In 1921 a group of Bend citizens, most of them women, led a successful campaign to have the city acquire 11 acres of land along the Deschutes River and protect it from development. Those 11 acres became Drake Park, the “jewel in the crown” of the city’s park system.
The laws of probability say that, given enough time, if something is possible, no matter how improbable, it eventually will happen. A flipped coin someday will land on its edge. A million monkeys banging on a million computer keyboards someday will produce Shakespeare’s King Lear. And the Oregon Liquor Control Commission someday will get something right.
The last wildly improbable event occurred last week, when the OLCC forbade the sale of the notorious Four Loko and six other alcohol-heavy, caffeine-spiked drinks.
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread,” the novelist Anatole France wrote in 1894.
The law the City of Bend is contemplating to deal with the (supposed) problem of loitering on downtown streets would, we assume, forbid the rich as well as the poor to sit or lie down on the sidewalks. Just the same, it would be an inherently inequitable ordinance – and an unnecessary one.
If you, or we, owed the City of Bend a couple of thousand dollars in taxes and told the city, “Okay, how about if we pay half of it and forget the rest?” the response probably would be something along the lines of: “Are you SERIOUS?!?”
When it comes to tackling organized crime on Wall Street, though, Oregon Treasurer Wheeler and Attorney General Kroger are a couple of tough customers.
- That Weird Anti-Dallas Brown Ad
- ODOT’s Parkway Deathtrap
- Mount Bachelor Academy Gets a Pass
- Rondo Boozell, the Rambo Candidate
- The Minimum Wage Whiners
- Corralling the Downtown Parking Problem
- The DMV Picks the Wrong Home
- Corporate Kicker Welfare Checks
- Jeff Merkley Speaks Out for Sanity
- The Artful Debate Dodgers
- SDC Deferral: Dumb, Dumber, Dumbest
- McDonald’s Super Sized Signage
- American Tax Dollars and Imported Workers
- Tammy Baney Takes a Stand
- Hassling Oregon’s Home Brewers
- The State of Oregon vs. the Big Bad Wolf
- The Room Tax Chiselers
- The Pharmacy Board and the Demon Weed
- The Three Stooges and Their Destination Resort Routine
- The Pink Nightmare on Highway 97
- Easing the Perennial Parking Pinch
- The Army’s “Second-Class Soldier” Treatment
- The Trolls Invade the Mountain
- Excluding Freedom and Common Sense
- The OLCC’s Mystery Man
- COBA Goes Panhandling Again
- New Resorts and Good Old Boys
- John Kroger Plays It Cool
- Trashy Problem, Classy Solution
- The U of O Jailbirds
- Two Slippers are Better Than One
- John Day 1, Nazis 0
- The 911 Board’s Weaselly Maneuver
- St. Charles Stands Up for Patients
- Reinhart’s Slash-and-Burn Attack
- Mayor Daley’s Raid on Oregon
- Wyden Takes On the Smurfers
- Measures 66 & 67: Let Us Count the Lies
- The Same Old “Death Tax” Lies
- Yes on Measures 66 and 67
- Wyden Achieves a Timber War Truce
- The Farm Bureau Gets Down in the Muck
- A Touching Fairy Tale About Taxes
- Oregon’s Chutzpah Champ
- The Bulletin Uncovers a Hidden Menace
- Jeff Merkley’s Cozy Silicon Valley Party
- Greg Walden Keeps His Streak Going
- Kulongoski’s Sneaky Green Fastball
- Election: “Yes” On COCC Bond
- A Sweet Deal on the John Day