Portland Mayor. Yes, it's good.

[Q, West Coast Style]

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ss ... onday.html

Portland Mayor Sam Adams acknowledged Monday that he had a sexual relationship with an 18-year-old in summer 2005 and, on the eve of his campaign for the city's highest office, lied about it and urged the young man to lie as well.
Adams said he made a mistake in not admitting the relationship when reporters first asked about it in September 2007. He did not describe the relationship itself as a mistake.

"I should have been honest about what happened, but I was not," he told The Oregonian from Washington, D.C., where he is attending a national mayor's conference and the presidential inauguration. "I apologize."

Adams met Beau Breedlove in April 2005. Breedlove, then 17, was an intern for then-Rep. Kim Thatcher, R-Keizer, at the Oregon Legislature. Adams, 42 and a city commissioner, was in Salem on a lobbying trip. They struck up a conversation, and soon after, Breedlove called Adams hoping for both professional and personal advice on coming out of the closet in the political world.

Breedlove had lunch with Adams and visited his City Hall office, and the pair went out for dinner alone at the Lotus Cardroom & Cafe. In a joking, locker-room manner, aides warned Adams that Breedlove was interested in him romantically. (Even after Breedlove had faded into memory, aides still told Adams to make sure his dates were "older than Beau.")

Adams took a date to Breedlove's 18th birthday party in June 2005 at his parents' home in Salem. Breedlove invited Adams to the family party, both men have said, because he wanted to show his family that it's possible to be gay, happy and successful.

Not long after, Breedlove moved to Hawaii and then Michigan, though he has since returned to Portland.

In fall 2007, as Adams made plans to run for mayor, rumors surfaced that he and Breedlove had a sexual relationship -- and that their liaison began when Breedlove was 17. That's a crime -- misdemeanor sex abuse, contributing to the sexual delinquency of a minor or sexual misconduct, depending on certain details -- under Oregon law.

Back in 2007, Adams and Breedlove both described their relationship as a casual, mentor-and-protege type friendship. Adams and City Commissioner Randy Leonard, a close ally, blamed what they termed a "nasty smear" by Pearl District real-estate developer Robert Ball, another gay man considering a run for mayor.

Adams sent a letter to constituents denying the charges. He held a news conference to refute them and suggested such gossip would scare other gay men from coming out of the closet. Several long-time friends came forward to support Adams' story by detailing how he had supported and mentored them as they struggled to come out.

"I didn't get into public life to allow my instinct to help others to be snuffed out by fear of sleazy misrepresentations or political manipulation," Adams wrote in his letter to Portlanders. "I understand the need for good judgment, and I work very hard to keep within the bounds of propriety -- as I did in this case."

Adams now says that he and Breedlove dated briefly a few weeks after Breedlove turned 18. He said that he knows the law: "I wouldn't get involved with someone under 17. That's illegal. That's just wrong."

Breedlove, via text message, refused an interview request, but Willamette Week reports that in a text message he told that publication: "I can't say anything. I'm sorry. I'm scared. If the story goes to print with me saying anything, I'm worried I will look like a scumbag. If I do say anything, then Sam's fate is in my hands."

The Portland Police Bureau will investigate based on Adam's statements because he said Breedlove was 18 at the time of the sexual relationship, and thus is not admitting a crime, said Officer Cathe Kent , a police spokeswoman.

However, if a complaint was made to the bureau, "we would be willing to look at any evidence that is brought to our attention," Kent said.

When the rumors first surfaced in 2007, Breedlove urged Adams to tell the truth, Adams said. But the new mayor said he did not think Portlanders would believe his version of events, that he and Breedlove were not involved until after his 18th birthday.

So he convinced Breedlove to lie and steered the young man to his political consultant, Mark Wiener. Wiener has acknowledged talking with Breedlove to help polish his responses to the media but said that Breedlove and Adams both denied they were more than friends.

Adams, pushed into his admission this week by new reporting by Willamette Week, said he did not know whether news that he had slept with a man 25 years his junior would have affected the 2008 mayor's race. He won in a landslide, becoming the first openly gay mayor of a top-40 U.S. city.

He said he would not resign.

"I made a mistake," he said. "I apologize to Portlanders for lying to them. And I apologize to Beau for asking him to lie. ... People should and can expect better of me."

[Goober McTuber]

Are there any straight people in Portland?

Beau Breedlove: “Sam, I think you should tell the truth”.

Sam Adams: “Talk to the Wiener”.

[ucantdoitdoggieSTyle2]

Beau Breedlove?


Damn.

