untethered

Portland Welcomes, Kills Baby New Year

Someone vandalized an anti-abortion billboard in Portland in such a grotesque fashion you might wonder if they weren’t trolling the pro-abortion side.

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — An anti-abortion billboard in Northeast Portland was removed after it was vandalized with the words “kill them kids” spray painted over the sign and x’s crossed over a photographed baby’s eyes.

The billboard, located on the 1600 block of Sandy Boulevard, displayed an advertisement from nonprofit group ProLife Across America. In its original, underlying message, the billboard read: “Protect the babies” and “heartbeat 18 days from conception.”

The Portland Police Bureau told KOIN 6 News that it’s unclear if any police reports have been filed in connection to the vandalism at this time. KOIN 6 also reached out to ProLife Across America and the owner of the billboard, Outfront Media, about the incident.

Outfront Media Operations Manager David Spivey told KOIN 6 that the company removed the vandalized billboard during the morning hours of Jan. 2. In an email to KOIN 6, ProLife Across America Director Mary Ann Kuharski said that the organization hopes to replace the signage.

So it’s likely neither the billboard company nor ProLife Across America bothered calling the police. There really is no point, except perhaps to document the crime for the statistics, and we don’t keep statistics on things like vandalism (or at least we never hear of them)–or the wrong kind of political violence.

If it went the other way this would certainly qualify as what the left routinely calls “stochastic terrorism” now–rhetoric doesn’t get any more directly violent than “kill them”. Needless to say “kill them” directed at abortion providers would instantly be recognized as a call to harm. Except the “kill[ing]” encouraged here isn’t directed at a group recognized as human, them being inconvenient to both the practice and political defense of abortion, and the killing encouraged by our tasteless vandals is ongoing at industrial scale.

If anyone was paying attention this all would be evident and work against the pro-abortion side, but no one is paying attention.

Sandy Boulevard, which runs from Portland’s close-in northeast neighborhood to the airport, was occasionally subject to anarchist marches and vandalism during the George Floyd Summer of 2020, when antifa toppled a near-hundred year-old statue of George Washington on the lawn of the German American Society in a Day of Rage style action that swept down the busy street.

So as for Sandy Boulevard, this is antifa country, boy. The sign was a direct affront, though it was placed about as discreetly as a billboard can be, tucked in low (and accessible) on the corner of a building.

The ghoulish satirical sentiment is typical of both both Portland and antifa. The culprits are almost certainly political, but it could also be any random marginal character.

Antifa often uses themes crafted to demoralize the opposition and desensitize the public at the same time, such as their “drive cops insane” theme, which comes as if cooked up in a lab by psyop propagandists and is consistent with antifa’s riot tactics which are largely psychological warfare directed at individual cops, seeking to drive them out of the profession (“quit your job” goes one of the chants)–a practice that has shown results with many police quitting, retiring or leaving for the suburbs in the face of the onslaught.

So the billboard vandals may have been been thinking along the lines of the broader decades-long campaign to de-stigmatize (as in “shout your”) abortion, in their perverse way; the goal is desensitizing the public to the opposition’s very argument–abortion is murder? so what?

The phrase comes like a late adaptation to a long debate, the last rhetorical bastion no longer opposing but accepting the opposition’s argument and embracing it, calling an airstrike on their own moral position to end the battle definitively.

Outrageous expressions such as this come like shit-tests of the apolitical public, of what we’re willing to accept. And Portlanders always fail leftwing shit tests–just where would outrage go, here? There is no shop for that. The sign came down in silence, a faint frisson of outrage crackled through the alternative (not mainstream) national media, briefly; the self-styled baby killers won, and made their point. Murder you say? Okay, do something about it.

Or it was a tasteless if bold (superior to “stunning and brave”) troll. If so it proves pointless or even self-defeating, in light of the fact the appalling sentiment will not be allowed to have an impression on the public by media disinterest. Whatever the intentions, the public is left that much more jaded by it and their endless passivity is once again confirmed. People check out in the face of the progressive left’s endless campaign of ugly, stupid and mean–and that suits anarchy fine.

Last Exit to Gresham

The phrase “last stop of the Blue Line in Gresham” sounds depressing to any Portlander’s ears, and apparently the light rail terminus gets real grim after midnight:

GRESHAM, Ore. (KOIN) — A gruesome fight at the last stop of the Blue Line in Gresham left a 78-year-old man seriously injured, with his ear chewed off and his skull exposed.

The fight happened just before 2:30 a.m. Tuesday and ended with the arrest of a 25-year-old man who recently moved to Portland from Georgia, authorities said.

Georgia’s not sending her best.

Gresham police and Multnomah County deputies were called to the Cleveland Avenue MAX platform after witnesses called in a possible stabbing that caused significant bleeding. When law enforcement arrived, the suspect — later identified through fingerprints as Koryn Kraemer — was still on top of the elderly man from Hillsboro and still attacking, officials said.

Detectives determined the man had not been stabbed but did have his ear chewed off “and part of his face.” Emergency responders could see the victim’s skull.

Kraemer — who initially provided the name of “El Baker” — was booked on an assault charge. The investigation continues.

This of course comes after a woman pushing a child onto the tracks made national news last Thursday.

A woman was followed and struck by a man on December 2 after getting off the train downtown.

S.F. got off the Max in downtown Portland, shortly after 9 a.m. on Friday Dec. 2 and walked down SE 11th Street before turning onto Alder Street.

What she didn’t realize at the time was that a man, Joseph Ibrahim, started following her.

