A new Bedsworth to amuse and signal the beginning of a brief blog-hiatus for me. It’s time to enjoy Spring’s and Portland’s sights and sounds, and get some work done too.
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Bedsworth Returns for another Round
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Surviving Victimhood
It occurred to me recently that I don’t like the word victim and don’t want ever to be called one, unless I’m not around to argue the point, in which case you can call me whatever you want. I hear and read so many stories about incredible people who I would prefer to call survivors or maybe alpha victims, though that’s not quite right either. You know the ones I mean, the ones who fight back, who stand up, who won’t let the bxxxxxxs get them down, etc. The bicyclist who stages a sting to get his stolen bicycle back, the rape survivor who braves a trial, a daughter who tracks down the man who shot her father, parents, family members and friends of survivors who figure out how to make the world a better place after the loss or injury of someone beloved, and so many other role models. We’re not to know what we’ll do on the other side of tragedy, but I’d like to think, if I had a choice (and not all tragedies give us one), I’d be one of those incredible survivors, rather than a victim, put upon, defeated, traumatized, passive. We need a better word.
Two very different books come to mind when I think about this, in addition to the stories I hear and read in the news. One is “Revenge,” by Laura Blumenfeld, an incredible story (I first heard Blumenfeld on Studio 360). The other, oddly enough, is “About Alice,” by Calvin Trillin. Among the other well-known joys of reading Trillin and his ever present, delightful puzzlement over the ways of the world, is his telling of some new Alice stories. The most extraordinary is the one he tells of a letter Alice wrote to a friend’s daughter who was raped. Trillin writes about Alice and her letter to their friend’s daughter (and please forgive me if I suffered confusion over quotation marks).
“This was a dozen years after Alice had been operated on for lung cancer, and among the things that she wrote to our friend’s daughter was that having lung cancer and being raped were comparable only in that both were what she called ‘realizations of our worst nightmares.’ She said that there was some relief at surviving what you might have thought was not survivable. ‘No one would ever choose to have cancer or to be raped,’ she wrote. ‘But you don’t get to choose, and it is possible at least to understand what Ernest Becker meant when he said something like “To live fully is to live with an awareness of the rumble of terror that underlies everything,” or to begin to understand the line in “King Lear” – “Ripeness is all.” You might have chosen to become ripe less dramatically or dangerously, but you can still savor ripeness.’” (Trillin, “About Alice,” 2006, pp. 8-9)
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Portland City Charter Review: Different Views
The Street Roots issue (April 13th) that is on the street now, and that will be available on the Street Roots homepage soon, has two articles on the Portland Charter Review measures, one by Joanne Zuhl, Street Roots staff writer, and the other by Don MacGillivray, who was a member of the Mayor’s Charter Review Commission.
More information on the Charter Review Commission and the reform measures can be found at the Citizens to Reform City Hall web page, the Portland’s Future Charter web page, and in just about every Portland metro area newspaper, happily too numerous to mention in the brief time I have this morning for blorking.
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Sit-Lie Ordinances
The Street Roots issue (April 13th) that is on the street now, and will be available on the Street Roots homepage very soon, has an article by Andrea Meyer, Legislative Director for the ACLU of Oregon, explaining why they oppose the proposed Portland sit-lie ordinance. Today’s Oregonian, May 1st, has an editorial by Israel Bayer, Director of Street Roots, on the same ordinance.
If you think you live in a city that’s not watching legal developments around the country on ordinances like this one, you’re not paying attention.
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Identity Theft in “Wayne’s World”
Monday’s (4/30/07) Oregonian story by Michelle Roberts and Bryan Denson, “Wayne’s worlds blur boundaries of law, sanity,” was interesting from more than one perspective. Toward the end of the story, we read:
“Shortly after Skeen’s release, he called The Oregonian and said he wanted to continue championing the causes of psychiatric patients. He asked the reporter to give him a list of the names of state hospital workers. She refused.
