Last Best Blog

This is the weblog page of Last Best News. Here you will find some news, perhaps, but also lots of commentary, opinion and satire. Just so you know.

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Montana, home of the entrepreneur

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The New York Times is reporting today that Montana “leads the nation in business creation.” The Times attributes all the business-creation activity to the Bakken effect: so much money has been flowing out of the oil patch, and so many people have been flooding into the region, that new businesses are being founded to meet new demands. The same study quoted by the Times lists Wyoming as second and North Dakota as third in start-up activity. What the story does not note, for some reason, though the study itself does, is that Montana was first last year as well, and North Dakota was, as it is this year, third. Only Wyoming’s status changed, jumping from sixth place to second. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Bakken, Greg Gianforte, Meadowlark Brewing, Sidney, Travis Peterson

Billings woman mum after telling ABC about Hastert allegations

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I suppose everyone’s heard by now that a Billings woman, Jolene Burdge, has come forward to say that her late brother, Steve Reinboldt, was sexually abused by former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert. I was asked by the Washington Post to speak with Burdge this morning, so I went to her house on Avenue D about 10 a.m. A man who identified himself as Burdge’s husband said she was not granting any more interviews. He said she told ABC News everything she knew as completely and honestly as she could, and that if she talked to other media her story might be “misconstrued.” He also said they have been flooded with interview requests from all over the country, starting this morning at 7. He said of his wife that “God is with her.” Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, ABC News, Dennis Hastert, Jolene Burdge, Steve Reinboldt, U.S. House, Washington Post

Media magazine takes a look at bureau closure

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The Columbia Journalism Review, the premier publication covering American media, posted a story today about what lies ahead, now that Lee Enterprises has closed its Capitol bureau. I spoke twice with the reporter, Corey Hutchins, who told me, as he says in the article: “In discussions about statewide alternatives, the name I heard most often was another former Lee reporter: Ed Kemmick. After a quarter century as a reporter and editor for the Billings Gazette, Kemmick started a website, Last Best News, in early 2014.” This shouldn’t come as a surprise. As I used to like telling people when I worked at the Gazette: “I’m the Sunday columnist for the biggest paper in the fourth-largest state in the most powerful country in the world.” Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Columbia Journalism Review, Lee Enterprises, state bureau

Gazette acknowledges bureau closure, more or less

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In David Crisp’s column this morning, he said he was unable to find any references in any of Montana’s Lee newspapers to the Great Falls Tribune story about the closing of Lee’s Capitol bureau. In David’s defense, he did say he couldn’t find any such reference “as of this writing,” which was Tuesday night. In fact, as I have just belatedly discovered, there are references to the bureau shutdown in the Billings Gazette today. Oddly enough, however, all of them are on the opinion page—guest editorials from Jim Elliott and James Nelson and a letter to the editor from Don and Mary Ann Dunwell. As far as I know, the Lee papers have yet to run a news story on the decision to close the bureau and send their two excellent reporters, Chuck Johnson and Mike Dennison, packing. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Billings Gazette, Chuck johnson, Lee Enterprises, Mike Dennison

Second time’s no charm: Lee papers shutter State Bureau

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The news is out that news coverage in Montana is taking a huge hit. Lee Newspapers is closing its State Bureau in Helena, the Great Falls Tribune has reported, and KXLH TV in Helena has a story that adds some details. Chuck Johnson, who has been covering Montana politics for more than 40 years, will take a buyout and retire. Mike Dennison, who has done the same kind of reporting for almost 25 years, will be taking a buyout while he looks for a new job. I couldn’t reach Johnson, but Dennison told me Lee offered the two veteran reporters continued employment—if they would accept quite substantial pay cuts. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Art Wittich, Chuck johnson, Darrell Erhlick, Gannett, Great Falls Tribune, John Adams, Larry Abramson

Small-town editor takes a big stand in North Dakota

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The Billings Gazette had an interesting story this morning about the small-town North Dakota newspaper editor who recently wrote a column letting his readers know that he was gay. It was a pretty courageous act on the part of Bryce Martin, editor of the Bowman County Pioneer, and with his permission, we are reprinting the column here in its entirety:

There’s so much hate in this world and I don’t understand it. Don’t see it for yourself? Scroll through some national news posts on Facebook and you’re guaranteed to find at least one person who has an opinion that isn’t going to impress you. Most of the time, it’s just scatological ramblings filled with snippets of bigotry aimed at some particular person or group of people, made by people that have nothing better to do. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Bowman County Pioneer, Bryce Martin, North Dakota

This Blackfoot River property is more than eye candy

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Big House

The Wall Street Journal is offering a tantalizing slideshow of a hot property for sale in Western Montana. The nearly 1,200-acre property, with a mile of Blackfoot River frontage, is being sold by Nina and Pat Brock, the former CEO of Brock Candy, referred to by the Journal as the “Gummy Bear Heir.” It’s a pretty spectacular place, but the asking price is $10.5 million. Which is too bad, because if it were only $8 million or so, I’d probably buy it. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Blackfoot River, Brock Candy, Wall Street Journal

All hail the new state dirt

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Close watchers of the legislative process probably knew this already, but I have only just been made aware that Montana now has an official state soil. Scobey soil, the Bozeman Chronicle informs us, is “a deep clay loam that holds water well” and “was selected because of its importance to the state’s wheat production in the Golden Triangle region of north-central Montana.” The dirt on this bill is that it was conceived by fourth-grade students at Longfellow Elementary School in Bozeman. Kristin Sigler, one of the Longfellow teachers who helped prepare the legislation and lobby for its passage, said the fight wasn’t easy. “We had an uphill battle when lawmakers thought this might be a trivial effort,” she said. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Last Best Blog, Longfellow Elementary School, Montana Legislature, Scobey soil