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Posts tagged as “Sam Adams”

A stadium that crosses the line

March 11, 2009
Lents

Lents Field visualization

There's a longish list of public-backed sports arena proposals around the Northwest we've thought might be fine ideas as private facilities, not so good as business ventures essentially backed by the taxpayers. So the first reaction here, when Merritt Paulson (owner of the Portland Beavers and Timbers and - should this be a red flag? - the son of former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson) proposed a partnership with the city to turn downtown Portland's PGE park into a major league soccer field, was skepticism.

We'd have to say at this point it remains a difficult call, and the hard time that three of the five Portland council members had with it seems entirely reasonable. The 3-2 vote was indicative of how close a call this could be.

Mayor Sam Adams and Council member Randy Leonard, and others around town not least including the Oregonian, have been on a hard push for the project. (Of the three other council members, only Dan Saltzman joined Leonard and the mayor to push it through.) The O's editorial arguing in favor pointed out that Seattle and Vancouver (B.C.) appear likely to have major league soccer teams, as part of a sport that seems to be expanding, and Portland could benefit from being part of that - "If the Portland city commissioners say goodbye to this deal, in effect, they'll be consigning Portland, nationally, to the nosebleed seats."

Such arguments sound wonderful if there's enough private support in town for the entertainment facility, but why should non-soccer fans be on the hook? Well, the advocates make a better-than-usual case for that. Some of that relates to an infusion of money and jobs at a time those things are much needed. The area around the PGE field could use a little rehab, and a fresh major league operation might do that; there is some urban development and geographic logic to this. (Paulson also has agreed to fork over directly a substantial chunk of the implementation costs; much of the rest would be made up through ticket and other fees.) But it also centers around the city's very limited liability: "In the unlikely event that Major League Soccer foundered, Paulson and his family company would make payments on the city's loans. Not only are they willing to backstop the deal, they're willing to absorb a hefty dose of cost overruns," says the Oregonian. Sounds almost as if what the city is really being asked to do is not a lot more than acting as a low-risk co-signer.

That's not quite all, of course. Willamette Week has a series of countering points, noting for example that many of the financial projections for the project come from Paulson's court - not from an independent city review - and that several other cities have dropped out of the race for major league soccer. Several of those are points worth more serious address.

This will take a while to get done, if something else doesn't slow or stop the process. It bears a close look. Albeit, a hopeful one.

Twitter fight!

March 4, 2009
Blumenauer

Earl Blumenauer

This is bound to just confuse some people. But on Comedy Central, it was enough to get the Daily Show's Jon Stewart shaking his fist and yelling: "Blumenauer!" (And for the second time in a week, after the "Felonious Monkeys segment.)

That being, of course, the usually mild-mannered Oregon Representative Earl Blumenauer, who has been tweeting on Twitter.

As have we. But now there's more: Blumenauer has gotten into a tweet-fight.

About 21 hours ago he tweeted, "McCain wasnt familiar with a blackberry right? Hows he supposed to understand a solar highway utilizing right-of-way to generate solar power."

That led to a batch of messages around Twitter including:

Twitter Fight! Rep. Blumenauer vs. Sen. McCain
In Twitter Fight, Rep. Blumenauer Slams Sen. McCain - Someone better get McCain to the Burn Unit!
Blumenauer's tweets beat up John McCain's tweets: Fight! Fight! Just go read it. My hat is off
Blumenauer's tweets beat up John McCain's tweets
CFG Blog Twitter Fight Over Pork: Senator John McCain vs. Rep. Earl Blumenauer. Let's get it on!

We may be seeing the dawn of political fights executed by the tweet.

Blumenauer happens to be a regular tweeter and if you're on Twitter, you might consider following. Some of his recent tweets:

Interesting to see the reaction to twittering. It’s helpful to follow the action, keep track and report back.
3:19 PM Feb 25th from web
Jindal is weird. I can't believe Jindal. Such a sad contrast with President. Doesn't even look or sound good, to say nothing about content
7:44 PM Feb 24th from web
Wow! As it settles in, I can only say: he hit it out of the park! Just what Congress and American people need to hear! Yes we can!
7:23 PM Feb 24th from web
New era of engagement! Not a moment too soon!
6:59 PM Feb 24th from web
Best line: "For 7 years we have been at war. No longer will we hide its price."
6:56 PM Feb 24th from web

Ran a check, by the way, to see who else among major Northwest political figures is tweeter. Conclusion: Not many, finding (via a quick search) none in Idaho and three very erratic tweeters in Washington (Senator Patty Murray, Governor Chris Gregoire, and Representative Jay Inslee, whose account is locked).

Oregon does have a couple of occasional twitterers in the congressional delegation, Senator Jeff Merkley and Representative Kurt Schrader. But apart from Blumenauer, the one other really active tweeter among major Northwest political figures seems to be Portland Mayor Sam Adams, who sends a lot of tweets. (Supply your own punchline if need be.)

Adams: Staying, for now

January 25, 2009

Word this afternoon that Portland Mayor Sam Adams is hanging in there, scandal notwithstanding, brings to mind a structural comparison with a politician from another state, former Idaho Senator Larry Craig.

Yes, there's the common element of disputes related to gay sex, but there are numerous differences besides that - and the point is a different one. The point has to do with the supposed inevitability of scandal>resign, or be thrown from office. The point is that the inevitability is not always there.

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It happens that way, of course, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer being maybe the most spectacular example. But what first looks inevitable sometimes looks less so with time. A decade ago, the resignation of Bill Clinton as president after the Monica Lewinsky affair was widely thought to be inevitable, and ouster by impeachment was considered a very serious prospect. But he finished out his term.

