After I published my column Sunday, many readers asked which legislators were responsible for bringing in Matt Trewhella to speak in the Capitol rotunda. (more…) Continue Reading →
Here are the ‘lesser magistrates’ who hosted bizarre sermon
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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.
Recent Posts
Grain bin house makes list of ‘genius’ conversions
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More accolades for Kate Morris’ beautiful grain bin house near Great Falls. Yahoo! Homes put the house, designed by Nich Pancheau, of Collaborative Design Architects in Billings, on its 2014 list of “most genius converted spaces.” Other projects on the list include a coverted monestary in France, a 120-year-old church in London and a laundromat boiler room converted into a tiny guesthouse in San Francisco, so Kate and Nick are in some pretty cool company. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, Collaborative Design Architects, Kate Morris, Nick Pancheau
The origin of the real king of beers
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I feel I just have to draw your attention to this article from The Economist about the origin and growing global reach of India Pale Ale, that hoppy, high-alcohol nectar of the gods. How does this relate to Montana, the purported focus of Last Best News? Well, I was just speculating with a few friends the other day on the origin of IPA—since one of our party had just returned from a Foreign Service stint in India—and we were in Montana at the time of the conversation! In the news biz, that’s what they call the local angle. Also, if any more justification is needed, Montanans are famously fond of craft beer, and Billings is fortunate in having no fewer than seven brew pubs. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, craft beer, India Pale Ale, The Economist
Study confirms it: Montana drivers the worst (or tied, anyway)
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Well, it’s official. Everybody loves to complain how terrible all other drivers are, and one constantly reads and hears the claim that “Billings drivers are the worst,” or, in the alternative, “Montana drivers are the worst.” In a nationwide ranking compiled by CarInsuranceComparison.com, Montana tied with South Carolina as home to the worst drivers. The ranking gave each states points for:
Fatalities rate per 100 million vehicle miles traveled. Failure to obey (percentage of fatal crashes that involved traffic tignals, not wearing seat belts, and driving with an invalid driver license). Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, bad drivers, CarInsuranceComparison, Minnesota, Montana, South Carolina
Turner biographer gives revealing interview
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Last Best News was barely a week old when I ran my review of Todd Wilkinson’s biography of Ted Turner. A year later I find myself thinking of Turner on a regular basis, having learned from Wilkinson, who lives in Bozeman, what a huge variety of important projects Turner is deeply involved in. If I had a Christmas wish for the whole world this year, it would be that Turner has a very, very long life. Whether or not you’ve read the book yet, check out this revealing interview of Wilkinson by Marc Bekoff, a writer and evolutionary biologist. The lengthy interview was published by Psychology Today and touches on many of the most interesting parts of Wilkinson’s book. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, Marc Bekoff, Psychology Today, Ted Turner, Todd Wilkinson
Bakken documentarians post film trailer
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The High Plains Heritage Project, which we have written about before, has a new video up, a seven-minute trailer for the documentary film the project team is planning to release next year. Besides being very well done from an artistic standpoint, the documentary looks as though it will live up to the reporting team’s stated goal of presenting a balanced, nuanced look at the immense changes sweeping the Bakken oil regions of Eastern Montana and North Dakota. In this trailer, there is the good and the bad, the ugly and the beautiful, lots of history and lots of looking ahead, and close-up examinations of what’s happening to the people and the land right now. Elsewhere on the HPHP’s Vimeo page is a link to 10 other short videos that were created in the course of the team’s reporting forays. This is all extremely promising stuff. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, High Plains Heritage Project, the Bakken
New investigative reporting site goes live
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As you can see, our top story this morning came to us via mtvigilante.org, which just went live yesterday—Dec. 12. This is good news for Montanans. The founding editor is Shane Castle, who published the Helena Vigilante, an alternative newspaper in the state capital, for three years before pulling the plug on the print edition this fall in order to work on getting mtvigilante.com up and running. (more…) Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, Helena Vigilante, mtvigilante.com, Shane Castle
VanDyke takes yet another political job
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The Nevada Appeal is reporting that Lawrence VanDyke, who lost a very expensive campaign to unseat Montana Supreme Court Justice Mike Wheat last month, has a new job. He has been named solicitor general for Nevada by that state’s newly elected attorney general, Adam Laxalt. VanDyke held the same position in Texas before Montana Attorney General Tim Fox hired him as his solicitor general. VanDyke worked there for only a year and a half before quitting, and with that very slender experience as a Montana lawyer decided to challenge Wheat. VanDyke attracted a lot of outside money—and it is true that Wheat did as well, in response to what seemed like a blatant attempt by non-Montanans to buy a seat on our highest court—and still got clobbered in the election, which reflects well on the ability of Montana voters to pay attention. Everything VanDyke has done suggests he is exactly the opposite of how he billed himself in his campaign slogan, “Law, Not Politics.” Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, Adam Laxalt, Lawrence VanDyke, Mike Wheat, Montana Supreme Court, Steve Sebelius, Tim Fox
Butte columnist hails hometown hero
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Ever since it was revealed that a certain fellow from Butte fired the shots that killed You Know Who over in You Know Where, there has been a flood of news stories, interviews and commentary about that particular SEAL. Now, I think, we have the definitive word on the subject, written by Bill Foley, a columnist at ButteSports.com. Foley has known You Know Who for most of his life, and has this reflection about their time together in junior high school:
“Like me, he probably wasn’t the coolest guy in the school back then. That is pretty much where our similarity ends. While I was too scared to go to boot camp for the National Guard, You Know Who swam up, in the middle of the night, on a Russian sub in the Persian Gulf. Continue Reading →
Filed under: Last Best Blog, Bill Foley, ButteSports.com, You Know Who
Mercury News profiles Sid Thomas
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Clair Johnson wrote a fine profile of Judge Sidney Thomas last month, a week before he came chief judge of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Today, the San Jose Mercury News ran a profile of Thomas, coming to pretty much the same conclusions as the Montanans who know him well—that Thomas will be a relatively low profile but effective leader for the court. In the words of one of his former law clerks: “There’s no drama. He’s not an ideologically driven person. He really cares about the record; we were deciding cases, not making policy.” Continue Reading →
