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[In an extremely nurse Dana Evans voice] Good Morning, Portland! Thank goodness this creepy summer weather is about to calm down. I mean, that doesn’t mean the climate isn’t toast, but at least we can put it on the back burner again. Portland is expected to be 67 and balmy today, but by Saturday we shiver back down to a respectable high of 58. Let’s get into it—here’s the news!
IN LOCAL NEWS:
• A 70-degree day in March is honestly not a good thing, people. And to make matters worse, the nasty Bradford Pear AKA Callery Pear trees are in bloom. They’re stinking up the blocks they’re on because they’re trying to attract flies to help them pollinate. Weirdly, it makes it a little bit better to know there’s a reason.
• The fallout from investigative reporting by the New York Times on accusations of child sex abuse against civil rights leader Cesar Chavez has been a mix of swiftness and obvious shock. By 10 am Wednesday, Councilor Candace Avalos announced on Bluesky that she had “begun looking into the process and talking with community leaders about renaming Cesar Chavez blvd to Dolores Huerta blvd.” Tell ya what, the whole NYT piece is worth a read. It isn’t very long. It represents the stories of people who were betrayed by the adults around them when they were children. Did all the people around Chavez truly know nothing and think his behavior seemed fine? Unlikely.
• Long-running LGBTQ+ electronic dance party Blow Pony saddles up for the last time on Saturday, March 28, calling it quits after 19 years of glorious gay revelry. Mercury contributor Andrew Jankowski spoke with the event’s founder about why nearly 20 years of planning electro ragers is probably enough. Read more about Blow Pony’s last rodeo in Jankowski’s piece.
• In Mercury Music Picks this week: Bijoux Cone celebrating her new single and homecoming, VBC’s Piss jumping the boarder, and Brazilian tropicália man Sessa serenading us into a swoon. Tuck into MMP and see you out there!
IN NATIONAL / INTERNATIONAL NEWS:
• It’s been a WEEK in a series of WEEKS. You know what they say: Blame a war on concerns about a country’s missile capabilities once, shame on you. Twice? Thrice? At a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Wednesday, the Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, affirmed that defense intelligence reports—the Trump administration’s own reports—estimated Iran’s ability to fire a missile and hit the US as 10 years out from being possible, which undermines President Donald Trump’s description of Iran as an “imminent threat.” Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe both testified before the committee, with Gabbard claiming she demured to presidential wisdom. Ratcliffe focused on the threat that Iran could have eventually posed, if left unbombed for too long.
• Today in weird little paper Sen. Jon Ossoff is sternly jabbing with his finger: This was kind of an under the radar story from a few days ago, but an email from Never Surrender. Inc (the leadership fundraising PAC formed directly from Trump’s 2024 campaign) dangled a “National Security Briefing Membership” for donations in an email last week, and access to the president’s “private national security briefings.” Such briefings would include classified information, New York Times pointed out. White House aides have also apparently been telling NYT that they don’t think there’s a clear strategy for the US war with Iran, but they’re trying not to tell the president that. Ossoff produced a printout of the email during Gabbard’s questioning, but seemed more focused on the email’s image, which contained an official White House photo of Trump saluting the coffins of six Army Reservists killed by an Iranian drone strike.
• The USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier is leaving the Iran war, at least, and sailing to Crete. CNN reports that “a fire broke out in the ship’s laundry area last week.”
• AP reports that the US national debt hit 39 trillion on Wednesday, and we’re not going to sit here and pretend that’s all the war on Iran, but estimates from inside the Trump administration put the cost of just the first six days at a cool $11 billion. It’s also very costly to wage war—it turns out—when oil prices are skyrocketing.
• In the early morning hours Thursday, Israel attacked Iran’s South Pars natural gas field, described by The Guardian as “the largest [natural gas field] in the world and… the biggest source of domestic energy in Iran, which sometimes struggles to produce enough electricity.” Iran attacked Qatar’s Ras Laffan energy facility in retaliation. French President Emmanuel Macron tweeted 🙄 that everyone should stop targeting civilian infrastructure. Via a long Truth Social post, President Trump stated the US had nothing to do with the South Pars attack, but that the US will “massively blow up the entirety of the South Pars Gas Field” if Iran attacks Qatar again.
• This short Poynter piece about the exhausting nature of the “24-second news cycle” is framed for journalists, but plenty of the ideas feel universally useful. It’s particularly welcome to see contrasting approaches in it: One person said they started the morning with brief news podcasts to keep up to date before the workday began. Another said they stopped listening to political podcasts entirely and just read the same two to three news sources every morning.
• Ready for some good news!? It’s only sort of good news because the whole mess starts out with seven officers with the Adams County Sheriff’s Office (in southern Ohio) raiding Afroman’s home in 2022. He of 2000 summer jam “Because I Got High,” rapper Joseph E. Foreman went on to use footage of the raid in videos for songs like “Will You Help Me Repair My Door” and “Lemon Pound Cake.” Then the officers sued him alleging that he had caused them “humiliation, ridicule, mental distress, embarrassment and loss of reputation,” because he showed video of them raiding his home. Outstanding. The breathtaking shamelessness. Well, an Ohio jury ruled in Afroman’s favor on Wednesday—it was a civil case, not a criminal one. I recommend the footage of Foreman’s testimony because it’s pretty wonderful stuff, despite the infuriating situation. Hate to see people in court unnecessarily; love this incredible vision of patriotism.
• Remember that really weird resignation letter from counterterrorism official and defeated candidate for Washington’s third congressional district Joe Kent? Well, the FBI is investigating him.
• Now get out there and LIVE READY, like this absolute burning rubble diva:
