S.W AND RICH HERMANSEN
Staff Writers
wine@lbknews.com
Dateline: Occupied Washington DC Summer 2025
We have returned to the DC area to fact check results of the invasion by Confederate state militias. During earlier visits in the fall, late spring. and summer of 2025, we dined out often in DC restaurants. We saw large numbers of patrons walking from the Metro and parking lots to popular restaurants in different areas of the city. Along the U-Street Corridor and around Eastern Market, the younger crowd bar-hopped well past midnight.
We recall hearing residents of many years in the DC area commenting about how the crowds have come back to downtown DC after the pandemic waned. They could not understand why citizens from outside DC continued to think of the streets of DC as crime ridden and dangerous. They remember the 1968 riots and election of Richard Nixon as president, and the early 1990’s drug gang war spike in the murder rate presided over by Mayor Marion Barry who appeared on camera smoking crack cocaine. DC took its turn as the murder capital of the USA in that era. Yet since the md-1990’s, the violent crime rate in DC has decreased substantially over time and relative to violent crime rates in, for example, Birmingham Alabama.
The problem that Trump and his entourage has with dining out in DC seems rooted more in the fact that the mayor and other elected officials in DC resemble and represent the population of DC and the Trump entourage resembles a troupe of mad men from Houston, Indianapolis, and Orlando. According to reporter Tierney’s sources, Trump ordered a well-done steak with ketchup. We have no intel on members of the cabinet ordering stone crabs.
In local news as reported by Tierney Plumb, writing for the Eater DC blog, the Trump dinner party, including VP JD Vance, Secretary of America First Marco Rubeo, and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, braved a 0.1 mile jaunt in a convoy of black Secret Service SUV’s from the White House to the door of Joe’s (of Miami) Seafood, Prime Steak, & Stone Crab restaurant.
Thanks to the presence of the National Guards of the Confederate States, The Trump party suffered no more scorn than that heaped on them by DC food critiques and a contingent of Code Pink protestors.
Trump declared immediately after this publicity stunt that his takeover of DC police powers had cleared the way for people in DC to feel safe to dine out.
Meanwhile Tierney Plumb heard from US Representative Anna Paulina Luna of Florda about the security breach that let Code Pink protestors heckle Trump and his dinner guests. She has obviously not tried to keep a secret In a DC restaurant.
S. W. Hermansen has used his expertise in econometrics, data science and epidemiology to help develop research databases for the Pentagon, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Agriculture, and Health Resources and Services. He has visited premier vineyards and taste wines from major appellations in California, Oregon, New York State, and internationally from Tuscany and the Piedmont in Italy, the Ribera del Duero in Spain, the Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale in Australia, and the Otego Valley in New Zealand. Currently he splits time between residences in Chevy Chase, Maryland and St. Armand’s Circle in Florida.
Rich Hermansen selected has first wine list for a restaurant shortly after graduating from college with a degree in Mathematics. He has extensive service and management experience in the food and wine industry. Family and friends rate him as their favorite chef, bartender, and wine steward. He lives in Severna Park, Maryland.
