Note: this essay introduces several feature articles in a special issue about the West’s immigration landscape. Last month, as immigrants and their supporters geared up for the May 1 “Day Without Immigrants,” and the Senate considered another comprehensive immigration bill, an 18-year-old Mexican woman gave birth amid the cactus and mesquite trees of the Arizona […]
The Immigrant’s Trail
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Fishing ban will make us forget salmon
When the Bush administration announced plans to close ocean fishing ofchinook salmon along 700 miles of Southern Oregon and Northern Californiacoastline, many people in my hometown sneered their approval. With the exception of a brief, limited and most probably token fishing season last summer, Idaho’s upper Salmon River basin has been closed to salmon anglers […]
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Puppets on the range
A puppet show just finished a 20-year run in southwest New Mexico. I first attended in 1994, when a magazine sent me to the Gila National Forest to inspect damage grazing had done to habitat of Gila trout, our only endangered inland salmonid. Grazing allotments in the Gila and Aldo Leopold wildernesses had been leased […]
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War protesters never die, they just keep on protesting
The third anniversary of America’s invasion of Iraq was March 19, so I joined a small group of people who met in Riverside Park in Salida, Colo., to state our disagreement with the war. It was a cold and cloudy day, appropriate for the occasion. There were the usual homemade signs. I wore my Army […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Magic Valley Uprising
How an Idaho citizens’ coalition gunned down a dirty power plant — and what it means for the West
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Global warming can give you the chills
It was an odd juxtaposition: As news outlets were reporting last winter about astonishingly frigid conditions in Russia, where nearly 40 deaths had been linked to temperatures as low as 24 degrees below zero, they were also reporting an announcement by climate experts that 2005 was the hottest year worldwide in more than a century. […]
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Wacky California is pragmatic leader of the West
The Interior West has long regarded California as a sort of rich eccentric uncle whose behavior is an embarrassment to the rest of the family. I have some firsthand knowledge of this attitude, because I am a fourth-generation Californian, who moved to rural western Colorado in 1992. The sidelong glances I received from a few […]
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Corn ethanol isn’t all it’s cracked up to be
This was supposed to be a cakewalk, a no-brainer, a slam-dunk. Ethanol from corn lessened our dependence on foreign oil, they told us. It helped our struggling Midwestern farmers. It was much better for the environment. Who could not support this? As it turns out, quite a few of us. Ethanol plants are sprouting like […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Ingredients: History, preservatives
Preserving Western History is “the first college reader to address public history in the American West.” “Public history,” explains the introduction, means history presented outside classrooms. All of us consume public history, by visiting parks, watching TV shows and reading magazines. Behind the scenes, even the most basic presentation of history can involve slicing, dicing, […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
A season of change
At the beginning of winter a few years ago, nature writer Bruce Stutz lay in a hospital bed in New York, recovering from heart surgery. Eight months later, seeking the same renewal that nature experiences each year, Stutz set out on a trek from New York to Alaska to mark the coming of spring — […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Ode to a very hot spot
Despite its sensationalistic cover, John Soennichsen’s book, Live! From Death Valley, is a serious look at this unpredictable corner of California’s Mojave Desert. That’s not to say the author doesn’t have fun with his subject: He dives into the area’s bizarre geological history and its eccentric local characters, and tells plenty of self-deprecating stories about […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
The tide of new generations
“Town Shopping” is a great article, but John forgot to mention geezerdom as the number-one factor affecting his high country experience (HCN, 3/20/06: Town Shopping). You’re getting old, dude, just like the rest of us. Remember when Loveland Pass was the only way to Denver? When Vail was a high-valley cow pasture? When a night […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Is Pombo the kick we need?
Dare I say it: The Endangered Species Act (ESA) has to go. I’m sure many megalopolis developers, real estate cronies and ranchers-without-a-cause would agree with me, though not for the same reasons. The ESA protects habitat for a single species, not the entire ecosystem. This is short-sighted, biased and inappropriate given current ecological understanding. When […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Give Norton some credit
I disagree with Paul Larmer, and think it’s highly unfair to kick Gale Norton in the back of the leg on her way out the door (HCN, 4/03/06: Norton Departs). Norton dealt directly with two of the largest Interior issues in the West during her tenure. You mentioned in passing the Colorado River water issue, […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
The rise of American socialism
Your fine article “Town Shopping” describes “realtors’ rise to power” (HCN, 3/20/06: Town Shopping). That rise to power rests on the rise of American Socialism, in my opinion — the use of government (from the halls of Congress to your county board of commissioners) for personal gain. It’s seen prominently in various targeted benefits to […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Too many people just like Fayhee
At first, I thought your jabs at the real estate profession were mildly amusing. I mean, in a recent issue you had two letters from Paonia realtors taking you to task for some comments you made; you stabbed them back with a cartoon placed smack in between the letters, and not less than two pages […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Gays aren’t going away
Bob Hayward of the Native American Church can be that naive only by choice (HCN, 4/03/06: Keep the closet closed, please). I was first introduced to homosexuality in southern Montana. How it relates to New York intellectuals is beyond me. Mr. Hayward may as well get used to our presence, because we are not going […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Guest farmworkers get a new deal
Foreign workers in the West’s fields and orchards have a new bodyguard: the United Farm Workers of America. Last month, the union signed a contract with Global Horizons, a California-based company that’s one of the country’s largest suppliers of foreign agricultural labor. At peak harvest, the company employs more than 4,000 workers in 28 states, […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
Corporations ask feds to set emissions limits
Last month, executives from six of the country’s largest energy companies made a startling request to federal lawmakers: Set mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions. At an April 4 climate conference held by New Mexico Sens. Pete Domenici, R, and Jeff Bingaman, D, the leaders of Shell, General Electric and others said they would prefer […]
Posted inMay 1, 2006: Magic Valley Uprising
County and Forest Service bury the shovel
A long-running dispute over an infamous dirt road in the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest may be winding down. The Forest Service and Elko County, Nev., are asking a federal judge to approve a settlement over the county’s claim to South Canyon Road in Jarbidge Canyon. Although the agency still refuses to recognize the county’s assertion of […]