Feature

Tipping the scales

A right-wing coup is under way in the nation’s courts, which George W. Bush is stacking with anti-environmental judges, and the impacts on Western conservation issues are not going to be pretty

Editor's Note

In conservation contests, there are no slam dunks

The increasing politicization of the courts is creating a hazardous landscape for conservationists, who need to diligently oppose anti-environmental judges

Dear Friends

Dear friends

HCN’s new book, Give and Take, pulls together our national monument coverage; Brian Erwin is HCN marketing director; corrections and comments

Uncommon Westerners

Solving the puzzle of chronic wasting disease: Veterinarian Beth Williams

Dr. Beth Williams of the University of Wyoming’s State Veterinary Lab is a leading expert in chronic wasting disease who has provided some of the only clear answers to a disease that is ravaging wild deer and elk herds

News

Park Service wilderness in disarray

National Park Service wilderness coordinator Jim Walters resigns in frustration over the agency’s neglect of wilderness, after the superintendent of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks allows helicopters in wilderness areas

Follow-up

President Bush’s budget will cut money for EPA and NOAA, give money for logging; Bush’s budget counts on drilling in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and pushes coalbed methane; Modern Pit Facility decision delayed by nuclear agency; and Department of Hea

Mining may no longer be king of the mountain

Environmentalists are delighted by a new court ruling that says Gale Norton’s Interior Department abdicated its duty when it refused to regulate hard-rock mining

Ethanol takes off in the West

Critics say a new push for producing ethanol from corn is actually a waste of both energy and money

Owens River will finally get its water back

The Lower Owens River in Inyo County, Calif., may finally get its water back from Los Angeles, thanks to a last-minute lawsuit by the state’s attorney general

Salmon get a break from pesticides

U.S. District Judge John Coughenour bans the use of 38 pesticides near streams that host endangered runs of salmon and steelhead in Washington, Oregon and California

No place for pesky nuclear waste

The European-owned company LES wants to produce nuclear fuel near Eunice, N.M., but has yet to come up with a plan for storing the highly toxic, radioactive byproduct

Rollbacks on the range

The Bureau of Land Management plans to revise its Clinton-era grazing regulations, and critics say the changes will let ranchers ride roughshod over the public lands

Book Reviews

Tongue-tied in the Southwest

Ruben Cobos’ new book, A Dictionary of New Mexico and Southern Colorado Spanish, is an entertaining introduction to the unique Spanish dialect spoken in the Southwest

Calendar

Big cats on the block

In The Beast in the Garden, David Baron looks at our changing relationships with predators, focusing on the death of a young Colorado man who was killed by a mountain lion

Essays

Nation's premier environmental group is target of a takeover

The Sierra Club is being targeted by an organized effort to take over its board of directors in the name of animal rightists and anti-immigration activists

Why I'm running: Immigration is the environmental issue

The author explains that he is running for the Sierra Club’s board of directors in order to get the club to tackle the problem of immigration

Heard Around the West

Heard around the West

Utahns vs. moose; mad cow jokes; missile-site home for sale; Rancho Costa Nada; famous trials of lurid cases, like Scott Peterson and Kobe Bryant, don’t always bring money to the towns that host them

Letters

The elephant in the room

Population growth is the problem

Enforce immigration laws now

What does Mormonism have to do with it

Are Mormons really green

Too much Mormon hype

Climbers: Get with it

Related Stories

Jurisdiction shopping made simple

The environmental records of federal judges are briefly examined, including Dee Benson, Don Molloy, Alan Angus McDonald, B. Lynn Winmill, Michael Hogan, Edward Lodge, Clarence Brimmer, James Parker and Sam Haddon

Congress overrules the courts

Even when environmentalists win in the courtroom, Congress can overturn the court’s interpretation of an existing law by passing a new one