My post today is hilarious. But also surreal and dreadful. But also sublime.
Please click the image above, to go to a website that looks like the image I have posted. It is a collection of live stream cameras across the city of Portland, so that any time you begin to worry, you can just click and watch.
Dump said recently: “Portland is burning to the ground. It’s insurrectionists all over the place. The place is burning down, and they pretend like there’s nothing happening.” Incidentally, to support this claim, an image of fire, police, and protests was posted on social media, but it was proven to have been false, so Dump’s people took it down.
In response to wildly false claims spreading…um…around the GLOBE, it appears that more and more people every day believe that my city, Portland, Oregon, is under seige.
This is a rumor designed by President Dump to justify sending in military forces to overtake our city, like he did in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. It has been argued as a way to combat the wave of crime and anarchy we are enduring. City leaders are refusing this military occupation, Dump says, because they are currently held hostage by a domestic terror group called Antifa (antifascist), and therefore they are not being truthful for fear of being harmed.
It is all utter nonsense.
The truth is, Oregon’s Governor Tina Kotek, has been able to meet and resist powerfully, thus discouraging intentions of the Orange One. This has made him furious, and he simply won’t relent. When a judge ruled it unlawful to federalize the Oregon National Guard and send them to our streets, Dump decided to use California National Guard instead. California Governor Gavin Newsom launched his own lawsuit and got a new court decision that sending California military would also be illegal. Then Texas Governor, Greg Abbot, convinced that Portland really was under seige, vowed to send in the Texas National Guard. It’s all so silly.
My beloved Portland has responded as perfectly as possible, which is to make fun of everything. Over the past month, demonstrations at the ICE (immigration and customs enforcement) facility (supposedly the epicenter of the chaos) have included:
- A half-dozen people in cowboy costumes riding inflatable chickens
- A dance party of the Cha Cha Slide by a dozen Portlanders with no rhythym
- A person in an inflatable frog costume and a person in a chicken costume that show up nearly every day
- Women in dresses, setting up actual tea parties with porcelain dishes on the sidewalk out front, and sipping tea
- Consistently low numbers of protestors. Sometimes a single protestor, holding a handwritten message on a single 8×10 sheet of printer paper
The annual Portland Marathon route went right past the ICE facility on Sunday. Thousands of marathoners calmly jogging right past – without incident.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem showed up for some boots on the ground validation of the terrors unfolding. Her department actually provided video of the throngs of violent activists from her rooftop vantage point:
Protestors below played the theme song to Benny Hill and offered to give them Subway sandwiches if they came down off the roof. People have reasonably asked: if it’s a war zone here, why is she dressed in a T-shirt and jeans with makeup and hair done to perfection? She should be in a flak jacket with a helmet on.
The chicken guy and the frog guy, naturally, have become local heroes.
Conscious Engagement 
I love Frogman and Chickenman. I’ll pop over for a spot of tea as well. I’ll also bring photos to show what a real fire and burning looks like
No kidding. While our Pumpkin In Chief decries a city burning to the ground, there are people in the world like you who are actually dealing with real fire and in danger of losing health and property. Let me know when you show up for tea, and I’ll head over there and join you.
👍🏼😁
I am dumbfounded trying to figure out how the GOP talking heads can say that Portland is burning when we, the American people, can use our eyeballs and see they’re all full of crap. Many people may have fallen for the “the world is burning” rhetoric in Taco Dump’s first presidency, but we’re hip to his manipulation now and are just starting to laugh harder at him and his entourage. I do love the chicken and frog guy, comic relief that underscores how godamn ridiculous it is sending in NG troops.
Andrew, you have voiced my thoughts as well. I am dumbfounded. And yet…many people believe it yet. These are people who are comfortable simply accepting their information from the GOP, and not checking anywhere else to see if there is more to the story. I love the chicken and frog guys too! Last night on a news broadcast, I saw that there were two more frog guys, in identical costumes. They said that the frog guy has become a symbol of the Portland resistance, and therefore he needs to multiply. Brilliant.
I’ve been trying to concoct a blog post of my own about all this. Hopefully the people who believe everything they read will instead believe what the locals say.
I love that Is Portland Burning website. I hadn’t seen that. It’s perfect.
I heard about that website yesterday for the first time, and I thought it is brilliant. How better to respond than to calmly present all current camera footage. My hope that simple people will simply believe the locals is not a very strong hope. I have heard from people around Oregon (that close!) who are now scared to death of Portland and have changed plans to stay out of the city “because of everything going on there right now.” These are people who get 100% of their news from Fox and from their buddies.
I look forward to seeing what other reasonable people have to say about all this, and I am eager to see your post, if you end up finding the words for it all. ❤
Every time I hear new nonsense coming from this administration I’m left wringing my hands and shaking my head. Not that they are doing it, their fascist playbook is on full display, but that people actually believe any of it. More and more I am left to consider what kind of people support this cruel regime. I can’t fathom watching children ripped from their parents and left naked and zip-tied in the street. What kind of person can be okay with that? These fabricated “emergencies” are terrifying and the people who can look away from this savagery terrify me more. Thanks for sharing the absurdity. I’m glad to know people like you and I, by far, outnumber those who remain numb to this brazen and ugly brutality. I think I’ll plan a trip to Portland soon!
