I remember the Dean scream very well because I was a young leftist when it happened.
If voter ID fails in Maine this November, I’ll be looking for work outside of Maine. It’s just going to keep getting more expensive and shittier, with fewer opportunities.
Gee, every newspaper in Maine except the digital-only Maine Wire wants to have a system of elections where you can register with absolutely no accompanying documentation, then vote a couple minutes later. And yes, Lewiston’s Sun Journal also just published a staff editorial opposing Voter ID. They were ALL bought out by an actual Soros nonprofit in 2023.
The rallying cry is “Save Absentee Voting”, which will still exist in a perfectly reasonable form if Question 1 is enacted. Like all socialist revolutionaries throughout history, they have to invert reality with euphemisms to not sound bat-shit crazy.
If they had any integrity, they would have campaigned on simply changing Maine’s constitution to allow noncitizens and nonresidents to vote, but they don’t.
I mean it’s a couple dozen people in front of a driveway in a metro of 2.5 million people. That said, if the worst thing in our country was a bit of fisticuffs worthy of making national news, I’d say we’re in a pretty good place.
The police are busy dealing with things like hit and runs and suspicious persons and stuff to worry about this. https://www.pdxpolicelog.com/
If it renders right, this video demonstrates how tiny a place it is. Nothing like “antifa is controlling blocks of the city” or whatever they said in the video. People are blocking a single street in front of a single driveway.
Here’s Google streetview. [Almost] Every photo and video I’ve seen takes place right there. The apartments in the background, the Ohio State memorabilia building, the ICE building, the train tracks, and the storage place with its red “South Waterfront Heated Storage” sign.
This was kind of a weird thing though:
There’s also been some local speculation that the increase in “right wing agitators” is related to the reversal of the court ruling.
From what I understand of the ruling: some of the reasoning for sending in the National Guard hinged on the fact that the Federal Protective Service was overextended and couldn’t handle the situation. But further discovery showed that this isn’t want happened; there was no increase in FPS deployment and the DOJ lawyers misled the judges or something like that.
So there’s speculation that this new wave of deliberate agitation to trigger violence is one attempt to help “prove” the need.
Maybe the picture is of something else, but if it is for “Question 1”…why isn’t the question/topic written at the top of that picture? Although I don’t even need to see the question to know how I would vote just basis that picture. Under no, where it lists the “impressive” list of endorsements….my eyes quickly located “ACLU”, and I was like, “ok, so I definitely do NOT want to choose NO” lol
They’re appealing to people who believe Laurel Libby “doxxed” a minor by sharing newspaper articles about a transgender teen winning first place, of which Maine has had several. Including her name was done for this purpose.
I think every one of those organizations is a 501(c)3 nonprofit, and they are all apparatuses of the Democratic Party funded either directly by tax dollars or by tax dollars laundered through other NGO’s. Some also have large endowments that fund them and other sources of private money, but they all row in the exact same direction when it comes to politics.
I’m assuming the machine will be in full force, rounding up migrants and getting them to the polls to stop this. If it passes, it will be a massive blow to Democrats and likely flip the state red.
It’s tough to say what the real impact will be, since there’s no way to even begin to guess how many illegal migrants are on the voter rolls, especially when the secretary of state won’t let the Federal government examine them.
I personally doubt that, but will give copious credence to your word.
The way I read the locals showing up at this point is that they were waiting to see what, if any, the local and federal response would be. Given that its like zilch, they decided to do it themselves.
I’ve done the same. I was reporting to a cop that a guy walking by had threatened to shoot my dog because she scared him on his daily walk to the crack house down the road. The cop was himming and hawing and telling me why not. So I told him bluntly that he either does his job now, or he’s going to be back later to scrape dead guy off the street.
He opted to do his job. Had he not, I would have.
I’m glad to get the straight dope from someone there though. I really appreciate the perspective you & @twojarslave bring. Much more credible than any “news” outlet. 
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Well, you could get a perspective from any of the “legacy” media outlets in Maine that will paint a much different picture of Lewiston than I do, mostly because they rarely talk about what’s actually happening, doing very little investigative journalism in a government watchdog role, and lots of positive narrative spinning and taking “official statements” at face value.
A good example of this would be listening to actual teachers share safety concerns directly with the schoolboard during public comment, and then the newspaper running a story that covers none of those details and featuring our Superintendent saying that “no violence was observed”, giving the public the idea that things are great in our school district.
You might have a couple hundred people at most who watched those public comments, but 10’s of thousands or more people who will read the newspaper article and many more who will just read the headline and online synopsis.
On the subject of Portland, you’ll see a very different reality than “Our beautiful safe city” in the short graphic if you watch Kevin Dahlgren’s videos. I’ve been following him for a while since Lewiston and Maine have adopted the same “harm reduction” policies as Oregon, and we’re currently experiencing the same hellscape conditions he documents. Conditions that also won’t be covered at any length by our mainstream news in Maine.
As far as what’s going on in front of the ICE building, it looks like Portland PD finally is doing something about it, thus allowing the feds to operate unimpeded or at least less-impeded in Portland.