Ibrahim snuck up behind S.F., striking her in the head with a heavy bag and slamming her to the ground. She later learned there was a metal lantern inside his backpack that caused the painful blow.

“I was gone. It was a complete knockout,” S.F. said.

In that violent moment, everything went dark. She said she thought she was dead.

“I look around,” she said. “There’s no one around except for Ibrahim, who’s at this corner where we’re standing. And he looks at me as if to say, ‘I got you. And I got you good.’”

She stayed down on the pavement in panic.

“I don’t know if I’m hurt and I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know if he’s going to come back to cross the street,” S.F. said.

Workers nearby came to her rescue and police responded, later arresting 18-year-old Ibrahim a couple of blocks away.

Effective on the first day of 2021 Mayor Wheeler pulled Portland Police from the region’s transit detail to appease the BLM rioters occupying downtown.

Portland Police Bureau (PPB) officers will likely no longer be a part of a tri-county public transit policing division starting January 1, 2021.

The change was announced by Mayor Ted Wheeler at a press conference Tuesday afternoon, as part of a list of police reforms Wheeler and the Portland City Council plan to enact in the near future. Those reforms come in response to protests against police violence seen in Portland and across the country for almost two weeks now.

“The community has said loudly and clearly that they do not want to see Portland police officers used for that purpose on transit,” Wheeler said at the press conference. “I do not believe that will lead to less safety on the transit system, because if there is an issue on the transit system, people will still call 911.”

But first remember to get off the tracks and out of the train’s way before you make that call!

Korean Church Barbecue

An abandoned Korean Christian church downtown was set on fire for the second time in as many years, and the suspect in this latest case has had at least that many genders.

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — A suspect is in custody for arson after the historic Portland Korean Church burned on Tuesday night.

Portland Fire and Rescue says the suspect — identified as 27-year-old Cameron David Storer who also identifies as Nicolette Fait, per the Fire Investigations Unit — was arrested and faces charges of first and second-degree arson and second-degree burglary. They are expected in court Thursday afternoon.

I happened upon the scene last time:

Update Jan 6: The church is coming down today:

Outgoing Oregon governor Kate Brown has commuted all seventeen death sentences pending in the state.

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Calling the death penalty immoral, Governor Kate Brown commuted the death sentences of 17 inmates to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Brown, 62, announced the commutations will take effect Wednesday, December 14 in a full-throated condemnation and repudiation of the death penalty.

“Since taking office in 2015, I have continued Oregon’s moratorium on executions because the death penalty is both dysfunctional and immoral. Today I am commuting Oregon’s death row so that we will no longer have anyone serving a sentence of death and facing execution in this state. This is a value that many Oregonians share,” she said in a statement.

The state, she said, “should not be in the business of executing people” even though she noted a “terrible crime” led to a conviction and the death sentence.

Brown said she has commuted other prisoners’ sentences after they showed “extraordinary growth and rehabilitation.” But the commutation of the 17 prisoners on Oregon’s death row has nothing to do with that.

Her decision “reflects the recognition that the death penalty is immoral. It is an irreversible punishment that does not allow for correction; is wasteful of taxpayer dollars; does not make communities safer; and cannot be and never has been administered fairly and equitably.”

Although Oregon’s death penalty remains in place, the legislature passed Senate Bill 1013 in 2019 that nearly abolishes the punishment, she said.

She also ordered the dismantling of the state’s “execution chamber” (lethal injection was the means).

Capital punishment remains in Oregon’s state constitution–which was amended by referendum in 1984 to include it; legally its repeal requires a popular vote. It’s only been used twice since 1984, both times after convicts dropped their appeals, in 1996 and 1997, when the last convict to be executed in Oregon petitioned against the automatic appeal provided for by law and threatened to sue anyone seeking to block the execution. The state hasn’t executed anyone involuntarily for 60 years.

The aforementioned Senate Bill 1013, now law, narrowed the scope of eligibility for the death penalty by redefining “aggravated murder”. In passing the law legislators promised it would not be applied retroactively, but the state supreme court nonetheless cited it (as well as “prevailing societal standards”) in favor of an appeal to a death penalty conviction, paving the way for a host of successful appeals from those whose crimes don’t qualify under the new definitions–a moot point now due to Governor Brown’s actions.

Incoming progressive governor Tina Kotek poses no threat to re-introduce the death penalty or raise the issue of the constitutionality of the Governor’s actions. Last November the state came closer than it has in a long time to electing a Republican–reacting negatively to Brown (least popular governor in the nation) as well as former house leader Kotek’s perceived role in the increase in crime and homelessness since 2020. Had the Republican won last November Brown’s actions would be very different; one has to wonder if they were in place for that eventuality.

As it is, the death penalty remains the law of the land and victim’s families are outraged. But we remain a one-party state with anemic Republican opposition and a Democratic trifecta controlling both chambers of the House and the governorship. As for public opinion a good recent poll is impossible to find in a casual online search, and the questionable ones range from 70 to 30 percent against capital punishment (2014) to 66 to 34 percent in favor (2012). My impression is support for the death penalty statewide is probably a minority now and soft whatever the numbers. The multitude of challenges to it making it a rarity rendered it a dead letter long ago. It hasn’t thus been a factor for so long the public barely associates it with the broader issue of crime. Still, the Governor’s statement asserted “many”, not a majority, of Oregonians oppose capital punishment. Likewise news accounts refer to falling support for the practice but won’t cite numbers.

Brown had already used her powers of clemency more than any previous governor and in the “racial reckoning” (as declared by the elite through the media, public not consulted) following the George Floyd riots of summer 2020, unleashed a frenzy of commutations.

