Lars Larson: The Houseless strike back

By Lars Larson,
NW and national radio host,

The anti-social activities of people sympathetically described as “houseless” seem almost too numerous to number:

Drug addiction, fires, fights and violence. Growing numbers of overdoses or criminal assaults that leaves victims in the hospital or in the morgue.

All efforts to solve this problem only seem to lead to more of it. Northwest cities now spend upwards of half a billion dollars a year, counting Seattle and Portland and all the other smaller communities.

Portland has tried to outlaw the illegal daytime camping on public land that threatens schools and parks and neighborhoods and now the so-called “houseless” strike back.

These campers who have rejected the rules of the society they live in and leech from have filed a lawsuit. In simple terms, it says you can’t make people to obey laws they don’t understand.

Do you get that? They understand enough to file a lawsuit and use the laws to claim they’re not bound by any of the laws they don’t want to follow.

Meanwhile, legalized hard drugs in Oregon fuel the addiction that keeps people on the street. Lawmakers refuse to fix that. Drug overdoses fill body bags. Defunded police have rules of engagement that tie their hands, prosecutors won’t prosecute…and the once great cities of the Northwest descend into darkness.