George Will: Die Already, Please?

Portland is trying to keep screwing with George Will for being a liar. I love Portland Transport, but sorry about the shite reporting. It's what you get from people who think ducks are news.

George Will Hates Portland

Newsweek is running a piece by George Will about Ray LaHood liking Portland and why liberals hate cars. It's really quite entertaining, as it's painfully obvious throughout the piece that George Will has never been to Portland, and probably only knows of us as Little Beirut.

One of the best moments of the piece is when he speculates, "Does he think 0.01 percent of Americans will ever regularly bike to work?" According to a 2007 article it's about .4 percent already.

He may want to take a look at the Pearl District. It's an upscale, urban neighborhood built around a streetcar. It nothing but warehouses and rail lines just 15 years ago, and not the type of neighborhood you'd want to be in unless you were looking for drugs or whores.


The Pearl District Now

As for his claims about how everyone needs a car, well, I don't. If I really do need one Enterprise will pick me up, or I can use ZipCar which has several sites near my neighborhood.

2009 Eurovision Song Contest Final

So I had never heard of this before, but CNN had an article about protests outside it earlier today. The official site has some background, as well as a live webcast I've now been watching most of the afternoon. Balkan Girls Like to Party Like Nobody by the Romanian group was quite amusing though. The swing-pop German and dance/techno Ukraine musicians were by far the most entertaining, each for their own reason. Hopefully they'll put some of these on their YouTube Channel. Some of the acts were very unique.

Edited to add props to the Finnish fire dancers and musicians. I've never seen Scandinavian rap before, and it's just crazy...

NY Times

So, the NY Times has made a stand about Frugal Portland. It's the Frugal Traveler in Portland, making for more fun than expected. We're Portland. We do that.

The New Old Lompoc and Ground Kontrol made it.