GOING ROGUE—Following yesterday’s distressing Congressional tour of an El Paso detention facility—and ProPublica’s horrifying exposé of “a secret Facebook group for current and former Border Patrol agents“—your hero and mine, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, declared Customs and Border Protection a “rogue agency.”
THIS IS GOING TO BE EVEN WORSE THAN THAT SEQUEL TO INDEPENDENCE DAY—”Donald Trump said on Monday that he plans to display battle tanks on Washington’s National Mall as part of a pumped-up Fourth of July celebration that will also feature flyovers by fighter jets and other displays of military prowess,” reports Reuters. “What this will cost the Defense Department and the National Parks Service is anyone’s guess,” notes the Washington Post‘s editorial board. “But the question of expense pales in comparison with the message that will be sent by a gaudy display of military hardware that is more in keeping with a banana republic than the world’s oldest democracy.”
TORNADO ATTACKS PORTLAND—”A tornado uprooted trees, knocked down branches, tore shingles from roofs, and caused other damage Monday in Northeast Portland,” writes Jim Ryan at the Oregonian. “The National Weather Service confirmed the EF-0 tornado, which traveled about a mile in Northeast Portland beginning shortly before 5:30 pm.”
FINALLY, AN UPSIDE TO CLIMATE CHANGE: SAND!—”Because of the erosive power of ice, there is a lot of sand in Greenland,” reports the New York Times. “And with climate change accelerating the melting of Greenland’s mile-thick ice sheet—a recent study found that melting has increased sixfold since the 1980s—there is going to be a lot more.”
ONE FOR YOU, NINETEEN FOR ME—”Gone are the days of showing an Oregon ID at a Washington register and getting an automatic pass on sales tax,” wrote OPB’s by Kate Davidson yesterday afternoon. “Starting July 1, Oregonians who shop in Washington must save their receipts if they want to get reimbursed later.”
TGIF—”Prestige television” is one of the more annoying terms of the past decade, but now, at last, we have a legitimate reason to use it: Deadline reports we might soon see reboots of Step by Step, Perfect Strangers, Family Matters, and Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper!!!
FOREST GROVE: A CORRUPTED TOWN SLIDING INTO IRREDEEMABLE CHAOS—Not only was a man arrested for attempting to exploit Oregon’s bottle-return program (“This stunt was previously and unsuccessfully attempted at the same location by a strikingly similar man,” notes Samantha Swindler at the Oregonian, “as well as Newman and Kramer in ‘The Bottle Deposit,’ on Season 7, Episode 21 of Seinfeld“), but the ruinous shadow of a town, which famously sits directly above the Hellmouth, also endured the escape of the “very friendly” Jennifer, a “5-foot-2-inch albino California Kingsnake,” and an incident involving a porta potty that “appeared to be occupied by several suspicious individuals who were causing a ruckus.”
There. That is all the news there is.
