In the days since Donald Trump directed his “Secretary of War” to marshal troops against “domestic terrorists” in Portland, encouraging the use of “full force” in a city he likened to a “war zone,” I have been hanging around the demonstration that the president wants to crush. What I’ve found is an atmosphere that is more like a carnival than combat.

By some accounts, this all started back in June, when a group of friends decided to pitch a tent outside an ICE facility in the city. “I was like, ‘Oh, hell yeah! Occupation against deportation! Let it begin, bitches!’” Andy Siebe, who has cropped, caramel-color hair and thin, rounded stumps for teeth, told me when I got to the encampment site, which consists of a heap of cots and tents and medical supplies.

The action, Siebe told me, quickl

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