RE: Ongoing changes in, and coverage of, demographics in Portland neighborhoods.
DEAR MERCURY—It would be nice if the city did some real research on how NOT to repeat the same mistakes it made over the years with North/Northeast. Portlanders now talk about the Numbers, Felony Flats, and East County in the same way people used to talk about North Portland. People said it was a part of town they didn't really consider Portland, that it was dangerous, ignorant, dirty, the schools are bad, there are gangs, the white people who live there are white trash. All of the hateful rhetoric that was constantly used as justification for gutting and auctioning off the old 'hood is now being thrown at the new 'hood.
Carlos Covarrubias
RE: "Not That Sarah Marshall" [Feature, Feb 25], an interview with Portland's foremost Tonya Harding expert.
When Harding was at the top of her game, flawless and confident, she was most definitely beautiful to watch. She didn't have a model's body, but she did things no one with a model's body could do.
posted by Burtles
RE: "#25" [Everything as Fuck, Feb 25], columnist Ian Karmel's heartfelt eulogy for recently passed Trail Blazer Jerome Kersey.
Blazers used to practice at Lewis and Clark, and I would go up there afterward to play rat ball. One time as I was passing through the locker room to the gym, and there was Kersey sitting outside the shower on a bench, head down. I've never seen a more exhausted individual in my life. That guy busted his ass.
posted by I'mrightyourwrong
RE: "Will Someone Please Adopt... Scruffles, the GOP Kitten?" [New Column! Feb 25], an adoption posting for a Republican kitten—free to good, heterosexual home that does not rely on government assistance—along with the contact number for Multnomah County Republicans.
TO THE MERCURY VIA VOICEMAIL—Mr. Humphrey, this is Eric Fruits. I'm chair of the Multnomah County Republican Party. I'm calling about an article or something... I guess it was supposed to be funny, that ran the other day about Scruffles the cat. Normally I like a joke as much as the next guy, but we're getting some very nasty phone calls because—believe it or not—people think we're going to do mean things to this cat. So, the article ends up not being very funny. I would like to talk to you about taking down that article or publishing some sort of correction that this was not something published by the Multnomah County Republican Party. Thank you very much. I appreciate it.
CONGRATULATIONS TO ERIC FRUITS and the gang at Multnomah County Republicans! We'd already decided they'd won this week's Mercury letter/comment/voicemail of the week upon receipt of this message, but then it got better! Check out an excerpt of their retort, "Wimpy, the Portland Mercury Kitten?" on blogtown.portlandmercury.com ["Multnomah County Republicans Loved "Scruffles the GOP Kitten" So Much—They Wrote Their Own!, March 3]. And check out how well it went over with the Blogtown crowd:
Shockingly, their response hammers home precisely why they perform so piss-poorly in Multnomah County.
posted by Matthew Hall
That's undeniably the best comedy writing I've ever read by a major-party congressional candidate who got 19 percent of the general election vote.
posted by Todd Mecklem
They just cut-and-pasted every other bullet point? They really couldn't come up with their own examples of cute things a kitten would do? That's just sad. Plagiarists Are Takers, not Makers.
posted by albert
Their grasp of comedy is so unsure they couldn't come up with a better name than "Wimpy." Seriously, guys: This is your problem. You don't do irony well. You don't do irony at all. Without it, you don't have the humor so much. Sorry. (Not sorry.)
posted by rich bachelor
@rich_bachelor They went with "Wimpy" because it's the nastiest insult a Republican can throw at someone. Not "stupid" or "cruel" or "greedy" or "asshole"—being Republicans, those are all considered virtues. The only insult that goes lower would be "poor," the worst cut of them all.
posted by Euphonius
