We want owls to return and the sheriff to leave.

Couple of things. I suppose that the same people who are opposed to the LNG terminal will scream price gouging when the cost of natural gas goes up. One of the reasons for high gasoline prices is the lack of refineries in the NW. Of course, that's not the only reason, but it certainly contributes to it.

As far as the sheriff, the people of Multnomah county voted to make the sheriff an elected office instead of appointed as it was under Home Rule. The choices of sheriff by the commission wasn't all that wonderful either. Instead of throwing out the baby with the bathwater, how about waiting and continue to try and get rid of the incompetent Bernie instead of revamping the whole system. It's Bernie that's the problem, not the fact the elected sheriff controls the jail.

All the LNG facilities in the world won't lower gasoline prices in the NW or anywhere else and high NG prices in Clatsop County aren't our greatest concern (I live in Clatsop).

Most of the County is rural and NG isn't even available. Portland metro & suburbs (ntm CA) will receive a much greater benefit from an LNG facility than Clatsop. Why not lobby to put it on the Willamette or better yet, in the SF Bay?

The proposed LNG terminals in Bradwood and Warrenton were determined the best possible sites because federal risk assesment guielines tell us facilities in this region pose the smallest risk of life lost. How you ask? Because of our sparse population. Put simply, an LNG disaster costing a few thousand lives is preferable to 10 or 20k.

This in mind, why the hell would anyone living in Clatsop want an LNG facility in their backyard? For the 60 "living wage" jobs it will produce? For the supposed $7 mil annual boon it will give the county (still a completely anecodotal figure originally stated at $5 mil)? This is all LNG props can offer in exchange for devaluing neighboring properties, threatening various legs of the local tourism industry, destroying large tracts of prime salmon habitat, and of course- putting the lives of thousands of local residents in constant danger. Remember, we live next to the very large and frightfully unstable Cascadia subduction zone (1 issue LNG props refuse to acknowledge).

"DISSENT IS PATRIOTIC" IS ON MY PRIUS BUMPER. FOR TWO AND A HALF YEARS OUR FAMILY HAS SEEN SHERIFF GIUSTO STAND UP WITH HIGH INTEGRITY AND COURAGE TO AN EGREGIOUS DISINFORMATION CAMPAIGN CREATED BY POWER-BROKERS WITH MOTIVATIONS VERY HIDDEN FROM THE PUBLIC. THE CHAIR'S ISSUES ARE NOT DUE TO THE INDIVIDUAL WHO HAS ACTUALLY DONE A SUPERLATIVE JOB OF MANAGING WHAT IS POSSIBLE AS SHERIFF. ASIDE FROM MEAN-GIRL PETTINESS, ISSUES ARE DUE TO INADEQUATE FUNDING TO MEET THE BASIC REQUIREMENTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES THAT WE ALL NEED TO BE MET BY OUR COUNTY LEADERS. RECKLESS FINGER-POINTING HURTS VOTER CONFIDENCE. MY FOUR CHILDREN AND I WOULD BE GRATEFUL FOR RESPECTFUL, MATURE PROBLEM-SOLVING AND CONSCIENTIOUS COOPERATION AMONG ALL OUR COMMUNITY LEADERS, TO PLEASE CULTIVATE TRUST. WE LOVE OREGON. LET'S TAKE GOOD CARE.

Your use of bold and run on sentences might confuse some readers. I'll translate for you:

"I am the fellow you see on the overpass with the cardboard signs. My master theory is that we are all controlled by a being from space named "XorgoX". Evidence of his tampering is most noticeable in local politics. One only has to look"

Ret, a PR firm was hired to agressively discredit Bernie in the media, for reasons most cannot imagine. Those who know where to access the facts, as opposed to the calculated and misrepresented political behavior, see a conscientious, hard-working, very smart professional in Bernie. If you met the exceptional son that he raised, an impressive young professional with substance, I believe you would regret not having better sources of information. Bernie was twice-elected because of his character, competence, and professional dedication.

What are the "reasons most cannot imagine"? And who hired the PR firm?

Lee, I've known Bernie for a long time too and I'm a retired cop. It doesn't take a PR firm to show his incompetency in the sheriff's position. His son may be fine, but Bernie is not only ethically challenged, he simply hasn't been much of a sheriff. The only reason he was reelected was that his only opponet was a drug addicted cop who's only platform was the halt of drug arrests. Get real.

