he fell back on invocations of 9/11, Afghanistan, and "wiseasses like [me]" whom he'd dispossessed of their vehicles, freedom, dignity, &c. over the years. After demanding my driver's license, he refused to accept it, barking that I should stand "ten feet back." When I called him "sir," he accused me of "attitude." When I told him my address, he accused me of lying.

I don't hate cops. I don't mind removing my shoes at security and getting my toothpaste confiscated. I like the fact that I've never felt less than completely safe in an airport.

What I resent is the Crusader Rabbit attitude of boneheaded, ball-less individuals who think they're single-handedly staunching the tide of extremism by being tasteless pricks. No matter how much respect you show them, it's never enough—and if you're lucky enough to keep mum under their soulless tongue-lashing, you'll think twice next time you're tempted to needle your libertarian friends.

"You've got 30 seconds to get off my airport," the fellow finally told me. I gave him no lip and drove off, thankful that he had parked too far back to notice my missing headlight.

*Five days and eight fucking years, officer.

–

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

(N.B.: Turner's girlfriend passed this on to me; it is not posted on his Web site but you should read that anyway.)

On this date in 2005: Get your Tragedy Hats!

None of the Redskins marketing endeavors under Dan Snyder dropped the jaw faster than the "Redskins Flag Hat" that went on sale on the team's web site and at FedExField at the beginning of the 2005 season.

For $23.99 plus shipping where applicable, Snyder would sell you a Redskin baseball cap with a red, white and blue Pentagon stitched on the side to tug the heart strings and stir more nationalism at a time when the country was already crippled by an oversupply. The hats were a great way, according to the radio ads that ran on the sports stations owned by Snyder, to "commemorate Sept. 11."

The punch line: The proceeds weren't earmarked for any charity or cause. Unless you consider the owner's wallet a charity or cause.

Genius!

***

(AFTER THE JUMP: Bankers going for Michael Vick haters? Bob McDonnell, you lie? Boswell basking in the afterglow of his Snyder bashing? DC Divas become video stars? A bump in the Nats' Road to 100 Losses?  Jaycee Dugard jokes?)

It didn't take long for signs of the Michael Vick influence on the football season to show up. The first commercial coming out of the first pregame show on NBC this season was for Wachovia. It featured a woman and her car full of dogs, and had her talking about how she needs to save money at the bank so she can make sure her dogs are cared for.

Coincidence? Heck no!

***

Sticking with notable commercials: Virginia governor wannabe Bob McDonnell ran his new campaign spot again and again on WRC after the Steelers/Titans broadcast.

In the commercial, McDonnell is seen walking down a suburban street while being followed by a cameraman as he lists a litany of political goals for the Commonwealth. To capture the football crowd that would be watching the spots, at one point in the ad McDonnell's son interrupts the boilerplatitudes by throwing the candidate a football and asking with a big smile and an excited shriek, "Dad, how 'bout a game?"

McDonnell answers, "You're on!"

But then he keeps walking down the street and talking politics! The commercial ends with McDonnell and his family standing together at the end of the street for no good reason.

Bottom line: There is no game!

If you tell your son, Game on!, and then there is no game, how can you expect Virginia voters to trust anything you say, Mr. McDonnell? How?

Answer the question!

Butt seriously: You've never seen a lower-aiming, dumbassier ad than this one.

***

Tom Boswell came off the top rope and landed on Snyder earlier this week. In his washingtonpost.com chat yesterday, Boswell told readers, "I've never had such near-universal positive reaction to a tough column."

Pretty soon, you could hold a convention of Snyder's supporters on a golf cart. Oh, wait. Maybe you already can.

***

Albert Haynesworth seems like a real funny tough guy. In an interview that aired yesterday on WTEM, the Redskins' only major offseason acquisition was asked if the size of Giants' running back Brandon Jacobs worries him. It doesn't.