The Craig comparison may be more pertinent. Think back to August 2007, to the explosion that greeted news of Craig's "disorderly conduct" arrest in the Minneapolis airport. Within a day or so, the common wisdom was that Craig would quit. This blog bought into that, briefly: "Our initial thought (on hearing the news reports 24 hours ago) was that, since his arrest in a Minneapolis airport mens room had little to do with his work as a senator, he might be able to ride it out, at least through this term (though re-election seems a lot cause). We no longer think so: While Craig is very unlikely to be forced out, conditions are deteriorating so quickly that his staying may soon become impractical."

But we also wrote not long after that Craig could stay if he chose. After all, there are no recall provision for U.S. senators; the only way he could be thrown out was to be expelled by the Senate, and since he broke no major laws (just a misdemeanor), that was highly unlikely. And while his clout in the Senate would be diminished if he stayed, he retained his vote, his grasp of how to work in the Senate, his staff and his public platform. That apparently is how Craig read it, when days later he announced that he would finish out his term. Which, earlier this month, he did.

Mayors, those in Portland included, can be recalled - the only way an elected official in Oregon can be made to leave. But not until six months have passed following a swearing-in, and weeks would pass after that before an election actually would be held.

Will the current Adams fury last that long? If Adams turns out to be a pretty good mayor in the months from here to there, will the anger be hot enough for the voters to fire him?

Maybe. But in the meantime, while circumscribed and while suffering some diminished clout and reputation, Adams would retain the prerogatives of office, his highly sophisticated grasp of how things work in Portland, and some (albeit not all) of his useful political relationships. (Of course, as Steve Duin's Thursday Oregonian column suggested, Adams would be wise to not stand in the way of any attempt to recall him, and should - at least publicly - welcome the verdict of the voters later this year.)

Taken as a whole, Adams' call on this sounds not so drastically different from Craig's, and from Clinton's. How well will it work? Check back in six months . . .

Adams’ survivability

January 21, 2009
Sam Adams

Sam Adams

Our first take on the scandal storm surrounding Portland Mayor Sam Adams (now a national story) was that it was significant but probably survivable, on grounds that his actions has no involvement with the handling of his current office. There also seemed to be a limit to the water torture effect: What else could come out to keep the story alive, to justify ongoing headlines?

As we get into Day 3, though, the question of Adams' survivability is moving rapidly in new directions, and becoming a lot less clear. There's an accumulative piling on effect, and it could make Adams' position untenable in short order. There are four factors here: The fact that he lied; that he lied about the whole case in response to charges from a fellow candidate for mayor, developer Bob Ball, which led to Ball's statements being dismissed as untrue; acknowledgment that another part of his story (relating to mentoring) was untrue as well; and the appearance at least that as a city council member he hired away a reporter at the Portland Mercury who was working on the story, essentially to quash it. The line between private activity and abuse of office has gotten a little blurrier.

There's a recall effort underway; the grounds: "1. Alleged illegal sexual misconduct with a minor under the age of 18; 2. Alleged ethical misconduct during his mayoral campaign of 2008 by making false statements; 3. Alleged ethical misconduct by encouraging others to lie about his own misconduct; 4. Alleged ethical misconduct by awarding city jobs to members of the media that were reporting, or were professing to report, this issue." That effort is somewhat stymied, though, because under state law elected officials cannot be recalled until they have served at least six months in office.

Although there's been no specific allegation of an illegal act, a state attorney general's inquiry is under way. Multnomah County is doing likewise.

And the news media is all over the story. The print Oregonian this morning had six news stories about Adams' scandal this morning - probably more space devoted to it in the local section than to everything else there put together - along with an editorial concluding: "He's already said he doesn't plan to quit, but we submit that it is not in the city's interest to have a mayor who cannot vouch for his own character under fire. He should resign." The Portland Tribune called for resignation too. And so have piles of letters to the editor around the area.

Can Adams ride this out, or is he being swamped by the storm? Today, even though a resignation may be the only way he would depart, his odds of survival in office much longer look a little less than even.

Sam Adams and the unfiltered impulse

January 19, 2009
Sam Adams

Sam Adams

Some months back a first-time candidate (not in Oregon) asked the question: Why do so many politicians keep getting caught in scandalous or near-scandalous sexual situations? (Worried, maybe, he might be missing a crucial strand of political DNA?) It was a good question. The snap answer might be that politicians tend to be gregarious people and prone to lots of human interaction generally; they draw energy from being around other people. Or something like that.

But there ought also to be a strand of political DNA that sends up a red flag in the face of a bad idea, and that's a strand that seems to be missing from a lot of political people these days. At the moment, you wonder: What was Sam Adams, long considered one of the brightest guys in Portland politics, thinking when he struck up that close friendship in 2005 with a 17-year-old named (however improbable it may sound) Beau Breedlove, a friendship that eventually and briefly went further than that. And then, for an extended period, lied about it.

Now on Adams' website (responding to a story just broken by Willamette Week): "In the past, I have characterized my relationship with Beau Breedlove as purely non-sexual. That is not true. Beau Breedlove and I had a sexual relationship for a few months in the summer of 2005 after he turned 18 years of age. I should have been honest at the time about the true nature of my relationship with Beau Breedlove when questions about my relationship with him first surfaced publicly in October 2007. In fact, Beau encouraged me to be honest about the facts of our relationship. I am deeply sorry that I asked him to lie for me."

The immediate comparison in the Northwest would logically be to the case of former Spokane Mayor James West, who was recalled from office in December 2005, after exposure of his trolling on gay sex web sites and relationships with much younger male partners. That was an explosive story that totally riveted, dominated, public life in Spokane for nearly a year.

How does the Adams story compare? What effect might this revelation have? (more…)