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Portland is not on fire.

I know because I’m standing in it. Throat raw, eyes burning, not from riot flames, but from federally sanctioned tear gas. A protester presses a water bottle into my hand and gestures toward the invisible demarcation line ahead. A thin strip divides the public sidewalk from federal property, peaceful protest from violent arrests.

The president calls this a war zone. He would have you believe my city is a battlefield smoldering in anarchy and swarming with “terrorists,” “insurrectionists” and “domestic enemies.” Proof, he says, that America’s enemies live within .

But if the subtext for why I am standing here weren’t so chilling, the scene might pas

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