Tag: Portland

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crime and punishment

Finally Fed Up

Ted Wheeler, Portland, Mayor

We keep returning to Portland — from a safe distance.

Why?

Because rioters keep rioting there. 

And because the people tasked to protect lawful order keep making nicey-​nice with the thugs.

But maybe not anymore.

Portland’s mayor, Ted Wheeler, is apparently finally fed up, thanks to the most recent mass mayhem, conducted to ring in the New Year.

What’s motivating the newfound concern for innocent victims? More than any epiphany about the proper responsibilities of government, it may be the average age and modal hue of the current batch of rioters — as well as Wheeler’s awareness that Joe Biden sort of won the election, so haven’t the rioters already got what they wanted?

“Why would a group of largely white, young and some middle-​age men destroy the livelihood of others who are struggling to get by?” Mayor Wheeler asks. 

Rhetorically.

You’ve had months, Mr. Mayor, to mull the motives of such persons as they ravage Portland. But I will assume you are sincere. So I will tell you.

Pull out your notebook. The “why” is: bad ideas plus bad character. They feed on each other. Gain insight into Marx, Marcuse, et al., on the one hand, and, on the other, thugs happy to rationalize their sprees. Then you will understand.

Yes, it’s time indeed to stop your “good-​faith efforts at de-​escalation”; it’s high time to use “additional tools,” like physical force, to stop the criminals who are committing their crimes right in front of you.

Oh, and by the way: it’s your job.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment ideological culture

The Portland Chaos

Portland, autonomous zone, protest

“As a lifelong Portlander,” Alan Grinnell writes to the editor of The Oregonian, “I am shocked at what our city has become.”

Responding to a Steve Duin column about Portland, the “broken city,” Grinnell asks, rhetorically, “Who would have thought that our downtown would become a wasteland, that there would be homeless camps everywhere in the city, and that gangs of armed thugs on all sides of the political spectrum would run out our police?”

Duin defined the problem as one of “mob rule,” lamenting that “just about everyone I spoke to was terrified they might be the next random target of the mob.”

After months of riots and property destruction following the killing of George Floyd by police in distant Minneapolis, Minnesota, the focus of recent police and community attention turned to a house on Mississippi Street from which so-​called “sovereign citizens” — the Kinney family (who are black and indigenous) — were evicted for not paying their mortgage (since 2017). Now the house is being occupied by “activists,” who have turned the area into a sort of autonomous zone — as was done for weeks this summer, dangerously, in the Capitol Hill area of Seattle.

“[I]f you live or tend shop on North Mississippi, and fear for your own safety around the local ‘security’ forces,” inquired the columnist, “what do you make of the cops’ retreat from the neighborhood?” 

While many appear sympathetic with the Kinneys’ plight, the takeover by the terrorists, er, activists, is another matter entirely. One black man on reddit calls it “one big scam,” suggesting folks “ignore these loons.”

But ignoring willful lawbreakers appears to be the problem, not the solution.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Common Sense crime and punishment general freedom ideological culture media and media people U.S. Constitution

The Mobs Attacked and Defended

Portland, riots, protests, Ted Wheeler

It’s “mobocracy” — the riots in major cities around the nation, but especially in Portland, Oregon, where the president sent federal agents. Local police had stood back for weeks as Democratic politicians — such as Joe Biden — referred to the rioters as “peaceful protesters.” Even as the mobs lit fires in the streets, defaced property, and attempted to break into government buildings.

Buck Sexton, writing at The Hill, makes the obvious linkage between the “anarchists” and the “Democratic” Party. 

But Sexton doesn’t really answer the key questions: “Why are anarchists terrorizing Portland? What was the real purpose of the Seattle ‘Capital Hill Autonomous Zone’? Why were ‘Occupy City Hall’ protesters allowed to fight with police in lower Manhattan for a month, until officers cleared out their encampment on Wednesday?” Sexton rejects the official reasons give by the movements’ apparent leaders, but doesn’t go very far beyond Democratic Party attempts to leverage the riots.

Which may at least offer amusement. “The reason I am here tonight is to stand with you,” Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler assured the mob as he put on goggles. “So if they’re launching the tear gas against you, they’re launching the tear gas against me.” But that same night, his security detail “scuffled” with “protesters” and his own police department threatened to use tear gas and impact weapons on the incendiary horde.

Is this really about legitimate protest, as Biden insists?

Fighting federal fascism, as Democrats and many others insist?

Americans are all-​in for criminal justice reform and the right to protest. Many, me included, have peacefully taken to the streets in recent weeks.

But there is nothing peaceful about assault, arson, property destruction.

And Democrats who aim to use the fracas to beat Trump in November may find that ‘playing with fire’ … burns. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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crime and punishment Fourth Amendment rights

Cops vs. Mobs, Tyranny vs. Law?

Portland, riots, protests

“He was stuffed into what may have been a rental van operated by unmarked federal agents,” explained Cato Institute’s Patrick Eddington, “and taken to the federal courthouse, where he was interrogated without counsel. He wisely refused to answer questions and was then subsequently released without any kind of charges being filed.”

Eddington concluded: “I think most people would call that kidnapping.” 

