Victimized businesses shamed for sharing their stories

By Taxpayers Association of Oregon
OregonWatchdog.com

There has been so many victimized businesses stories coming out of Portland that some feel obliged to shut them up to protect Portland’s proud liberal reputation.

The most recent example was Portland’s famous ice-cream shop, Salt and Straw, saying that they may have to move their headquarters out of Portland.   A nearby homeless RV caught fire and took out the electricity for the neighborhood — including their office.  Also, Salt and Straw employees are repeatability harassed, sometimes at knifepoint, by vagrants.    Since sharing her thoughts, owner Kim Malek said “This is hard…I don’t want to throw gasoline on the fire. But our stores have gotten phone calls and threats since I spoke out. And threats to me personally.”

I can’t believe people threatened a business owner for saying her employees were threatened.

Steve Duin noted that a Lewis & Clark Professor shot back at Salt and Straw for complaining, “Can you imagine a corporation that would threaten to leave a city because someone’s home burned down near their headquarters? Instead of offering help, Salt & Straw wants to pack up its waffle cones and flee to the burbs. Enjoy your gated community.”

Then a liberal local newspaper stated, “Many Mercury employees (including myself) have been shot at, tear gassed, and assaulted by law enforcement—all while trying to do our jobs. It hasn’t occurred to me once to move my business “out of state.”

The icy response from the Mercury represents that they do not know that you cannot run a business if you have no electricity or no employees willing to work because they do not wish to be threatened (especially in a labor shortage).

This is the same Mercury newspaper that criticized Columbia Sportswear way back in 2017 for complaining about crime and threats to their employees.  Back then, people protested outside Columbia Sportswear for daring to protect their employees from crime.  Instead of shaming and protesting Columbia Sportswear back in 2017, the liberals should have listened and done something.   Instead, it got worse.  Just weeks ago Columbia Sportswear moved their popular brand Sorel out of Portland.   It has becoming an exercise in failure.

Consider also the Rains PDX store that was forced to close their business.   They had to post a closing sign outside their door defending their decision (see below).  That’s right.  Defending their decision to close from critics.  Their closing note told people that their insurance was not picking up the tab for their 15 different break-ins.  This very excuse that “insurance-companies-pay-for-everything” was used throughout the Portland riots by liberals to downplay attacks on business.

This is the result of many years of a liberal Portland mindset that teaches people that businesses are some form of a necessary evil and that they never pay their fair share.  It is anti-Capitalism at its worse.

(photo: vandalized Portland Starbucks  Two Starbucks closed in Portland over rampant crime)

(photo: Student climate protest this year, students attacked capitalism)

It is also a blow-back to protect the liberal utopia dream in Portland.

Their progressive paradise dream is coming apart and up in flames and the whole world can see it.  For liberal media and liberal college professors to side with victimized businesses would be to admit defeat and that the Portland experiment has failed.  This is just like when people justified Communism as a work in progress so they now justify Portland’s failure as a temporary speed bump on the way to progress.

It is not a speed bump, it is like a road to hell.

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