I think if the parents had decided upon Cocksnorkler Breedlove dude would have had a better chance at not growing up to be a homo.

[Dinsdale]

Fag Adams is apparently already on a plane home from Washington. His need for damage control is off the charts.

And it would appear the people of Portland are PISSED. Fortunately, I live just "over the border" and am a couple miles outside the city limits, in the land of lower taxes and less ridiculous political do-nothingness. But there appears to be some serious outrage going on. Dude just took office a few days ago, and is already busting off "sorry about all the lies, Portland, but I'll be good now."

Early opinion-polls are running about 3-1 in favor of Fag stepping down (as a side note, becoming mayor increased his status and paycheck, but in the structure of the oddball Portland city government, a city council"man" actually weilds more power than the mayor, to a degree... which is good, since the less chance this tool has to spend money, the better off the area is).



But, I will give Adams some very limited props... I mean, exactly how big of a fuckup does a person have to be to upstage the Messiah today, and make the Inaguration a secondary news story?

[Dinsdale]

Breedlove had lunch with Adams and visited his City Hall office, and the pair went out for dinner alone at the Lotus Cardroom & Cafe.

BTW-the Lotus has been there for decades and decades and decades. And the next time someone walks through the door of the Laid-us with honorable intentions, it will be the first time.

[Q, West Coast Style]

In Oregon, the drinking age is still 21, but in Portland, you only have to be 18 to have a Sam Adams.

[Dinsdale]

Shaping up to be some primo local entertainment (and the national media will probably get a kick out of it, too).

As things are shaping up, apparently a reporter from one of the street rags started digging up some dirt on the story... right up until the point she quit digging up dirt... when she was offered a fat job in the city government, which she openly admits she has no relevant experience nor has any business having the job.


Fag Adams is going to try and fight this. But right now, it looks like the outrage is going to be too much for him to keep his job, which he's had less than 3 weeks.

Frankly, he was a complete fuckupas a council member, and he's upped his game from mere "fuckup" on being elected mayor.


Still, no one gives a fuck that he's gay... but they're sure pissed off about the "yeah, so what, I lied... get over it" he's selling today.


At minimum, this should produce some outstanding jokes.

[Trampis]

On a side note, wait till Barry frees up gays to be gay in the military. How long will it take for the first General/Enlisted manlove scandel to froth to the top?

[Q, West Coast Style]

Sam Adams Brewery should add a new variety . . . Breedlove Bach.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

How many rolls of Bounty has toddowen blown through reading this thread?

over/under is at 6

[Bobby42]

Maybe Portland should be too white after all. I'm recalling the brothers I sent over there.

[smackaholic]

bob, EVERY place should be too white.

[longtimelistener2]

But, I will give Adams some very limited props... I mean, exactly how big of a fuckup does a person have to be to upstage the Messiah today, and make the Inaguration a secondary news story?

RACK!!

Yeah, I thought it was convenient timing.

This certainly helped take the edge off from over-exposure of Obama.

[Goober McTuber]

Sam Adams Brewery should add a new variety . . . Breedlove Bach.

Wouldn’t that be Breedlove Bock?

“Breedlove Bock – it goes down easy”.

[Bobby42]

bob, EVERY place should be too white.

Why don't you open up a jar of peanut butter, spread it on a white cracker and chew it up real good.

[Dinsdale]

This is getting fun.

Sammy has yet to show up for work since this "came out," even though the rest of the city council has been working their asses off all week with the change of "leadership." Add that to his list of "accomplishments" -- willfully not showing up to work when he was able-bodied (how "able-bodied" only Breedlove and a few dozen other teens truly know).


But damn -- this city is known for being extremely "gay-friendly," aka "LGBT-friendly," and now, the live-and-let-live crowd that makes this area so great is really questioning whether they've done the right thing being "gay-friendly." A good percentage of the "gay community" is backing Adams on what's essentially a no questions asked sort of endorsement, the defense being "everyone lies about sexual relationships and has skeletons in their closet."

What they don't seem to acknowledge is that he very clearly violated the City of Portland Code of Ethics For Public Employees... multiple violations.


Then, there's that pesky matter where he hired a local reporter thatwas going to break the story (she of course denies it now) to a cushy city job at double her current salary that she was in no way qualified for... which is a crime 'round these parts.

And since the mayor is MIA, musician Thomas Lauderdale (leader of the very-famous-amongst-the-international-geriatric-crowd Pink Martini), an open gay in his own right (and rumored to dig the young ones, as well), has for some odd reason appointed himself Adam's spokesperson (even though he has one on the city payroll), and says he won't resign.