The “he” — detained and questioned by federal agents* in Portland, Oregon — is Mark Pettibone. Whether the van was rented is irrelevant, nor do these agents or their vehicles require any marking.

And criminal suspects can lawfully be held for questioning. 

“So that we understand how police may remove someone from the streets,” Cato Daily Podcast host Caleb Brown adroitly offered, “we understand that they need to identify themselves.… that people who are placed under arrest retain certain rights to communicate with the outside world, to assert their ability to have a lawyer present for questioning.

“It seems that perhaps,” added Brown, “asking for a lawyer was the trigger here” resulting in Mr. Pettibone’s release.

Eddington agreed, but then announced that it “really does have the feel of Argentina or Chile in the 1970s, with the disappearances that took place. The only thing lacking was Mr. Pettibone being murdered by those agents.”

That is one big “only”!

“This is being done essentially to try to suppress protests in this country,” argued Eddington. “It has nothing to actually do with protecting monuments.” 

“We’re talking only about violent rioters,” Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli told NPR. “We’re not talking about actual protesters. We’re not seeking to interfere at all with anyone peacefully expressing themselves — period, full stop.”

Following the rule of law means protecting peaceful protests. And welcoming an investigation into the federal role in Portland. More concerning than Mr. Pettibone’s detention is the continued use of so-​called non-​lethal weapons, which seriously injured a protester weeks ago.

But the rule of law also means protecting Portlanders and their property against violence and destruction. And welcoming an investigation into the state and local dereliction of duty in Portland. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* The Department of Homeland Security acknowledged that agents with the CBP (Customs and Border Protection) were “cross designated to support FPS” (the Federal Protection Service) in Portland “because of the demand for more manpower in light of the violence.”

Note: Walter Olson, a senior fellow at The Cato Institute’s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies and founder of the blog, Over​lawyered​.com, details what we know about the Portland controversy. 

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insider corruption political challengers

Straw Candidacy

Sara Gideon, candidate, Portland,

“No Corporate PACs,” says a Facebook ad by the Sara Gideon for U.S. Senate campaign, “Just You.”

“Gideon is running to unseat Republican Sen. Susan Collins in 2020,” the Portland Press Herald reports, noting that “fighting corporate money in politics” has been a prime “focus of her campaign.”

Yet, as Democratic Speaker of the Maine House, the challenger ran something called the Gideon Leadership PAC that raked in a majority of its funds from corporations such as Aetna, American Express, AT&T, Comcast, Eli Lilly, Time Warner, Verizon, Visa, and Walmart. The Maine Examiner informs that “records from the Maine Ethics Commission show she has built her career, and funded efforts to boost her statewide support, with contributions from large corporations.”

Last month, Gideon was slapped with a Federal Election Commission complaint for violating campaign finance law forbidding one person or entity from making contributions that are reimbursed by another. Gideon made numerous personal contributions to Democrats running for federal office only to turn around and have her leadership PAC reimburse her for the expense.

Her PAC being the true donor, Speaker Gideon is what’s known as a straw donor.

But it gets worse, explains Erin Chlopak, a former FEC official and currently with the Campaign Legal Center. “Corporations cannot make contributions to a federal campaign, and you can’t circumvent that ban by using a straw donor to funnel money originally from a company to a federal candidate.”

A spokesperson for Gideon’s campaign blamed “incorrect advice.” 

At her level of corporate involvement, I’d say the “incorrect advice” was to emphasize the anti-​corporate money pledge.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Sara Gideon, candidate, Portland,

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education and schooling ideological culture

Administrators Strike Back

Peter Boghossian, Portland, postmodernism, academic research, education

The academic world is filled with “scholars” who write papers that are almost never cited, and which are so filled with gobbledygook and periphrasis that they are almost impossible to read.

Without cracking up, anyway.

A year and a half ago I wrote about one team who authored fake papers to show up postmodernist academics for the phonies they are. But the sad truth is that even serious papers prove to be nothing more than “cryptic, pretentious, prolix nonsense.” 

Since then, the team that wrote the infamous “The Conceptual Penis as a Social Construct” went on to successfully place some incredibly goofy papers into prestigious journals — and even garner earnest praise from peer reviewers.

Now, the humiliated academic world is striking back. One of the japers, Professor Peter Boghossian of Portland State University, is facing academic censure and misconduct charges.

“This strikes me (and every colleague I’ve spoken with) as an attempt to weaponize an important [principle] of academic ethics in order to punish a scholar for expressing an unpopular opinion,” wrote Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker, entreating PSU not to persecute their philosopher. Biologist Richard Dawkins and psychologist Jordan Peterson joined Pinker in support of the rogue-​but-​reasonable academic.

PSU administrators say that Boghossian, by trying to trick academic journals into publishing fake studies, has violated Institutional Review Board protocols. You see, he did not seek approval to carry out experiments on human subjects!

The thing is, the whole post-​structuralist, post-​modernist, “‘Studies’ studies” mob has been experimenting on their alleged clients, the students, for decades. And the results have been … enlightening if not praiseworthy.

It is hard to see Boghossian’s antics as anything but heroic.

And hysterical.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Peter Boghossian, Portland, postmodernism, academic research, education