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GOOD MORNING, PORTLAND! It's gonna be another sunny day with highs topping out at 82—so it might be the perfect time to sample one of the great boozy, frozen cocktails from some of the city's best liquor emporiums during our SUMMER OF SLUSHIES! Not only are they delicious, but they're only $8 each, and guaranteed to cool off that hot head of yours. And now? Here's some hot-headed NEWS!

IN LOCAL NEWS:

• Let's start with some good news: Former Malheur Refuge domestic terrorist Ammon Bundy and a right-wing extremist pal have been ordered to pay a whopping $50 million (!!) to settle a defamation suit brought upon them by an Idaho hospital. After a severely malnourished baby was taken from its parents and brought in to the St. Luke's Regional Health medical center for treatment, Bundy & pal started a smear campaign against the hospital, falsely accusing it of kidnapping and child trafficking. Naturally, a lot of gullible and dim-witted right-wingers believed it, causing all sorts of trouble for already beleaguered hospital staff. (Something tells me Bundy's right-wing fleecing machine may have trouble coming up with the $50 mill—hee-hee-heeeeeeee.)

• Speaking of scammers, according to Portland's ombudsman's office, Stanley C. Kennedy Enterprise Inc. (AKA 1-800 BOARDUP) was contracted by the city to help local businesses board up their windows and doors, but instead tricked customers into paying them directly, routinely charging $150 more per job. This scam netted the company at least a cool $142,000 more than they deserved. AND OH... here's an interesting graph:

Police responding to the vandalism scenes also improperly told owners that they could get a better deal by working directly with the company and cutting out the city, the ombudsman said.

WHAAAAT?? Oh, let's keep our eyes on this, shall we?

• Summer camps and parks are reopening in the Parkrose and Argay Terrace districts now that officials say that their asbestos scare, associated with a local abandoned Kmart burning to the ground, is less than originally thought, and according to them, presents little risk to residents.

• More good news... especially for fans of the wildly successful Portland Street Response team. (Not such good news for Commissioner Rene Gonzalez's attempts to sink it.)

• If you're looking for some hot, new non-mainstream country music to listen to, then check out this Mercury report from the FairWell music festival that was held in Redmond, Oregon last weekend! The three-day gathering of 36 “good country” bands featured all sorts of Americana, roots rock, and more, and for your listening pleasure, we picked our top five faves.

IN NATIONAL/WORLD NEWS:

• Liar admits he lied: Rudy Giuliani has conceded that he flat-out lied when he made false statements about two Georgia election workers who he claimed committed ballot fraud during the 2020 presidential race. While the squirming shitheel is claiming that his destructive lies fall under "protected speech," we'll see how that defense holds up in court—particularly following the case where Fox News paid more than $787 million to Dominion Voting Systems to settle their defamation claims.

• The president's son, Hunter Biden, is expected to plead guilty to two misdemeanor counts for failing to pay his taxes, which will probably result in Biden being put on probation. This ruling will surely result in more yelps of outrage from Republicans, who are still refusing to go after the REAL criminal in the Biden family:

• Actor Kevin Spacey has been found not guilty of sexually assaulting four men by a UK court, bringing an end (at least for now) to a salacious trial where singer Elton John testified for the defense, and Spacey bragged to the jury about giving a ping pong table to Dame Judy Dench. 😵

Get ready for some hot UFO action as the House Oversight Committee will be hearing testimony today from three former military officials who claim to have either had run-ins with UFOs (also uninterestingly called UAPs) or have knowledge that the government is in possession of "intact and partially intact vehicles of nonhuman origin." (An even more uninteresting way of saying UFOs.)

• And finally... the Barbie movie IS still great, even if this amazing scene was left on the cutting room floor: