Opinion
What do hunting, huckleberries, honoring our veterans, and accountability for taxpayer money have in common? Two things. The first is that they’re all strongly supported by Montanans. The second is that we’re already well on our way to putting big wins on the board this legislative session that involve all of them. Let’s start with hunting. We recently had the first hearing on a bill that will double the annual cap on money that private landowners can receive for allowing public hunters onto their properties via the Block Management Program. Senate Bill 58 will sustain and improve hunters’ access to many prime hunting grounds located on private property while bene...
Affordable housing shortages. Rising food and childcare costs. Protecting our state constitution. There are a number of pressing issues facing Montanans that our representatives could (and should) be addressing during the 68th Legislative Session, issues that we elected them to handle. Instead, we’re l...
Editor, Our present lives as humans on earth are filled with increasing chaos, confusion, and the development of advanced methods of killing each other. This can surely threaten our continuing human existence on planet earth. There is a clear and empowering answer to all this. It involves the ‘power...
Editor, A recent public relations piece from the ever-ready opportunist Senator Tester announced he introduced legislation to strengthen the border. I want to point out to Senator Tester and his constituents he just voted for the massive Omnibus Bill that set spending records. In that Bill, on Page 753, t...
For this New Year, I splurged during a sale and bought myself a countertop ice maker. I’ve never lived in an apartment with an ice maker built into the freezer. Ever since I left home, I’ve just used those little freezer ice trays, and mostly gone without ice at all because they never fe...
Happy New Year! We are all so excited for 2023 and the wonderful updates and changes it will bring to our building with our renovation project. We hope you are excited as well. We will continue our music in the library series after our renovation is complete. We have several programs scheduled for J...
Who am I supposed to hate, again? For years I taught a graduate class, Identity Conflict, and I would begin the term by noting that trying to list the composite identity elements of any one individual would show that, indeed, we are unique. No two humans share an exact measure of identities. Even twins bi...
I’ve always loved gardening. No, I’m going to take that a step further: I’ve always loved growing things. Growing things - as in flowers, vegetables, friendships, babies and kids, this column, faith, my marriage, knowledge, compassion, kindness and most importantly love. And more, ...
As Montanans, we care for each other. Across the rural-urban divide, generational divide, and Brawl of the Wild divide. Of all our constituents across Montana, the most deserving are our elderly neighbors who are on Medicaid benefits. They have served Montana well, and at this final stage in their lives seek...
Two a.m. Boink! My eyes pop open. It’s Christmas Eve, but it’s not that I just heard Santa wandering through the house. It’s far more banal: gotta use the bathroom. I crawl out of bed, step bare-assed into . . . oh my God . . . a learning experience. Another one! The heat was off. The...
