Opinion

PRESIDENT TRUMP IS SENDING federal agents into the streets of Portland and has threatened to send them to other cities with Democratic mayors and governors. Confirmed reports from Portland tell of protesters being picked up in unmarked vehicles, taken to the federal courthouse, and held without charges.

WE WANTED HAIRCUTS. Now we want football.

A PART OF RESPONDING to any crisis is having enough good information on which to make decisions—whether you are making those for yourself or others. Let’s add one more list to the various checkoffs from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), employers and others on how to deal with COVID-19: Tools and tips for getting good information about dealing with the virus from sources you trust.

I COULD HAVE WRITTEN this column about no Republican senator yet admitting to including $1.7 billion in their latest coronavirus aid bill for remodeling the Washington D.C. FBI building, long a Trump pet project.

ICONIC RANCHES, FARMS, AND small towns sustain about 3 million Texans—a population larger than the city of Houston’s. The sense of community, plentiful open space, and great quality of life—all found in places like West Texas and the Panhandle—have sustained families for generations. We also power the state’s economy, supplying energy, food and fiber to the world.

WHENEVER THE FIRST AMENDMENT’S 45 words ring out, whenever a voice for justice seizes our attention by using its core freedoms to power our democracy, John Lewis will be there. Lewis, 80, iconic civil right hero, longtime Georgia congressman, pugnacious fighter for voting rights, courageous Freedom Rider and selfdescribed seeker of “good trouble” in the cause of equality, fairness and human rights, died July 17 after months of battling pancreatic cancer.

EXHAUSTED. Overwhelmed.

THE CUTS COME NEXT. The latest news from the Texas comptroller—that the state will have $11.6 billion less to spend in its current budget than lawmakers expected—leads straight to a conversation about which programs and services in the state budget are expendable.

I DON’T KNOW WHO in rural America thinks American democracy is working. Country people who grew up trying their best and playing by the rules have seen jobs go away, schools and post offices close, poverty and addiction encroach into daily life. Though small towns do not live in perpetual despair, more and more I get a sense of, “I plucked my eyebrows and shaved my legs for this?” But maybe democracy is something we can fix.

The chainsaws and wood chipper that Asplundh crews wielded in our quiet community last week were pretty raucous—but they weren’t nearly as loud as the caustic reviews their arboreal expertise earned from homeowners in Canadian, whose trees were unfortunate enough to have grown up under an Xcel power line.