Clackamas county is closed on Fridays but I predict something will still be be done by the outgoing commissioners or staff.

You are so right. We always liked it when we could arrange for the four day reprieve offered the Wednesday afternoon before Thanksgiving. To you and yours a Merry Christmas!

Confuses excuses focuses.

More of the Nike deal details are coming out every day. When I saw the part about only in-State sales being taxable, something occurred to me:

What would happen if every business got that kind of deal?

First of all, there would be little incentive to sell anything in Oregon. No incentive to build new stores, market products here, etc. But of course Nike could "donate" uniforms to U of O and Oregon State and when games are televised, it's just free advertising for any college out of State which can then order uniforms from Nike that they will not have to pay Oregon tax on.

Supposed this largesse were extended to other businesses? Locals like Rejuvenation House Parts and Powell's Books to a lot of online business and a majority of it is with customers out of State. Why shouldn't they get to avoid taxes on these sales as well? What about Harry & David? Precision Cast Parts? ESI? Tektronix? Columbia Sportswear? The list goes on and on.

There have got to be some pretty angry business owners out there, considering the kid glove treatment one business is getting when it doesn't even manufacture a majority of its products in Oregon - or even the United States - and certainly won't be breaking its neck to market them here.

Well, in 30 years it won't be Uncle Phil's problem. He'll probably be running that big track in the sky.

With these elected officials it is more like -
Time for the Ultimate Christmas Surprise.

Gosh I hope not. I just want to enjoy Christmas.

Have a Merry X-mas everyone!

As you may have noticed, only large businesses that can afford the taxes get the tax breaks they do not need. What the hell. Re-elect the Doctor. Oh my, we already did.

Anyone want to speculate where Kitz might find a million dollar a year job after he leaves office?

Thanks
JK

Well, this isn't government, but cable network TNT announced late last night that they were canceling Leverage, the Robin Hood/con caper that has filmed in Portland for 4 of its 5 seasons. (And the last season was actually set IN Portland with a fictional HQ -- and crew-owned brew-pub -- at Bridgeport in the Pearl.) What was the Season 5 finale and is now the show finale will run Christmas night. Kind of a weasel-y way and weasel-y timing to announce a cancellation.
Well-written and well-acted, the show did a great job of showcasing Portland locations and Oregon's scenery -- I'll miss it.
(You may remember that Oscar winner Timothy Hutton, the show's star, was voted Portland "mayor" in a Willamette Week stunt earlier this year. Leverage fans all over the country saw to that by voting early and often from as many different IP addresses as they could hack -- a hacker is part of the Leverage con team.)

We will probably find out sometime Saturday morning that the world really did end on Friday. With my luck it will be revealed on the very last page of the metro section.

Friday, 12-21-12, came at me at the "Service of Remembrance" for Cindy Ann Yuille, the hospice nurse killed at Clackamas Town Center.

When I heard one of the victims of the shooting was a hospice nurse, it struck me immediately as an extra level of wrong. Certainly killing children remains the worst possible crime, but as adults go, who deserves to have a pass more than a hospice nurse? They spend their days helping families through the scariest, most challenging aspect of life: Facing our mortality. So shouldn't they be granted some extra force field to compensate for doing a saintly job? I mean does the universe have no sense of right and wrong at all?

Later, on the way home from Montgomery Park, there was also a realization that I had sold Portland way short. We all have. While our pathetic politicians go on their ego trips, and we respond with why we're going to leave because of the leaf tax, there is a dedicated group of people right here just toiling away, doing work that most people couldn't handle for a week, much less a career.

So imagine what Cindy must have been like if she was considered a star in that field? I remember writing after it happened that - based on the numbers - this incident could have been a lot worse. After you hear the biography of Cindy Yuille, you realize that, no, Clackamas was as bad as it could possible have been, just based on losing her.

Now it's common to speak kindly of the dead, but hearing the details of this life, just startled me. Do people this together actually exist? And why aren't we honoring them; celebrating them more?

Actually, this was covered by one of Cindy's colleagues: When her bosses wanted to nominate her for a big hospice award she told them not to, that it was her job, and she didn't need the notoriety.

Finally, there was her 23-year-old daughter, Jenna, 10 days out from this horrible experience, getting up before hundreds of people and several TV cameras, and saying what her Mom meant to her. It was a stunning display just as a speech, and a real testament to what her Mom had given her to deal with the world.

The only time Jenna lost it was when she spoke directly to the husband. After getting through anecdotes that would crush a normal person, including her last conversation with her Mom a couple of Mondays ago, Jenna only really lost it when she thought about the pain and suffering of someone else.

There are some remarkable people living in the Portland area. I'm going to remember that. It seems like it's all about the politicians, but it's not.

Thanks for that, Bill. There are many amazing people with dedication and love who do what they do because it needs to be done and they do it in spite of whatever bells-and-whistles windmill the City, the County, Metro of the State decide is more important.

They are truly unsung heroes and - refreshingly - with them it rarely about the bottom line.