“What is he, 250 [lbs.]?" Haynesworth said. "I weighed 250 when I was in the 10th grade.”

But here's Jacobs dominating Skins' safety Laron Landry last year. "That's getting run over!"  yells John Madden about the hit, which is far more brutal than when Bo Jackson's famously gelded Brian Bosworth in a "Monday Night Football" game. Jacobs' hit was enough to get writers of the NBC TV show "Friday Night Lights" to reference it in a script last season. In a scene where some characters are watching the highlight tape Dillon High fullback Tim Riggins sent to U of Oklahoma scouts, the guys all agree he looks like "Brandon Jacobs running over Laron Landry." (God, I miss that show! Come back soon!)

***

In case you missed it: The most viral sports column of the year, on so many levels, comes from Mark Whicker of the OC Register, perhaps the only employed writer on the planet who found inspiration for giggles in the Jaycee Dugard kidnap/rape/impregnancy/enslavement.

Read his non-apology, too. And the comments! It'll take all day, but it's worth the time.

Funny is hard, and damn if I don't hear a time bomb ticking every time I try to get chuckles here, what with New Media's typing demands and aversion to paying gatekeepers. But how many folks had to sign off on Whicker's words before they actually showed up in print?

***

I was in Delaware for vacation recently.

Few states like gambling the way Delaware likes gambling. There are casinos at the fairgrounds in Harrington and at Dover Downs, where there's also horse racing.

All the talk while I was there was about the feds siding with the NFL to crush Delaware's attempt to bring in single-game football betting.

Scads of evidence of the local love for wagering were available at Kupchick's, a nice, low-key restaurant in Lewes, Del. On the bulletin board, the results of the recent Travers Stakes from Saratoga were written in magic marker above the daily dining specials. There were stacks of fliers on the counter with instructions on how to enter the deli's Suicide Pool for this NFL season, entry fee and all.

So I asked the guy behind the counter what he thought of the appeals court's ruling that stopped the state's gambling pursuits. I guessed he would.

"Somebody made a phone call," he says. "They had to help Vegas."

I'm with him. No other explanation makes sense.

***

The DC Divas lost the Sup-Her Bowl, but the First Ladies of Women's Football* are featured in a new video I discovered on youtube. It ain't ever gonna be Soulja Girls — I was the only one to have seen the video according to the Youtube counter last night, and as of this morning the count was up to just six views — but, I gotta say, the song's catchy. Sing with me: "I like football..I like it a lot...I like girls that play...and even when they're not."

This thing deserves double figures in views!

***

Nats win! Countdown to 100 Losses™ stalled at 8!

***

*Dan Snyder really did trademark "First Ladies of Football" for his cheerleaders, a clear affront not only to women's football players, but also to the guy cheerleaders in his troupe. But not surprising. Snyder's amusement park chain, Six Flags, has also tried trademarking "Daycation" and "You Are Here." He likes claiming ownership of things™.

Story tips? Wanna Play the Feud? Tube amps for sale? Send to: cheapseats@washingtoncitypaper.com

Me, I was living in San Francisco at the time—home to the Examiner, which produced the best page-one on the attacks, by a mile.

On Oct. 25, 2001, September 11 became a holiday, thanks to a resolution sponsored by this charmer. Not a real holiday, mind you, rather the kind where President Bush encouraged "employers to permit their workers time off during the lunch hour to attend the noontime services to pray for our land."

It was a perfect American solution: a holiday you don't get off work for, a remembrance of sacrifice that requires no sacrifice whatsoever.

The next year, Bush changed the name of the holiday to Patriot Day. Calendars say Patriot Day. Crayola offers a page of warmed-over July Fourth activities to complement it.

And that's about it. Tomorrow, heads will bow in remembrance, somebody will play "Taps," and everyone will call it "September 11th." No one, except maybe the president and a few maudlin gym teachers, will use the dipshit term "Patriot Day."

Nice to see the marketplace of ideas actually working once in a while.