Further proof that the Mainstream Media is totally reliable and unbiased has emerged.

Today I learned that Forbes Magazine has named Portland, Oregon as one of the best places to visit in America!

Yep. Come to Portland, where you can camp on the sidewalks, visit closed retail establishments, and smoke fentanyl in the streets.

Should you OD, the cops are ready to help with Narcan!

Did they visit Portland 20 years ago and just get around to making their recommendation?

— Calicomoon💐 (@Calicomoon6) May 4, 2023

How on Earth did Forbes compile its list? After all, Portland residents aren’t so happy to be there, so why would anybody go out of their way to visit the place? Other than the easy availability of fentanyl, I mean?

Forbes did exactly what you would expect a self-respecting MSM outlet to do: ask the craziest people in the world what they think.

Portland is one of the best places in the U.S. to travel, according to a recent report from Forbes Magazine.

The business magazine looked to “leading women travel experts and influencers” for their favorite travel destinations to help complete its yearly list of the best American cities to visit.

The unranked list featured a variety of cities coast to coast, from lesser-known escapes to popular urban locales.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler tweeted Wednesday about how the list called Portland “a phoenix rising from the ashes.”

The Rose City made the list thanks to travel writer and blogger Kay Kingsman of The Awkward Traveller.

Kingsman cited Portland’s rep as a foodie city, and how many of its new businesses are LGBTQA+ and BIPOC-owned.

So chances are that they did indeed go to somebody who is drawn to the city by the easy availability of illegal drugs. As for being a “foodie” city? A lot of those businesses are closing down both due to out-of-control crime and the consequent drop in foot traffic.

Another #Portland business is shutting down its downtown location. Coava Coffee says staff "have been on the front line enduring extreme violence & criminal activity on an almost daily basis" for several years now (i.e., since the 2020 BLM-Antifa riots). https://t.co/d7dJU2qwUb

— Andy Ngô 🏳️‍🌈 (@MrAndyNgo) April 11, 2023

It turns out that unwashed, smelly people are not fun to walk around, and dodging their excrement is hardly appetizing. Random assaults by schizophrenic drug addicts add to the atmosphere, but it turns out that such exciting experiences get old after a while.

Far from being a phoenix rising from the ashes, Portland is a total mess and is losing population due to that fact. I personally have family members who have left the city due to its decline, and they are hardly alone.

Thank you @Forbes for naming PDX as a best travel destination!

"Like a phoenix from the ashes, Portland, Oregon is reemerging in 2023 with unprecedented growth in the food and beverage scene, both in quality and variety,” says Kay Kingsman.https://t.co/zKRn6u8aqx

— Mayor Ted Wheeler (@tedwheeler) May 3, 2023

I’m not sure who paid what to whom to get this ringing endorsement, but it reflects absolutely nothing about the reality of the city. Saying Portland is a nice place to visit is like claiming the border is secure. There is no way to justify such an outrageous claim, and to be honest they really don’t justify it.

They just state it flatly, and we are supposed to believe them.

All this happy talk is just that. It may be that Portland will recover, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Welcome to Portland pic.twitter.com/yF6t9cXjfX

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) April 18, 2023

John has written about the “urban doom loop,” where bad conditions beget economic decline and economic decline begets even more bad conditions. As people leave the resources to address the problems become scarcer, and it becomes a death spiral.

He describes the urban doom loop thusly:

• In response to the pandemic, lots of fairly well off white collar workers moved out of city centers and relocated (temporarily) to suburban areas or second homes.

• The need to keep businesses running spawned the widespread adoption of ways to get around people not being in the office, i.e. zoom meetings.

• As people who’d escaped the cities realized they could do their jobs from home for extended periods, a return to the cities became optional. For many, the move to the suburbs became permanent.

• With fewer people working downtown, there was much less need for secondary businesses that were dependent on those workers. Restaurants and shops closed permanently.

• With many fewer people needing to work downtown, the need for public transport collapses.

• As people settle in to working 3 days in the office and two days out, the need for commercial real estate drops. Like the shops that once supported them, many office buildings are partly empty.

• With shops, restaurants and offices partly empty, tax revenue to cities declines dramatically, making it difficult to maintain services.

Add in crime, drug abuse, and homelessness and you get…Portland.

Portland’s great advantage is its location. It is a truly beautiful setting. And as California demonstrates having natural beauty as an asset is a very powerful draw.

But the “cool” factor of Portland is gone, and it was killed by the “cool kids” who think of all the basics that make civilization possible as a massive drag. Law and order, self-restraint, getting a job, and paying bills. Capitalism. None of these things are cool, even if society collapses without them.

So they dispensed with them.

In Portlandia–a show that captured the moment when Portland was cool and attractive–they joked that Portland is where young people go to retire.

That city is irretrievably gone, and that makes me sad in a way. As much as I understood that the dream was stupid and unsustainable, it also was a pretty good dream and it worked for a while. It worked mainly because the backbone of the city–the middle class–still were responsible adults who didn’t follow their own advice. But it was, in fact, a cool place.

Now it is a mess, and not even the most outrageous propaganda efforts by Forbes or anyone else can convince the world that it is coming back.

The propaganda will continue, of course, because otherwise, the doom loop will relentlessly move forward.

Such is life. Once again the simple fact that socialist dreams beget actual nightmares has proven to be true. It is an iron law, like gravity.

And unlike critical theorists, I know gravity exists.