Where you watching the Knicks games?

Can someone explain what these phishing texts hope to accomplish? What's the goal?

Richard Rommelmann, 8/6/35 - 2/13/20 xx

When I was 11 years old, a few months after my parents split, my dad came over to the apartment. He was holding an album. This was not particularly normal, but there was something, he said, he wanted me to hear.

Walking off energy at 10:30pm, Lower East Side, and look, the immigrant fruit vendor is still at work; I’ll take a mango. How in god’s name do we not want these people here?

I had dinner last week with a friend who said she’d noticed something consistent with the protesters, no matter what part of the country they were in.

When I moved to Portland in 2004, the junkies in downtown's Pearl District, romanticized in Gus Van Sant's 1989 "Drugstore Cowboy," had been replaced by farm-to-table restaurants and a flagship REI store. Portland was on the up, a media darling poised to become the next great American city. Then came the record scratch that was 2020. With the nightly riots in Portland entering their seventh month and the air ringing with chants of “DEFUND THE POLICE!,” citizens were asked that November to vote on Ballot Measure 110, the Drug Addiction Treatment and Recovery Act. Offering addicts a soft landing rather than jail time - those possessing and using hard drugs in public would face no penalty other than a possible $100 citation, waived should the user voluntarily enter drug treatment - was in step with the year's anti-carceral mood. Its passage would also give Oregonians the distinction of being the first state in the nation to fully decriminalize drugs. Dozens of organizations supported Measure 110, from the editorial board of The Oregonian to the Oregon ACLU. Harm reduction advocates saw Measure 110 as a “humane, effective approach that will save lives” and a positive step toward granting bodily autonomy to those who chose to do drugs. Portland’s newly elected progressive district attorney Mike Schmidt said Measure 110 “sends a clear message of strong public support that drug use should be treated as a public health matter rather than a criminal justice matter.” Measure 110 passed with 59 percent of the vote. “For us, it's like this dream happened,” said the executive director of the New York-based nonprofit Drug Policy Alliance, which had pumped an estimated $5 million into getting Measure 110 passed. Meanwhile those living the dream saw an effort meant to help addicts act instead as an accelerant. Fatal opioid overdoses skyrocketed, especially from fentanyl. The number of homeless in Portland swelled to 6300. Violent crime spiked before dipping in 2023. People stopped going downtown, both because of the perception of danger and because it was too sad, seeing hundreds of people dope-sick, smoking fentanyl under blankets, shooting up in the park, stepping over used syringes and the foil and straws distributed free by advocates of harm reduction. Oregonians started having second thoughts, started wondering if their impetus to help was making things worse... (Read the rest of "Drugs 1, Oregon 0" at Make More Pie, bit.ly/431Grwy. Photo by @cocainemichelle)

I deleted a tweet that I need to make stronger. For 15 months, I have been explaining that black bloc protesters in Portland are the MAIN source of violence. Proud Boys and right-wing groups rolled through four times in 2020. Then who tf was committing the violence every night?

RIP, Miggy. I am sorry your death is being used as a punching ball gotten around to in paragraph 8.

“They do things like stand in front of someone’s car and, when the car tries to move, claim they’re about to be run over,” she said. “They basically put themselves in danger and then make you responsible for keeping them safe.”

The divorce deck is gonna be lit

This, from @NellieBowles, would seem outrageous to the point of criminal in the normal times but now, instead, the person who brings the news of the human horror is made to shut up bariweiss.substack.com/p/tgi…

She's running

She referred to this phenomenon as safetyism, an idea introduced in Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff’s The Coddling of the American Mind, which described the concept as a “cult of safety… [that] deprived young people of the experiences that their antifragile minds need,…

Many people saying to me, "all I see in my feed are peaceful protestors." I'll leave it at this: if this were your mother's house, would you consider this peaceful? Does it depend on who your mother is? Note "she" had not yet emerged the night I shot this

I have never been as enlivened to vote against someone as I am to vote against Mamdani. I get his appeal - he's young, he's telegenic, he's not Cuomo - but I cannot stand more firmly against his beliefs and prejudices, which he's been trying to cast in shadow. So foul, so dark

He put himself through school, basketball scholarship, wound up a partner at Neuberger Berman, I don't think he ever thought he was entitled to any of this, but he wanted me to be, to think, you know what? You get to be here, learn the words.

Re: what happened today at the Times

This, happening at the home of Portland councilman who voted against defunding the police. So we're clear on how things currently do down in Portland

This is insane. The protests by ICE cover 1.5 blocks of a 135-square mile city. Portland did not fully recover post-pandemic/the 2020 summer of rage, and occupancy is lower than it could be, but, my dude, otherwise the city thrives. Anyone who says otherwise has their own agenda

Fascinating, horrific, granular on Magnitsky. Bonus: @PreetBharara has a wonderful voice. Ace podcasting. wnyc.org/story/death-sergei-… via @WNYC

"The underlying reason for the fall of Sri Lanka is that its leaders... fell under the spell of Western green elites peddling organic agriculture" and the philosophy that "we had to let some people die so the rest of us could live." Via @ShellenbergerMD commonsense.news/p/sri-lanka…

…thereby making them more fragile, anxious, and prone to seeing themselves as victims.”

