Voted Yet?

[November 1st, 2006] Former Portland Police Chief Charles Moose graduates this Tuesday, Nov. 7, from the Honolulu police academy. Yes, it's sunny Hawaii , but the $37,000-a-year job is a far cry from his days as a $180,000-a-year police chief of Montgomery County, Md., where he gained national fame for catching two snipers who terrorized the Washington, D.C., area in 2002 before facing criticism that he shouldn't have made money off a book he was writing about the manhunt. The 53-year-old Moose, who was Portland's top cop from 1993 to 1999, will be on one-year probation in Honololu like all other recruits, and will work beneath senior officers as a rookie cop, according to The Washington Post.

Amid the George Bushes and Bill Clintons roaming Portland's downtown streets in search of Halloween soirees Saturday night, you might have missed the fact we had a real, live ex-vice president and his wife on those streets, too. Former Vice President Walter Mondale and his wife, Joan , were in the lobby of the Paramount Hotel on Southwest Taylor Street before they went to a local wedding. When a WW editor, in the lobby for a meeting, greeted him, Mondale asked, "Do you know how to get ahold of Neil Goldschmidt ? He's not listed in the phone book." Mondale and Goldschmidt worked together 25-plus years ago in the Carter administration.

As it turns out, Goldschmidt also was in town for a mini-reunion of sorts last Sunday at Rabbi Manny Rose's West Hills house. A crowd of about 40 welcomed the ex-guv home from his new home in France. Among the guests: credit-card tycoon Irving Levin and his wife, former OPBer Stephanie Fowler ; Goldschmidt's former fellow Oregon Electric Utility board member Tom Walsh and his wife, political consultant Patricia McCaig ; Goldschmidt's ex-wife, Margie; and Bob Burtchaell , the private eye who provided valuable assistance to Goldschmidt over the years.

Ex-Trail Blazer Rasheed Wallace (and current WW "Hydro Hog") has his posh Dunthorpe pad on the market for a cool $5.5 million . The 10,000-square-foot home—which sits on 2 acres—has five fireplaces, a five-car garage, a pool and a multi-use sport court. If that's not enough, the ultra-private mansion sits behind gates on a tree-lined lane with a circular driveway and a fountain. 'Sheed, now with the Detroit Pistons, may be the home's most famous resident. But the estate is also listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The Oregonian's daily circulation numbers have taken another painful dip. In the most recent six-month period measured at the end of September, the paper's circulation dropped 6.8 percent, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. The Oregonian certainly isn't alone nationally in daily circulation decline, with all but three of the top 25 largest papers showing a dropoff in the last six months. But the numbers show The O's most recent drop is third-largest among the country's biggest 25 daily papers, trailing only the Los Angeles Times and the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Former Portland Tribune columnist Promise King is leaving his current City Hall job and returning Nov. 22 to his native Nigeria. Why? Because King's cousin Adams Oshiomole is running for governor in the Nigerian state of Edo, and King wants to help with the campaign. King, who's worked as a senior policy adviser to City Commissioner Dan Saltzman for the past year and a half, plans to return to Portland at the end of January but is unsure what he'll do when he gets back.

^WEB-ONLY MURMURS:

A new setback for Oregonian Dave Perez in his bid to resist the Recording Industry Association of America's crusade against music piracy (see "Inside the Den of a Pirate," WW, May 31, 2006): Last week, federal judge Ann L. Aiken ruled in Eugene that Perez couldn't get money from the RIAA for attorney fees he incurred when the industry group alleged Perez illegally downloaded music from the Internet. The RIAA has gotten Perez dismissed from the case, and now is focused on alleging his wife and two of his children did the downloading. Aiken's decision on attorney's fees now means Perez faces a $31,000 legal bill for himself as well as whatever legal costs arise going forward for his wife and kids. Given that the RIAA initially told Perez it wanted less than $5,000 from him to avert a lawsuit, Perez tells Murmurs, "Now I feel almost like an idiot; I could have paid this thing off years ago for $4,800."

When Washington and its fans roll into Autzen Stadium this Saturday, Nov. 4, the potent combination of tailgating and bitter rivalry will test the University of Oregon's season-long "Code of ConDUCKt" campaign. The campaign's fliers, ads and banners aim to guilt student fans into submission, and includes a hotline for fans to report rowdies. But Vicky Strand, Oregon's Athletic Department Event Coordinator, says student conduct isn't the problem. "Most behavioral issues come from other fans," says Strand. At the Sept. 16 Oklahoma game, security booted a record 80 fans out of nearly 60,000 in the stadium. But fewer than one-third of those 80 were students. Ejections shrank to 42 against UCLA and 36 last Saturday against PSU, but that ratio has held true. Maybe Oregon's campaign ought to take closer aim at fans who've already graduated.