What’s the Matter with Oregon?

Look, it’s bad enough that McCain’s intern flack attended our college in our hometown. But what the hell’s going on in Yamhill County?

NEWBERG — Students and campus leaders at George Fox University denounced the hanging of a life-size cardboard cutout of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama on campus, vowing to work together to fight racism and intolerance.

Our first reporting job was in McMinnville, just down the road, and while, yes, we first encountered Libertarians during our time there, the area’s gentle Republicanism never struck us as suffocating. You want nutcases, head down to Medford.

How absurd is this story? George Fox is Quaker. Then again, so was Nixon.

Effigy of Obama alarms George Fox campus [Oregon Live]
Comments

If it’s any comfort, the reaction here is generally horrified and “ow can that happen here?” I ave a couple of friends who work at GF, and everyone was shocked and appalled. Don’t think they saw it coming. Still, Newberg has become the preferred location for the Jesus-loonies, with it’s exceedingly ugly housing developement. There’s some bizarre storefront church on every corner, and a local Jeebus school that no doubt teaches creationism. I prefer to avoid it, and only drive through to get to wineries. Oregon overall is the whitest place I’ve ever lived, but generally not too religious (I’ve lived in Mac 9 months and no one has invited me to church or come to my door proselytizing. Would not happen in Oklahoma or SC).

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