By Hal Brown
This story was covered on Portland's KOIN TV:
Fearing for their trans daughter’s safety, a Texas family flees to Oregon
This is a poignant story. It has a happy ending.![]() |
Click above to read article |
This is a blog with my opinions on politics, psychology, and other subjects. My posts are sometimes serious and sometimes snarky. I'm a retired MSW clinical social worker/psychotherapist and mental health center director who was also a cranberry farmer. Scroll archives on bottom of page to see previous blog stories. There are new ones added almost every day, although if I don't have anything original to say I try not to say anything at all.
By Hal Brown
This story was covered on Portland's KOIN TV:
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Click above to read article |
My morning ritual leading up to eventually deciding what, if anything, I can blog about is:
Then I look at The New York Times, Washington Post, Raw Story, Salon, and other websites. I often find something I want to blog about in those stories.
Today I was surprised to see that the main HUFFPOST story was about something that very much impacted me as an Oregonian who is pleased to live in a very progressive state.
This is what I saw:
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Click above to read article. |
Oregon progressives and even middle-of-the road residents dodged a bullet named Christine Drazen, a far right Republican, in our most recent governor race, because an independent named Betsy Johnson became a third party candidate.
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Click above to read article (left to right Kotek, Johnson, Drazen) |
Oregon, and Portland in particular, isn't a politically progressive Brigadoon. We have many problems including a lamentable rate of often deadly shootings, and rampant homelessness. In addition, we have our history of Black Live Matters protests which became violent and made national news. This was because far right groups came here because they were attracted to Portland's reputation as a being so progressive. We are known, among other things, for being so early in decriminalizing recreational use of marijuana, being LGBTQ+ friendly, and accepting immigrants. We also have the first-of-its-kind psilocybin therapy program.
We also have the eastern rural portion of the state, which is mostly Republican and tends to be rampantly MAGA. They have been voting in non-binding country referendums to become part of Idaho in something called The Greater Idaho Movement. Read today's article about dueling protests.
My takeaway from this situation with our senate is that I should never get blasé about living in such a progressive area, and in the suburbs of a city which rightfully proudly celebrates itself for being weird.
There is hope as far as this attempt to block hundreds of bills addressing, among other things, gender-affirming medical care, homelessness, gun control, mental health care, education, and abortion rights.
There is a fly in the ointment that these Republican senators may have inadvertently swallowed. This is that a 2022 ballot measure is now part of the Oregon Constitution. It disqualifies a lawmaker with 10 or more unexcused absences from holding office in the next term.
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My new US House rep inside Trump's mouth in a DonkeyHotey caricature |
I was very much invested in my Oregon elections this year because there was a chance that two Democrats in our most blue state I supported might loose. One was Tina Kotek running for governor and the other was Jamie McLeod-Skinner running to represent our newly redrawn 5th Congressional District.
It was a huge relief when Kotek beat her far right challenger Christine Drazen, but businesswoman and former large suburban Portland city mayor Lori Chavez-DeRemer won her race.
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Click above to read and view video |
I read the above article (afterwards I watched the video that went with it). Just from reading the article I began to think that perhaps she won't be that bad:
“That’s one of the things I focused on as mayor. You’re a non-partisan mayor. You’re representing everyone in the city. We have to do the same here,” Chavez-DeRemer said. “I will always reach across the aisle to make sure I’m listening to the other side.”
Notably her response to one question was not in the website article, but was in the video. She was asked about her opinion about the conviction of Oath Keeper Stuart Rhodes. It was almost unbelievable that she said she hadn't been following this and had no comment. Either she was lying or hopelessly out of touch. I vote for the former.
Then I got to the last part of the article (at six minutes on the video):
Looking ahead to 2024, in light of Donald Trump announcing his presidential bid, Chavez DeRemer stated her support for whoever ends up at the top of the Republican ticket.
“I think we’re going to see a lot of Republicans running and we’ll see if he becomes the top of the ticket for the Republican party. I will support the nominee, but at this point I think it’s wide open for us to make those decisions early,” Chavez-DeRemer said.
This might as well come from a GOP talking point 3-5 card because it is pretty much word for word what other Republicans are saying when asked the same question.
After reading the article I watched the video on the website to try to be fair in my judgment that the interviewer was, to put it mildly, utterly horrible and an example of the kind of softball interview that would get a student fired from a college newspaper.
This interview by Ken Bodie, a local TV station morning anchor, was published and aired on Dec. 3rd. Online it was updated on Dec. 4th. I think it came after Trump's appearance with Ye and Fuentes and possibly before his "suspend the Constitution" post. She should have been asked about her opinions about these if either had already occurred.
This is what Jennifer Rubin wrote in The Washington Post (summarized here on RawStory):
"It should not be too much to ask that serious media outlets label the GOP accurately as a threat to constitutional government and to democracy," she added, "No member of the media should allow Republican candidates, officeholders or operatives to escape an interview without declaring whether they would support for president a self-described opponent of the Constitution."
Here's a comment similar to what Chavez-DeRemer said from this ABC News article:
Republican Ohio Rep. Dave Joyce said Sunday that he didn't want to be drawn into commenting on Donald Trump's recent call to suspend the Constitution over baseless claims of 2020 election fraud.
Joyce, the chair of the Republican Governance Group, a centrist group in the House, was asked by ABC "This Week" anchor George Stephanopoulos to respond to Trump's post on Saturday on his Truth Social platform. The former president wrongly asserted that the "massive fraud" -- which did not occur -- "allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution."
Joyce initially declined to respond, saying he didn't know what Trump said on social media and that the public wasn't "interested in looking backwards." But Stephanopoulos pressed further, and Joyce ultimately said that Trump's comment should be taken "in context" but that it wouldn't prevent him from supporting Trump if he ends up winning the nomination.
Addendum: This would be my version of this article.
Two slightly related stories caught my eye on the website of a local Portland area TV station. Once I started writing about them my mind wandered far afield to cover other subjects.
“I’ve never even seen this stuff before. So I’m trying,” said Scott Yon, a customer at Shroom House. “I understand it may not be legally up yet, but in Portland, it doesn’t seem like people get arrested for anything.”
Even though the Oregon Health Authority and police say this is not legal, the long lines seen outside the store show the simple economics of supply and demand.
Public domain, Creative Commons.. By Hal Brown, MSW, Retired psychotherapist This is a classic case of municipal decision makers putting t...