Last Best News (https://montana-mint.com/lastbestnews/author/david-crisp/page/16/)
A political candidate in Billings has threatened his opponent with a defamation lawsuit over remarks she made while campaigning for the House District 48 seat she now holds. Jessica Karjala, D-Billings, told the crowd on Monday at the Greater Yellowstone Central Labor Council Labor Day Picnic that she had received a cease-and-desist letter over the weekend from a Billings law firm threatening a lawsuit. (more…) Continue Reading →
Bob Story, executive director of the Montana Taxpayer Association and a former state legislator, has struck back with an op-ed piece taking on claims that income tax cuts passed in 2013 are cutting into school maintenance funding today. Story probably was referring to an opinion piece by educators, but since Last Best News has reported in considerable detail on this topic, allow me to retort. Those old tax cuts matter because gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte has argued that income tax revenues actually increased after the cuts, and he has proposed doubling down by cutting rates even more. (more…) Continue Reading →
The Billings Gazette on Tuesday shut the spigot on the firehose of public comments that had marked its online edition for years. The decision to kill public comments was announced in a Sunday column by Editor Darrell Ehrlick. He gave readers until Tuesday to respond. More than 200 did before the comments section went dark on Tuesday. Ehrlick wrote, “What began as a noble experiment in conversation has been mired in name-calling, epithet and trolling.” He noted that National Public Radio also recently ended reader comments on its website and said that other newspapers are following suit. Continue Reading →
The Greater Yellowstone Central Labor Council Labor Day Picnic follows an unvarying agenda: fried chicken, hamburgers and hot dogs for lunch; a range of free domestic beers ranging from Budweiser to Bud Light; bluegrass music by Jim Southworth and Southbound; inflatables for the kids; and speeches by Democrats. The only difference this year was that an early drizzle and cool temperatures appeared to hold down the size of the crowd. Lunch lines, which sometimes take a half hour or longer to get through, were so short that one line closed altogether at an early hour. But the light rain had stopped and the sun was shining by the time political candidates were given a few minutes each to make their case to union members. As usual, all of the speakers were Democrats, except for Dirk Sandefur, who is running a nonpartisan race for the Montana Supreme Court. Continue Reading →
Learning that San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick had refused to stand for the National Anthem reminded me of the one time I sat down for social justice. Kaepernick said he was protesting oppression of black people in the United States. His NFL employer, perhaps taking into account the liberal politics in Moscow on the Pacific, issued a grown-up statement: “In respecting such American principles as freedom of religion and freedom of expression, we recognize the right of an individual to choose and participate, or not, in our celebration of the national anthem.” It was a brave stand in a league where standing up for America is just good business. A report by U.S. Sens. Continue Reading →
Montana colleges and universities posted mediocre results in Washington Monthly’s annual rankings, which came out Monday. The University of Montana ranked 115th nationally in the overall rankings. It was the only Montana school to make the list, which included more than 300 colleges and universities. In the “Best Bang for the Bucks” listing of colleges in the West, only the University of Montana Western campus in Dillion cracked the top 40. Montana Tech in Butte was listed 49th. Continue Reading →
Programs in wind technology, petroleum engineering and leadership studies could be among ways to improve enrollment and retention at Montana State University Billings, a national expert said here last week. (more…) Continue Reading →
My insect antennae went up as soon as I saw the grade on the political mailer: F.
I give out a lot of B’s and C’s, and the occasional D, but not many F’s. They are usually reserved for students who don’t show up to class, don’t do the work or steal the work of others. So what crimes had Rep. Kelly McCarthy, D-Billings, committed to deserve a grade of F from Americans for Prosperity, the Bozeman-based arm of the political action group funded by the Koch brothers? AFP flunked McCarthy on three issues: He voted for Obamacare expansion, against income tax reform and against school choice. Well, at least McCarthy voted. Continue Reading →
Republican gubernatorial candidate Greg Gianforte has been distributing fliers about Gov. Steve Bullock’s stance on admitting Syrian refugees into Montana. You can see an image from the flier to the left and below. The flier was being distributed statewide just as a refugee family from the Democratic Republic of the Congo was settling in Missoula. We thought Gianforte got the message exactly right but the image wrong. So we updated it for him and posted it above. Continue Reading →
Economics Professor Jack Chambless wrote a piece in Wednesday’s Billings Gazette arguing that Hillary Clinton’s proposal for free college tuition is a bad idea. He could have said, “Nice thought, but we can’t afford it.” Instead, he makes a more complicated case. Here’s his argument: (1) free tuition would create an artificial demand for college classes, forcing universities either to expand or to raise admission standards; (2) inept students would be enticed to attend college; (3) those inept students could have spent their time more profitably with an internship or vocational training; (4) the value of a college degree would be reduced; (5) professors would be stuck teaching “educational welfare recipients”; (6) free stuff is poor stuff; and (7) taxpayers should not be forced to pay to educate the children of others. Whew. That’s a lot of weight for a short column to bear. Continue Reading →
