Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Oregon Occupation

China landed on its shores this morning.

"Portland debates moving tent city to upscale digs" Associated Press, October 6, 2013

Portland, Ore. -- One of the toniest areas of Portland might soon be home to a tent city. 

I thought those were gone since the recovery.

In many towns, the owners and developers of high-end homes and condominiums would scream to high heaven about diminished property values.

But this is Portland, where citizens try their best to be tolerant of everything except intolerance - and gluten.

Ha-ha.... ha.

Opponents of a city plan to put 100 people under a century-old bridge in the Pearl District are carefully choosing their words when complaining about the prospect of new, down-on-their-luck neighbors.

Out of sight you guilt-inducing trolls!

Rather than express concern for their financial investments, they criticize the city's expedited process and worry for the welfare of those willing to live in a parking lot under the Broadway Bridge.

Tiffany Sweitzer, the president of Hoyt Street Properties, a realty and development firm that has helped transform a dying industrial area into a sparkling urban neighborhood, said "throwing a bunch of people under a bridge" should not be the city's solution to helping the estimated 2,000 residents who sleep outside each night.

"It's embarrassing, because that is not how you would treat anybody," she said.

Mayor Charlie Hales and city commissioners plan to decide Oct. 16 whether to move the camp to the Pearl District from its current home near the entrance to Chinatown. If approved, a coalition of property owners promises to sue.

The camp known as Right 2 Dream Too (or R2D2) was established in 2011 during the Occupy Portland movement.

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Related: Occupy Now Controlled Opposition

They are when they are in my jewspaper!

"Guilty plea in ‘Family’ ecoterror case in Ore." by Nigel Duara |  Associated Press, October 11, 2013

PORTLAND, Ore. — The woman at the center of a seven-year manhunt whose face graced wanted posters around the Pacific Northwest cast a smaller shadow Thursday on a slow walk to her defense table in a federal courtroom.

Now a decade removed from her membership in the ecoterrorism group ‘‘the Family,’’ 40-year-old Rebecca Rubin stood erect in a jail jumpsuit.

‘‘Guilty,’’ she said, in a voice so soft a judge had to ask her to speak up. It was the first of three admissions of guilt she made Thursday to arson and conspiracy charges, and with them, consented to give up at least five years of her freedom. She will be sentenced Jan. 27.

Rubin’s plea was the latest admission of wrongdoing by members of the Family in a series of arsons across three states from 1996 to 2001 that did $40 million in damage. Ten people pleaded guilty in 2007 to conspiracy and arson and were sentenced to prison. Two others indicted in the case remain at large.

In the final act for which she was charged, Rubin freed horses at a federal wild horse facility in California before other members of the group set a barn on fire.

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Related:

"Investigators say they don’t know exactly what caused a house fire that killed five people Sunday in Eastern Oregon, but it wasn’t arson caused by an accelerant or an accident in a drug lab."

Death to them all!

"Oregon governor can deny execution" Associated Press, June 21, 2013

SALEM, Ore. — Oregon’s governor can deny execution for a death row inmate who wants to die, the state’s highest court ruled Thursday, affirming a gubernatorial power that has been at the center of a debate over the morality of capital punishment....

I'm against it, but if he wants to who am I to say no?

Governor John Kitzhaber, a Democrat, opposes the death penalty and intervened weeks before Gary Haugen, who was convicted of two murders, was scheduled to be die by lethal injection in 2011. The governor vowed to block any execution during his term in office and urged a vote on abolishing the death penalty.

Maybe they should send him to Ohio then.

The Legislature has shown little interest in putting it on the ballot in 2014....

I've shown little interest in this post.

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Something else I just found:

"Rescuers find body of snowboarder in Oregon" Associated Press, August 05, 2013

MOUNT HOOD, Ore. — A dozen rescuers armed with chain saws and other tools chipped away at tons of ice and snow Sunday to recover the body of a 25-year-old snowboarder killed when an ice tunnel collapsed on Oregon’s Mount Hood.

The snowboarder, Collin Backowski of Colorado, was traveling with five companions when the tunnel collapsed Saturday afternoon. The others tried to dig Backowski out but they could not break through the ice and snow.

Rescuers quickly responded but halted efforts about 11 p.m. Saturday, then resumed early Sunday morning.

Tiffany Peterson, a spokeswoman for the Hood River sheriff’s office, said that after removing tons of debris by hand, searchers found Backowski where he had been buried by 8 to 10 feet of snow and ice.

None of the searchers or other snowboarders was injured, Peterson said.

The ice tunnel was on the White River Glacier, which begins about 6,000 feet up the south side of the mountain.

Companions took pictures of the area just before the tunnel collapsed, giving searchers a better idea of where to look.

Warm temperatures made snow on the mountain slushier, adding to the challenge of attempting to reach the snowboarder.

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