Free Republic

The Portland Thorns are removing a T-shirt from store shelves and the team's website in response to criticism that its slogan "Feelin' Thorny?" was sexist. The T-shirt was gone in slightly less than 24 hours since the controversy broke on Facebook and was fueled on other social media platforms.

Neil McFarlane, the general manager of Portland’s TriMet transit agency, stunned Portland-area residents recently when he warned that the agency would have to cut service by 70 percent unless unions agreed to reduced benefits in upcoming contract negotiations. When he did so, he piously noted that TriMet’s non-union managers have had a pay freeze for four years.Turns out that pay freeze was more imaginary than real. In the last year alone, TriMet gave its managers pay increases totaling nearly $1 million. McFarlane alone received a 3 percent raise, which–considering his previous pay was $215,000 a year–means a $6,450 boost to...

"Portland terrorism arrest: Emails show connection between Portland city worker and Pakistan suicide attacker, feds say" SNIPPET: "At the beginning of 2006, Reaz Qadir Khan received an email from a man he knew, goading him about Khan's past devotion to seek martyrdom for Allah, authorities said."

Howls of rage went up after the Joint Terrorism Task Force, guns drawn, arrested Maher Hawash in the parking lot of an Intel Corporation facility in March, 2003, and placed him in solitary confinement. The protests intensified as prosecutors detained him without charges for more than a month in an Oregon jail while they pored over the evidence. Given Maher Mofeid "Mike" Hawash's biography, this all came as a particular shock, for he personified the American success story. A Palestinian born in Nablus in 1964 and reared in Kuwait, he arrived in the United States in 1984, earning degrees in...

Silence fell across a Portland courtroom Thursday as U.S. District Judge Garr M. King read the verdict in the terrorism case of Mohamed Osman Mohamud, whose attempt to bomb the city's town square two years ago stunned the nation. Jurors found the 21-year-old Somali American guilty of trying to detonate a weapon of mass destruction in Pioneer Courthouse Square -- a four-block walk from where they sat in the downtown courthouse. Mohamud, whose lawyers argued that the FBI entrapped their client in a sophisticated sting that went too far, showed no reaction. Wearing a sweater and slacks, he rose from...

Tuesday, October 11, 2011 Bishop Sample shares his Vision and Program for the New Evangelisation At the final session of the Convocation of Priests serving in the Diocese of Marquette, Bishop Alexander Sample spoke about his vision or program for the New Evangelisation. He summed it up by saying: It's the Gospel of Jesus Christ! This is very much in line with Pope John Paul II's view: that there is no need for any new program. However, Bishop Sample highlighted two central themes that are, as it were, coming over the horizon: the renewal of the Sacred Liturgy the work...

Bishop Alexander K. Sample of Marquette. File: Photo/CNA. Portland, Ore., Jan 29, 2013 / 10:35 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Benedict XVI has named Bishop Alexander K. Sample of Marquette, Mich., to shepherd the archbishop of Portland, Ore. In a Jan. 29 statement, Archbishop-designate Sample noted his “excitement and joy at taking up this new challenge that God has placed before me.” “I have always tried to be obedient to the will of God and to accept whatever the Church asks of me to be God’s will,” he said Tuesday. “It is in this spirit that I have said 'yes'...

The paid informant who helped orchestrate the FBI sting that resulted in the arrest of five anarchists for allegedly plotting to blow up an Ohio bridge is a convicted felon who was arrested on bad check and theft charges in the midst of his cooperation with federal investigators, The Smoking Gun has learned.Shaquille Azir, 39, was named in a pair of felony indictments filed in January in Cuyahoga County, according to court records. Azir, who TSG has identified as the informant in the federal bombing case, is accused in the indictments of passing bad checks on July 25, 2011 and...

Mr. Khan and Mr. Day said several people who worship at the mosque said the FBI had knocked on their doors late at night on the day of Mr. Mohamud’s arrest, but that none agreed to speak to agents. “People were finding cards in the doors that said FBI,” Mr. Day said. The mosque, the largest in Portland, has been the center of controversy before. In 2002, the mosque’s imam, Sheik Mohamed Abdirahman Kariye, who — like Mr. Mohamud — is a naturalized American citizen from Somalia, was arrested at Portland International Airport. Prosecutors subsequently said that trace elements of...

Mohamed Osman Mohamud: Misunderstander of Islam He yelled "Allahu akbar" and tried to kick agents as they swooped in to arrest him. DoJ press release here. "Feds Arrest Somali-Born Teen in Car Bomb Plot," from the Associated Press, November 27 (thanks to Markus): PORTLAND, Ore. -- A Somali-born teenager plotted to carry out a car bomb attack at a crowded Christmas tree lighting ceremony in downtown Portland on Friday, but the bomb turned out to be a dud supplied by undercover agents as part of a sting, federal prosecutors said. Mohamed Osman Mohamud, 19, was arrested at 5:40 p.m. just...

