Salem will soon have red light cameras installed, Portland has had them for some time. A sense of outrage about the practice is building momentum, to the dismay of bloated bureaucracies that have come to depend on Oregon’s drivers as a cash cow. It might come as a surprise to learn that the timing of [...]

This doesn’t go nearly far enough or address enough issues, but it’s an important step in the right direction: declaring an end to the massively destructive “War on Drugs” that especially targets people of color: Support Reforms to Federal Drug Sentencing Laws Oregonians have the chance to change federal sentences for crack cocaine and challenge [...]

As you may be aware, the green lifestyle encompasses many different forms and philosophies, to the extent that the movement has become somewhat fragmented. What it loses in focus it makes up for in the diversity of the approaches that are evolving to heal our environment. In this blog I’ve attempted to gather this information [...]

This Lelo in NoPo blog entry tells a sad tale –OPB is bringing Ira Glass of “This American Life” to Portland for a fundraiser, but can’t be bothered to look hard enough to find a venue that isn’t in a homophobic right-wing church (whose membership, on the whole, likely thinks OPB is part of the [...]

I’m stunned and saddened to see Ron Wyden’s name on this list. Lifted from Crooks and Liars: Bob Geiger: It’s been almost three weeks since I last wrote about the status of cosponsorship on the Habeas Corpus Restoration Act of 2007, a bill by Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) that would “…restore habeas corpus for those [...]

One of the key weaknesses of the Roman Empire was its reliance on tax farming (the actual term, by the way)–the practice of selling offices to private interests in return for a given sum of money to be obtained from the residents of the provinces governed. The tax farmers bought their offices and then were [...]

A message from the freepress campaign, working to keep the series of tubes a place where anyone can communicate. Once again, all categories checked, because keeping the Internet open is important to every issue: Last week, a quarter-million people came out in force to tell the Federal Communications Commission to open the public airwaves to [...]

Dear George, Tell Your Story to the FCC Read Other Stories Phone and cable company lobbyists are attacking Internet freedom again in Washington. But people from every corner of the country are rising up to stop them. You can help by taking five minutes to save the Internet. The FCC needs to hear your story [...]

There is a provision in the Oregon Better Health Act (SB 27) that has drawn criticism by several Onward Oregon members who are members of the legal community. SB 27 Section 11, sets up six subcommittees, with one subcommittee set up to (as currently written) “make recommendations concerning how to address the issue of medical [...]

Fascist America, in 10 easy steps Last autumn, there was a military coup in Thailand. The leaders of the coup took a number of steps, rather systematically, as if they had a shopping list. In a sense, they did. Within a matter of days, democracy had been closed down: the coup leaders declared martial law, [...]