Today's Frustration re: DC Statehood

[fabrisse]

In the constitution the federal District, later called the District of Columbia was marked at 10 miles per side which makes a total of 100 square miles. 31 of those square miles went back to Virginia in 1846 and became Arlington County. This leaves us a total of 69 square miles.

So why is someone at YouTube saying that DC doesn't deserve statehood and needs to be "put back" to the 10 square miles it's supposed to have? Is innumeracy that rampant?

Comments

[kathmandu]

Very probably it's innumeracy, or just plain not thinking. You may recall that incident during the recent election when a right-winger argued that the Biden vote counts from Georgia were obviously fraudulent, Georgia didn't have that many people *total* ...he was looking at the Wikipedia entry for the Republic of Georgia over in Eurasia.

[fabrisse]

Oh dear lord! I hadn't heard about the Republic of Georgia mistake. That's hilarious. Terrifying, but hilarious.

[dewline]

I'll call it "terrifying" minus the "hilarious".

[neotoma]

Some people don't understand the difference between 10 square miles and 10 miles squared. Poor math skills are rampant (says the child of a retired math teacher).