Meanwhile Portland broke its annual homicide record at 92 with three weeks remaining in the year.

PORTLAND, Ore. — Portland police have made an arrest in the case of a deadly stabbing that occurred on Friday morning in Southeast Portland’s Centennial neighborhood.

Homicide detectives booked Andrew M. Morrow, 36, of Portland, into the Multnomah County Detention Center. He is facing one charge of murder in the second degree.

The deadly stabbing in SE Portland’s Centennial neighborhood became the 91st confirmed homicide in the city this year, according to Portland police — breaking last year’s record of 90 homicides.

Officers from the Portland Police Bureau’s East Precinct responded just after 11:30 a.m. to reports of a disturbance in the 17100 block of SE Powell Boulevard, at the Meadow Park East apartments.

Police arrived to find an injured victim, suffering from apparent stab wounds. Paramedics responded to treat the victim, but they died at the scene.

Is there a sadder epitaph than “died at the scene”?

In Gresham, on metro Portland’s eastern flank, auto thefts are becoming so common the city has taken to handing out anti-theft devices for autos. Yes, they’re giving out The Club.

GRESHAM, Ore. (KOIN) — After seeing a notable increase in car theft in 2022, Gresham officials provided a free anti-car theft device called The Club.

Anyeon who showed up with their vehicle and proof of ownership was able to claim the steering wheel lock — and hundreds of people showed up.

Gresham Police Chief Travis Gullberg said the “idea is prevention and deterrence.”

The biggest car model targets for thieves, police said, are Fords, Hondas, Toyotas, Chevrolets and Kias.

That really takes me back to a simpler (but similar) time:

Kevin Michael Grace will join me again tomorrow (Monday 12 December) at my YouTube channel.

Last August Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt asked a grand jury to return murder or assault charges against a strip club bouncer who shot and killed one man and wounded another after one of them fired on him. The grand jury declined (per Oregon law they did not issue a “true bill”), finding Jascha Manny had acted in self defense.

But things haven’t ended there because, as the local free weekly Willamette Week reported at the time, there is a “noteworthy element of the case: Manny is white. Ross is Black…” The paper provided no further context (beyond the disparate capitalization; still, even readers of the woke WW trolled the rag by mockingly asking for elaboration in the comments).

Now leaked documents reveal the district attorney filed charges after the ADL’s “Center on Extremism” brought him open source intelligence passed along from Rose City Antifa, anarchist architects of the 2020 George Floyd riots, exposing Jascha Manny’s involvement with white nationalist activism in Seattle, where he came to the attention of local antifa after organizing a counter-protest in support of the police in 2015. With eyewitness and video evidence showing no crime, the DA tried to convince one had been committed based on Manny’s political beliefs, as evidenced by the chat logs provided to him by antifa by way of the ADL and presented to the unimpressed grand jury.

Manny and his employer Mary’s Club are being sued by the wounded man and Portland’s radical progressive community is still lobbying for criminal charges.

The grand jury accepted Manny’s account that he confronted Lauren Abbott Jr and another man as they harassed homeless people on the street, shining a bright light in their eyes. The eventual deceased Abbott fell, was pushed down or “body slammed” depending on who you believe (the last being the characterization of the surviving shooting victim presently suing Manny and Mary’s; video is inconclusive, but doesn’t suggest a full-on “body slam”); 19 year-old Lauren Abbott got up shooting and Manny returned fire.

The only mentions of violence appearing in Manny’s alleged Stormfornt.org chat logs, as “Pariah1” are to discourage it. In the supposedly damning record the ACLU provided Manny and his small group of pro-police demonstrators are the only victims of violence–attacked and sent running by a much larger group of the same black-bloc anarchists trying to get their law enforcement allies to send him to prison now.

Still District Attorney Mike Schmidt put the material in front of a grand jury as reason to charge Manny. Eric Stryker of National Justice reported on this last week:

During the proceedings, prosecutors centered their argument for criminal charges on prejudicial information secretly provided to them by the ADL’s “Center on Extremism,” which asserted that Manny had pro-white political beliefs.

On November 15 Abbott’s surviving friend and lawsuit plaintiff Kolby Ross held a press conference calling for hate crime charges.

Antifa-allied journalist Alex Zielinski of The Mercury, Portland’s more radical free weekly, details the lawsuit pending against Mary’s and Manny here in a typically slanted piece. Included is a photo of the plaintiff standing sideways and contrapposto to show us how harmless he is:

Antifa boasted of routing Manny’s small 2015 Seattle protest with “golf clubs, chairs, bricks, bottles and even a fire extinguisher”:

On May 21st, 2015, Olympia police officer Ryan Donald shot two brothers, black and unarmed, while responding to an alleged shoplifting incident. Both survived, but the younger brother is now paralyzed from the waist down. As outcry over the shooting began to grow, protesters organized several demonstrations against police brutality. Meanwhile, a small contingent of counter-demonstrators started showing up at various events around Olympia to support the police. They were a mix of various unorganized right-wing racists that were part of the same loose social group, who may have become politically active due to Jascha Manny’s encouragement. (Manny first came to our attention as a white power activist due to his participation in several actions with the American Freedom Party.)

