News

Portland police yesterday announced that they'd caught that most elusive brand of criminal, the smartphone thief.

Three recent Apple-related robberies are being blamed on an unnamed 16-year-old from East Portland, and police say they expect to make more arrests.

This should give Portland police bragging rights over their counterparts in Berkely, Calif., where 10 officers on overtime failed to locate the chief's son's stolen iPhone, despite the fact that they had its GPS location constantly updated on a map.

As a deterrent to robbery, the police press release says, iPhone and iPad owners should "always be aware of their surroundings and not focus solely on their electronic device."

And then what are they supposed to do? Like, look at people? Pfft. 

Another alternative is to buy an Android, which nobody wants.

The police on the arrest announcement follows:

16-year-old arrested in connection with iPhone robberies

Today, Thursday, May 24, 2012 the Portland Police Bureau Transit Division arrested a 16-year-old male in connection with three iPhone and iPad robberies that have occurred in recent weeks.

Officers of the Transit Division have been actively investigating these crimes, conducting both uniformed and plain clothes missions. Their investigation along with TriMet surveillance video resulted in the identification of this suspect and a search warrant being served at a residence in the 3200 block of Southeast 138th avenue in Portland.

Thefts of iPhones and iPads are increasing across the nation and in Portland due to the growing popularity of these devices. Whether on a MAX train, on a city sidewalk or in a park, this is a crime of opportunity that can be avoided by being vigilant. Portland Police, Transit Police and TriMet encourage people to always be aware of their surroundings and not focus solely on their electronic device. Be attentive to the people nearby. Keep devices close to the body when using and stowed away when not in use.

The dedicated work of Transit police officers and the TriMet surveillance video were crucial in leading to today's arrest. The suspect will be charged in Juvenile court with Robbery III, Computer Crime, Theft I, Theft II and Theft III.

More arrests are expected.

Arts & Books

Paul Fussell was a great writer and scholar and, in the three years before his death yesterday, an Oregonian.

Obituaries are beginning to appear around the world, but the best honor one could pay to the man is to read his writing. Fussell stripped war of heroism and romance. His voice was steady, clear and honest and on basically every subject, worth hearing.

In the excerpt below, from a 1982 essay on his experiences during the American invasion of Vichy France in World War II, Fussell explains how he came to his subject:

Everyone knows that a night relief is among the most difficult of infantry maneuvers. But we didn’t know it, and in our innocence we expected it to go according to plan. We and the company we were replacing were cleverly and severely shelled; it was as if the Germans a few hundred feet away could see us in the dark and through the thick pine growth. When the shelling finally stopped, at about midnight, we realized that although near the place we were supposed to be, until daylight we were hopelessly lost.

The order came down to stop where we were, lie down among the trees, and get some sleep. We would finish the relief at first light. Scattered over several hundred yards, the 250 of us in F Company lay down in a darkness so thick we could see nothing at all. Despite the terror of our first shelling (and several people had been hit), we slept as soundly as babes.

At dawn I awoke, and what I saw all around were numerous objects I’d miraculously not tripped over in the dark. These objects were dozens of dead German boys in greenish-gray uniforms, killed a day or two before by the company we were relieving. If darkness had hidden them from us, dawn disclosed them with open eyes and greenish-white faces like marble, still clutching their rifles and machine pistols in their seventeen-year-old hands, fixed where they had fallen. (For the first time I understood the German phrase for the war dead: die Gefallenen.)

Michelangelo could have made something beautiful out of these forms, in the Dying Gaul tradition, and I was startled to find that at first, in a way I couldn’t understand, they struck me as beautiful. But after a moment no feeling but shock and horror.

My adolescent illusions, largely intact to that moment, fell away all at once, and I suddenly knew I was not and never would be in a world that was reasonable or just. The scene was less apocalyptic than shabbily ironic: it sorted so ill with modern popular assumptions about the idea of progress and attendant improvements in public health, social welfare, and social justice.

To transform guiltless boys into cold marble after passing them through unbearable fear and humiliation and pain and contempt seemed to do them an interesting injustice.

I decided to ponder these things.

His books are highly recommended.

News

Speaking of money in politics…

U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) is among those speaking on the Senate floor today in favor of a legislative effort to roll back the unlimited corporate donations permitted by the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision.

"The Supreme Court, with #CitizensUnited, attacked the heart of our Constitution," Merkley Tweeted this morning.

You can watch the speechifying live over at C-SPAN 2.