No Republicans running is due to no farm team. When the Democrats hold the top three elected offices in the State, and both houses of the legislature, all the boards, commissions, agencies are headed by appointees, and I will damn well guarantee you that none are conservative, nor Republican. This is a one pary governmet in Oregon, and will be for some time. Business will buy whatever they need from the legislative whores, and the rest will continue gettng screwed as the State job becomes the pearl in the oyster of employment.

I don't think you can blame Republicans for not having candidates. If your experience for the last 20 odd years is pissing in the wind, as a Republican, why stay involved? You do have to know that laws are passed, but they are administered by administrative rules that come from the agency, and those agencies are all headed by and represented by in legal matters, by Democrats serving at the leisure of the Democrat Governor...That is how government works.

There is no longer a loyal opposition to Democrat rule in Oregon, and will not be as long as the voters of the Tri County area control the elections statewide. Measure 49 was defeated on 66% of the land base of Oregon, with 120,000 nay votes. But the 155,000 yea votes from 0.04% of the land base, Multnomah county, was more than enough to win the election statewide. Urban voters telling people how to use their land in Harney county. That is a tyranny that will bring the downfall of the consent of the governed at some point in time.

And I agree that you don't change the structure of government because you elected an ass to office. If enough are put off by his actions or attitude, he will be turned out in due time...oh, is he a Democrat? And entitled Democrat. Sort of a civil service legacy to nepotisim. State police, Governor's driver and body guard, unit commander, all the perks under Democrat governors. Ever notice that Lindsey Ball is sailing a similar course? Governor's driver, and confidant, means you know where the bodies are buried if you can add two and two. So your reward for silence is being upwardly mobile in State employment....Evindently Democrat governors take good care of their minders and enablers.

If you dig deep enough, and through all the names not matching in marriages (political camoflage) you will find a lot of wives, sons, daughters, husbands with good State employment and appointments to boards, commissions, and administrative jobs. The same names keep appearing in different places, time after time. That is the farm team. You control the process, you control the farm team. And from the farm team come candidates for legislative and State offices....Democrats are alive and well, and Republicans are disappearing like spotted owls. Some are displaced by aggressive barred owls (democrats?), and some are bred by barred owls (who hasn't been....by a democrat?). And vastly expanded urban areas and occupation of the land is greatly reducing habitat. Add to that the "let 'er burn" "mother nature at work" enviro phiosophy, endorsed by Democrats, is eliminating habitat forever, on an annual basis....you can't burn it black, kill all the trees, shrubs and annual plants, and have food for the voles and squirrels that owls eat....so the owls leave or starve or both. Haven't you noticed that since Democrats have been in charge, owl numbers have dropped precipitously in Oregon? two plus two equals four.....and I will keep my mouth shut....

Hey Lee,

Does Bernie know who fathered that exception kid? The way he, Neil, Neil's wife and everybody else was sleeping with each other I don't know how you could trace any of their offspring's lineage.

Rumors abound.

Lee, why would a PR firm be needed to discredit a Sheriff alledged to be an accessory to statutory rape? I have a good imagination. Please test it by explaining the reasons.

He was twice-elected before the voters learned of his involement with the Goldschmidt scandal. We had a need to know before those elections. A person of "character" would not run for public office with a secret agenda. There would be no effort to discredit him if he had not run for public office.

DDave, you seem to sincerely want to be an informed voter. Thank you. The history makes honest answers too long and confusing for media to report, or to print here really. My children want me to try. I don't mind sharing, by phone, evidence I have of egregious nonsense (which is also wasting taxpayers' dollars). My family and I continue to suffer retaliation and severe repercussions for doing so. We would much prefer our privacy, but that has not been respected in our public silence. Instead, on principle --- in a climate where many lawyers smell blood and are eager predators --- we increasingly speak out. Our safety depends on it. (Also, anyone can ask questions directly of the Sheriff; he personally responds to all of his emails.) Three of my precious children are daughters, so excuse me for not having fun with sarcasm here. With the far-reaching enmeshments among power-brokers in this town's history, innocent well-intentioned people unwittingly become complicit in many cover-ups. The hired PR gun is an "old crony"; the firm (facing multiple fraud suits, etc.) who hired him 2 1/2 yrs ago were taking advantage of their accomplished founding partner ----- with whom they had been battling for many years and who was overcoming multiple medical issues ----- by creating mean, deliberate fictions around him and the Sheriff, to the detriment of many. The reprehensible disinformation campaign has been exploited widely. (The Sheriff has not been among those with secret agenda.) By stirring up controversy in sensationalized reckless media, shareholders could force their founding partner to resign (which they did this year). Have you noticed how many years we've had the same D.A.? (Did you see the example of corruption in the Duke U. cases?) Domestic violence victims can increase their risks by seeking help from authorities, in my experience. My children are already being told threats that their mother is going to die. I wish the 10-yr statute of limitations did not apply to child rape (as with the Catholic priest cases). No one looking at the facts is calling the Sheriff an accessory at all --- on the contrary. In '04 when State Senator V. Walker gave evidence of old gov's 30-yr-old egregious crimes to that horribly abused child (before that, no police record or any proof was available)to WW (instead of to her boss, the current gov), Bernie was completely cleared when re-appointed to TriMet board. No one grilled the Sheriff about the many rumors more than I have. He is a colorful character, ethnically Italian, and he is also remarkably decent and honorable and a stellar father --- as their well-brought-up child's mother would tell you. (You can ask my father and mother as well.) By the time anyone was hearing rumors, that without proof was slander, the very authorities to whom one would report were the ones circulating the rumors, of even much more than child rape. Timelines get distorted, and the guilty scramble to cover each others backs. I'm almost 53 and remember almost 20 years ago when "that governor" was more celebrated with more sycophants than you can imagine, if you weren't around then (at the time I felt sorry for the children and invisible wife of the philandering creep, as I imagine anyone around them did). These are serious community issues --- unbelievable injustices get concealed. ("Alien theories" make more sense.) And this response is a short version. Back to middle school hmwk...