As Jascha Manny’s enthusiasm and confidence grew, he posted on the online racist forum Stormfront (under the moniker of “1pariah”) calling for a white supremacist police solidarity march to be held on May 30th. Meanwhile, word spread among anti-racists of Manny’s plans. A rally against the dual forces of white supremacy–neo-Nazis and police–was planned for the same night. The anti-racist protestors were a mix of people from the Black Lives Matter movement, black-bloc, various antifa and allies, with hundreds in attendance. Only ten or so neo-Nazi boneheads showed up. This is a situation typical of explicit white supremacist public actions–a paltry amount of fascists met by throngs of opposition–and demonstrates Manny’s tactical inexperience as an organizer.

As the rival groups met, Jascha Manny and his “crew” assaulted an older protester and fighting  broke out. The neo-Nazis were quickly routed from the area, fleeing golf clubs, chairs, bricks, bottles, and even a fire extinguisher. Running for their lives, they made it to their vehicles, but not before having their windows smashed as they fled the city.

I fear these people are looking to the Biden Department of Justice for help.

Talking with Canadian patriot Kevin Michael Grace, @kmgvictoria, at my YT channel:

Tina Kotek will be Oregon’s next governor and is an immediate contender for most radically left-wing governor in America. As Democratic Speaker of the Oregon House she led the legislative campaign that followed antifa’s 2020 siege of Portland like an occupying army follows an invasion, passing a host of progressive police reforms in the shock and awe of the moment. Kotek allied with BLM rioters against Portland police while the fight was still on, writing to Mayor Wheeler to denounce the use of tear gas to disperse a crowd attacking a police station:

What needed to be protected last night? An empty office building? Was this need more important than the health of neighbors, of children in a neighborhood, of people returning home from work? The declaration of an ‘unlawful assembly’ did not seem warranted. The declaration of a ‘riot’ was an abuse of the statute. Therefore, the ensuing actions by the PPB were unlawful.

The police union chief wrote back that there were in fact people in the building. Tina persisted, and as police and rioters were still meeting nightly on the streets of downtown Portland Kotek led the passage of a law limiting their use of tear gas and other riot control measures.

Despite the public mood turning back toward law and order, she edged out Republican Christine Drazan in a race that would not have been close but for the presence of a liberal Democrat spoiler. Nike founder Phil Knight was her most prominent opponent, donating millions to her two opponents citing crime as his motivation.

Kotek has vowed to focus on homelessness, which will mean “bold land use reform” repealing zoning laws limiting duplexes, apartments, low income housing and the like in more suburban neighborhoods. Real estate developers will thrive and a good deal of money will be transferred through various programs to “the BIPOC community” as they share in any boom.

Voters passed a gun control measure requiring state police background checks to purchase and permits expiring every five years to own a gun, and limiting sale of magazines to ten rounds. Some county sheriffs have said they won’t enforce it. The law will face legal challenges.

Trump endorsed ex-CIA candidate Joe Kent has lost in a red Washington state district by a few thousand votes after having displacing the establishment Republican in the primary who would have likely carried the seat.

Illegals will not vote in elections after legal voters shot down a Multnomah County charter amendment that would have allowed it. The law might have not made it past legal challenges; a similar rule by New York Mayor Eric Adams was overturned. A few municipalities in other parts of the country seem to be getting away with it though.

Free at last! Slavery is officially illegal in Oregon after voters approved Measure 112 removing language allowing slavery and involuntary servitude from the state constitution. The language is in the original section establishing Oregon as a free state outlawing slavery and involuntary servitude except for as criminal punishment. Oregon outlawed the migration of Blacks! into Oregon along with their importation as slaves in its original constitution and at least one proponent approved of the rule as a means of keeping out undesirables. Despite the anarchist refrain that this demonstrates the Deep Roots of White Supremacy here, there are two recorded instances of the law being enforced before becoming a dead letter due to a lack of support–and probably due to the low level of Black! in-migration. Now opponents of White Supremacy can point to the fact the measure didn’t get anywhere near the North Korean levels of support it demanded (I voted no, as I imagine many did, to oppose the excess and mentality behind the gesture–one gesture deserves another):

Oregon voters approved a change to the state’s constitution, stripping language that for more than a century has allowed for slavery and involuntary servitude as punishment for a crime. As of Thursday morning, 55% of voters were backing Measure 112, unofficial results show.

And for many, that’s disturbingly close.

“Removing language referencing slavery from the Oregon Constitution is a good thing and is long over due,” said Rep. Travis Nelson, D-Portland, who won election Tuesday as state’s first Black, openly LGBTQIA+ lawmaker.

Yet, more than 686,000 Oregonians, or about 45% who voted on the measure, opted to keep slavery and involuntary servitude a lawful punishment for people convicted of crimes.

“It’s a big number,” Nelson said. “That’s troubling to me.”

Oregon passed a law in 1994 requiring prisoners to work 40 hours a week to pay for their incarceration along with Measure 11, establishing mandatory minimum sentences. Progressive legislators led by our next governor failed to repeal Measure 11 in 2020. Apparently the work policy remains in place (convicts can meet twenty hours of the requirement attending classes). Naturally police abolitionists call this slavery; I can’t find what the convicts are paid. Currently for some programs the Oregon Department of Corrections pays prisoners in Oregon the federal minimum wage with time and a half for anything over 40 hours a week. The slavery-language measure will have no effect on policy but is still tied in with the issue of prison labor by the left.

Portland will revamp its government.

Radical leader and city commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty lost to establishment candidate Rene Gonzalez.

Vague and unfunded Measure 111 amending the Oregon Constitution to declare health care “a fundamental right” and requiring the state provide it to the poor and disabled is narrowly behind at the moment [update: the measure has passed]. Oregon already offers a healthcare plan for low income residents.