Merkley and Oregon's senior U.S. senator, Ron Wyden, are among 43 co-sponsors of a bill by U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) to place additional disclosure requirements on "super PACs," the monster campaign finance committees empowered by the 2010 high court ruling. 

Oregon, which places no limits on campaign financing, was not among 22 states that this week joined a legal fight, led by Montana, to ask the Supreme Court to overturn its decision.

News

With a good share of the country's business reporters freaking out over today's first-ever public stock sale by Facebook, The New York Times' Bits blog hones in on the company's new Oregon tax break.

"A few hours after the I.P.O. Friday, Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber was scheduled to sign into law a so-called “Facebook bill” that assesses big data centers in Oregon for taxes on their local value, not on intangible assets like their national brand. The signing will take place at Facebook’s 333,400 square foot data center, located in Prineville, Ore."

"With this bill in place, Facebook is likely to build a second big data center at the site, which is a showcase for the company. … "

"The Oregon law applies to other companies operating big data centers in Oregon, as well. Apple, Google, Amazon and other companies operate computer centers in the state, which is an attractive location for its geographic location with low electricity costs."

In the comments on the NYT blog, an Oregon resident complains that the Kitzhaber-backed tax breaks "are going to some of the most profitable companies on the planet. And since the low cost of electricity [in Oregon] is what brings data centers to this state, it's questionable whether the tax expenditures are even needed to make it attractive to build data centers here."

News

It's no tranquilized bear falling out of a tree, but this Mayberryesque report of a duck family rescue comes via the Portland Police Bureau's Facebook page.

Gold star for correct usage of the word "badling":

In the late afternoon hours of Monday May 14, 2012, two Portland Police officers responded to a call of some wayward ducks ambling along the median of the northbound McLoughlin viaduct, North of Southeast Holgate Boulevard. The officers arrived and spotted a mother duck several ducklings walking along the center median of the viaduct as traffic moved swiftly by.

The veteran officers, knowing that attempting to get out on foot and catch the mother duck and ducklings would prove futile, slowed traffic by using their rear emergency lights and gave the ducks a police escort along the viaduct as traffic slowed and passed the parade on the right.

It's hard to photograph a badling while driving.

On one occasion, two ducklings fell through a storm drain and the officers stopped to lift the drain and retrieve the young birds, putting them back in the march with the others.

As the badling of ducks wandered off oft the viaduct near Southeast Harrison Street, the officers got out of their cars to herd them to the West towards Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and eventually the Willamette River. As one officer blocked traffic on MLK, the other officer escorted them on foot across the street and into a parking lot, out of harms way. The officers then continued to follow them until the mother duck and her ducklings made their way through a hole in a fence and down to the rivers edge.

Photos courtesy of the Portland Police Bureau.

News We don't know about you, but we just couldn't wait for the election results in the Portland mayor's race to roll in tomorrow night.

So we sent WW news intern Cody Newton to consult with the experts on the future—astrologers, fortune tellers and psychics.

Only two—Tarot card counselor Caffeine Jones and certified Magi astrologer Ken Humke—accepted the challenge.

WW asked Jones and Humke to focus on the leading candidates, Eileen Brady (Gemini), Charlie Hales (Aquarius) and Jefferson Smith (Cancer).

We are posting the fortune-tellers' fuller responses below. But for those with short attention spans, here's the upshot.

Jones, the Tarot reader who disclosed her support for Occupy Portland protester/candidate Cameron Whitten, offers the following:

Based on these cards, if goaded on by a newspaper…to pick one candidate, I would guess that the winner would be Smith. Brady will likely be second.

Looking to the stars, Humke sees an entirely different outcome:

There are strong negative transiting influences on election day for all three candidates and no comparable positive influences for any. … This suggests that either a Brady-Hales or Hales-Smith runoff may be in the offing.

Read the rest below. Remember, ballots are due tomorrow.

Humke:

I am fairly confident from what I have been able to do so far that none of the three will get over 50 percent.

There are strong negative transiting influences on election day for all three candidates and no comparable positive influences for any. Those in Brady's and Hales' charts are very similar and of a heartbreak nature (Saturn/Chiron midpoint opposition/conjunct and semi-sextile/quincunx the Sun, respectively), but the negative effects on Hales are much stronger because this transit doesn't complete for Brady and the Earth is under the same influence in his heliocentric chart whereas that has expired for Brady.

