I'm also a Beltway Boy...but I hate it. It's a corrupt town. I like the interaction but it's filled with too many people who want to "enlighten" me.
Bush, I would agree vis a vis Party to Party is kicking a little butt, but at what cost is the question.
I can make an expediency argument for the Steel bill, but CFR was a huge mistake IMO.
I don't like it (inside the Beltway) either. My favorite vacation was one year at the height of a Bubba-sleaze-flood, with total globalthermalnuclear politics going on in D.C., and the headline of the local paper was "Cattle Drive Starts in Okey-Pokey County." Now that was living.