From the outside – and even for many in the West – the West’s politics are usually seen as swaths of unbroken primary colors. The coast is blue (which in today’s color coding means Democratic) and the interior is Republican red, dotted here and there with liberal bastions such as Aspen, Boulder and Santa Fe. […]
Primer 1: Politics
Posted inArticles
Mining reform has one foot in the door
For only the second time in 136 years, Congress is nearly unanimous in its call to update the 19th century law that still governs the country’s metal ore mining. “There’s a pretty broad sentiment in both parties and both houses that the mining law of 1872 needs to be reformed,” says Luke Popovich of the […]
Posted inWotr
Hank, the non-cow dog
A story in my local Montana paper, the Missoulian, described the growing problem of family pets harassing wildlife and livestock. It seems that the expansion of urban life into the wild is taking its toll on deer, elk, cattle and all kinds of burrowing creatures. The story really hit home as my dog Hank, aka […]
Posted inWotr
Bombing away in Socorro, New Mexico
Folks living in Socorro, in remote, central New Mexico, are regularly jolted by the sounds of car bombs and calculated cave-ins. It’s all cooked up by the Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center, a division of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, known here simply as “Tech.” “Energetic materials” refers to anything that […]
Posted inWotr
Lake Powell’s sandstone walls speak after 232 years
Across the Southwest, Native Americans, explorers, miners, settlers and Mormon pioneers have left dozens of inscriptions on rock walls. Now, a rare historical marking has been authenticated on one of the canyon cliffs that surround Lake Powell in Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. The inscription was carved when the United States was only six months […]
Posted inArticles
The fur is flying
Michael Moss’ 64-acre goat ranch sits on the edge of BLM land in southwestern Oregon. It’s “healthy cougar country,” he says, and he’d like it to stay that way. That’s not something you’d expect to hear from most livestock owners, but Moss is a member of Goat Ranchers of Oregon, a group that advocates smart […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Unnatural Preservation
In the age of global warming, public-land managers face a stark choice: They can let national parks and other wildlands lose their most cherished wildlife. Or they can become gardeners and zookeepers.
Posted inWotr
Running the gantlet of Homeland Security
Albuquerque’s international airport, dubbed The Sunport, ranks as one of the smaller and friendlier airports around. That’s important for Westerners like me. Since traveling became an uncertain business, being met by “our” people behind the counter, in shops and at the gate, goes a long way to ease nervousness for infrequent flyers. This is particularly […]
Posted inWotr
It’s time to call the gas industry’s bluff
There’s been a steep falloff in friendly chitchat around the local gas pumps, and no wonder. With diesel at $3.40 a gallon and gasoline only somewhat cheaper, it’s common to see someone drop $100 on a tankfull. A typical American family will spend more than $3,000 on liquid fuels this year, and another two grand […]
Posted inWotr
Here’s a new way to think about Black History
Every February, the contributions of black Americans are recognized during Black History Month. Since I’m black and work for the Bureau of Land Management, a mostly white federal agency, I appreciate that. But I also have a complaint: Why has its observance become so predictable? By now, I am sure that everybody knows that black […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Heard around the West
UTAH Jim Stiles, publisher of the Canyon Country Zephyr in Moab, has been called cynical, chronically ticked off, dour and – more kindly perhaps – curmudgeonly. He is greatly annoyed by the Lycra-clad bicyclists that invade his part of the world, and he’d like the rip-’em-up crowd of ATV and four-wheel-drivers to take a hike. […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Standing outside, late, in a charcoal forest
When my bladder provokes me out of the cabin, the Montana night is deep. The door closes behind me. I step down two stairs to the frozen, scoured ground. It is warm and breezy. The wind sounds like river current moving among the black stalks of tree trunks. An acrid hint of fire is in […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Die with me
“Indians must either fall in with the march of civilization and progress,” wrote Major James McLaughlin, military director of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation, in 1889, “or be crushed by the passage of the multitude.” More than a century later, three writers uncomfortably assess that prediction, and find that Native Americans have indeed fallen into […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Time to call the gas industry’s bluff
There’s been a steep falloff in friendly chit-chat around the local gas pumps, and no wonder. With diesel at $3.40 a gallon and gasoline only somewhat cheaper, it’s common to see someone drop $100 on a tankful. The Pump N Pay is as glum as a morgue. A typical American family will spend more than […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
A bad idea hits the gas pumps
A quiet invasion is under way near my home in Colorado. Inconspicuous black stickers are appearing on gas pumps to announce the arrival of a new molecule looking to occupy gas tanks. It goes by the name of C2H5OH – ethanol. Typically, my consumption of ethanol is strictly oral, in the form of alcoholic beverages. […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Outen the lights
I am glad to know someone with the Park Service is concerned about preserving the night sky (HCN, 12/10/07). My husband and I have sat on the edge of Bryce Canyon as well as Mesa Verde, both rims of the Grand Canyon and Zion at night enjoying the starlit sky and seeing the Milky Way, […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Fight the good fight
Thank you, Jim Detterline, for your fight against arbitrary and capricious workplace rules, and thank you High Country News for reporting Jim’s story (HCN, 12/10/07). Two of the kids you are fighting for are my daughters, 7 and 10, both of whom were born hard of hearing. Both love being outdoors; the 7-year-old is already […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Standing up for catron county
Though we ourselves are not in the wolf recovery area, we have quite a few long-standing friends in Catron County (HCN, 12/24/07). So even though wolves haven’t eaten my dogs in my yard, or killed my horse in my corral, or stalked my children while waiting for the school bus, I have followed the issue […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Ah, diversity …
High Country News could devote an entire issue to examining the cultural diversity of the West. Or, as you did, print just three of the responses to “Last Chance for the Lobo” (HCN, 1/21/08). The two letters from Reserve, N.M., remind me of the quote, “It is better to remain silent and be thought a […]
Posted inFebruary 4, 2008: Unnatural Preservation
Limit one per household, please
That Somali’s tie may be straight (and he’s lucky to get into the U.S. from such a Godforsaken country); but he has eight kids (HCN, 1/21/08)! In an overpopulated world and country, this constitutes gross environmental irresponsibility. Every time I read about somebody with such an enormous family, I get mad. Besides the “green” movement, […]