Jesse,

I'm sorry this has been your experience.

As one who works in economic development and helps with business advocacy at many levels, I believe there's a combination of failure on both the side of government and private business.

While it's necessary to call out those who fail to be helpful, it doesn't seem beneficial to me to try and pit business against government. Part of my job is to bridge that gap, and I truly believe it can be done - and Oregon needs that. We all benefit when government and business can find ways to overcome roadblocks and work together for the collective benefit of the entire state.

I too have somehow missed all of the government harassment of businessmen.

When I worked at AcryMed, which used a chemical coating process for medical devices, we had to deal with EPA regulations for the disposal of fluids. We set up processing equipment to filter the fluid to meet federal standards. We were then visited by the local water agency that informed us that the local standards were tighter than federal. Now according to the vocal anti-government crowd this would have been a classic Oregon anti-business attitude. Instead the agency worked with us to find a low-cost easy to implement solution. They were helpful and cooperative.

At the same time I have found similar experiences as Jesse with big corporate vendors or customers.If you read the complaints about government from the anti-government crowd they always talk about regulation, but when they talk about specifics I find myself wondering why they think they have the right to pollute or destroy without any accountability. Would they really want to live in a place that did not have the regulations we have today? Sure some bureaucrats and some regulations are too rigid and need to be modified, but so too do the practices of many big corporations.

Thanks, Jesse.

And let me just post a review right here: The food is good, the drinks are great, the service is fantastic (it helps to know the owner!) and everything is very affordable.

And here's the best thing about The Guild Pub. They may just be starting up, but Jesse's already giving back to the community. I do believe the Guild donated to the Multnomah County Democrats Celsi Dinner. He's also doing happy-hour-all-night nights weekly for veterans, union members, and - as is traditional - service industry folks.

But most of all, the Guild is just a comfortable place to hang out. And given the heavy political audience, it seems there's always somebody you know there.

It's about time Oregon politicos had a place like Cheers!

Jesse - great post and I do hope to stop by this week to check out The Guild.

My all-time favorite bumper sticker is/was "Ma Bell - She's got you by the Calls." -- and it is still timely as it applies to Comcast and Google and others too large to do good by their customers (like the old SNL Exxon ad about being too big to care).

For years (maybe still) my landlord here kept getting a bill for less than 50 cents from Verizon...and he'd keep paying it knowing the mailing and processing by Verizon was costing them more than the wrongful bill...just to get back at them. And he's a die-hard limited government R!

No, no, Jesse, that's not it an all. Oregon is a bad place for business because businesses have to pay taxes here, and that drives them out of the state to wherever businesses go where they don't have to pay any taxes at all. (I'm not sure where that is, exactly, but Somalia is a possibility.) You don't have the proper talking points down AT ALL.

(Besides, what the hell are you doing bringing facts and real-world experience to a discussion about doing business in Oregon? Don't you know that topic is supposed to be a fact-free zone?)

Good luck on your new business, Jesse!

Somebody needs to change the argument from "bad for all business" to "good for the right business." There are businesses that would do better in other states - let them go, no hard feelings. Oregon attracts the kind of business it wants - no need to wring our hands.

About ten years ago or so I had an odd stretch of about a week where I had terrrible customer service from a number of different private businesses, and great customer service from the DMV.

I've actually had quite good experiences from a number of different government agencies. Despite Reagan's bit about the scariest words in the English language, I've found most government employees, like most private employees, want to be helpful.

First: the Guild rocks. I hear Jesse has some guidance on the beer list, and whoever that genius is has done a great job. Second Kari's comment about great service--and I've been there when they didn't know I knew Jesse. Same good service.

Second: one of the biggest lies in politics is the one that says private companies are efficient because of market dictates. Anyone who's worked with a large company over any issue--tech support, customer service, billing changes, etc.--knows what a effing Kafkaesque nightmare it can be. I recently did a switch on my health insurance at Kaiser--we had been covered under a policy from my work and we switched to my wife's. The date of the changeover was Jan 1, but it STILL hasn't gotten changed in Kaiser's massive, bloated system.

Don't tell me about the efficiency of business. Big institutions are almost always inefficient.

Don't even get me started on medical insurance companies.