However, Brady has other negative influences, notably heliocentric Saturn opposition Sedna and square Jupiter, which are respectively disempowering, and destructive of good judgment and good fortune.  It also forms T-Square geometry, which compounds the negativity. Smith has a different negative influence that is dream shattering (heliocentric Chiron square Juno).  This suggests that either a Brady-Hales or Hales-Smith runoff may be in the offing.

Jones:

As a spiritual counselor, people ask me many questions. They want to know about their careers, love lives, pets, home purchases, you name it. But no one has ever before, in the 25 years I have been reading Tarot cards, asked me to predict the outcome of a political race.

I wish they would. I believe fiercely that we are lucky to live in a society that has relatively free elections. An individual's vote may seem insignificant in the scheme of national politics, but on a city level, each of us does have a say in who runs our community, and how they do it. I would love to hear from people that they care.

.... I am a Tarot Counselor. I do not market myself as a psychic. My regular clients insist that I should, claiming I give accurate predictions. They may be unaware of the tricks of my trade. From a statistical perspective, I really have no better chance than rolling a 23-sided die. (Political geeks are nodding, because they know there are 23 candidates on the ballot. RPG geeks are getting upset, because there are no 23-sided dice, and what would that look like, anyway? Impossible!) Truly, doing a reading for each candidate  in order to pick a winner would be impossible. So, it was suggested that I choose from the three front-runners. Better odds, at least, but still a crapshoot.

Or is it? Because I reluctantly assented, we shall see. If the candidates want their full readings, they can contact me. I'm not going to blab on about the meanings of each card. I will focus on the short-term, and long-term outcomes. These are: the card on your far right (short term), and the one just below and to the left of it (long term)

We'll begin with Eileen Brady.

Short-term outcome--  Page of swords reversed: Not receiving bad news.
Long-tern outcome-- Nine of pentacles reversed: Never say die.

Moving on to Charlie Hales.

Short-term outcome – Queen of wands: Intellectual wisdom.
Long-tern outcome – Four of swords: Comfort with letting go.

And finally Jefferson Smith.

Sort-term outcome – Ten of cups: A new beginning emotionally. This card is often associated with family. Brady has it in her Center position.
Long-term outcome – The Sun: Success; growth; prosperity.

These cards do not look good for Hales. He looks like a guy who will have to take his knocks, this time. The other two are both looking good. Brady might not receive bad news in the next week or two, because the news might be great. Of course, she may not receive it because she may be in denial. Perhaps the counting process will be slow. The “not” in not receiving bad news refers to the reversal of the card.

Smith has no reversal in his future cards. One might read this as a new job for him, and a new outlook, coming soon.

Based on these cards, if goaded on by a newspaper (which is the actual position in which I find myself) to pick one candidate, I would guess that the winner would be Smith. Brady will likely be 2nd.

There. I said it. Perhaps I shouldn't have, but I did. Look for Brady in future races. We have not seen the last of her! Oh, and please remember to think for yourself. No one else can do it for you.

News

A new poll by DHM Research shows Portland mayoral candidate Charlie Hales leading Eileen Brady and Jefferson Smith by a wider margin.

KPTV and OPB News, which commissioned the poll, have published the results on their websites.

The results, which show Smith steadily gaining share as Brady lags, show similar trends as an Oregonian/KGW poll released last week. But a SurveyUSA poll also released last week showed the top candidates in an effective tie. 

The outlier in this new poll is Hales' lead, at 32 percent.

The top two vote-getters in tomorrow's primary election advance to the November general election (unless by some miracle one candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote).

On its corporate Twitter account, DHM is going so far as to call tomorrow's primary for Hales and Smith:

More info to come on #pdxmayor. Bold prediction based on data: @HalesforMayor & @jeffersondsmith survive

This may prove premature. Many voters remain undecided, and as of this morning, only 17 percent of Multnomah County voters had returned their ballots, according to the Oregon Secretary of State's office.

Here is a table by KPTV comparing the new poll's results to a DHM poll last month:

Candidate	Apr. ‘12	May ‘12
Total Charlie Hales	25%	32%
Charlie Hales	23%	29%
Lean Hales	2%	3%
Total Eileen Brady	23%	16%
Eileen Brady	20%	15%
Lean Brady	3%	1%
Total Jefferson Smith	20%	24%
Jefferson Smith	18%	21%
Lean Smith	2%	2%
Other	6%	8%
Undecided	28%	21%

The poll also shows incumbent City Commissioner Amanda Fritz maintaining her lead over her main challenger, state Rep. Mary Nolan (D-Portland), 33 percent to 25 percent.