This is good local shit. Glad I don't live on that side of "the border."

But the gays with the blinders on, who are at best extreme bigots who are labelling anyone who thinks Adams should step down as a "homophobe," have been marching on City Hall in support of Adams. The members of the gay community that aren't hate-filled bigots have joined the ranks of those marching on City Hall demanding that Adams resign, and thosesame level-headed, clear thinking gays are also quite vocal that they believe that Adams has set the gay rights movement in Portland back at least 20 years. They're saying things like "we've spent a lifetime trying to convince people that not all gay men are teen-lusting predatory pedophiles, and now this asshole goes and gives the impression we are."

There's probably going to be some violence in the streets in the next few days, maybe even this afternoon when both groups are planning on hitting the streets at the same time... should be good... and frankly, my money is on the straight people kicking some ass in this matchup, since their offensive strategy doesn't involve men swinging purses.



And in a somewhat, ever-so-slightly-related-story:

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - Two Portland directors have been nominated for Academy Awards - one a little-known documentary journalist, the other a world-famous name.

The lesser known of the two, Irene Taylor Brodsky, was wide awake when the phone rang Thursday at 5:30 a.m. She was rocking her 4-week-old baby to sleep when she realized the Oscar nominees were about to be revealed.

"I thought, 'I bet they posted the results,' she told The Oregonian newspaper. "So I put him in his swing and went to check on Oscar.org. And before I could hit send on the first e-mail, the phone rang."

Taylor Brodsky was nominated for her documentary "The Final Inch," a 38-minute film dealing with the resurgence of polio in the poorest parts of the world. The film hasn't played theaters, but will eventually reach a wide audience on HBO.

Portland's other nominee, Gus Van Sant, told The Oregonian he was asleep when it was revealed that he had been nominated for "Milk," his film about the slain gay-rights leader and politician.

"I had my phone turned off," Van Sant said. "But when I did wake up, I had a lot of text messages and voice mails."

This is Van Sant's second best-director nomination. The first was for the 1997 picture "Good Will Hunting." James Cameron won for "Titanic."

"It's not as interesting as being nominated the first time," he said. "But I don't get too involved in voting-type things. It's a little like a lottery."

"Milk" ended up with eight nominations, among them best picture and best actor. Van Sant said he was particularly happy that costume designer Danny Glicker earned a nomination. "It's unusual for a film set in the 1970s to be up for that award," Van Sant said.

I suppose it's still valid to list Van Sant as a "Portland director" -- although he's one of the gay celebrities that are backing Adams blindly. Combine that with his habit of driving his car around the streets of Portland late at night while he's liquored up, and I'm guessing dude's going to be run out of town pretty soon, and all the awards in the world aren't going to get the majority here to forgive him.

I can't believe how quickly the city, and metro area in general have been so radically divided. It seems like it's about 3-1 in favor of resignation, and I don't think that ratio is much different in the gay community -- those people feel betrayed, for the most part.


But like Blago, he's sticking to his guns and doesn't see the problem... except he does see enough of a problem that he isn't showing up at City Hall, nor has he been all week (although he was in DC monday and tuesday).


The whole "YOU'REA HOMOPHOBE!!!!" thing is cracking me up, though... yeah, it makes sense to label the voting public who elected the guy in a landslide (after he smeared a rival gay (conservative) candidate when he mentioned the inappropriate affair, and ruined the guy's political career with lies and deception before it ever got off the ground). Uhm, they voted for a gay guy, but now they're "homophobes"? Yeah, I don't think so -- they're not "homophobes," you're a "bigot." Lots of black kettle/potse found.


Fun stuff. Hopefully the mayor stays gone, and he can't spend any more money on his horribly corrupt "plans" that make all of his gay buddies rich (like giving them advance warning of where the new light rail lines might be going, so they can go slurp up the still-cheap but now developable land, which there's persistent rumors of him doing).


Throw the bum out. Maybe people will lighten up on the other gay dude (Bob Ball, big local developer) in the new election, and he can impliment his pro-business, anti-green-for-the-sake-of-being-"green" policies... which would be good for the city, rather than Adam's ultra-progressive-if-you're-a-gay-developer-not-named-Bob-Ball agenda.

One of Adam's platform planks was to rid the downtown and central areas of the city of cars. Yup, you read that right -- his goal was to outlaw cars in much of the city, making bicycles and busses the only means of transport -- sounds like sound economics, eh?

