Great article again. Hey Richard have you seen that the chief petitioner for the new capital gains tax on the ballot (26-238) is Evan T Burchfield? He’s an antifa felony rioter! Seriously.
Did you see Nigel Jaquiss’s story, “Stock Answers?” That measure could pass simply if tenant activists rally the troops to get out the vote, and if ordinary taxpayers aren’t informed.
Granted, not all tenants will vote for it. Me, for example.
It’s hard to know which lie is repeated more often in the media — that ex-felons can’t find housing or that evicted tenants can’t find housing.
A couple of years ago, I came home to find multiple police units in the parking lot of my apartment house. What was going on?
“Welfare check,” one of the cops told me. Multiple units for a welfare check?
I called the manager. One of the residents had threatened to burn the place down. This wasn’t the first time she had made such a threat. Turns out, she had done just that — started an arson fire at another apartment house in Montana and caused $1 million worth of damage.
Because she was a mental case, everybody was tip-toeing around. Wouldn’t want to offend her.
How did she end up here? How did she find another place to live after causing $1 million worth of damage at another place? Easy. PEOPLE LIE. They don’t tell the truth about their history. They have family members and friends who lie for them.
In this woman’s case, the manager had reached out to the woman’s family to see if they could help. Guess what? They were glad to dump their problem on somebody else.
This is the world we live in.
Evan T. Burchfield’s organization is called “Eviction Representation for All.” Sorry, but some tenants deserve to get evicted. If they are so lazy and irresponsible that they can’t even show up in court to try and represent themselves (and where judges often cut them some slack) well, then, tough.
Have you seen the arrest report on Evan Burchfield?
State v. Evan Burchfield: It is alleged that on September 5, 2020, Portland Police declared a gathering near Ventura Park an unlawful assembly after individuals in the crowd started throwing multiple items including Molotov cocktails, frozen water bottles and rocks toward police. Officers reported seeing a group of approximately eight people standing a short distance away. Approximately six individuals held shields facing the officers and would not disperse. The group continued to face and move towards officers. When police approached the group, it is alleged that a person holding a wooden shield, later identified as Burchfield pulled his shield back, lifted it with both hands and threw it at an officer who stood about two feet away. The bottom of the shield hit the officer in the face. The officer’s full face shield protected him from injury. Burchfield is accused of then running away. Officers later arrested him without further incident.
Mar 18, 2023Liked by Richard Cheverton, Pamela Fitzsimmons
Thought I would share that I grew up in Ireland where ranked choice voting / "proportional representation" is the way they do national elections. I never understood it. I know there were counts and recounts and it was ( and I think still is ) all done by hand !
You vote "1 through N" in order of your preference. Then a "quota" is established by some formula that is a function of how many votes were cast.
Sometimes a candidate is elected on the first count and if they are, then their "excess votes" - those over and above the quota - are distributed to the other candidates according to the second and subsequent preferences they got.
You'll also hear about candidates being eliminated from the counting and their votes being distributed to other candidates based on their second and subsequent preferences.
Sometimes there are multiple rounds of counting before all seats in a district are filled. (Unlike over here where there is one representative in Congress or in Salem for a district, they have districts ("constituencies" they call them ) which have several representatives each. It's something to do with the population in the district. Sometimes one political party wins all the seats in a district, other times they are spread over two or three parties.
The whole election process is a sight to behold, with all those multiple counts to be done. And all done by hand with stacks of papers shuffled and stacked and restacked.
Just for grins I DuckDuck'd "Irish election count center pictures" and found this gem of an article:
According to the article, counting of votes started on a Saturday at 8am, and the article finishes with "Monday, 10am : Count number 9 is underway" !!
Further up in the article they say this :
"We’ll be honest, we’re not sure how this whole proportional representation thing works. One of the four seats of this constituency just went to a guy who didn’t really get that many number ones, but then by the virtue of 2nd and 3rd choices of other ballot papers, he’s been elected to one of the highest ranking jobs in Ireland"
Pretty much sums up how I felt about it when I was living there!
