Monthly Archives: May 2026

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Kotek A Winner? Please, No.

A YouTube channel called Election Time recently ran an item showing Democrat Tina Kotek polling at 45% and Republican Christine Drazan at 44% in the governor’s race. 

And this isn’t the only outlet saying Kotek has the advantage. 

“While Oregon’s 40-year history of electing Democratic governors and the state’s strong distaste for Republican President Donald Trump suggest Drazan has a difficult road ahead of her,” the Oregon Capital Chronicle opined on May 26. And I recently heard a couple political analysts on OPB saying Kotek will likely win it all again. 

They can’t be serious. 

This is the “Tax Everything that moves Kotek” who just tried to pull a fast one on Oregonians by shifting a despised transportation tax measure to May in hopes reduced voter participation would doom it, but still saw more than 83% of voters across the political spectrum reject it. 

This is the leader of Oregon’s Democratic party that has fostered an  anti-business climate for decades, enabled horrendous K-12 school performance despite high per pupil spending, filled the state Supreme Court with liberal judges ever since the administration of Republican Victor Atiyeh, whose term ended in January 1987, and exploded the state budget since then, increasing it from $12.57 billion in 1987-1989 to $138.9 billion in 2025-2027.

It’s the party that gleefully accepted, and then stalled returning, a $500,000 contribution from a disgraced and bankrupt crypto company after the U.S. Attorney’s Office requested it return the money to the federal government. 

This is a party so beholden to unions, which represent just 15% of working Oregonians, that it enacted a law to pay striking public and private workers unemployment benefits, that has watched Oregon’s business reputation tank in national rankings, that tolerates underperforming K-12 schools while suspending the requirement that high school students must pass standardized proficiency exams (the “Essential Skills” requirement) to graduate, that has watched the projected cost of the Interstate Bridge Replacement project swell from $4.8 billion to $14.4 billion, and potentially $17.7 billion.

Oregon is in trouble and continuing Democratic Party control isn’t the solution.   

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Will the Oregon Democrats’ Transportation Tax Gambit Work?

It’s a tactic as old as the hills. Put controversial measures on the ballot in predicted low-turnout elections, hoping to gain from voter apathy.

Oregon Democrats, ever anxious to ignore the public will, pushed the vote on Measure 20, the much-reviled $4.3 billion transportation funding referendum, to the upcoming May 19 primary ballot, rather than the November ballot, in hopes that would give it a better chance of passing. 

Maybe they were right. With only about a week to go to cast ballots, about 87 percent of eligible Oregon voters have not done so. 

Critics of the measure came up with about 250,000 signatures to get the measure oin he ballot in the first place, more than three times what was required. Where are all those people now?

If approved, 

  • At a time of escalating gas prices due to the Iran war, and President Trump  discussing lowering the federal gas tax, gas prices in Oregon would increase six cents per gallon to 46 cents.
  • Vehicle registration fees would increase from $43 to $85 for passenger vehicles; $63 to $105 for utility trailers; $44 to $86 for mopeds and motorcycles; and increase passenger vehicle title fees from $77 to $216.
  • Payroll taxes would double to 0.2%.

The deadline to have a ballot postmarked or in a drop box is 8:00 p.m. May 19. DO IT!

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Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire.

President Trump doesn’t just make a mistake once in a while when he speaks. He’s a veritable fountain of blunders, a gusher of goofs, steadily adding to the nonsense his administration spews out.

When he took some time off during a May 7 drive over the surface of the drained Reflecting Pool in his 22,000 pound presidential limousine, nicknamed “The Beast,” to deliver some remarks and answer questions from the press, the event was, as usual, a cavalcade of small and large misstatements from start to finish. Here’s a snapshot of things he said in just that one case, while a grinning, tuxedo-clad Secretary of the Interior Doug Bergum, who is overseeing the renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, stood by.

