News you can use
News you can use
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Ahhh, the third week in April, the days are noticeably longer, the birds of summer are returning and their primarily nocturnal enemy, the cat, is spending more nighttime hours outside. Spring is in the air. But I’m pre-obsessing over the coming sleep deprivation. The longer daylight days are my only unhealthy relationship. I love that the sunlight burns away the cold and dark of winter, but so do the birds. They sing songs about it … all the time. That combination of light and...
I hate to make sweeping pronouncements about “This is what’s wrong with society … ,” but I see a deeply rooted problem with what I’ll call a modern language disconnect — people not using language others understand, people not putting in the effort to understand the words they are hearing and that old flimflam classic of using words in ways they weren’t intended in order to create confusion, perhaps act in malice. As an example of the first of these, I give you the Eurasian...
Matt Rosendale has a long history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. He has told Montanan’s how much he values and supports protecting public lands, supports Montana farmers, ranchers and agriculture, supports our veterans, wants to improve health care and wants to promote fiscal responsibility. However, his actions tell a different story. Rosendale’s relationship with the Wilks Brothers not only extends to the fact that he earns income from the Wilks brothers by leasing out two of his oil wells, then receives fin...
One hopeful sign for the future of the American experiment is the fact that a lot of people are actually coming up with better government ideas. Last year, Alaska adopted a suite of electoral reforms, including open primaries, and ranked choice, final four voting. Similar plans, at local and state level, are in the works elsewhere around the country. No doubt change is wanted. On a good day the congressional approval rating rises to 20 percent. Congressional accomplishments? We can always count on Congress to vote more money...
Yesterday the four of us women who are here on the rancho went to Oconahua to share pot luck with Ana and Michelle, and to meet Michelle’s sister Janice. My neighbor Janet and I have been to their home several times. This was the first for Kathy and Crinny, so it was really special for them to see the lovely and incredible stone house that Ana and Michelle built over 11 years. We each introduced ourselves to Janice, me being last in line. “Hi, Janice. I’m so delighted to me...
Over the years, the Havre Public School District Board of Trustees has made some major decisions regarding the future of education in our community. Topics that have no historical precedent to rely on such as mask mandates, quarantine guidelines, online school capabilities, and the request from teachers to move from a traditional five-day schedule to a four-day school week, have brought an unprecedented level of decision-making expectations and public scrutiny to our trustees. Now, one of the greatest opportunities that...
“Dress for the job you want!” was advice I heard from an early age. I took this advice to heart. I was working a lowly job in a government office while applying for jobs in businesses around town. I had never worked in business, but I had a freshly minted business degree, so I bought some suits and, every day, I showed up for my job (answering the same boring questions on the telephone) dressed for the job I wanted rather than the one I had. The day I got the call for an int...
Fifty years ago I was unbelievably blessed to be the research staff for the Declaration of Rights Committee of the Montana Constitutional Convention. As we approach the 50th Anniversary, I must give a solemn nod to the recent passing of two giants: Bill of Rights Committee Chairman Wade Dahood and Committee member Bob Campbell, primary reasons Montana has such a spectacular document. They had a lot of help, from committee members Chet Blaylock, Dorothy Eck, George James, Don Foster, Marshall Murray and Lyle Monroe as well as...
A lot of people were relieved when Twitter parried Elon Musk's takeover grab, and are now worried about what happens next because free speech radical Musk seemed about to invite Donald Trump to start tweeting again. Should the one-time tweeter in chief get his Twitter account back? For democracy to work, every citizen has to get a chance to put up a soapbox on the town square ( now called Twitter), including former presidents whose social media opus, even before Jan. 6, 2021, was vituperative, repetitive, assertive of the thi...
Unfortunately, I have friends stuck in a spite fight. As is often the case, one party is bewildered while the other party is self-righteously sticking pins in voodoo dolls, metaphorically speaking. I’m the onlooker. There is nothing I can do but watch it unfold. I feel sad. I know about spite. And I know who spite hurts. Not so much the intended victim, who often is unaware. My first clear and vivid memory of my own spiteful action occurred when I was five or six years old. M...
This past week, I was invited to the North Star School to speak about voting and the importance of open elections. North Star School is holding class elections and students wanted to learn more about state and local elections. Thanks to Rhett Wolery and Kaine Berardinelli for the personal invite and opportunity for me to share about my participation in both local and state elections as a county commissioner for 18 years and as a senator in Montana Legislature. I like to start...
Of course, we should have known something was wrong. The nice thing about living in our new condo is that we don’t have the responsibilities of a stand-alone home. There is no yard to rake, no snow to shovel. There is someone at the front desk who will take in our mail and even water our plants. We were so pleased that we could leave for an extended trip to Mexico without these worries. But then, we got a notice from our electric company that indicated our electric bill was v...
