Chapter 2438: Alarm

Georgetown in the early morning was quiet and tidy. Feng Yiping was running slowly on the streets full of European-style buildings and full of European style.

Although it was not far from the central area where the White House was located, he still preferred the atmosphere here.

The central area near Pennsylvania Avenue, which is equivalent to our Chang'an Avenue, is magnificent, but no matter what time it is, it seems unpopular and always gives people a feeling of being too far away from the world.

Unlike here, it is full of life.

Hearing the movement behind him, he stepped aside. An old man wearing a helmet and only wearing shorts on his lower body rode a recumbent bicycle past him on the road.

Next to the bus stop behind, a bus was approaching the station. In such a quiet morning, the dull sound of the valve and the closing of the door somehow made people feel a little relieved.

He quickly stepped aside again. There should be a person lying on the bench by the road. The whole person was covered by a quilt, and half of the quilt fell to the ground. A pair of leather shoes was placed alone in front.

This was the third homeless person he had met this morning.

Seeing so many homeless people on the streets of the capital of the world's most powerful country, not far from the White House and Capitol Hill, made him somewhat emotional.

In China, since he had never jogged near Chang'an Avenue in the morning, he didn't know whether there would be such a situation there.

But most likely not.

We have always been very strict about the appearance of the city.

But the pair of leather shoes of this homeless man, which at least looked good, could still silently watch over him, which really surprised Feng Yiping a little.

If this is also a common phenomenon, then it seems to be more or less commendable.

Because of work, he had just started working and slept in the lobby of the train station when he was on a business trip. Even in such an occasion, he would never dare to take off his shoes.

He turned his eyes to the road, thinking while running, about Quora, is it best to operate independently or directly as a new feature of Facebook?

If it is a new feature of Facebook, it seems that there is no need to call it Quora. It should be more appropriate to call it Facebook Answers or something.

But he always felt that such a Q&A website should be operated independently at the beginning.

Facebook already has many good features. According to Feng Yiping's suggestion, Zuck is leading engineers to develop another product that will be very important in the future, WhatsApp.

The concept of this product has long been mentioned in the hackathon that Facebook has been holding. After the first generation of iPhone was officially launched, Feng Yiping officially made a suggestion.

Because he didn't know when WhatsApp was originally launched, so naturally the earlier the better.

He vaguely remembered that Facebook seemed to have spent a lot of money to acquire WhatsApp.

Now he doesn't want to spend such a waste of money.

Therefore, it doesn't seem too urgent to let Facebook add the Q&A function at this time.

Perhaps, let it operate independently first, but let users log in with Facebook accounts, and then, when it develops to a certain stage, merge it into Facebook, would it be a good arrangement?

The sound of tapping came from the front, and it was a mounted policeman turning over from the road over there.

Feng Yiping finally turned back near Georgetown University, where a lot of Harleys were parked. Some riders wearing hats and sunglasses, many of them with beards, gathered together nearby. It was unclear whether they had just arrived or were about to leave.

The riders, including the ladies, were as sturdy as their motorcycles.

According to the traditional concept in China, this was a group of guys who would immediately stop a child from crying.

Seeing Feng Yiping looking at them, some people nodded to Feng Yiping, and then watched him slowly run back along the original route.

Owen and the others who turned with him successfully attracted the attention of the riders. Who was this young Asian?

Judging from the composition of his security personnel, he obviously did not look like a senior official of the Asian embassies or the second generation of power in Asian countries.

They might forget this question soon, or maybe one day, when they saw Feng Yiping again on TV, they would suddenly realize it and remember this morning.

And Feng Yiping was already thinking about another question at this time. Would Governor Shi and California take action today?

Looking in the direction of Capitol Hill, to be honest, he was really looking forward to it.

At this time, not far from him, the old lady he missed, California Congressman and Speaker of the House of Representatives Pelosi, also woke up in her mansion on the Potomac River in Georgetown.

…………

Compared to 2006, Capitol Hill in November 2007 was really very quiet.

The election of U.S. congressmen is held every two years on November 7th of even-numbered years.

In odd-numbered terms, congressional elections will be held at the same time as the U.S. presidential election.

For example, the 109th Congress was held at the same time as the U.S. presidential election in 2004.

In even-numbered terms, such as the 110th Congressional election in 2006, it will be held separately.

Such elections are what Americans often call "mid-term elections."

The focus of the midterm elections is the Democratic and Republican parties' fight for control of Congress. At the same time, governors of 37 states will be re-elected at the local level.

Therefore, the midterm elections in the United States can be said to be a weather vane for the presidential election.

Last November, Capitol Hill was busy. Then, the Democratic Party created a miracle. After 12 years, they once again won control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives, making Republican President Bush completely a lame duck.

At the local level, the Democratic Party has 28 governors, and the Republican Party has only 22 seats - this actually roughly foreshadows the winner of the 2008 presidential election.

After last year's hustle and bustle, Capitol Hill in November this year, even though it has been hotly discussed recently because of the subprime mortgage crisis, still seems very calm.

This calmness is actually related to the working hours of the congressmen.

The American people have long complained about the working hours of these public servants on Capitol Hill. Experts have calculated that on average, congressmen work at most three days a week.

Generally speaking, important meetings that require everyone to vote are usually scheduled on Mondays or Fridays by the Senate and the House of Representatives. In this way, even if the members have returned home - they usually say they have returned to their constituencies, they will have enough time to rush back to Capitol Hill to vote.

But the reason why the members do this is actually because society is progressing.

Because unlike before, many of the wives of the members also have jobs, so more and more members' families are unwilling to settle in Washington.

As a last resort, members, such as Obama, have to run between home and Capitol Hill.

Not only do ordinary members spend little time on Capitol Hill, but so do congressional leaders.

For example, the leaders of the Senate and the House of Representatives will mostly only make a brief report on Tuesday, and then hold a summary press conference on Thursday, and then leave.

And today happens to be Wednesday, and the members on Capitol Hill are the least busy in the week, and relatively speaking, the most idle time of the week.

However, although the members may not be in the office, the office is still running tightly and orderly, and the staff and interns, under the leadership of the chief of staff, work in an orderly manner.

Their main job is to make various preparations for the next meeting of the congressmen.

This kind of preparation mainly includes two major aspects, one's own preparation, and finding ways to understand other congressmen, especially the preparations of their boss's opponents for the next meeting.

Like other places, those interns who have obtained internship qualifications are still at the bottom of the food chain here, and most of them can only do work such as sorting documents and answering calls.

Originally, Wednesday morning should be relatively comfortable, but today is obviously different.

At 9 o'clock in the morning, some of them had just poured themselves a cup of coffee, and before they had time to take a sip, the phone on the table rang.

After that, several phones in the office rang one after another. The callers, nominally, were their boss's boss, that is, the voters in the constituency where the congressmen were located.

Such a lively scene includes the offices of 53 California congressmen on Capitol Hill and the offices of 2 senators.

So, before 10 o'clock, those congressmen who were in Washington but not in the office, received the notice and all hurried to Capitol Hill, including Grandma Pelosi.