  • Trump: “The Reflecting Pool (on the National Mall at the Lincoln Memorial) was built in 1922”. Close, but no cigar. The original was completed in 1923.
  • Trump: “The Reflecting Pool is 2400 ft. long.” Close again, but no cigar. It is 2,030 ft. long. 
  • Trump: “It is taller than any building in the world laid on its side.” Nope. The Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, is the tallest building in the world at 2,717 ft, followed by the Merdeka 118 building in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia at 2,233 ft.
  • Trump: “Obama spent 38 million dollars over 2.5 years (renovating the pool).” A 2012 renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool cost $34 million and took roughly 18 months.
  • Trump: “The estimate to fix (the Reflecting Pool) was $300 million, we’re going to do it for $1.8 million.”  The Biden administration studied replacing the iconic pool’s granite, which had an estimated cost of $301 million, but never embarked on the project. Trump has said at various times that his renovation, involving cleaning the granite lining the basin and coating it in an “American flag blue” will cost $1.5 – $3 million. The government has already agreed to pay the company doing the job, under a no-bid contract, $6.9 million and the Park Service’s internal estimates indicate the cost could exceed $12million. On May 11, The New York Times reported that on May 8 the Interior Department added $6.2 million to the contract’s previous cost, saying it now planned to pay $13.1 million to a Virginia firm, Atlantic Industrial Coatings. Then on May 12, The New York Times reported Trump was downplaying his connection with the firm. “Mr. Trump did an about-face early Tuesday, distancing himself from the company. “I didn’t give out the contract, ‘Interior’ did, to a contractor I did not know, and have never used before,” Mr. Trump wrote in a post on his Truth Social platform,” the NYT reported.
  • Trump: “We didn’t have a safe (Washington, D.C.) city in my first term. Crime is down now 88% – 92%.”  Data indicates that crime in Washington, D.C., has experienced a significant decline during 2025 and early 2026, but the 88%–92% figure is a fictional, exaggerated number. Allegations are also being investigated that DC police have manipulated data to show lower crime numbers. As of May 2026, multiple DC police officials face discipline over allegations of manipulating crime classifications.
  • Trump: “My triumphal arch (proposed for Memorial Circle on Columbia Island, a traffic circle on Memorial Drive between the end of the Arlington Memorial Bridge and Arlington National Cemetery) will be number 60 in arches in the world.” Trump’s proposed “Triumphal Arch” or “Arc to Trump”, designed to dwarf the 164-foot Arc de Triomphe in Paris, is planned to be 250 feet tall, over twice the height of the 99-foot Lincoln Memorial, which would make it the largest triumphal arch in the world, but not the 60th. 
  • Trump: “They (US military) are on average knocking out 8 Iranian fast boats a day.” Secretary of state Marco Rubio has said U.S. Forces recently destroyed 7 Iranian Fast Boats in an incident in the Strait of Hormuz, but that rate is not occurring each day. 
  • Trump: “I got Americans out of foreign countries and I don’t pay $6 billion dollars to get somebody out, like Biden used to do and Obama, they gave 6 billion dollars to get some person out.” The Biden administration facilitated the release of $6 billion in frozen Iranian assets in September 2023 to secure the release of five American citizens detained in Iran, though the funds were Iranian oil revenues, not U.S. taxpayer money.
  • Trump: “We’ve taken in hundreds of billions in tariffs, and we’re taking it from countries that have ripped us off for years.”  U.S. importers and consumers bear 94%–96% of the tariff burden, not foreign countries, with the costs essentially functioning as a tax on American households.  Foreign exporters bear a very small fraction of the cost, sometimes reducing their prices slightly to remain competitive, but they do not pay the tariff directly.
  • Trump: “Gas prices have come way down.” As of early May 2026, U.S. gas prices have not been coming “way down” and are actually elevated. On May 7, AAA reported drivers are seeing another sharp increase at the pump, with the national average for a gallon of regular gasoline rising 25 cents for the second consecutive week to $4.55. Pump prices are now $1.40 higher than they were a year ago. 
  • Trump: “The stock market today, for the 59th time since I’ve been president, hit a new high.” The stock market did not, in fact, hit a new high on May 7. All three major indexes dropped. The S&P fell 28 points, the NASDAQ fell 32 points, and the Dow fell over 300 points on Thursday, bringing it back below 50,000 after its surge the previous day.
  • Trump: “The construction workers, they all voted for me. I’d say 99-100 %.” Non-union construction workers are a large and influential voting bloc and a significant number voted for Trump in 2024, but union members and their families largely stuck with the Democratic presidential nominee, with Vice-President Harris winning 54% of union household votes.
  • Trump: “We think we’re going to have it (the ballroom) done by July 4th.” On July 31, 2025, the White House issued a statement that a 90,000 sq. ft. addition would be made to the White House to incorporate a 650-person capacity ballroom.The project was set to begin in September 2025 and planned to be completed “long before” the end of the President’s term in 2029. In December 2025, a National Park Service report said a much larger ballroom would be completed by 2028. The project’s above-ground construction has faced legal challenges, with construction as of April 18 being allowed to continue only until June 2026.

