Time for another slippery commute, Portland. The O's headline folks are calling it "scary," even. No snow on the horizon today, but no melting, either. Which means this frictionless limbo continues—and I still have to be at the office. TriMet seems to be doing okay for now.
Insult to (slip-and-fall-related) injury: Portland City Council hasn't approved legal weed delivery yet (it will, probably next week), meaning you'll have to trundle the 300 treacherous feet to your nearest pot shop if you're staying home from work.
Hmmm. A report last year found that African Americans make up 20 percent of the Multnomah County jail population, but comprise 40 percent of the inmates who guards use force on. But a new audit commissioned by Sheriff Mike Reese says it can't conclude force is applied disproportionately. Glad that's all cleared up, sheriff.
There's a new report out about Portland's economy, saying we're doing great! That is, compared to "peer cities" like St. Louis and Sacramento. Still lagging Denver, Seattle, and Minneapolis—what the PBA's president calls "the big guys"—in many areas. Oh, and the median household income in Camas is $40k more than it is here.
A set of fancy new drawings for major development in the South Waterfront has been making the rounds this week. If the newly unveiled plans come to fruition, it'd be a huge injection to that neighborhood. I still never want to live down there.
I'm basically just leaving this here for myself to find later. If you read the NYT's super interesting piece on how Russia hacked the DNC earlier this week, you'll want to listen to two of the reporters recount how they got the story.
About those hacks: President Obama is making his most muscular comments about retaliation to date, as Donald Trump openly doubts that Russia did anything at all that might have helped him win the election.
What else is Trump up to today? Oh just appointing an ambassador to Israel"who has questioned the need for a two-state solution and has likened left-leaning Jews in America to the Jews who aided the Nazis in the Holocaust."
Meanwhile his kids are banking $60,000 to have coffee with people—a longstanding charitable endeavor that raises new questions now that their father is about to be in the White House.
And let's check in on the nation's climate scientists, who are busy shoveling as much federal climate data as they possibly can onto private servers, for fear that a Trump administration will try to wipe it out. My god.
A vital evacuation effort began in eastern Aleppo, Syria, yesterday. Now it's been halted far too soon.
No surprise: The racist who killed nine black churchgoers in Charleston last year is guilty.
And, sure, whatever: Scott Baio filed a police report because the wife of the Red Hot Chili Peppers' drummer began "grabbing him under his arms and shaking and pushing him" because of his support for Trump.