[smackaholic]

dins, you and some of your ne'r do well associates need to go stir up some shit. and don't forget to bring a camera with you. and for god's sake, use a good camera with atleast 8X optical zoom and video capabilities.

I don't wanna see some grainy ass cell phone pic of some gay lynching. We already got mstool for that kinda stuff.

[Dinsdale]

Bro, if I didn't have other plans, I WOULD be at City Hall at 5:30.

And any pics I might take would be ripe for "L to R: Douchebag, Stevo, **insert T1B nic**" captions.

[Dinsdale]

It just gets better...

Thomas Lauderdale, the musician who unilaterally appointed himself as Adam's spokesperson, has now come out and admitted that he lied this morning when he said the mayor told him he wouldn't resign, and he was "determined to stay in office." He now admits, just a few hours later, that he never actually spoke with the mayor.


Liars of a feather stick together, I suppose.

[Derron]

Then, there's that pesky matter where he hired a local reporter that was going to break the story (she of course denies it now) to a cushy city job at double her current salary that she was in no way qualified for... which is a crime 'round these parts.

Bullshit.

It's not a crime..it's a fucking standard practice. People go to work in government around here because they know somebody, have the goods on somebody, or have convinced the person hiring them that they are no where competent enough to take the interviewers position. It is not because they are even marginally competent.

There is this practice in school districts of TOSA"S, or teacher on special assignment. This people,mostly dudes, that got caught just short of criminal,and are forever warehoused in the Administration Building doing shit projects until they retire.

Then you have fat sloppy pieces of shit who are City " Economic Development Director"s, who count a gook opening a new C store as family wage jobs.

The right in Lars Larson was having fun with this today..I listened to his show from Redmond ( freezing fog and ice...fuck) to home this afternoon..but they are the true minority in the U & L.

The over under on the fags v the straights today in Portland ?? Maybe a protest and a confrontation, but when the fags see all the fresh meat, its more about the hook up than the protest.

[Dinsdale]

A picture is worth a thousand words (or 10,000 Dinsdale words):





First real encounter with the public since the scandal broke, and he approached it with his usual holier-than-thou attitude.

While he's "determined to stay in office"... he's done. But there's some bullshit rule that there can't be a recall election until he's been in office 6 months... which WILL happen... people are PISSED.

It's getting to be the point in the scandal that people are starting to toss each other under the bus... and the bus tires keep running over his carcass.

The nickname SAMBLA seems to have stuck. Breedlust now admits to a lengthy kiss in the City Hall restroom while he was still 17 (age of consent in Oregon is 18, although for over 16, it's delinquency of a minor, a misdemeanor).


This is an AWESOME soap opera. Last time we had one of those a couple years or so ago, Willamette Week reporter Nigel Jaquiss became the first street-rag reporter to ever win a Pulitzer out of the deal...

and he's going yard on this one, aswell. Not sure about his very opinionated, pointed journalism, but he has quite a talent for making these types of stories play out like soap operas, and keeps the readers rivetted week after week... hence, the Pulitzer. Wouldn't be suprised if he added another Pulitzer to his mantle over this one. Overall, it's a shitty paper, but when they do make any sort of effort not to suck (rare), they can be entertaining.

It's been a while since I've seen this town this fired up over local politics. There's usually only a lot of interest when they're talking about approving a new bike path or bus route.


Good timing, too, since this guy is an avowed enemy of the downtown business district (yeah, that's a "sustainable" city policy) and... automobiles. Dude rides his bike to work from NoPo every day (every day he shows up, anyway)... I wonder if he's changed his tune, since his bike now has a pretty freaking big bullseye painted on it. But his long-term goal was to ban all cars from Downtown Portland... no, seriously. So, hats off to Nigel Jaquiss and Beau Breedlust for stepping up and eventually getting him out of there, before he could hara-kiri Portland into disaster.

I'm pretty sure Amy Ruiz, the reporter who was originally breaking the story for a different (and even shittier) street rag, right up until the point she got offered a fat job by SAMBLA that she was in no way qualified for (chosen over many, many applicants with college degrees relevant to the job -- she had no education, training, or experience to even apply for the job) will be finding a new city/state to live in, too. Things are going to get VERY uncomfortable for her around here, since thatwas probably the most egregious betrayal of public trust and ethics out of the whole deal.



If a person is REALLY bored, hit up www.wweek.com and catch up on the story... it's pretty good real-life soap opera shit, if you're REALLY bored.

[Dinsdale]

Sorry, I meant to type Per Say.

[Q, West Coast Style]

http://gawker.com/5136726/portland-mayo ... -porn-star