Washington was designed to be a perfect square, and it was until Alexandria broke away. When the Interstates were built, "The Beltway" was added to encircle D.C. What you have, then, is a broken square surrounded by a near perfect circle. Flying in, most visitors land at Dulles or Ronald Reagan airports, so from their rented car or hotel shuttle, all they will see coming in is an elegantly manicured, dignified and affluent landscape. In D.C. itself, they will be lavished with magnificent monuments and arts, much of it free of charge, and just about every turn of the neck is rewarded with a grand vista. If this is their only exposure to the United States, then this country is truly a utopia of handsome, well-dressed people who cherish arts, fine dining and well made cocktails. The grit, squalor and menace of Washington are well off the beaten tracks and hardly exist, really, compared to other American cities, and even during its bloodiest years, the bullets didn't fly in downtown D.C. As for the homeless, they're shooed away from tourist attractions and don't really assert their presence until nightfall.
All capitals strive to be showcases, sure, but very few, or perhaps none, is as successful at blocking out its nation's true ugliness and failures. This sleight of hand, though, also works on many of the residents of this near perfect square inside a near perfect circle. The hell they've created keeps seeping in, however, and soon enough, it will overwhelm, if not explode, this Potemkin village of a city. This smug bubble will burst.
Addendum: Returning from D.C. a week ago, I meant to start this Postcard right away, but couldn't, since my computer was struck by a bunch of very nasty viruses, and this happened as I was in the middle of uploading photos of AIPAC members leaving the Convention Center after Netanyahu's speech. While wasting five days trying to fix my computer, and it's only half functional as of this writing, I processed and posted photos from my laptop, but this too was struck with a virus. This second attack was quickly neutralized, however. In all my years of using computers, I've never had two infected with viruses within the same week, and I don't claim to know what happened exactly, but it was surely a reminder that I, like everybody else these days, am completely dependent on various systems that can be cut off at any time, for any reason. Each of us can have our computer, phone, bank card or even car shut down at any moment, and don't think it won't happen to at least some of us in the future. What if, suddenly, you won't be able to withdraw any money, or email or call anyone? Very meekly, we've already accepted that we can be prevented from flying without any explanation. As for viruses, these aren't just used by governments as weapons against each other, but also as a way to punish, or at least warn, individuals.
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