Elephant In The Room: For once, news about a circus and D.C. government that involves an actual circus. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is demanding that the District look into whether the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus is violating city laws against animal cruelty, specifically with its treatment of elephants (who paraded through the city last night). PETA alleges the city is giving favorable treatment to the circus even though it reportedly does horrible things to pachyderms. No word on how the tigers are treated. -3
Cathedral Cash Crisis: Turns out the earthquake last summer and its attendant damage to the National Cathedral isn’t even the biggest problem there. Repairing what broke in the tremor will cost $20 million, but other repairs will take another $30 million. The cathedral’s budget is in bad shape; 100 positions have been eliminated in recent years. Seems like it’s time to start praying over there. -2
Hoya Injury Report: The Georgetown Hoyas men’s basketball team is a 3 seed in the NCAA tournament’s Midwest region, and various cable sports luminaries are chortling already over their predictions that 14 seed Belmont will upset the local kids. We’re not so sure about that, but we are worried about some medical news from campus recently. Jack the Bulldog, the Hoyas’ mascot, tore his ACL (or the canine equivalent) and will be out of commission for two months. Silver lining: The dog doesn’t travel to games as far from D.C. as the Hoyas’ matchup in Columbus, Ohio, is, so they would have been without him regardless. -1
Offseason Champs Already!: First, the Washington Redskins traded up to get the second pick in the NFL draft, virtually guaranteeing they’ll take Baylor QB Robert Griffin III. Yesterday, they made moves to get Griffin some people to throw the ball to, signing free agent wide receivers Pierre Garçon and Josh Morgan. If that sounds like the moves of the guy in last place in your fantasy football league combing the waiver wire late in the season, so what? It’s March, dream big! +1
Yesterday’s Needle rating: 75 Today’s score: -6 Today’s Needle rating: 69