an unqualified ``Washington'' is going to be Washington, DC

George Washington's family, after whom Washington DC is named, came from Washington County Durham and the town has a number of artefacts to verify this, so your analogy is not so far away.

When I heard of the sniper attacks, I thought of the shootings in Hungerford here in the UK, it's the worst of all nightmares, you or somebody in your family being randomly shot down in cold blood, something that would be almost impossible to guard against - and the likelyhood of it happening in Washington DC, County Durham or anywhere else in the world is about evens.