Greater Idaho advances:

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — The Greater Idaho movement has made headway after two Eastern Oregon counties voted to move the state lines for Oregon conservatives who want to live in Idaho, which is a red state.

During Tuesday’s midterm election, 60% of Morrow County voters said “yes” to county measure 25-88 to move the county to Idaho. In Wheeler County, 58.15% of voters also said “yes” to measure 35-29 to move the Idaho border.City of Portland holds press conference as charter reform approval leads

The Greater Idaho movement reports that 11 of the 15 Oregon counties that would be moved to Idaho have voted in support of adjusting the state lines.

Oregon Democrats will not have a veto-proof majority but will likely retain the “trifecta” of majorities in both houses of the legislature and the governorship. The state will remain on its course.

Ted Wheeler has announced an initiative banning camping on Portland streets and herding the homeless into “designated outdoor camping with services.”

The mayor’s resolution calls for moving the homeless to at least three designated campsites — with the first opening within 18 months of securing funding.

He didn’t specify when the funding would be confirmed or how much the measure would cost.

Under the plan, the camping sites would initially be able to serve up to 125 people and provide access to services such as food, hygiene, litter collection and treatment for mental health and substance abuse.

The city council is taking public testimony right now:

The city stopped clearing campers from the streets almost entirely in May of 2020 per CDC Covid guidelines that recommended leaving them where they are and providing them with sanitation:

• If individual housing options are not available, allow people who are living unsheltered or in encampments to remain where they are.
  • Clearing encampments can cause people to disperse throughout the community and break connections with service providers. This increases the potential for infectious disease spread.
• Encourage people staying in encampments to set up their tents/sleeping quarters with at least 12 feet x 12 feet of space per individual.
  • If an encampment is not able to provide sufficient space for each person, allow people to remain where they are but help decompress the encampment by linking those at increased risk for severe illness to individual rooms or safe shelter.
• Work together with other community organizations and offices to improve sanitation in encampments.
• Ensure nearby restroom facilities have functional water taps, are stocked with hand hygiene materials (soap, drying materials) and bath tissue, and remain open to people experiencing homelessness 24 hours per day.
• If toilets or handwashing facilities are not available nearby, assist with providing access to portable latrines with handwashing facilities for encampments of more than 10 people. These facilities should be equipped with hand sanitizer (containing at least 60% alcohol).

Don’t tell them about the alcohol content in the hand sanitizer!

Political opposition and the rising tide of homeless have made the city’s efforts to re-establish a ban ineffective, and the situation downtown continues to deteriorate. Activists have been opposing the sweeps since long before the law was suspended for Covid. When the George Floyd riots led to the radical takeover of city politics and ensuing new levels of indulgence for violent protest and the police retreat generally, antifa and allies began physically opposing sweeps with some success.

Mayor Charlie Hales relaxed the ban on homeless camps back in 2016 before moving back to enforcement that summer.

In June of 2021 the Oregon Legislature, led by Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tina Kotek passed a law allowing camping on public lands citing the 9th Circuit Court’s Martin v Boise ruling, which holds a municipality cannot force the indigent off a given street if no shelter is available.

The bill was written in the spirit of the Martin v. Boise ruling, a 2018 U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decision that bans governments from criminalizing living in public spaces if the local government is not providing enough shelter beds for each homeless person. That ruling applies to other Western states, including Oregon—but cities have argued that their current practices don’t conflict with the ruling…

And on Thursday, after the bill passed, Kotek told WW, “My hope is that local governments that have not yet reckoned with the Boise decision will take the opportunity to engage in a transparent, public process to update their ordinances, find ways to expand their shelter capacity, and make the rules clear for all.”

But it’s unlikely the bill will prevent sweeps of Portland homeless camps come July 2023, when cities are required to have codified their policies and ordinances in compliance with the bill.

The city is arguing that it’s already in compliance with the Martin v. Boise ruling. And while Kotek may wish for cities to comply with a larger moral framework underlying the court ruling, that’s not what her bill mandates…

So the most likely outcome is that Portland can still sweep homeless camps from public property so long as it doesn’t arrest or fine the people living there.

The city has the right to tell vagrants to “move along” and keep out of certain areas, as cops have been doing forever, it would seem even under the law But Portland’s homeless population is too large and its homeless caretaker industry too strong for that. In the going-on three years since relaxing the sweeps antifa and allies have successfully opposed a few high-profile sweeps. The siege of “the Red House on Mississippi in late 2020 began as a homeless sweep: police attempted to clear out a foreclosed home that had become a homeless camp, antifa headquarters and nightly party terrorizing the neighborhood when they were chased off by protesters who established an autonomous zone for a time. Antifa still sells the victory as an eviction defense.

So Ted Wheeler needs to offer something to his left to take back the streets; he’s going big with a comprehensive plan to both house the homeless and build new affordable housing. Developer interests no doubt like the sound of his “moonshot” proposal to add 20,000 new affordable housing units by 2033.

Wheeler’s asked the next governor, Democrat Tina Kotek or Republican Christine Drazan, to declare a state of emergency. Drazan has agreed.

He has lined up the city council except for radical leader Jo Ann Hardesty, who is acquiescing if not supporting and will likely be voted out in November. There is no funding yet and the mayor offered no funding estimates.

A group is suing the city over violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act because so many sidewalks are impassible for those with mobility issues, bringing more pressure to bear.

Wheeler’s plan has the potential to introduce his large camps without solving the problem of homelessness on the streets, as the radicals take over the administration of the camps and still successfully oppose the “criminalization” of street camping.