Have politicians always been this coarse; this (to quote Orwell) "unshakeably certain of being in the right"? How can we trust a person who revels in humiliating others; who sharpens their knife, sticks it in, then licks it? It's beyond foul and shameful

Leaving aside that mug shots are part of the public record and easily found online, I wondered how those committing the crimes had, just like that, been recast in the role of victim. I wondered whether they’d heard the old saw, “If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.”

No, L.A. is not under lockdown. No, the protesters aren’t Soros-paid agitators. And no, this isn’t Portland 2020. I’m here in Los Angeles. Here’s what’s actually happening. My latest Dispatch from L.A. for ⁦@reason⁩ reason.com/2025/06/12/los-an…

I am crying at this post. Nearly all of my husband's baristas quit in 2019. I had to work register, my husband was pulling shots when a guy from a church 25 miles away came in and said, we are so sorry, and ordered $600 worth of coffee parishioners had pitched in for. Go support.

I am squirming so hard listening to this, if not as hard as WaPo reporter. It’s inconceivable to me that she would contact sources with this sort of leading and threat. Regardless of how you feel about @stoolpresidente - or anyone - this putrescence should not pass as journalism

No mention on homepage of NYT, WaPo, WSJ. We are still rehashing what happened January 6, 2021. How is this different? Oh wait

I don't think I've ever used the phrase, "You're a monster" except in a silly way, but am tempted to use it now if you do not see this as heartbreaking. We need to take better care of each other; this bloodsport yields only pain and less beauty newsweek.com/why-im-leaving-…

I was today years old when I learned it's "won and done" not "one and done."

First Opinion piece for the LA Times - thank you for asking me to write it: OUTRAGE CULTURE IS OUT OF CONTROL latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la…

1/ Let's do this. The news out of Portland 2023 is grim. The murder rate quadrupled in five years. Drug overdoses doubled between 2019 and 2022, with the state ranking second in the nation for opioid addiction and last in drug treatment.

At every pro-Palestinian protest I've been to, incl. at the DNC, I've not once heard from the podium a word about the Oct. 7 massacre, no recognition of murdered Israelis and those taken hostage. The lack of acknowledgement shows the unseriousness of protesters. Grow up and look

Not gonna lie, very very pleased to have my first piece in @TheAtlantic - "Keeping schools closed for so long was a mistake, and the Democrats shouldn’t pretend Harris is responsible for opening them," @NancyRomm writes: theatlantic.com/politics/arc…

“Thomas Sowell once said that activism is ‘a way for useless people to feel important, even if the consequences of their activism are counterproductive for those they claim to be helping and damaging to the fabric of society as a whole.’” Can confirm. robkhenderson.substack.com/p…

I thought of this earlier today when I came across a letter written by a reporter at a Portland newspaper, claiming the “publication of mug shots and personal information of people who have been arrested and charged with crimes at protests” was putting the arrestees in danger.

.@mtaibbi links video to what happened in Portland this weekend. THIS HAPPENED ALL THE TIME WHEN I WAS ON THE GROUND! Taibbi is right to write, "It’s time the wider press took more notice, because this is not an aberration with this type of activist" but what took so f*king long?

Congratulations America, we are now run by 8th graders

"A lot of good-hearted leftists and Democrats got bamboozled into thinking this is how you stand up for justice," says @bungarsargon. True. Are we at a watershed moment? I think so.

Me, to female cop: Why are they yelling at you! Cop: I don’t know. They don’t have anything else to do. Female protester to male cop: GO BACK TO QUEENS! You’re fat! Drink a smoothie!

The gleeful vindictiveness of some to the assassination of United Healthcare CEO Thompson - including posting photos of *other* healthcare CEOs - makes me fear how quickly they would rush into the arms of the STASI, and cheer the cold kiss of the guillotine

This, just completed on W 57th, is giving me the jimmy legs

Omg this child. So proud!

Yup

I am going to tell you why violence is going to get worse. All the rational protestors are off doing other things; they got bored setting the same fires and breaking the same windows every night. So who's left? People who want to make a name, the chronically bored, the dickheads

My first piece for Newsweek, on Donald McNeil and the Times succumbing to another mob. A pleasure working with @bungarsargon! newsweek.com/new-york-times-…

Though I’d read Coddling, I did not specifically recall the concept, and I did not, perhaps, both because it’s become the water we swim in, and because whatever defensive posture it once imagined for itself has long since gone on the offensive.