A few days later, on July 19, 2004, James Sellers, a public information officer for the Oregon Department of Human Services called the reporter. Sellers asked whether she had received the employee list that her assistant, “Mike Allen,” had requested for her. The reporter told Sellers she had no assistant. Sellers said he had sent the information to an e-mail account that wasn’t a working e-mail address for the newspaper. After that conversation, the reporter phoned Skeen, saying she suspected he had pretended to be her assistant to obtain information.”
What I want to know is why is a PIO or any other government employee sending lists of employee information to anyone without FIRST checking on the where that information is going? The alleged Oregonian “assistant” had a non-employer email address. Yes, I know there are lots of reasons for that, but you’re sending personal information for heaven’s sake. How hard is it to call the reporter and verify that s/he is the person who will get the information? Enough personal information security lapses occur without anyone being able to stop them; couldn’t we at least minimize the ones that occur due to negligence, incompetence, and stupidity? On the Internet no one knows you’re Wayne.
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Construction Contractors Board: Let the Consumer Beware
Sunday’s (4/29/07) Oregonian had a good story by Sarah Hunsberger “Remodel disaster: $50,000 vanishes, as does contractor,” on how limited Oregon law is when protecting consumers from contractors who do shoddy work or go out of business, even when the consumer takes all possible care to check out the contractor’s bona fides at the CCB and beyond:
‘As home improvement season gets under way and families gear up to make big investments this spring and summer, the O’Briens’ misfortune offers a reminder that even though Oregon regulates contractors, consumers still carry the burden to protect themselves.
An investigation by The Oregonian in 2005 revealed that weak state laws and passive enforcement by the state Construction Contractors Board have allowed unscrupulous or financially troubled contractors to remain in business and avoid paying penalties levied by the state agency.
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Non-compete Clauses: If it’s in small print and you have to sign it, read it – please
Sunday’s (4/29/07) Oregonian had a good story by Brent Hunsberger on noncompetitive agreements, “You can’t take that job,” and how they aren’t just for executives and knowledge workers:
” Last week, less than a month into new jobs, Sean Mesarich and Scott Beeson received a call that threw them for a loop.
Their former employer was threatening to sue both for violating a noncompete agreement.
Neither recalls signing the one-page pledge. And neither is an executive, doctor or salesman, careers in which the agreements are more of the norm.”
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A Troutdale Tram?
The April 20th Gresham Outlook reports:
“Tram backers approach Troutdale“
“With gasoline prices currently stuck above $3 a gallon, global warming concerns generating headlines and the Portland-metro area gripped in gridlock that only gets worse, alternative transportation methods continue to inch toward the mainstream.
But car-pooling, driving a hybrid and taking the bus all pale in comparison to Ben Missler’s 20-year renewable energy vision of building an $800 billion network of trams powered by wind and the sun across America.
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Trevino named to Circuit Court post
The April 24th Tillamoook Headlight Herald reports:
“Trevino named to Circuit Court post“
“Mari Garric Trevino has been appointed by Gov. Ted Kulongoski as a Tillamook County Circuit Court judge, filling the vacancy created by the retirement of Judge David Hantke.
Trevino said she is excited and honored to be appointed to the position, and will do her best to live up to the standard of integrity set by her predecessor, Judge Hantke.”
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Sisters’ Nugget and the Oregon Legislature
I really wanted to post to a hot law story from the Sisters’ Nugget (who wouldn’t want to post to a newspaper referred to as Sisters’ Nugget? :-), aka Nugget News, but this is the best I can do, which isn’t too bad. It must be a great and peaceful place.
“Don’t rush reform,” By Eric Dolson
“Two laws need to be recognized by the Oregon Legislature, and neither was passed in Salem.
The first is the law of unintended consequences. The second is that, given a chance, most people will do the wrong thing for all the right reasons.
These are immutable, and legislators will obey them, willingly or not.According to The Oregonian, the House and Senate will attempt to “clean up our act,” in the words of the estimable Peter Courtney, after revelations that the Oregon Beer and Wine Distributors Association paid for legislators to go to Hawaii for a little golf.”