Leave it to hippies to turn an otherwise perfectly fine idea
into an uproarious exercise in self-parody.
For instance! Marijuana. It’s great, right? It smells good and makes
everything funny. But in the hands of hippies, it’s just another Cheech
and Chong prop, what with all the “heeeeey, man” and “whoooaaa” and
“groovin’ out” to terrible music. Also? Free love. It’s everything
great about love, but without the emotional price tag! And yet hippies
went and turned the ’60s into a cesspool of weird blisters and
discharges. Thanks for nothing, longhairs!
And now, they’ve made me hate the idea of peace. Last Wednesday,
August 8, Commissioner Dan Saltzman brought forward a resolution
supporting a national “Department of Peace,” which would fund
community-based conflict resolution measures. It’s difficult to argue
against non-violent solutions to societal problems, but after listening
to nearly a half hour of testimony from supporters, I wanted to go out
and punch a random stranger. Don’t believe me? These words were uttered
by someone whose last name is—I shit you not—Mystic-Healer:
“We all have a soul energy vibration. It’s like a soul internet
connection.”
Look, Portland City Council, if you want the rest of the country to
take your exclusively symbolic resolutions seriously, we’re
going to need a gag order on anyone wearing a crystal necklace or
anything made out of hemp.
The peace resolution wasn’t Dan “Jerry Garcia” Saltzman’s only time
to shine last week; he also unveiled the Office of Sustainable
Development’s Portland Recycles program, which sets mandates for
businesses to recycle and compost their waste.
But as inherently “Portland” as the program is, it didn’t find a lot
of fans during the council hearing, with business owners arguing
against the mandate, environmentalists saying it doesn’t go far enough,
and neighbors complaining that it doesn’t address garbage and recycling
truck noise.
Yeeesh! Sometimes, you can’t make anybody happy. Including local
conspiracy theorists, who are worried that the upcoming nuclear terror
drill in the city (irritatingly dubbed “Noble Resolve”) could “go
live.”
The folks at Oregon Truth Alliance are warning that the
August 20-24 Noble Resolve—which will test city, state, and
federal agencies’ response to a simulated “dirty bomb”—could
become a reality. For evidence, they point to similar simulations
occurring at the same time as the World Trade Center attack and the
London subway bombings.
I totally believe it. One time, I spent hours playing The
Sims, and my simulated character’s tedious, lonely life totally
became my real life. Spooky.