One thing the system did guarantee : in the Parliamentary system they have over there, you would _always_ get coalition governments. Rarely ever did a party win a majority. The result was often unstable governments that didn't last long, although the last decade or so they seem to be managing better. It also results in some small political party with very little overall support becoming a lynchpin that holds a coalition together, and getting some important cabinet position as a result.
I don't live in Portland's jurisdiction ( thank goodness ) but I do live nearby . It'll be interesting to see how this "experiment" unfolds.
“(Y)ou would _always_ get coalition governments. Rarely ever did a party win a majority. The result was often unstable governments that didn't last long… .”
In other words, tribalism. If the U.S. had used ranked choice voting pre-World War II, we would have never had the power to take on the Nazis. We would all be speaking German or Japanese now. (Nothing against Germany or Japan, but I’m glad America won.)
Two of the most diverse countries in the world today are Chad and Uganda. How can that be since they appear to share a similar skin color? Because of tribalism. Thousands of tribes make them “diverse.”
All those Portlanders who pushed for ranked choice voting wanted a more “diverse” city council.
If the city can’t function now, just wait until the various tribes start fighting.
Thanks for the comment. There are folks in the legislature who would like to extend ranked choice statewide...before it has been tested in the real world in PDX. Sounds familiar.
Thanks Richard for figuring out the Euclidean meets Orwellian ballot rules that Portland is inflicting on its citizens. I'm sure it's coming to a ballot near me soon.
I ran for office 7 times on a county-wide basis (and about 5 times for the lowest office possible - precinct person, back when I thought there was hope in the Democratic Party) and while the office of District Attorney in Oregon is non-partisan, offices like Attorney General (and Secretary of State) are illogically partisan, and right now VERY partisan.
I have voted for various Disney characters but I was informed that such votes were not counted unless either the fictional candidate paid or the votes made an actual difference. In 2008 John Kroger (who I supported) ran as the Democratic and successful candidate as Oregon Attorney General. For whatever reason the GOP did not mount a candidate so, unbeknownst to me and without my endorsement, about 200 people in Clatsop County wrote me in as the Republican candidate for AG. I only found out it because had the statewide write-in votes actually reached some threshold, I might have briefly been the GOP candidate for AG (not a post I was looking to run for back then).
Mar 17, 2023Liked by Richard Cheverton, Pamela Fitzsimmons
Local media? LOL... you can't get local media to write about anything substantive. The Portland media is a joke, they play it so safe. As to the secrecy of some of Portland politics, that's just the new way the power players run things today. It's disgusting really, how they just do what they want and never listen to what the people want. There was more citizen engagement that was actually effective in the 1970s. Now, they give you your three rushed minutes to speak to the king before the Gong bell sounds and you're kicked out. Try to rush out a few words of concern or complaint and they throw you out. Yell a little, feel "heard" in some way? Oh brother. It's all just a stupid show, nothing but a show.
"Okay, get it off your chest, maybe make some sense but we're still gonna do exactly what we wanna do!"
As a politically unaffiliated journalist who grew up in Portland and was briefly a member of its "local media" and left many years ago, I am happy to live somewhere else.
It's great that you left, Greene, but not every Portlander can just up and leave. You do realize that other human constraints often control how, when or if a person can leave a state and then move to another. "Good luck, suckers." Really? Do you even conceptualize how ignorant and uninformed you sound? So, you were a "politically unaffiliated journalist" is that right? Isn't that just another word for being a legend in your own mind, right? Along with you were, "briefly a member" of the "local media" also?
You are right. My comments were unkind, and I understand from old friends that life in Portland is difficult now. I have spent many of the intervening years in some other spots I would have liked to have missed myself. Life is often like that.
Your apology seems sincere, so thank you. I am not stuck here. I could pick up and move if I had to. But in the words of Margaret Cho’s memoir, “I Have Chosen to Stay and Fight.”
Portland’s progressives refuse to see their own hate, their own racism, their own fascism.
Could you or Pamela please do a story on the capital gains proposal 26-238? So much there! Thank you for considering!
Great article again. Hey Richard have you seen that the chief petitioner for the new capital gains tax on the ballot (26-238) is Evan T Burchfield? He’s an antifa felony rioter! Seriously.