Ted might want to be careful about attaching his name to this program. Shanty towns sprang up during the Great Depression and were soon dubbed “Hoovervilles” after Republican President Herbert Hoover.

Portland had its share and Seattle had one that lasted ten years before “succumbing to prosperity” in 1941.

Shanty towns are already making a comeback of course.

Governor’s Race: Can Kotek Absorb the Red Wave?

[correction: Republican gubernatorial candidate Christine Drazan is pro-life, not choice as written in the original draft; forgive the error]

Chances are oh so slightly better than not that November 8 Oregon will elect its first Republican governor since 1982. Republican Christine Drazan currently holds a small lead in polls over Democrat Tina Kotek. The choice is stark between hardcore progressive Kotek and Drazan, who is pro-life, against vaccine mandates and anti gun control. Despite voter dissatisfaction with Democrats and their policies on crime and homelessness Drazan’s victory is still only possible due to a spoiler in the race.

Kotek was the Oregon House’s longest serving speaker until stepping down to run for governor. She doesn’t inspire warm feelings even from fellow Democrats, despite, or maybe because of, a reputation for effectiveness and having held down the seat unopposed through four election cycles. You probably have to bruise a lot of shins doing that.

Tina is vying to be the first openly lesbian governor in America, following the (presumably) first openly bisexual governor, retiring Kate Brown. In her horn-rimmed glasses, sport coats with wide collars and Rachel Maddow haircut she presents as something between androgyne and Chris Hayes, that is to say just barely to the masculine side.

Her cold sexless vibe may contribute to a lack of enthusiasm from the party’s non-white minorities. After she tried forcing out a Hispanic rep over multiple sexual abuse allegations he survived and filed a hostile workplace complaint claiming the terrifying epicene had given him PTSD. A congressional panel cleared Kotek, advising the claimant “grow a pair”. Okay, that’s not quite a direct quote but an accurate approximation; the complaint was dismissed on the grounds the Legislature is not a typical workplace and not bound by workplace standards of harassment.

In 2020 Black! Representative Janelle Bynum made a play for the speakership based on her being Black! and all, then ran a lazy and inept campaign as if to prove it. The more radical Kotek retained the speakership and then took advantage of the summer’s BLM riots to pass a slew of police reforms.

Kotek should probably be grateful Democrats didn’t get everything they wanted as the public mood has turned against those reforms–for which there was never any genuine enthusiasm outside the legislature and activist-anarchist complex. Homelessness and crime are the most cited citizen concerns now.

So what should have been a stroll for Kotek is more like a walk down a darkened Old Town sidewalk, trying not to step in shit.

As a non-Jewish white–lapsed Catholic, now Episcopalian (and Kotek looks every bit the modern Episcopalian minister)–she has only her out-of-fashion lesbianism keeping her out of the Coalition of the Fringes’ lowest tier, Straight White Woman (in the Coalition the less fringe the identity the lower the rank, and they’ve finally figured out white woman isn’t fringe at all).

Our Long Nightmare of Competent Male Leadership is Still Over

Whatever happens to Kotek, one “red wave” won’t be enough to wash away Portland’s progressive sand castles. But we are experiencing a red tide of sorts as three women contend for the governor’s office in a diverse field where lesbians, straight moms and the post-menopausal are all represented.

Betsy Johnson is the independent candidate, a retired Democratic representative recruited by the old liberal establishment to run as an independent. She lags the field and remains as a spoiler against Kotek. Nike founder Phil Knight gave her 3.75 million dollars and then, after she faded in the polls, donated another million to the Republican Drazan. In all likelihood Johnson agreed to stay in the race and drain votes from Kotek at the behest of Knight, whose issue is crime and has declared himself devoutly “anti Tina”.

Sitting governor Kate Brown is one of the least popular governors in the country and term-limiting out. She was selected in 2015 to replace the deposed John Kitzhaber, a popular Democrat with a reputation for competence who served two terms, retired and then returned to serve one and a half more before being run out of office after his long, longtime fiancee and acting First Lady was exposed using his office to peddle influence for her environmental non-profit and other tacky things.

She’s a story all her own, a charming working class adventuress with a seedy backstory who brought down what might become Oregon’s last competent governorship.

She was born in August 1967 in Seattle, the first person in her dirt-poor family born outside Oklahoma or Arkansas. Her mother had left her first husband for his younger brother, Orville Johnson, Hayes’ father…

Hayes has described her late teens and early 20s as “my lost years,” but her string of poor decisions carried into and after her Evergreen experience. She was 29 when she accepted $5,000 to marry Abraham B. Abraham, an Ethiopian man hoping to stay in the United States, and 30 when she and a boyfriend bought property in rural Okanogan County, Washington, hoping to set up a pot farm.

Hayes has portrayed herself as the unwitting and often unwilling victim. Of her marriage to Abraham: She was broke, desperate for cash to pay school expenses and, “associating with the wrong people.” Of the pot farm: A domineering and dangerous partner bullied her into the deal.

Those accounts differ from how those who know Hayes today describe her, and they run counter to the memories of people who encountered her then. Hayes has never been accused of being a shrinking violet, but rather a hurricane-force personality.

“The leader was her,” said Patrick Siemion, who brokered the 1997 real-estate deal for Hayes and her then-boyfriend, Karl Topinka. “She did all the talking, all the negotiating.”

She could be a character in a Bret Easton Ellis novel.

The outline of this saga resembles many a “me too” takedown, where an old fashioned sex scandal real or contrived is used to oust a man who is then replaced, for progress, with a woman. Kitzhaber still probably doesn’t know what hit him. There’s no fool like an old fool–especially where women are concerned.

