Help me find the Portland anarchists

PORTLAND, ORE. — I’ve been on the front lines of the protests here, searching for the “radical-left anarchists” who President Donald Trump says are on Portland streets each evening.

I thought I’d found one: a man who for weeks leapt into the fray and has been shot four times with impact munitions yet keeps coming back. I figured he must be a crazed anarchist.

But no, he turned out to be Dr. Bryan Wolf, a radiologist who wears his white doctor’s jacket and carries a sign with a red cross and the words “humanitarian aid.” He pleads with federal forces not to shoot or gas protesters.

And then they shoot. Wolf, an assistant professor at Oregon Health Sciences University, helps at a medic stand operated by volunteers from the medical school.

Could they be radical-left anarchists? No, they’ve imposed order on the anarchy of the street by establishing qualifications for field medics and a hierarchy among them, so that any badly injured protester will immediately get the right kind of care.

Accomplishing all this while tear gas is swirling and impact munitions are whizzing by, without even asking for insurance cards — that seems the opposite of what fanatical anarchists might do.

Tear-gassed mayor

Maybe the rioting anarchists were in front of the crowd? I found musicians and activists and technicians. Oh, wait, there was a man using angry language about the federal “occupation” and calling it “abhorrent.” Lots of protesters don’t seem to like him, so could he be a crazed anarchist rioter?

Oops, no, that’s just Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler, sputtering after being teargassed by the feds.

OK, I’ll fess up: Sure there are anarchists and antifa activists in the Portland protests, just as there are radiologists and electricians, lawyers and mechanics. Report on the ground here and any single narrative feels too simplistic.

The protesters aren’t all peaceful, nor are they primarily violent. They’re a complicated weave, differing by time of day.

In the evening, the throngs are entirely peaceful, listening to speeches and the authorities do not intervene. Then, as if following a script, about 11 p.m. some protesters begin to shoot fireworks or set small trash fires.

Provocateurs are found in both the streets and the White House.

We see dueling narratives. One is Trump’s, and it portrays Portland and other cities with protests against police brutality as teetering on the abyss and requiring his Lincolnesque hand to hold America together. The other is — well, shall we call it reality? Yes, there’s violence and vandalism, as well as opportunistic looting, and it’ll be a challenge to manage it, but local officials are much better placed to do so than the White House.

I’m against all violent attacks on officers, and I worry that Trump’s provocations are succeeding in seeding violence.

Every time angry progressives burn a building down, they win votes for Trump.

That’s what this is about: politics. The big threat in Portland and across America is not anarchists but COVID19, so Trump welcomes street clashes to change the subject.