Did you see Nigel Jaquiss’s story, “Stock Answers?” That measure could pass simply if tenant activists rally the troops to get out the vote, and if ordinary taxpayers aren’t informed.
Granted, not all tenants will vote for it. Me, for example.
It’s hard to know which lie is repeated more often in the media — that ex-felons can’t find housing or that evicted tenants can’t find housing.
A couple of years ago, I came home to find multiple police units in the parking lot of my apartment house. What was going on?
“Welfare check,” one of the cops told me. Multiple units for a welfare check?
I called the manager. One of the residents had threatened to burn the place down. This wasn’t the first time she had made such a threat. Turns out, she had done just that — started an arson fire at another apartment house in Montana and caused $1 million worth of damage.
Because she was a mental case, everybody was tip-toeing around. Wouldn’t want to offend her.
How did she end up here? How did she find another place to live after causing $1 million worth of damage at another place? Easy. PEOPLE LIE. They don’t tell the truth about their history. They have family members and friends who lie for them.
In this woman’s case, the manager had reached out to the woman’s family to see if they could help. Guess what? They were glad to dump their problem on somebody else.
This is the world we live in.
Evan T. Burchfield’s organization is called “Eviction Representation for All.” Sorry, but some tenants deserve to get evicted. If they are so lazy and irresponsible that they can’t even show up in court to try and represent themselves (and where judges often cut them some slack) well, then, tough.
Have you seen the arrest report on Evan Burchfield?
State v. Evan Burchfield: It is alleged that on September 5, 2020, Portland Police declared a gathering near Ventura Park an unlawful assembly after individuals in the crowd started throwing multiple items including Molotov cocktails, frozen water bottles and rocks toward police. Officers reported seeing a group of approximately eight people standing a short distance away. Approximately six individuals held shields facing the officers and would not disperse. The group continued to face and move towards officers. When police approached the group, it is alleged that a person holding a wooden shield, later identified as Burchfield pulled his shield back, lifted it with both hands and threw it at an officer who stood about two feet away. The bottom of the shield hit the officer in the face. The officer’s full face shield protected him from injury. Burchfield is accused of then running away. Officers later arrested him without further incident.
https://www.mcda.us/index.php/news/nine-people-charged-following-recent-unlawful-assemblies-in-portland-oregon
Thought I would share that I grew up in Ireland where ranked choice voting / "proportional representation" is the way they do national elections. I never understood it. I know there were counts and recounts and it was ( and I think still is ) all done by hand !
You vote "1 through N" in order of your preference. Then a "quota" is established by some formula that is a function of how many votes were cast.
Sometimes a candidate is elected on the first count and if they are, then their "excess votes" - those over and above the quota - are distributed to the other candidates according to the second and subsequent preferences they got.
You'll also hear about candidates being eliminated from the counting and their votes being distributed to other candidates based on their second and subsequent preferences.
Sometimes there are multiple rounds of counting before all seats in a district are filled. (Unlike over here where there is one representative in Congress or in Salem for a district, they have districts ("constituencies" they call them ) which have several representatives each. It's something to do with the population in the district. Sometimes one political party wins all the seats in a district, other times they are spread over two or three parties.
The whole election process is a sight to behold, with all those multiple counts to be done. And all done by hand with stacks of papers shuffled and stacked and restacked.
Just for grins I DuckDuck'd "Irish election count center pictures" and found this gem of an article:
https://waterfordwhispersnews.com/2016/02/29/we-spent-the-weekend-counting-votes-and-heres-what-we-learned/
According to the article, counting of votes started on a Saturday at 8am, and the article finishes with "Monday, 10am : Count number 9 is underway" !!
Further up in the article they say this :
"We’ll be honest, we’re not sure how this whole proportional representation thing works. One of the four seats of this constituency just went to a guy who didn’t really get that many number ones, but then by the virtue of 2nd and 3rd choices of other ballot papers, he’s been elected to one of the highest ranking jobs in Ireland"
Pretty much sums up how I felt about it when I was living there!
