Why not just write: "It'll kick all the homeless out of downtown."

There are so many loaded statements in the message. A good PR consultant would be advising them very differently—please your constituents first. Be direct. Enough fucking about.

That kind of advice.

Note to Mike Kuykendall: I am available as a publicity consultant. I cost $200,000 a year, but will only run a contract for 10 years at a time. And nobody gets to ask any questions about it.

Those benches that were supposed to keep the homeless folks from sleeping on the ground at 80K per bench? They have a bar right in the middle, no place to lay down, just to sit up right. Umm ok. If I'm homeless and wanna sleep/lay down, how does the bench help me?

The fact is, it doesn't help. It is a means to shut up Scott Moore, Matt Davis, and the public who were up in arms about the sit/lie ordinance. Whatever. The government here and nationally all know - we don't care, people are too fucking busy trying to pay the bills in an increasingly expensive society to give two seconds of thought to homeless, wars, oil pilfering or similar.

I don't know if you've noticed, FP, but Scott and I have no intention whatsoever of "shutting up" on this issue. Thanks for posting—good points.

It's easy to look at wars and the bigger injustices and ignore fascism when it's going on right in front of your face. I'm glad you've seen through it.

Since too many of you at the Mercury are so shortsighted, I'll give you some better solutions:

1) Remove all illegal immigrants according to the already existing laws.

2) Fill the void left in the job market with homeless people who are physically able to work.

3) Conduct psychological evaluations on homeless people before allowing them to stay long term at shelters.

This would produce many benefits:

1) Former immigrants would be forced to fight for better conditions in their own countries instead of relying on somebody else to be their social sugar-daddy. Then they could all build their own national infrastructure and create their own wealth instead of being the pawns to their northern neighbors as they are now.

2) It would give people who are down on their luck a true path to change instead of just waiting for a handout. Working for a living also does amazing things to a person's self-esteem and worth.

3) Separating people with real mental problems from the rest would ensure that the truly needy are the ones getting help and not the bums just looking for a handout.

4) It would be a great "in your face" to the people who become filthy rich by relying on cheap immigrant labor. Screw them.

Hell, this would solve so many social issues, the Mercury wouldn't have a reason to exist anymore. Except to cover the occasional imaginary cop beating, thank you for that. You might even call this "progressive".

Anyone know whether Logan 5 has hit thirty years old yet? I want to make sure they don't miss their appointment at Carousel.

Logan, we're shortsighted?

How many thousands of dollars of your own money do you want to pay in taxes to "[r]emove all illegal immigrants according to the already existing laws."

And how many more thousands do you want to pay to keep immigrants from getting here? Once that's paid, how do you want to pay for mental and social services to the vast majority of homeless people who have chronic mental health problems? And rehab for their self-medicating drug and alcohol addictions?

I'm not sure what planet you arrived from in which homelessness is a luxury that people are cheating the system to achieve, but I can assure you that the vast majority of people don't live on the streets because it's "fun."

Nor do people flee their families and their communities to live in a country illegally because it's something fun to do--they do it because it's necessary, and because the free market accommodates their cheap labor.

Hate to break it to Sandra, but the SAFE oversight committee is not going to last two years because someone is going to challenge in court long before that.

In fact, I would wager that someone will challenge the law before the year is out!

The ACLU, Adam Arms and the Northwest Constitutional Rights Center all disagree with the law and I'm sure, under the right circumstances they would be more than willing to on the case.

I better call them all up and find out. No rumblings of such a move, so far...

Fix for homelessness: Fix mental health services.

Fix for illegal immigration: Fix Mexico.

Wake Up Portland- not one penny of homeless funding goes into the homeless hands; it all goes into the poverty pimps pockets. The homeless are not who you should be mad at. Not one person should be homeless anywhere. If you are homeless and go to one of the homeless agencies they act suprised that you need housing, med care, food! The ask "what do you want from me" it should be "how can I help you".