State Ballot Initiatives: Guns and Slaves

Measure 114 requires a permit from the Oregon State Police to purchase handguns, establishes a database of gun owners and limits the sale or manufacture of magazines to ten rounds. It appears headed for victory. The ballot summary:

Oregon law currently allows persons over age 18 to acquire firearms (federal law requires age 21 for some handgun purchases), seller/ transferor must request a criminal background check. Measure requires permit from local law enforcement to acquire firearm; person must pay fee, submit photo ID, fingerprints, complete approved safety training, pass criminal background check, not be prohibited from possessing firearms; officer may deny permit to person believed danger to self or others. Permit issued within 30 days, valid 5 years. Permit denials appealable. Must present permit, pass background check to acquire firearm. State Police creates/ maintains permit/ firearm database. Magazines over 10 rounds, or readily modifiable to exceed 10 rounds, prohibited; exception for current owners /inheritors. Exceptions for law enforcement, armed forces. Criminal penalties. Other provisions.

The measure made the ballot by petition introduced by “interfaith group” Lift Every Voice Oregon, now leading the predictable suspects in the Yes campaign. In donations they’re out-raising the No camp by about 7 to 1.

Ballotpedia on how measures make the ballot through petition:

In Oregon, the number of signatures required to qualify an initiated state statute for the ballot is equal to 6 percent of the votes cast for governor in the most recent gubernatorial election.

…[T]he signatures of at least 1,000 electors are required to trigger a review by state officials, a period of public commentary, and the drafting of a ballot title…

Moreover, Oregon is one of several states that require a certain number of signatures to accompany an initiative petition application. The signatures of at least 1,000 electors are required to trigger a review by state officials, a period of public commentary, and the drafting of a ballot title. Prior to gathering these initial 1,000 signatures, petitioners must submit the text of the measure, a form disclosing their planned use of paid circulators, and a form designating up to three chief petitioners. The 1,000 preliminary signatures count toward the final total required.

The measure made the ballot with just over 112, 000 signatures.

Measure 112 Removes language allowing slavery and involuntary servitude from the state constitution. The language is in the original section establishing Oregon as a free state, outlawing slavery and involuntary servitude except for as criminal punishment.

Section 34. Slavery or involuntary servitude. There shall be neither slavery, nor involuntary servitude in the State, otherwise than as a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.

The section was eventually amended to prohibit the in-migration of Blacks! entirely, and that history is positively cherished by the radical left now. The original prohibition of slavery was motivated in large part by economic protectionism.

White emigrants who came to present-day Oregon during the 1840s and 1850s generally opposed slavery, but many also opposed living alongside African Americans. Many were nonslaveholding farmers from Missouri and other border states who had struggled to compete against those who owned slaves. To avoid a similar competitive situation in Oregon, they favored excluding Blacks entirely, although a small number did settle in region. A few immigrants brought slaves to Oregon during this time, taking advantage of the lack of enforcement of Oregon’s anti-slavery laws.

Oregon’s small white population had voted on July 5, 1843, to prohibit slavery by incorporating into Oregon’s 1843 Organic laws a provision of the 1787 Northwest Ordinance: “There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory otherwise than in the punishment of crimes whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” The law was amended, however, on June 26, 1844, by the provisional government’s new legislative council, headed by Missouri immigrant Peter Burnett. As amended, the law prohibited slavery, gave slaveholders a time limit to “remove” their slaves “out of the country,” and freed slaves if their owners refused to remove them.

The effect was to legalize slavery in Oregon for three years. Moreover, once freed, a former slave could not stay in Oregon—a male would have to leave after two years, a female after three. Any free Black who refused to leave would be subject to lashing, a provision that was known as “Peter Burnett’s lash law.” Burnett, who later became the first U.S. governor of California, gave this explanation for his support for the law: “The object is to keep clear of that most troublesome class of population [Blacks]. We are in a new world, under the most favorable circumstances and we wish to avoid most of those evils that have so much afflicted the United States and other countries.”

Oregon was the only such free state with exclusionary laws–it had three–which don’t appear to have been much enforced.

The second exclusion law was enacted by the Territorial Legislature on September 21, 1849. This law specified that “it shall not be lawful for any negro or mulatto to enter into, or reside” in Oregon, with exceptions made for those who were already in the territory. The law targeted African American seamen who might be tempted to jump ship. The preamble to the law addressed a concern that African Americans might “intermix with Indians, instilling into their minds feelings of hostility toward the white race.” The law was rescinded in 1854.

At least one person was expelled under the law. Jacob Vanderpool, reportedly a sailor from the West Indies, arrived in Oregon in 1850 and was arrested and expelled from the territory. Exclusion orders were issued against at least three other Blacks during this period, but they received enough support from whites that they were allowed to stay…

The [exclusionary] clause was never enforced, although several attempts were made in the legislature to pass an enforcement law. The 1865 legislature rejected a proposal for a county-by-county census of Blacks that would have authorized the county sheriffs to deport Blacks. A Senate committee killed the last attempt at legislative enforcement in 1866. The clause was rendered moot by the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, although it was not repealed by voters until 1926. Other racist language in the state constitution was removed in 2002.

Although the exclusion laws were not generally enforced, they had their intended effect of discouraging Black settlers. The 1860 census for Oregon, for example, reported 128 African Americans in a total population of 52,465. In 2013, only 2 percent of the Oregon population was Black

Alas, this history is crack to the anarchists dismantling the state who never tire of citing it as proof of Oregon’s irredeemable racism; they doth protest way, way too much.