One thing the system did guarantee : in the Parliamentary system they have over there, you would _always_ get coalition governments. Rarely ever did a party win a majority. The result was often unstable governments that didn't last long, although the last decade or so they seem to be managing better. It also results in some small political party with very little overall support becoming a lynchpin that holds a coalition together, and getting some important cabinet position as a result.
I don't live in Portland's jurisdiction ( thank goodness ) but I do live nearby . It'll be interesting to see how this "experiment" unfolds.
“(Y)ou would _always_ get coalition governments. Rarely ever did a party win a majority. The result was often unstable governments that didn't last long… .”
In other words, tribalism. If the U.S. had used ranked choice voting pre-World War II, we would have never had the power to take on the Nazis. We would all be speaking German or Japanese now. (Nothing against Germany or Japan, but I’m glad America won.)
Two of the most diverse countries in the world today are Chad and Uganda. How can that be since they appear to share a similar skin color? Because of tribalism. Thousands of tribes make them “diverse.”
All those Portlanders who pushed for ranked choice voting wanted a more “diverse” city council.
If the city can’t function now, just wait until the various tribes start fighting.
Thanks for the comment. There are folks in the legislature who would like to extend ranked choice statewide...before it has been tested in the real world in PDX. Sounds familiar.
Thanks Richard for figuring out the Euclidean meets Orwellian ballot rules that Portland is inflicting on its citizens. I'm sure it's coming to a ballot near me soon.
I ran for office 7 times on a county-wide basis (and about 5 times for the lowest office possible - precinct person, back when I thought there was hope in the Democratic Party) and while the office of District Attorney in Oregon is non-partisan, offices like Attorney General (and Secretary of State) are illogically partisan, and right now VERY partisan.
I have voted for various Disney characters but I was informed that such votes were not counted unless either the fictional candidate paid or the votes made an actual difference. In 2008 John Kroger (who I supported) ran as the Democratic and successful candidate as Oregon Attorney General. For whatever reason the GOP did not mount a candidate so, unbeknownst to me and without my endorsement, about 200 people in Clatsop County wrote me in as the Republican candidate for AG. I only found out it because had the statewide write-in votes actually reached some threshold, I might have briefly been the GOP candidate for AG (not a post I was looking to run for back then).
Local media? LOL... you can't get local media to write about anything substantive. The Portland media is a joke, they play it so safe. As to the secrecy of some of Portland politics, that's just the new way the power players run things today. It's disgusting really, how they just do what they want and never listen to what the people want. There was more citizen engagement that was actually effective in the 1970s. Now, they give you your three rushed minutes to speak to the king before the Gong bell sounds and you're kicked out. Try to rush out a few words of concern or complaint and they throw you out. Yell a little, feel "heard" in some way? Oh brother. It's all just a stupid show, nothing but a show.
"Okay, get it off your chest, maybe make some sense but we're still gonna do exactly what we wanna do!"
As a politically unaffiliated journalist who grew up in Portland and was briefly a member of its "local media" and left many years ago, I am happy to live somewhere else.
Good luck, suckers.
That’s not nice to those of us stuck here.
It's great that you left, Greene, but not every Portlander can just up and leave. You do realize that other human constraints often control how, when or if a person can leave a state and then move to another. "Good luck, suckers." Really? Do you even conceptualize how ignorant and uninformed you sound? So, you were a "politically unaffiliated journalist" is that right? Isn't that just another word for being a legend in your own mind, right? Along with you were, "briefly a member" of the "local media" also?
Another fantasy Mr. No name?
LOL :)
You are right. My comments were unkind, and I understand from old friends that life in Portland is difficult now. I have spent many of the intervening years in some other spots I would have liked to have missed myself. Life is often like that.
I apologize sincerely.
Your apology seems sincere, so thank you. I am not stuck here. I could pick up and move if I had to. But in the words of Margaret Cho’s memoir, “I Have Chosen to Stay and Fight.”
Portland’s progressives refuse to see their own hate, their own racism, their own fascism.
Thank you for your kind comment. I enjoy reading your posts and respect your decision to fight the good fight. You have my best wishes.