Why didn’t they do that sooner?
It’s also interesting to check out social media comments on the newspaper’s facebook page, of which there are many and they’re almost all regular people saying the obvious - yes on 1 for voter ID (and no on 2, a red flag law). I literally know nobody in Lewiston who is against voter ID, but its not like I know everyone and its not like social media decides elections.
Still, it’s fun to browse. The vast majority of the comments are Yes on 1, No on 2.
I also doubt it. Didn’t mean to suggest that I shared that view; just sharing that it was out there.
There is a history of pushing back against the judiciary. E.g., “send in the Oregon guard” → “the judge says you can’t” → “ok, so I’ll send in California’s” → “those judges say you can’t” → “ok, so send in Texas’s” → “original judge says you still can’t” → appeals court + Noem visit + “antifa” declared as a terrorist organization + “antifa roundtable” + Insurrection Order talk.
Now that the appeals court is pushing back too, the options are running out.
Attempts to root out “antifa” and its funding haven’t yielded anything of substance. There’s been talk, but no action, or at least nothing that’s been publicly released.
Likewise, footage from the Noem visit didn’t add any credence to the “violent left wing terrorists” claim.
Invoking the Insurrection Act requires something that can be legally argued as an insurrection. Nothing has met that threshold yet. So that’s where it gets into “maybe they’re trying to make that happen?” It’d be awfully petty though.
And the appeals case is pretty weird with what seems to be very questionable behavior:
the record showed a colorable inability to execute federal law. Central to that determination was the majority’s acceptance of defendants’ averments that protests had forced the redeployment of 115 Federal Protection Service officers, “nearly 25% of FPS officers nationwide,” to Portland.
when asked directly whether all 115 officers remained in Portland, counsel stated only that “some” had gone home but “many” remained.
In discovery produced Wednesday night, the government “admitted that 115 FPS officers have never been redeployed to Portland.”
Citing four separate time frames, the discovery showed deployments of 27 troops, 31 troops, 29 troops, and 20 troops in Portland at any given time between the middle of June and end of October.
The original Trump-appointed judge also pointed out she wasn’t a fan of the games:
Based on the conduct of the defendants and now seeing TX National Guard called up, I am going to grant alternative TRO requested. Let me ask plaintiffs—I’d prefer not to modify original TRO, but I am troubled to hear of CA and TX NG being sent to OR, in apparent violation of my order
So, who knows at this point. I’d like to see this all just fade away into distant memory.
This guy?
In court, Dahlgren admitted that he “made up identities and wrote the made-up names on receipts” and did so “with the intent to deceive.”
I’m honestly not shocked at all that he was corrupt in that role, as that’s what I’ve observed here in Lewiston’s “harm reduction” community. Only one agency called Spurwink has operated without a trace of funny business, merely following the guidelines laid out by the government.
Our main player was The Church of Safe Injection, whose building was recently condemned (pictures above) after burning through at least $300,000 in public money (probably closer to $500,000) with no accounting of how they spent it. They’ve never actually filed a detailed tax return, only 990N’s. They were definitely running a flophouse and the people in charge were definitely using themselves. The first two leaders died from their religion.
That said, the charges don’t exactly discredit him as a source of information when he plainly shows the reality on the ground, seemingly without any use of AI or other deceptive methods to make it into anything other than what it is.
It’s the same thing I see in downtown Lewiston and what you can find in all kinds of unexpected places if you walk the trails around town, which I don’t do nearly as often due to the needle hazards posed to my dog. Especially around fall when so many leaves can cover them.
The walking dead zombie apocalypse started up roughly the same time our frequent shootouts in the street began. Lewiston has always had a few homeless characters around town, but almost everyone knew Punk ICE back in the day and he wasn’t nodding off in public, shitting on the sidewalks, or getting high in the park under a tarp.
That dude was out picking up bottles and scavenging.
I actually know everyone in this article. The author is a fan of my writing and the musician was a regular at the bar I bounced at.
While I’m on the topic of reality vs perception depending on who you listen to, a non-Mainer transplant from Connecticut has declared his candidacy for a house seat representing Lewiston in Augusta. He’s the son of Maine’s largest newspaper’s editor, a man who consistently editorializes in support of radical Democratic policies with mental gymnastics that are consistently ridiculous.
Anyway, his son is getting into Lewiston politics, which really favors people who have minimal connection to Lewiston rushing into town and winning office over the locals. This guy actually attended Bates College, so he has more connection than our mayor, who rolled in from Arizona, set up a business that would be very conducive to money laundering, then got right into politics and became our Mayor.
Majerus-Collins presents a completely inverted view of reality, consistent with what his father tries to do in his newspaper editor job. Homeboy actually says he feels totally safe in downtown Lewiston, which makes him either a fool or a liar.
He got completely roasted in the comments by actual locals for this attack on Bobby Charles, who is absolutely correct about Mills failing to help Lewiston’s violence problem.