Measure 111 amends the Oregon Constitution to declare health care “a fundamental right” and require the state provide it to the poor and disabled. Oregon already offers a healthcare plan for low income residents. The measure would enshrine the right and its funding against other essential services in the Constitution. The potential cost is not considered.

Multnomah County Ballot Initiatives: Pronouns, Disenfranchisement by Wetback

Measure 26 31: Should charter require county to extend the right to vote, including to noncitizens, to the fullest extent allowed by law?

Summary:

State law provides that county residents who are United States citizens 18 years of age or older are eligible to register to vote. Registered voters can vote in local, state, and federal elections, with limited exceptions (for example, under state law a person sentenced to a term of incarceration for a felony is not eligible to vote during the term of incarceration). Current county charter does not address voter registration or qualifications for elections for county officers and on county measures.

This charter amendment recommended by the Charter Review Committee requires the county to extend the right to vote, including to noncitizens, to the fullest extent allowed by law. This amendment would apply to the right to vote in elections for county officers (chair, commissioner, sheriff, and auditor) and on county measures (initiatives, referenda, and referrals of county ordinances or charter amendments).This amendment would not immediately change existing voting rights in county elections, but directs the county to take action to extend the right to vote as allowed by law.

This appears a direct violation of federal law:

(a)It shall be unlawful for any alien to vote in any election held solely or in part for the purpose of electing a candidate for the office of President, Vice President, Presidential elector, Member of the Senate, Member of the House of Representatives, Delegate from the District of Columbia, or Resident Commissioner, unless—

(1) the election is held partly for some other purpose;

(2) aliens are authorized to vote for such other purpose under a State constitution or statute or a local ordinance; and

(3) voting for such other purpose is conducted independently of voting for a candidate for such Federal offices, in such a manner that an alien has the opportunity to vote for such other purpose, but not an opportunity to vote for a candidate for any one or more of such Federal offices.

The county can allow illegals to vote in local and state elections but it can’t allow them to vote for national office. Unless they plan a special limited local ballot for illegals, which they don’t, this is illegal.

Put on the ballot by recommendation of the county’s charter review committee, which reviews the charter every six years.

Measure 26 30: Should county charter be amended to replace gender binary pronouns (including he, she, his, and her) with gender neutral terms?

Ballot summary:

The existing county charter uses gender binary pronouns including he, she, his, and her, throughout the document in sections 4.10 (Qualifications), 4.20 (Terms Of Office; Successive Terms; Running For Office in Midterm), 4.40 (Vacancies – Causes), 6.10 (Chair Of The Board), 6.50 (Sheriff), and 7.20 (Civil Service Commission). In addition, existing charter section 7.40(4) provides that references to the masculine gender in that chapter of the charter refer to the masculine, feminine, neuter, or applicable noun.

This charter amendment would replace gender binary pronouns throughout the charter with gender neutral terms appropriate to the context. For example, use of the pronouns “he or she” in section 6.50 to refer to the sheriff would be replaced with the term “the sheriff.”This amendment also would remove existing charter section 7.40(4) because that section would no longer be necessary after removal of all references to gender.

Put on the ballot by recommendation of the Charter Review Committee

City of Portland Initiative: A Rank Choice

26 228 Should Administrator manage city government, 12-member Council (three from each district) make laws, voters elect officials using ranked choice process?

Summary:

The first would make changes to Portland’s city government structure. The measure would provide a City Administrator, supervised by the mayor, to manage daily operations, including hiring, firing, and supervising bureau directors. The mayor would no longer be a member of the City Council, but can introduce laws and break tie votes on non-emergency ordinances. Salaries of elected officials’ salaries would be decided by an Independent Salary Commission.

The second would expand the City Council to twelve members. The city would be divided into four geographic districts created by the Independent District Commission with three councilors representing each district. The district boundary lines would be adjusted every decade beginning in 2030 based on census population data.

The third would establish ranked-choice voting that would allow voters to rank candidates in order of preference. Primary elections would be eliminated. The process for tallying ballots would depend on the office. For Mayor and Auditor, if no candidate receives over 50% of the votes in the first round, the candidate receiving fewest votes would be eliminated, and that candidate’s votes are transferred to each voter’s next-highest ranked candidate. The process would continue until a candidate exceeds a 50% majority. For City Council, candidates win when they exceed a threshold set by the number of available positions. Ballots would be counted in rounds. Any candidate exceeding the threshold would be elected, and that candidate’s votes above the threshold would be proportionally transferred to other candidates based on voter preference. The candidate receiving the fewest votes in each round would be eliminated, and that candidate’s votes would be transferred to other candidates based on voters’ preferences. The process would continue for as many rounds as necessary until all positions are filled.

Referred to the ballot by the Portland Charter Review Commission.

Portland’s commission form of government–the last or one of the last such in the US–where four commissioners are elected city-wide and the mayor sits on the council–is hated by all as dysfunctional and ineffective. Ranked choice voting and the expansion of the city council will favor the Coalition and is supported by progressives.

The measure will probably pass.

White Portland to End Jo Ann?

Police abolitionist leader and city commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty appears headed for defeat as challenger Rene Gonzalez out-polls her around 2 to 1.

Like Kotek in Salem, Hardesty’s success effecting anti-police laws leaves her closely identified with the decay in public order voters are poised to reject. I don’t expect this to be the last we see of the wraith-like Hardesty, who promised “to end white Portland” upon her election and went to it with boundless resentment. I hate to think what she will be like after losing.

But Jo Ann’s story deserves its own post later.