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Legally Beau's age makes all the difference in the world, but as a mom and someone who has worked a lot with troubled teens, Sam's more advanced years, power, authority, contacts, star appeal, and decades of experience as a strategist put him in a completely different league than a 17 OR 18 year-old. No matter how mature the young man may be.

(For heaven's sake, Sam is the MAYOR of the 30th largest city in the U.S. and Beau was a high school student!)

Unfortunately time and circumstances are such that a lot of people were looking to Sam to show the world that sexual behavior is almost incidental to the full identity of gayness. I'm deeply disappointed that Sam's poor judgment and exploitive behavior make the public story all about sex and recruiting young boys; fueling the common heterosexual misconception that pedophilia is somehow related to gayness.

Here's what I want to know: If there was nothing wrong going on, why not tell people you are "entitled to a private life" and be done with it. It's the lying, and the willingness to smear Mr. Ball, and conspiring with Beau to misrepresent what happened that makes me the most mistrustful.

It's how Mayor Adams has conducted himself, and the disrespect he has shown people. Not the least of which are the Citizens of Portland

I have lost faith in Sam.

posted 4 years, 4 months ago
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