Keep watching this post for updates and additional context.

News

Today, American Civil Liberties Union attorney Nusrat Choudhury is in Portland arguing to a federal appeals court panel of judges a lawsuit challenging the government's "no-fly" list ought to be reinstated.

The ACLU lawsuit, first filed in 2010 on behalf of 15 plaintiffs who'd been placed on the list—including U.S. military veterans—was dismissed one year ago by U.S. District Judge Anna J. Brown of Portland.

Brown's opinion (pdf) said her court lacked jurisdiction in the case and that it ought to have been filed against the Transportation Security Administration, rather than other federal law enforcement agencies.

"Yet, in court filings, the government itself admitted that the Transportation Security Administration plays only a ministerial role, and it is the [FBI-managed] Terrorist Screening Center that makes the decision to put people on the No-Fly List or remove them," Choudhury, pictured, writes on her blog, summarizing her arguments today to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel.

She goes on:

We filed our case against the right agency, and the government's effort to delay a hearing on the constitutionality of this unfair system is wrong.

Being unable to fly has severely affected the plaintiffs' lives, including their ability to be with their families, go to school, and travel for work. Plaintiff Abe Mashal, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and dog trainer, has lost the business of clients located outside of driving distance from his home in Illinois. He told us: "I have no idea why I'm on the list. I should have the chance to clear my name and live my life normally. This has been a real hardship for me both personally and financially."

It is unconstitutional for the government to put people on secret lists and deny them the right to travel without even basic due process. Without a meaningful way for people to challenge their inclusion on the list, there's also no way to keep innocent people off it.

Reuters has a recap of the case, the government's defense and the latest developments here.

Arts & Books

Over at Slate today, editor Dan Kois publishes an interview with "Zach," the heretofore anonymous author of a well-received local zine that has sold (until now) some 750 copies, and modeled on the Choose Your Own Adventure series, and titled "Love Is Not Constantly Wondering If You Are Making the Biggest Mistake of Your Life."

Zach is

a 33-year-old in Portland who works as a sleep-disorder researcher. (“I’m the guy who covers people with wires and watches them sleep. It’s a great job because it gives me plenty of time to read. Although I am perpetually tired.”) On the phone, Zach is soft-spoken and upfront about the fact that nearly everything in the book comes from his real, catastrophic relationship with a real [ex-girlfriend named] Anne. He told me he’d rather I didn’t use his full name. “Part of it is I don’t want my family to know that I wrote this, or really, anything,” he says. “My parents are awesome, but there are just certain aspects of my life, like almost all of it, that I would rather they not be involved in.” He also doesn’t want people trying to track down Anne or her family.

Kois, who picked up the zine on a visit to Portland, calls Zach's work "a small masterpiece of twentysomething romantic trauma – a book with real clarity of vision that reads, at times, like a horror story."

The Slate review has already been appended to the zine's page at Powell's online store.

It's a good time for Portlanders with quirky side projects.

News

Reactions are rolling in after President Barack Obama's statement to ABC News earlier today that he supports full marriage rights for same-sex couples. 

Obama's election-year shift on the still-controversial issue comes as a vindication to Oregon's equal-marriage advocates.

Basic Rights Oregon executive director Jenna Frazzini told WW:

Very exciting. This is the first U.S. President to open his heart to gay marriage. It’s an incredible testament to how far we’ve come. I would add that the President has been on a journey—that like many Oregonians that we’ve been talking to and supporting—to marriage equality. Like those Oregonians, he’s heard stories and he’s come to realize they want to marry for the same reasons he and his wife wanted to marry.

Politicians, too, are weighing in.

"Great Fricking News!" Portland Mayor Sam Adams wrote on Twitter.

U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon) released the following statement:

I applaud President Obama for voicing his support for marriage equality. This is an issue of fundamental fairness for the men and women who seek to create a family with the person they love. I look forward to working with our President to make this vision of full equality a reality.

U.S. Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-Oregon), the state's newest member of Congress, also released a statement:

I applaud President Obama for his announcement today supporting gay marriage. Marriage equality is a fundamental civil rights issue, and it is more important than ever that we stand united. This is an historic day for the LGBTQ community and our nation as a whole. Well done, Mr. President!

We'll update this post as more reactions arrive.

— Reporting by Cody Newton