This is the worst science fiction movie ever

When the police refuse to lift a finger to address property crimes, and when the district attorney won't prosecute anyone who's randomly caught committing such crimes, things can get really crazy and really dangerous. That's where we are in Portland now, with thieves brazenly driving vehicles (usually stolen ones) through storefronts in order to steal what's inside. It's a regular thing.

On Friday – Black Friday, although the store was closed for an annual virtue-signaling – a car deliberately crashed through the front doors of REI in the Pearl District to enable a theft. It was the third break-in there in a week. Then the other night a couple of dudes backed a van through the front of the gas station store at Northeast 25th and Broadway, on the borders of the Irvington, Grant Park, and Sullivan's Gulch neighborhoods, and hauled off an entire ATM. 

This while teenagers have been ramming stolen vehicles through the fronts of numerous weed shops in Portland for weeks now. It is a completely, utterly, and quite possibly irretrievably failed city at this point. No one in their right mind would come and set up shop here. And the existing business owners are heading for the exits.

Meanwhile, the suddenly alert Salt + Straw lady and some of her central eastside business neighbors were treated to the latest helping of pablum from the mayor, Dud Wheeler, last night at a safety "summit." Wheeler told them that the City Council's latest resolutions will begin solving the problems.

“I believe these five resolutions are a radical departure from the status quo,” Wheeler said. “It will provide enforcement citywide, not just block by block, not just neighborhood by neighborhood, but citywide.”

Sure. Sure it will.

The man is an empty suit. But at least he showed up to face the music, sort of. The chair-elect of the county commission, Jessica Chevy Vega, couldn't be bothered; she sent her head lackey. The failed police chief, The Chuckster, was home polishing his trophies and sent a captain. And with them on the dais was a bobblehead from the state legislature named Rob Nosse, part of the illustrious army of solons who pass one law after another giving more rights and privileges to the guys crashing through the storefronts than to the victims whose property is being trashed. 

The City Hall and State Capitol responses would be laughable, if we weren't all scared to death and wondering if we can get out of here in one piece. Perhaps the most bizarre moment was when the police captain reportedly said this:

"I look at the shooting data, I look at the reports every week, and there is movement in the shootings," Crooker responded. "But I think that what we are seeing is still a problem that needs to be addressed. And the shootings need to continue to go down. It’s not just a reduction in the shootings, it’s addressing all the criminal conditions that leads to crime."

Downright inspirational, isn't it? But in particular, you have to love "the shootings need to continue to go down." Makes it sounds like we're making progress. Hmmmmm... unlike Officer Krupke, I'm reading these numbers, which say that through the end of October, reported shootings for the year were almost exactly where they were last year, and up by more than 50 percent over the year before. Not to mention the fact that a lot of people have become so used to the gunfire and the non-response from the cops that they no longer bother to sit on the phone for a half hour waiting to report what they heard.

And what's worse, homicides in Portland this year have broken the all-time record once again. In all of 2021, there were 90; we're already past that, and it's not even December. I can only conclude that the gangsters' aim is improving.

Anyway, by the end of the "summit," the ice cream monarch seemed relieved, as if something had been accomplished. You have to wonder if that feeling will make it through a single weekend. I feel bad for her employees, who I'm sure are every bit as frightened today as they were yesterday.