"Then it snowed 11 Inches" headline brought to mind a classic Oregonian headline. You recall Mejía Poot? Poor sod was a non-English speaking hispanic who might have been mentally ill and had diabetes or something (it has been over 20 years). For what it is worth I don't think he was a citizen but I do believe his heirs hit big in the city lawsuit lottery.
Poot became confused on a city bus and physically disputed the matter. So, he struggled and ended up in some lock up. While in whatever chokey he was in he charged a down cop with a metal rod and got shot to death. Bummer. Admittedly.
I cannot locate nor recall the headline exactly, but it was to the effect that he'd been executed because he was two bits light for the fare.
No fact, just narrative. Nicely concise and collapsed, but bullshit nonetheless.
By the way did you see where New York rioters and looters are scoring a 3 million dollar payout because the cops they attacked weren't masked?
It is very easy to write massive checks on behalf of "the government" when none of the money is yours, you will never be held to account why you allowed that money to be paid, and because personal injury lawyers are the single greatest beneficiaries of these sometimes obscene payouts.
In the normal world of personal injury law, the future income of the person killed or otherwise unable to continue working is calculated, and PI lawyers will note that a 90-year old widower, childless, but a beloved and famous composer is "worth much less" than a 30-year old plumber's assistant with four kids. Sounds cruel, but it is true, and insurance companies know that
But in this counter-intuitive world of Portlandia that's all gone. The city or county can't wait to show its social virtue by paying out 7, even 8-figure settlements in cases where blame is questionable and the future earning potential of the claimant may have been enough to buy a nice used car. This is not a comment on the value of any human life and anyone who has lost someone they love knows literally no amount of money "makes it all better."
In theory a large pay-off will deter the "bad actors" who caused the death to act differently in the future. How is that working out? All we get are a bewildering alphabet soup of "advisory groups" with "lived experience" who regularly spit on all the public record laws and open meeting regulations that once made Oregon famous. And the ghost of a police department that has no traffic division (while traffic deaths skyrocket) and no drug team, because we functionally legalized all drugs.
When is the last time any elected official or bureaucrat was held accountable for the ear-popping amounts of settlements? It is incredibly rare for these cases to go to trial - because one class of people always win - lawyers like me.
Right now I'm re-reading Thomas Ricks' book The Generals. It is a study of American army command failure in the post-war years and examines the failure of the military to replace or hold accountable generals who do not measure up or who demonstably fail in their duties.
He sees it as a clear departure from General Marshall's practice, a practice that provided a clear victory. In the world of local politics it would seem that neither the voters nor the office holders punish failure very often. Or fight for the right.
I was also reading today of Geico losing in a court of law. A policy holder had had frequent sex with a woman who contracted venereal warts from her paramour. Becaue it occured in his car, voila! Geico got clipped for 5 million
Thank you for a well-written, and cogently argued article on the homeless crisis here in Portland. On the one hand, you have developers and the hyper-woke homeless industrial complex… On the other hand, you have the housed folks and the taxpayers wanting law and order. I sincerely hope law and order and a return to normalized civic life can occur here.
Well analyzed. Except for the gratuitous sounding George Soros comment, I can’t disagree with you.
"Then it snowed 11 Inches" headline brought to mind a classic Oregonian headline. You recall Mejía Poot? Poor sod was a non-English speaking hispanic who might have been mentally ill and had diabetes or something (it has been over 20 years). For what it is worth I don't think he was a citizen but I do believe his heirs hit big in the city lawsuit lottery.
Poot became confused on a city bus and physically disputed the matter. So, he struggled and ended up in some lock up. While in whatever chokey he was in he charged a down cop with a metal rod and got shot to death. Bummer. Admittedly.
I cannot locate nor recall the headline exactly, but it was to the effect that he'd been executed because he was two bits light for the fare.
No fact, just narrative. Nicely concise and collapsed, but bullshit nonetheless.
By the way did you see where New York rioters and looters are scoring a 3 million dollar payout because the cops they attacked weren't masked?
It is very easy to write massive checks on behalf of "the government" when none of the money is yours, you will never be held to account why you allowed that money to be paid, and because personal injury lawyers are the single greatest beneficiaries of these sometimes obscene payouts.
In the normal world of personal injury law, the future income of the person killed or otherwise unable to continue working is calculated, and PI lawyers will note that a 90-year old widower, childless, but a beloved and famous composer is "worth much less" than a 30-year old plumber's assistant with four kids. Sounds cruel, but it is true, and insurance companies know that
But in this counter-intuitive world of Portlandia that's all gone. The city or county can't wait to show its social virtue by paying out 7, even 8-figure settlements in cases where blame is questionable and the future earning potential of the claimant may have been enough to buy a nice used car. This is not a comment on the value of any human life and anyone who has lost someone they love knows literally no amount of money "makes it all better."
In theory a large pay-off will deter the "bad actors" who caused the death to act differently in the future. How is that working out? All we get are a bewildering alphabet soup of "advisory groups" with "lived experience" who regularly spit on all the public record laws and open meeting regulations that once made Oregon famous. And the ghost of a police department that has no traffic division (while traffic deaths skyrocket) and no drug team, because we functionally legalized all drugs.
When is the last time any elected official or bureaucrat was held accountable for the ear-popping amounts of settlements? It is incredibly rare for these cases to go to trial - because one class of people always win - lawyers like me.
Right now I'm re-reading Thomas Ricks' book The Generals. It is a study of American army command failure in the post-war years and examines the failure of the military to replace or hold accountable generals who do not measure up or who demonstably fail in their duties.
He sees it as a clear departure from General Marshall's practice, a practice that provided a clear victory. In the world of local politics it would seem that neither the voters nor the office holders punish failure very often. Or fight for the right.
I was also reading today of Geico losing in a court of law. A policy holder had had frequent sex with a woman who contracted venereal warts from her paramour. Becaue it occured in his car, voila! Geico got clipped for 5 million
Thank you for a well-written, and cogently argued article on the homeless crisis here in Portland. On the one hand, you have developers and the hyper-woke homeless industrial complex… On the other hand, you have the housed folks and the taxpayers wanting law and order. I sincerely hope law and order and a return to normalized civic life can occur here.
Another well researched and well written article on an important topic.