Lest we forget - I never will - that when NYT science reporter Donald McNeil Jr. floated the lab leak theory in 2020, he was drummed out by activist employees who saw accusations of racism as a silver bullet; "screw pursuing the truth, we'll get ours now." yahoo.com/news/senior-us-jou…

If it were true, as the reporter cited, that “one of the people [her paper had interviewed] has since left the state for fear of his safety,” I wondered whether he actually were afraid or whether proclamations of fear was the ante currently required, the dumpster fire you set…

This week, the governor of Oregon, the mayor of Portland, the challenger for his seat, and the police commissioner all went on record stating that violence in Portland is due to police brutality and white supremacists invading the city.

To repeat: Generous, responsible, thoughtful people don't cloak themselves in victimhood, and then try to get others fired. That is all. (May create a keystroke for this to save time.)

Oh my god, fix the effing streets, and clean up the subways, and set up programs to help the many mentally ill people suffering in the open, and DO SOMETHING THAT MATTERS. What is wrong with these people that they so so very much avoid doing actual work?!

People need to stop slurping their rage calories from things that involve them not at all. The woman acted like a jerk, she needs to live with herself and those who will tolerate such occasional behavior; the end. Go take a walk in the sunshine, everyone!

"20 prior arrests." The criminal justice system is broken. You can shout all day at me (you'll have to stand in line!) that I'm a fucking bootlicker. Actually I want violent people, who've repeatedly shown us they are violent, to not be able to slash 11-year-old girls in the head

Feds still have not responded. It will be now

Short version: She was a convicted murderer of a NJ state trooper who fled the US rather after escaping prison. I’d say “Do better, Chicago Teachers Union” but clearly they’re part of the death cult that revels in the murder of the “enemy.” They should be kept away from children

He put on a Frank Sinatra song, "My Way." He stood me in the middle of the room and cued up the song I think eleven times, until I knew all the words. It seemed important to him that I did.

Take that, Bette Midler

.@NYTOpinion asked: Can you show us the 2020 riots in a clear light? With pleasure. And I thank them for asking nytimes.com/2021/11/22/opini…

The only protest-related murder-to-date in Portland was committed by self-proclaimed BLM/antifa dude (he shot a member of a Trump-supporting group). He was not emblematic of even the violent black bloc kids; he was a disturbed person looking for identity. He's dead now too

You can't make it up: At the 1:20 mark, a young pro-Palestine activist screaming at the cops that the only pro-Israeli in a sea of people screaming expletives at him, is the one inciting violence. Dance on, smiley dude

I mean... but seriously, it has to be that they expect an answer, and then... I don't get it

My feature for @reason about Portland's mesmerization with self-destruction - look away from the nihilistic fire, kids! - is online now. Let's talk about it! reason.com/2021/03/22/the-dr…

New Yorkers, my people.

Dishes of buttermints, Readers Digest, ashtrays

My dad came up from practically nothing. His father killed himself when my dad was three. At age four, he was making paper flowers with his mother to help support the two of them.

Second. Drive around this country and you will be ever-astounded by your fellow citizens, their warmth and interests and bigheartedness. Any party that encourages you to hate others has their own agenda xx

"My Phone Says 2023. It Feels Like 1948." Must read piece by @MattiFriedman thefp.com/p/matti-friedman-m…

With untold number of homes in danger, maybe young people are taking a break from saving the world save their family’s possessions. Maybe they’ll become less afraid when called upon to handle that which is unquestionably unsafe.

They lived on Barrow and Commerce, in the West Village. From the age of nine my dad worked (and smoked). He took the tickets, sold the popcorn, swept the floor at the Cherry Lane Theater.

Let’s say you are really good at playing guitar. Maybe not Billy Zoom, but damn good; you know your stuff, you’ve been doing it for years if not decades. Then, as if out of nowhere, you learn that Vice President Kamala Harris really shreds. You learn this from no fewer than six major news outlets on the same day, coincidentally, within 48 hours of Harris becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee for president. This might cause you to wonder why the administration had kept this light under a bushel. But you won’t wonder this because, as a journalist and a regular American, you’ve been repulsed by the conveyor belt of garbage coming out of the White House for months (and, it turns out, years), garbage journalists and regular Americans were expected to dutifully deep throat, about how President Biden was not experiencing cognitive decline, and that to suggest otherwise was “unacceptable and does not live in reality.” If I try very hard, I can squeeze out a drop of admiration for the White House staff. They stayed at their posts, and if this meant feeding the public a steady diet of bullshit sandwiches with the intent of keeping Biden in office, no less sentient, then so be it. But I cannot summon that drop for the journalists conscripted to distribute the sandwiches. They had one job, to be the eyes and ears for the public, and in this they failed. Some of the failure can be traced to a susceptibility to a brain fever inspired by Donald Trump, a fever that told some reporters it was not only okay to act on a set of alt-journalistic principles, it was noble, and if this meant squinting hard enough to see a visibly failing 81-year-old man as the most capable person to lead the nation, they would do it. They had to. Animus for Trump was the power-pack they and the administration had counted on riding to 2028 and, as stinky and rickety as it might be, they could let go only at their own peril. And then on Sunday, in flew a deus ex machina. You can nearly hear the communal heave of relief from those on the political beat. No more proppin’ up ol’ Joe; with Harris, they had a fresh candidate to spit-shine, and I imagine the country’s editors working double-time, trawling for stories that made the vice-president look, if not cuddly, then at least relatable, and didn’t she do some cooking thing a few years ago? Which is how we wound up with multiple national reporters snorting up what crumbs they could from a short-lived “Cooking With Kamala” series on YouTube, in which - spoiler alert - the only item Harris herself cooks to completion is a tuna sandwich.... [Read the rest "When Is a Tuna Sandwich Not a Tuna Sandwich?" on Make More Pie, link in bio]

