House call
I was expecting a stampede of bobbleheads when grumpy old Earl the Pearl Blumenauer finally announced that he's retiring from Congress. It hasn't materialized. But today we learn that a third local politician is planning to make a run for his cushy seat.
I had never heard of her, but her name is Maxine Dexter, and she's currently in the state senate, from the northwest Portland district that Mitch Greenlick used to represent. Dexter's claim to fame is that she's the queen of "harm reduction." That's all I need to know. Her day job is being a doctor at Kaiser. MDMD, as it were.
And she doesn't actually live in Blumie's district. Like current Congressperson Andrea Salinas, who's stinking it up from just outside her district, Dexter will be carpetbagging from just the other side of the boundary of the Third. Jamie McLeod-Skinner, the Dem who ran unsuccessfully last time around for the seat currently occupied by Jamie Lori Chavez-DeRemer, also did not live in the district in which she was running. What's up with all that?
Battling Sinister Dexter for the commute to D.C. will be Sushi Jayapal and Eddy Morales. Whoever wins the primary on May 21 will doubtlessly have a lock on the seat in the general election.
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Meanwhile, rumor has it that Rene Gonzalez will run for Portland mayor against his fellow City Council member, Mingus Mapps. Under the misguided new city charter, the mayor will not have much of a say in anything. But neither Mapps nor Gonzalez wants any part of sitting on the 12-member "rank-choice" City Council that will be seated just over a year from now.
This sets up the possibility that Mapps and Gonzalez will cancel each other out, and the new mayor will be some airhead like Carmen Rubio. No matter who the mayor is, it's probably going to be quite a disaster. Even worse than what we have now. You didn't think that was possible, but watch.
Perhaps Gonzales wants to use his bully pulpit & business community connections to
ReplyDelete1. Kill off Portland Street Response (or at the very least transfer whatever it is that it does to the County’s Project Respond…where it shoulda been all along); and
2. Muster the support necessary to fix “charter reform”.
As to #2, charter amendments don’t have to wait for 10 years. They can be put forward at any time…all it takes is enough signatures to do so. Maybe Gonzales figures that after a year of this Cat 5 CF, the voters WH can still think will have had enough.
I assume that “Jamie” Chavez-DeRemer was a joke, correct?
ReplyDeleteYou know, at a certain point they all look like Jamies to me.
DeleteAnd to add to the confusion, I get political contribution requests from a Julie Chavez-Rodriguez.
Delete"They all look alike" How apropos. That's how all of us non-lefties view the Portland city council and Mult. county commission and all the rest of the Blue dominated positions.
DeleteSeems like you may as well. Oh well. Nothing to be done. The future of this region will be in the hands of same these look alikes for many years to come.
I think Jayapal would have been the sure fit from the DPO given her sister's connections. But in the last week she's really screwed up by not condemning Hamas's use of rape. Jewish Democrats are probably looking for a more palatable representative for Oregon than the Jayapal sisters. I'm really not sure how the DNC would see it: are they growing weary of the "progressive caucus" causing disunity, or do they see a "big tent" where every opinion is valid as long as you vote the way you're told and keep bringing in money for the party.
ReplyDeleteI have no idea what Maxine Dexter could be thinking. She's brand new to the game of musical chairs. Why would she be under the opinion that this machine she's brand new to will throw her a bunch of resources?
Meanwhile, I think Rene Gonzalez will easily sail into the Mayor's position. Not that it will improve things, but at least he's not an overtly corrupt political clown.
I think it's too early to tell about Gonzalez. There are all sorts of cards they're going to play against him. As for Jayapal, the sooner she's off the screen, the better.
DeleteShortly after the establishment ran her off from running for governor in favor of Knute, Chavez-DeRemer set-up shop in Arizona and had planned to run for some office there. It seems she pretty quickly figured out she wasn't wanted there either and came back. THAT'S some carpetbagging.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what she really thinks of the job now that she's got it. If you scroll back far enough in her social media, you'll see she's attended LOTS of Koch brother events. Seems that's who she's aligned herself with. While they're nominally in charge, they're not the ones driving the bus at the moment. What do you suppose the Koch people are doing around the edge...
In the age of drumpf, les frères Koch are plain ol' fashioned purveyors of graft...of the kind we've seen since the advent of the Republic. The worshippers at the altar of Orange Jesus are batshit crazy. The devil you know...
DeleteIn a one party state, who gives a crap who wins? I am going to miss telling Earl what a worthless blowhard he is, and it is long past time to ride off into the sunset.
ReplyDelete