And as usual, Trump took an opportunity to bash a woman reporter, ABC’s Rachel Scott, who asked, “Why focus on all these projects as gas prices are soaring? Part of Trump’s response – “Such a stupid question that you asked. Maybe you can understand dirt better than I can baby, but I don’t allow it. This is one of the worst reporters. She’s from ABC fake news and she’s a horror show. A question like that is a disgrace to our country.”

Another day in Trump-world.

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It’s A Shakedown: Don’t Divert Clean Energy Money to Subsidize Blazers Purchase

If you voted for the Portland Clean Energy Community Benefits Fund, did you want the money to get hijacked to subsidize a Texas billionaire’s wet dream to own the Portland Trailblazers.

The Fund’s 1% tax on retail sales of companies that make a billion dollars or more has generated $1.6 billion. Portland’s city leaders are considering diverting $75 million from the Fund for renovations and ongoing maintenance at the Moda Center as part of the deal to keep the Blazers here following their purchase by billionaire Tom Dundon and his investment group. 

 “This is going to be a very complex high wire act and high winds for city officials and politicians,” said Portland sports commentator John Canzano. “And you have Tom Dundon down below going hey wait a minute. I didn’t buy this franchise to play in an old building.”

Well, wait a minute. If Dundon doesn’t want his team playing in an old building, put some money into fixing it up, just as other NBA team owners have invested heavily in upgrading existing venues to maximize revenue streams. 

“The prevailing economic wisdom is that, generally speaking, the economic impact, measured in jobs and taxes, does not cover the average public investment,” according to Judith Grant Long, an associate professor of sports management and urban planning at the University of Michigan who has studied the issue of taxpayer subsidies for sports teams. Reams of peer-reviewed research show that stadium and arena investments cost more than their economic benefits.

“Where are our city’s priorities, anyway?”

The news is full of stories about Portland’s tight finances, driven by declining tax revenues, inflation, and expiring pandemic-era funds.

Mayor Keith Wilson is proposing an $8.5 billion budget and job cuts for fiscal year 2026-27 to bridge a record $160 million shortfall in the general fund. And Wilson is already proposing transferring $27 million in interest earned by the Clean Energy Fund to close the city’s financial gap.

But the city can spare $75 million from the Fund to help enrich Tom Dundon and his buddies?

If they follow the practices of other NBA team owners, they will one day turn around and make big bucks selling the Blazers. The payoffs for other buyers of NBA teams who have subsequently sold their teams have been eye watering.

Jerry Buss bought the LA Lakers in 1979 for $67.5 million. In June 2025, his family agreed to sell controlling interest to Mark Walter, a minority owner since 2021 and owner of the L.A. Dodgers, for $10 billion. Mark Cuban purchased a majority stake in the Dallas Mavericks from H. Ross Perot Jr. in January 2000 for $285 million. Cuban sold a majority interest in the team to Miriam Adelson and Patrick Dumont of the Adelson family casino empire for $3.5 billion in 2023.

So don’t worry about Dundon. He’ll be fine.