Lee,

Are you the same Lee Doss that first told investigaters that you and Bernie did NOT go to Seattle together (after you sent your husband to the Betty Ford clinic)? Then, when confronted with your lie, you recanted your lie and admitted the truth. (I read your interview, and Bernie's, Margie's, and Debby Kennedy's).

Did you know that Bernie was sleeping with Margie (while married to Neil) and Debby (while she was sleeping with her boss, Gov Neil)? Is this the same Bernie who you mention above as the "Bernie was twice-elected because of his character."

The revelation that Goldschmidt was raping a 14 yr old was news and a shock to me and everyone else I know at PPB, but not the affair between Mrs. G. and Neil's OSP driver. I heard about that in Portland when it was still going on. The various people that told me might have said Bernie's name, butI didn't know him so I don't recall if they gave it or not. But it was all over law enforcement circles that the governor's OSP driver was sleeping with her. I thought at the time, good grief, if I'm hearing about it, everyone in the world must know! And that this driver must be a real moron if he's not only doing it, but telling people about it! The only surprise as that this didn't come out when he ran for Gresham city council, much less sheriff. 'Course I guess Goldschmidt opened all those cans of worms himself when it came out about him.

Too bad there haven't been any viable sheriff candidates since Noelle got tired of dealing with that disfunctional county commission. KInda laughable that Wheeler thinks he can run the jail. They haven't done much of a job of running the rest of the county.

Lee,

Are you saying your ex-husband has threatened to kill you? After the way Bernie packed him off to rehab, and considering how close you and Bernie have become, wouldn't that be awfully stupid on his part?

Z - Excuse me; you might agree that this method for concerned citizens to communicate is lacking. Anyone who needs to know is welcome to call me. I hope that you all in this tech-savvy generation can improve access to reliable information. (Independent papers have to compete out there, too, you know.) Voters need the truth.

Lee,

There's a thing called a paragraph. Try it sometime.

Anon, if I was another reader of all this, I'd say the same thing (time won't allow me to return to these little comment boxes, or I'd figure out how to show paragraphs for you). It's an example of the political dilemma. Voters get sound-bites. The complex truth is needed to understand the real issues and keep wise citizens involved.

Lee, those are some of your best classic rants. Just as twisted and rambling as they always are.

Maria,

Your characterization based on media is evidence of the problem. Conscientious voters who look to media for information are let down by reckless, sensationalized tabloid nonsense. Please feel free to call me if you want. I care about accountability of public leaders, too.

Drexel, they do appear that way, don't they... I'm sure online comment boxes are not the place for communicating about complex issues. Interesting to see how much these are read, though. Tabloid media is profitable. Stay safe and have a happy holiday season.

Lee, thanks for the sentiment, although you could take less than 750 words to say "leave my boy friend of questionable moral ethics alone."

The Lee Cason Doss ramblings are kind of like watching our own local version of Heather Mills McCartney melting down in a public, pithy and verbose way.

I think you could add verbose and pithy. A bit like our own local Heather Mills McCartney melting down in a very public way.

Lee,

I find it paradoxical that you are so concerned for people to know "the truth" and yet you are not willing to make it public.

If someone has threatened you, why hasn't he been arrested? Last I heard, threatening another person's safety is against the law.