Opinion

“It’s beginning to cost a lot like Christmas,” were the lyrics to a cheeky Instagram reel that was recently sent in a back and forth thread between a friend and I. Funny as it was, I’ve long felt that the most wonderful time of the year is cheapened by frantic consumerism. We’re bombarded with messages to rush to this sale and to buy this latest gizmo to the extent that Black Friday has now pushed in some places into Thanksgiving - a day that is all about gratitude and family. Nothing to be bought there. Except turkey and all the fixings of course – which with the price of food these days is nothing to sneeze at. But it’s a holiday that if you ask m...

Catastrophic cuts are in the offing for Medicaid, the nation’s largest single source of health coverage, serving primarily low-income Americans. But catastrophe isn’t inevitable.  For some time, Republican lawmakers and allies in conservative think tanks have formulated plans to shrink Me...

Here’s a rhetorical question for Montanans: would you rather state government spend public money on things like billboards in Chicago to attract more tourists, or use that money to lower your property taxes?  I know exactly how my constituents in the Flathead Valley would answer that question a...

Old things are often valued.  An old house is called mid-century modern. Old cheese is aged. Old furniture is antique. Old dishes are Depression glass. Old cars are classic. And we all know wine only gets better with age.  But old people? They are just old (Or seniors, at best.) So w...

Passing family farms and ranches on to the next generation is challenging, and future changes to federal inheritance tax could make this process even more difficult and expensive. Many Montana producers have had to deal with paying the “death tax” for a business that is simply being passed down t...

Editor, I’m writing this letter to the casinos our Salish and Kootenai Tribes own and operate and concerns their strategies - ways casinos operate. I noticed some unusual conditions about winning and days conducted especially on holidays or any given event. More have won out of state than locals of ...

My journey through grief has been a public one, laid out for you here on these pages. Many of you have walked with me through the healing process, and for that I’m thankful. It’s funny (in a not so funny way) the things that help us heal. For me, much of the healing process has been lead by cr...

As the 69th Montana Legislature gears up to meet this winter, lawmakers are spending time thinking about policies they believe will make the state better. The Montana Transparency Project believes one straightforward option is a law standardizing fees for Right-to-Know requests. While we’ve been ass...

In recent opinion pieces, Evan Barrett, a longtime Democratic consultant, and Mike Jopek, a former Democratic legislator, have repeatedly provided their “simple solution” to our high property taxes in Montana: just lower the residential property tax rate to 0.76%. If it truly was that simple, bot...

Editor, This letter expresses my personal opinion and explanation of where we are as a nation today. This has nothing to do with politics. I know many others feel and express this same view. It all has to do with human nature and how Donald Trump’s negative human nature aspects have enlivened oth...