Research recently revealed that the drought we are experiencing in the West is the most severe and prolonged drought in 1,200 years. This megadrought directly affects the ski industry: less precipitation means less snow (which was painfully clear this winter). Our snowpack is of particular importance, not only because it makes for better skiing, but also because it is our water storage. In the spring, snowmelt refills our lakes and reservoirs, irrigates our pastures, and keeps river levels up and temperatures cool enough to...
Know the consequences before signing the petition to put CI-121 on the November ballot. At face value, CI-121 and freezing your residential property taxes may sound like a good idea. But if you further investigate the details of this misleading ballot initiative, you will find several adverse consequences. What is CI-121? It is a ballot initiative proposing a constitutional amendment that would freeze residential property value at the 2019 level and changes the assessed value to the acquisition value when purchased. This...
I just didn’t imagine myself saying this, but some lines in the sand might be worth drawing. Mind you, I’m not talking about breaking laws, or bucking society, or compromising principles, or shirking responsibilities, or bending the rules — or even throwing myself on a sword or dyin’ on a hill. Sure you could do those things with your little line in the sand. The line represents a border between either and or, this and that, one or the other. Maybe the line is one you won’t c...
Americans have vital choices to make. Failure to make choices before voting is not an option. Some people are trying to limit your access to the poll and invalidate your ballot. For example, Texas’s new state law permitted nearly 270,000 ballots destroyed. We need to redouble efforts to help everyone to vote. If many of us fail to vote, then by default we may push our society towards living in a right-wing political cultist environment. There we will have to accept big lies and endure a country fraught with tension, fear, a...
Hello, my name is Tina Louise Salazar, and I am running for the office of Clerk and Recorder. I’m originally from Texas and my education and experience make me the best person for the office of clerk and recorder. I’ve always considered running for office, but it wasn’t until I became a resident in Havre, Montana, that I decided to run. When I arrived in Havre, I was worried that people wouldn’t be friendly or that I’d never feel part of a community like I did in Texas, but I was wrong. The people that I have met here are...
The plan was to buy everyone cake. My husband, Peter, and I are finally getting ready to leave Mexico, and we can’t say we are too happy about it. The last two months in San Miguel de Allende have convinced us that it is a place we want to return to, and now leaving it feels very hard — especially when my sister tells me about the freezing rain hitting her home right now. “We had to cancel our trip to visit Uncle Andy and Bea!” she tells me. “The roads were terrible!...
Remember those words from long ago? I glance at tee-shirts on computer side-bar ads, and see that phrases from when I was young and innocent, or at least oblivious, our phrases are making a comeback. So go with the flow even if you’ve no idea what it means. I remember during a particularly tough few years when my mantra (I didn’t know the word mantra back then) was “acceptance is the answer to all my problems today.” I thought if I said it often enough the words would magical...
In the space of a few days I’ve transformed from a hermit grub to social butterfly. It all began when John and Carol invited me to please, please, please join them for a lunch before they headed off into the sunrise back to Minnesota. I had turned down numerous such invitations during these last months, just not comfortable being out in the greater community. When you come to visit we will take you to spend an afternoon walking the grounds of the Hacienda del Carmen, a b...
One of the benefits of the modern foodie fascination for people like me is that we can just keep throwing ingredients together with abandon, but now we can attach professional-sounding terms to it and all of a sudden our haphazard cooking process is legit. When you make chicken something out of whatever you found in the fridge, it’s more eater-friendly to say the meal is “based on a traditional dish from the Oaxaca region of Mexico,” rather than “It’s kind of Mexican ....
“A child said, What is the grass? ….................................... “Growing among black folks as among white, “Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, “I give them the same, I receive them the same.” Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass Recent expert panels point to voter suppression efforts, legislative bodies that don't bother that much with the issues that concern citizens, and rancid partisan politics as “flaws” in American democracy. Each of our major parties agrees that the other party has become an existential thr...
I have a weakness for grouchy people. I have a couple of friends I would describe as perpetually grouchy, and I’m not quite sure why, but I think they are good for me. To clarify, I’m not fond of being around people who are in the habit of deliberately messing up their lives. I think everyone has known at least one person like this, and it’s hard to watch. I see the train coming down the tracks. I hope my friend will alter course. I try not to be too bossy as I suggest it mi...
What if, when you wake up from the coma, the hospital people are having one of those political differences of opinion? Medical Person One:“So Mr, Rawn, could you tell us who is president?” Me: “That's an easy one: Joe Biden.” Medical Person One: “Stop the steal! The real president is Donald Trump!” Me: “Well, things have been kind of hazy ever since the asteroid fell on me, so if you say so.” Medical Person Two: “Actually, Mr. Rawn was technically correct the first time, but in reality Joe is just a place holder while Kama...
In 2021, a state audit of the Montana Public Service Commission revealed “several situations indicative of an unhealthy organizational culture and ineffective leadership, including certain commissioners overriding department controls.” They added, “We believe this culture limited management personnel’s ability to enforce compliance with state and department policy.” Put differently, at a taxpayer funded agency, there was a complete failure of integrity that created an environment ripe for fraud. Being incompetent is bad, b...