After spending some time recently talking to people who don’t see eye to eye with us, I realize it’s not that they see brutality and choose that. It’s that they do not believe brutality is happening. Or attacks on democracy. The GOP says it’s all lies, and their followers believe what they say without question. As I wrote in my blog post, they are saying that Tina Kotek actually DOES want the National Guard, but she is scared to admit it for fear of being attacked by Antifa. They truly do believe that the administration is trying as hard as they can to protect the people of Portland. Kristi Noem said it clearly, “I wish you loved Chicago as much as you hate President Trump.” She said even if the people of Chicago don’t care about their city, Dump does, and that is why he sent in the National Guard. When people believe completely that Dump wants to help us, and anything bad said about him is a lie, then nothing is going to make them come around.
I keep making myself sound like an alarmist, but the people who passively obey and agree with all of it are the most terrifying to me, like you said. Those are exactly the people who gave Hitler permission to destroy lives and pursue genocide. It is not an exaggeration in my mind. This is exactly the same situation, and the people who aren’t furious are enablers. I am beside myself sometimes with worry. It’s like living in a dream world, an alternate universe, where nothing makes sense and logic has no value.
Years ago I went on and on about how dangerous the growing media consolidation was to our democracy. If you control the message, you control the people I said. People rolled their eyes and thought I was an alarmist. Fast forward to today: was I right? Yep. And it’s terrifying. I agree that talking to people now is difficult. But things are about to shift into overdrive when their insurance premiums skyrocket and when their kids come at them with “WTF were you thinking?”. I am just sick about it all. Too many nights I wake and can’t get back to sleep. When did being awake and being anti-fascist become a bad thing? I can’t even look at some people anymore. I’m sorry for whatever makes them so vulnerable, but I no longer trust them. That’s it in a nutshell. I no longer trust them to act in a way that even benefits themselves. We live in a world where innocent children are being terrorized and Proud Boys are walking our streets. A dystopian nightmare for sure. Some days I just want to hunker down and lock my doors. Other days I’m mad as hell and can’t stay silent one more minute!
Yes, and yes. Love you, my friend.
Also, that frog hero! OMG, I love it so much!
As if anyone would have believed a word of it
I am so sad to say that many, many people believe it. That is why I am frightened. 😦
Very sad
I am daily lost for words at how the USA/NATO/ Th West/ The World got lumbered with this dreadful creature.
Thank goodness that he didn’t win the Nobel Peace Prize.
Andrew!! Pedro and I have been agonizing about the peace prize for days!! Just worrying, worrying, that the rest of the world has been duped like our stupid countrymen have been. THANK GOD for María Corina Machado winning, and for promoting democracy, no less. I hope that someone takes that as a message about destroying democracy vs. building it. Of course now, we will have to deal with weeks of Republicans being insufferable about the witchunt and how their Dump was robbed of his rightful prize, and blah blah blah. But that is better than him winning it.
Fighting crime against own citizens with humor. Portland is demonstrating well how it’s done. Of course, something like this should never never never happen. May it stay light.
Thank you Manja, for seeing it clearly and also for reposting. It is wonderful to make light; and still… the reason people are there is awful. Humans can be wonderful and terrible, and yet I’m still glad to be living among them. 🙂
It would be laughable if it weren’t so dangerous.
And now with the return of the hostages to Israel, who’s going to control his ego?
🙄
Brian, I am tardy with noticing your comment here. My mind has gone the same direction, wondering how changing events will change that fickle man. Along the lines of Israel, my thoughts when he was not awarded the peace prize: oh great, now he’s going to just hand Ukraine over to Putin and Gaza to Netanyahu. It is tiring to live like this. And I hate that this horrible man is an export to the rest of the world. His awfulness is making things bad for people in completely different countries. I heard this news report of the extra challenges now getting children vaccinated in rural India, because that kookoo JFK has made vaccines sound scary. An Indian health minister was explaining that with the Trump administration, people in villages in India now don’t want their kids vaccinated because of this maniac drug-damaged ding dong in charge of health care in the United States? In what reality does that make sense? Gah!
It must be indeed tiring and despairing to live in America right now… The destruction of the East wing is our Kristallnacht…
Stay safe.
I’ve been watching on YouTube. Seems a better place to get real news. Still, be very careful. I don’t understand how people can not see what’s really going on. I’m an uneducated woman and I can see it. Love and hugs to you both.
Yes!! I have realized this with TikTok: I get the news instantly and accurately there. I’m not saying I listen to fear-mongers, which is what most people assume social media is. But on social media, you get to see tons of video of normal people who happen to be near newsworthy stuff who have filmed it, and you get to see exactly what happened! And it’s horrifying.
I think you mean you have no degree, not that you’re uneducated. I find you to be one of the most educated mentors in my life. ❤
Just more common sense then most folks. 🙂