A Portland man who was charged with secretly shipping firearms parts to a man in Finland was sentenced Tuesday in federal court to three years of probation and a $2,500 fine.

PORTLAND, Ore. – For more than two years, the only image the public has had of the man accused of plotting to detonate an 1,800-pound bomb at a Portland Christmas tree-lighting ceremony is this: A sullen-faced, sunken-eyed terrorism suspect in a mug shot taken just hours after his arrest.

Portland, Maine – A restaurant owner in Maine is using free food as part of a devised plan to assemble area residents in protest against a number of pro-life women that minister to abortion-minded mothers outside of the local Planned Parenthood. Mike Fink of Mike’s Restaurant in Portland states that he is staging a protest next Friday because he opposes the presence of the women and their children at the abortion facility, which is located next door to his business. “Normally, we do not get involved in religious or political debate because it is a waste of time,” Fink wrote...

Scores of out-of-state strikebreakers wait on high alert in Northwest hotel rooms, ready to replace longshoremen in case of a lockout at grain terminals. Three fully crewed, non-union tugboats protected by armed guards stand by, prepared to keep grain ships docking. In a provocative move, a California company has moored the tugs on the Willamette River near longshore Local 8's Northwest Portland union hall. Quietly, owners of Portland, Vancouver and Puget Sound terminals have spent months preparing for a battle royal on the waterfront, lining up troops and assets like chess pieces. The agribusiness giants have laid legal groundwork for...

A gunman who witnesses say was wearing camouflage and a white plastic mask opened fire in a shopping mall near Portland, Ore., in a rampage that left three dead, including the shooter, and multiple wounded, police said. Authorities say police "neutralized" the gunman but have yet to elaborate on how he died. Witnesses described a harrowing scene, as the gunman appeared to be dressed in body armor while firing off an estimated 60 shots from a semi-automatic rifle. One witness told KPTV that the gunman ran past her and her boyfriend and "had the look of death in his eyes."

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Two boys, ages 7 and 11, are accused of trying to rob a woman with a loaded gun, police said Sunday. The boys tried to carjack a 22-year-old woman who was in her family's truck waiting for her parents in a church parking lot, Portland police said in a statement. Ami Garrett, of southeast Portland, told officers that when the boys approached her, the younger boy told the older boy to "show her your piece." The woman said that when she refused to give them her vehicle, they demanded cash and her phone. She said that...

Many see a right-wing conspiracy in the death of Portland’s commercial progressive talk-radio station. But Bain didn’t act alone.Carl Wolfson’s last show on KPOJ-AM 620 sounded like victory. For the past six years, Wolfson, a former standup comedian, hosted a three-hour morning drive-time show that had turned into a radio clubhouse for Portland liberals. Wolfson—laser-fast with a quip and constantly in defense of Democrats—spent the weeks before the Nov. 6 election boosting liberal candidates and puncturing Mitt Romney. “Romney has zero foreign-policy experience,” Wolfson liked to say during the campaign. “He was asked about the Middle East, and his only...

PORTLAND, Oregon — Police in Portland say a maximum $1,000 reward has been offered for information leading to an arrest in the case of Italian marble religious statues damaged at a Catholic shrine and botanical garden.Sgt. Pete Simpson says three statues were damaged this week, with the heads removed.Police recovered one of the statue heads Friday after a passer-by called to say it was perched on a post at the west end of the 62-acre site popularly known as The Grotto. That head belonged to a statue of the Virgin Mary.Still missing are heads belonging to statues of St. Joseph...

A story in this week's WW shows Portland officials—including Mayor Sam Adams and both mayoral candidates—scaling back the city's anti-Walmart stance as the shopping giant's mobile-software division, WalmartLabs, moves into a downtown office. But Walmart is also making concessions to Portland culture. As reported in the Daily Journal of Commerce on Monday, the new Walmart breaking ground on Hayden Meadows in North Portland, will boast the city's largest ecoroof. "We recognize that being an efficient business and a good steward of the environment are not mutually exclusive," Walmart spokeswoman Rachel Wall tells WW. "Walmart has worked with the Portland Bureau...

PORTLAND, Ore. – Portland police shut down the Burnside Bridge and detained 13 bearded men who said they were headed to a photo shoot to raise money for breast cancer research Wednesday evening. According to spokesman Robert King, police received a report that a man on the bridge had an assault rifle. Officers shut down the bridge just after 7:30 p.m. while they investigated. Police found 13 bearded men, many of whom wore military style uniforms. One of the men had an assault rifle, King said. They were taken to the Central Precinct. It's unclear if the assault rifle was...