I don’t know that Keirnan has ever trained martial arts and I’m positive he’s nowhere near as strong as I am, and I can say with 100 percent certainty that downtown Lewiston is NOT a safe place to walk around at night. It used to be, but you will 100 percent have dangerous, unstable people approach you. In my case, it’s often hookers (even if I’m just in my car on the rare occasions I go downtown, they still assume I’m “prowling” for them) along with dope dealers. I’m not exactly a prime target for victimization, but people get victimized every single night in Lewiston. When it is the addicts being victimized, it rarely makes any news headlines. Our news media often only reports on stuff when social media buzz has already clued people into what happened, like a 30 round exchange at 3pm that is too well-known to ignore. Routine gunfire is now just that, routine, and doesn’t always make the news when it would have been one of the biggest stories of the year if it happened 15 years ago.
I guarantee you this dude would not spend an evening walking up and down the tree streets, record his interactions, and then post it to prove his bullshit narrative about the city he’s here to leech from.
There’s only one reality, but Maine Democrats want you to believe what they tell you, believe in "their truth”, not your lying eyes.
Soy overload
I’d never heard of the guy before you brought him up.
And I agree that those charges don’t exactly discredit him.
However, it is surprising how many people trust the content coming from people who have a documented history of misrepresenting the truth. E.g., the DOJ lawyers above, or Kevin Dahlgren admitting “intent to deceive” in court, or videos of Nick Sortor pushing a woman and getting arrested for it while documenting the “violent left”, etc.
Politics aside, I don’t think these are the best sources. Outside of a few people, the other sources don’t have these strikes against them.
Now, I certainly understand the “these are the minority opinions, so they’re the ones revealing what’s really happening” sentiment, but that’s not much different than exclusively listening to Pavel Tsatsouline for training advice because he trained the Spetsnaz. The problem’s not the sources themselves, it’s the selective exclusion of the majority sources too.
Yes, there are homeless people in Portland, there are many who have easy access to drugs, commit property crimes, camp on the sidewalks, under bridges and squat in abandoned property. That’s not something I’ve seen much of, to that degree, in those ways, outside of the west coast. (My experience has been Portland, Seattle, San Diego and San Francisco.)
Is there corruption and misreporting from the [many many, here] nonprofits involved in various assistance efforts – of course there is. Is it disproportionately higher than religious or other nonprofits? I doubt it. I’m condemning both, not saying “it’s ok because they do it too”.
Is it something that affects most people’s lives in the city, or requires notable behavior changes to avoid? No, it’s not. Of the hundred+ parks and playgrounds I’ve taken my kids to, there’s only 2 that it’s been an issue… and those issues no longer exist today. The city took care of it.
There’s millions of people here, and hundreds of miles of paths, trails, roads. There may be 1% that are as bad as his videos show, but the other 99% is still “our beautiful safe city”.
If all you’re looking at is the 1%, yeah, of course it’s going to look like what you’re looking at. But you have to really go out of your way for that to be your experience. Videos unfortunately make it easy to do that. Negative things get disproportionately documented.
I don’t want you to interpret that as me saying “it’s not a problem”. It certainly is.
Here’s a fairly representative example of Portland’s downtown areas from the perspective of an ebike.
A few tents, some graffiti, especially in the more industrial areas and away from the streets.
Or another.
Your first video doesn’t really bolster your case, given that the narrator obviously avoids some kind of off-screen dysfunction in the second minute of the video.
I could make a really long video about Lewiston that makes the whole town look great, as long as I stayed away from places that aren’t. A lot more places fit that bill nowadays.
I’m not sure how long that stuff has gone on in such volume in Portland, but the present levels of public dysfunction are still quite new to Lewiston.
That’s why this was a pretty good representation of the city. The first video especially captures many of the “bad” areas of the city. It starts at the main protest grounds for the George Floyd riots, travels down along Naito parkway where the addicts left needles near the bike paths, passes the homeless shelters near Voodoo donut at 2nd and Burnside, heads to the southeast industrial area covered in graffiti, then under the bridges that had many tent cities, along the river by OMSI where there’s tents in the parks, etc.
If anything this video is biased to make Portland look worse than most people’s experiences.
The other main factor for our differences in opinion may just be scale. The Portland metro is 2.5 million people and Lewiston-Auburn is 111 thousand. Alternatively Lewiston has 38k people and Portland city has 635k.
It seems to me that the basic idea here in Maine, according to Maine Democrats, is that we in Lewiston should accept these conditions as the new normal, and move on from there, while continuing to fund their various nonprofits and policy ideas.
Would you say that’s accurate in Portland?
Actually, I wouldn’t. The lowest I’d seen it was during Covid and then lower during the BLM riots in the middle of that. They had even implemented a 9PM curfew for all businesses. People were unhappy all around and didn’t like that “normal”. Since then things have continued to reverse course steadily, both in subjective experience and in terms of crime statistics.
Well, that’s good for Portland, but the Democrats’ policy ideas here in Lewiston don’t seem to be playing out in the pubic interest. All while they tell us that we should retain the present system of elections that has no process security whatsoever that could prevent or detect a noncitizen or a nonresident voter. Right after the city was pumped full of migrants in a very short time frame.
It seems a little fishy when taken as a whole, if you ask me.
