Dear HCN, Hal Walter is all wet. I’ve packed with llamas an average of 300 miles, 65 miles per week at elevations averaging 12,000 feet, each summer since 1985. The average weight carried per llama during the week has been 90 pounds. When my llamas want to crap or pee at a creek crossing I […]
Kudos for llamas
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
A poet writes of pride and shame
Dear HCN, I wish to thank my detractors, who have flailed away at me and my poem, Advice for visitors to Rock Springs (HCN, 9/16/96). One accused me of being full of shit. Darn it, it’s probably true, and may be the main reason I write at all. I’m glad HCN liked the poem enough […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
One issue unites us
Dear HCN, I’m a bit puzzled by your article on “Earth First! The Next Generation” (HCN, 9/2/96). It’s not the first of its kind I’ve read this year but I continue to wonder what all the fuss is about. Could it be the unexpected appearance of consistency among a group of people generally portrayed as […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Yellowstone land swap stinks
Dear HCN, High-powered environmentalists, stealthily working behind the scenes, have persuaded President Clinton to support a $65 million land exchange that will rescue Yellowstone National Park from the proposed New World Mine (HCN, 9/2/96). I wish I could be pleased by this news, but I am not. Like many Americans, I consider the mining proposal […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Utah ranch to remain whole
The historic Dugout Ranch bordering Canyonlands National Park in southeast Utah will be purchased by The Nature Conservancy to prevent its possible development into recreational properties. The Conservancy has a one-year option on the ranch and will need to raise $4.62 million in the next year to complete the transaction. The ranch, northwest of Monticello, […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Boise braces for floods
Sandbags may have replaced mountain bikes as the “in” thing for Boise residents this fall. Forty thousand sandbags were recently snapped up by homeowners and businesses after the city’s public works department offered them to the public to ward off possible floods and mud slides this winter. City officials say an August fire that denuded […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Elk target tourists
It’s time to watch your step in Yellowstone National Park. Aggressive herds of rutting elk have taken over park headquarters at Mammoth Hot Springs, as they do every year at this time, and two women tourists narrowly escaped injury at the hands – make that horns – of sexually aroused bulls. The first incident occurred […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Desperate wolves
Four wolves in Montana’s Sawtooth pack that were shot in September for killing livestock may have been starving and frantic to feed their 14 pups. All the wolves had badly maimed paws, says Bob Ream, a biologist at the University of Montana. “The federal trapper who shot the wolves told me that three of four […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
What happens when “True Grit” meets “Easy Rider’
Utopian Vistas: The Mabel Dodge Luhan House and the American Counterculture by Lois Palken Rudnick, 1996, University of New Mexico Press, 416 pages, $35. Lois Palken Rudnick’s Utopian Vistas is almost enough to send me back to my native New York. But it’s probably too late. After more than two decades here, I’m unlikely to […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Montana Native: Who Cares?
In bold, black letters the bumperstickers declare: Montana Native. I spot them as I drive and, like the chiggers of my native Virginia, they make me itch. For the naive observer, the message must seem benign, a mere statement of birthplace pride. But for an increasingly wary transplant like me, it conveys something more sinister […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Heard around the West
The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation may be in terminal decline, but its spirit lives on over at the Federal Highway Administration. The FHA recently rebuilt Highway 9, from Murray, Idaho, to Thompson Falls, Mont., and the new road is so high and so water-resistant that during wet periods it backs water into Murray, population 63, […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Custom and culture’s worst enemy speaks
The West is certainly changing, but cultural beliefs rather than economic facts tend to dominate our dialogue. Because those beliefs are tied to a vision of a good society rooted in stereotypes of a simpler, less-corrupted-by-evil America, I see them as a type of economic fundamentalism. Consider these characteristics: Worshipping at the rearview mirror. Economic […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Wise-users try to whip up a recipe for their own salvation
Casper, Wyo. – Utah House Speaker Melvin Brown tells the audience that he doesn’t want to end the evening on a negative note. But he does want to make you “mad enough to come back tomorrow recommitted.” To get their blood pumping, Brown conjures up an enemy – Thomas Michael Power – a University of […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
The body politic may edge to the left
WASHINGTON, D.C. – If only they had as much imagination as gamblers, politicians here could be singing the lament of Harry the Horse and Nicely Nicely in “Guys and Dolls”: “Where’s the action? Where’s the game? Gotta have the game or we’ll die from shame.” There’s supposed to be a game going on here. The […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Public-lands issues loom large in November
Note: This article is a sidebar to a feature story. A hot election issue this year in Wyoming is the fate of the state’s 3.6 million-acre school trust lands, which generate money for the public school system. The Legislature approved the sale of some 35,000 acres in 1995, despite well-attended protests. Primary results show little […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Indian gamblers target green lawmakers
Note: This article is a sidebar to a feature story. It’s not sagebrush rebels who have environmentalists and their candidates on the run in New Mexico this election – it’s Native American gambling interests. Angered by the state Legislature’s refusal to sign gaming compacts, some tribes have thrown considerable resources into campaigns to defeat key […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
A green state could return to its roots
Note: This article is a sidebar to a feature story. With the possibility of winning another U.S. Senate seat and four out of five House seats, no other state in the West holds greater promise for Democrats than Oregon. Democrats won an early victory in the state last January, when Ron Wyden defeated Republican Gordon […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Moderates may gain in most conservative state
Note: This article is a sidebar to a feature story. The Idaho Legislature – considered the most conservative assembly in the West – probably won’t change too dramatically this election. Democrats are hoping to double their seats, but even if they do, they’ll still hold barely a third of the Senate and less than half […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Brown air could lead to greener state politics
Note: This article is a sidebar to a feature story. Even though Republican Gov. Fife Symington is facing a trial next March for bank fraud, Arizona Republicans say they don’t anticipate a backlash in the upcoming elections. Of the six U.S. House seats now held by Republicans, only the 6th District seat is competitive. Republicans […]
Posted inOctober 14, 1996: Greens prune their message to win the West's voters
Nevada: Who hates nuclear waste most?
Nevada’s two congressional districts seem a lot like Mutt and Jeff: Covering two-tenths of 1 percent of the state’s land mass but containing half its population, the 1st Congressional District encompasses Las Vegas. The other 99.8 percent of the state is the 2nd Congressional District. In a tight race for the Las Vegas seat are […]