News Former state Rep. Derrick Kitts (R-Hillsboro) never had any problem generating news of all kinds when he was in the Oregon Legislature. And he's back in the news today in a tangential way because many are questioning how MSNBC can suspend Keith Olbermann for donating to Democratic candidates when MSNBC host Joe Scarborough donated to Kitts when Kitts ran unsuccessfully as the Republican challenger ...   More

News For much of the gubernatorial campaign, Republican Chris Dudley enjoyed a massive fundraising lead over Democrat John Kitzhaber. Dudley tapped connections from his 16-year NBA career, large out-of-state donors as well as wealthy Oregonians and their companies in impressive fashion for a first-time candidate. One local forest products company, Stimson Lumber, gave the rookie candidate $510,000. ...   More

News We had a pretty civil discussion yesterday (thanks everybody) in response to the question of what advice you'd give Gov.-Elect John Kitzhaber heading into his term next year. So in that spirit (and because it's a slow-news Friday), let's try something similar today with Republican gubernatorial candidate Chris Dudley. Dudley didn't mention politics in his concession remarks the evening after ...   More

News Oregon is formally starting a discussion next week about whether or not to legalize lane sharing for motoryclists, also known as lane splitting or filtering. In a small first step, the Governor's Advisory Committee for Motorcycle Safety has planned a public meeting and released a report [PDF] on the practice, which is currently against the law in every state except California. Based on the ...   More

News Veteran political consultant Patricia McCaig served as Gov.-elect John Kitzhaber's campaign manager in the months leading up to last Tuesday's election victory for the Democratic candidate. Today's filings with the state show McCaig got a $42,000 "win bonus" for guiding the campaign to victory. Paying campaign staffers for victory is not unheard of around the country—New York City Mayor ...   More

News Gov.-elect John Kitzhaber has a lot of work to do between now and when he takes office Jan. 10, 2011. Kitzhaber must prepare a budget and hire staff . And he must prepare to follow through with one of his campaign pledges: to ask state agency heads, commission chairpersons and some program directors to submit their resignations. Kitzhaber has said he will radically change the way Oregon's government ...   More

News For those of you keeping track of convicted child murderer Diane Downs, she's up for another parole hearing Dec. 10. Downs, perhaps Oregon's most notorious female convict, shot her three young children on May 19, 1983 on a dirt road in Springfield in Lane County. She killed one of the children and wounded the two others, then claimed a "bushy-haired stranger" had pulled the trigger. One of Downs' ...   More

News Elections do matter. Now that last week's elections have given Republicans control of the U.S. House next year. Rep. Greg Walden—the only GOP member of the Oregon congressional delegation—has a lot of juice as head of his party's transition committee. And he's getting a lot of face time on national TV. Last night, Walden was on Fox News' On The Record W/Greta Van Susteren to talk ...   More

News The Oregon House Democrats had their usual post-election meeting last night in Salem to vote for leadership positions. Speculation in the past week centered on whether House Speaker Dave Hunt (D-Gladstone) would retain his power after Democrats' 36 to 24 super-majority melted away into a 30-30 tie with Republicans. And Democrats took the unusual step of having an outside mediator come in to ...   More

News If you have two minutes to kill and can stomach Duke basketball, watch this video of Blue Devil Kyle Singler (h/t to Deadspin) apparently making a bunch of amazing shots. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJWPASQZqLc[/youtube] Our only "earth-shattering" conclusion from this video of Singler (an Oregon native whose Duke team will be in Portland on Nov. 27 to play the University of Oregon ...   More