Have lived, repeatedly, since the age of 10. No man has ever come close to the causticism that women can deal out.

One of the owners, a friend, moved from Portland to Austin a few months ago, one reason being, he was so fed up with what activists were doing to the city. It's not getting better guys. Upcoming story on it all

Dementia, three months apart. I'm not saying the one on the right is mom's best day (she broke her hip in March), or that Biden will decline as rapidly, but it's faster than you think and does not go in reverse.

With my girls ❤️❤️ @KatTimpf and Leah McSweeney

I’m convinced CRT will wind up on the scrap heap of bad ideas, remembered as an assumed panacea, like blood letting, that when administered causes only suffering

The definition of "peaceful protest" grows more and more elastic in Portland. @DAMikeSchmidt is this prosecutable? I ask in all seriousness

WTA > NBA cnn.com/2021/11/18/china/wta…

“Common sense is returning to San Francisco” - live at SF school board recall

The next time you feel bad about yourself, recall that Bernadine Dohrn cheered the stabbing death of 8.5 months pregnant Sharon Tate and, quote, "We instantly adopted as Weather’s salute four fingers held up in the air, invoking the fork left in Sharon Tate’s belly." podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…

"How long would Portland keep falling for the upside-down world? How long before it became clear people must extend a significantly larger amount of empathy to people like Rachael rather than people like her murderer?" New from me. Please share x washingtonexaminer.com/polit…

In case you’re in a bad mood

And about those last: they’re really not scary, made as they are almost always by people who don’t have the stones or the skills to come at you with their complaint, to engage in discussion; they hide inside their anonymity, inside their riot gear.

I don’t know if anyone else has heard, but this is a really good book

…exonerated not by remorse but a public quailing, or an apparent quailing, in the face of repercussions. *Hey, wait a second,* I imagine some people saying. *Publishing someone’s photo and personal information seems a little out of bounds.* I agree.

"I think Hamas should blow the fuck out of Israel," he says. Taken tonight, and sent to me by a PhD student I interviewed earlier today. As the videographer says, "Harvard Square, everyone."

Glory

My latest for @reason on the #PortlandProtests and the deliberate misinformation campaign being waged reason.com/2020/09/04/youre-…

My daughter finds sketchbook of her late dad’s. Includes sketch of me done while he was dying. Miss you Tim

My gosh what a good idea

Comments from people who sent this to me: "Absolute fucking insanity even by Portland standards" "At some point they're gonna do this to the wrong combat vet and get a pretty rude awakening that dressing up like an operator does not, in fact, make you one" oregonlive.com/crime/2021/05…

Christmas Eve dinner, 5-lb boneless ribeye roast. How do I cook it?

Life hack: Don’t renew your subscription to the New Yorker. They’ll keep sending it anyway.

Hoaxsters Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman tried a few weeks ago to get journos to bite on a hilariously bad (if no less potentially career-crashing) sexual assault allegation against Dr. Anthony Fauci. None did. Then I got an email reason.com/2020/05/07/she-sa…

I adore this woman, and @davidafrench is right: "She was brave to take her stand those many years ago, and one thing I know after reading her work and watching the backlash — she remains brave today." The Sliming of Bari Weiss nationalreview.com/2018/03/t…

"We can’t stay somewhere that treats children as an afterthought. We can’t stay somewhere that doesn’t fight for their own kids and the kids of their neighbors. We can’t wait for kids to get their childhood back and just hope for the best." Viva @karol xx foxnews.com/opinion/leaving-…

I have no reason to pile in Markle. But as a baker (and a pretty good homemaker), what's on offer here is awful, the cake is dry, the focaccia thin and pale; she arranges flowers, so what? Is it oxymoronic to expect better? Is Netflix hoping for a hate-watch? That seems rude