Last Best News (https://montana-mint.com/lastbestnews/page/41/)
I was planning to ride off into the sunset today, but if I may appropriate an observation by Benjamin Franklin, it looks as though I might be heading in the direction of the rising sun.
In the week since I announced that Last Best News would cease publication today, I have heard so many expressions of interest in reviving it in some shape or form, with or without my continued involvement, that it appears likely that this independent online newspaper will live on.
If there was ever anything that the right and the left could make common cause over, it would be the corporate control of America. It may be the only thing they agree upon, but since they disagree on almost everything else they won’t join hands to accomplish something they both want. They don’t trust each other, either, which doesn’t help. Continue Reading →
I’m still trying to decide who had the worst response to last week’s political scandals — Roy Moore down in Alabama or Troy Downing here in Montana.
Moore is the Republican U.S. Senate candidate who brought the Ten Commandments down from Mount Sinai and presented them to the chosen people of Montgomery, Ala. Continue Reading →
HELENA—This will be the 33rd special legislative session in Montana history and the first called by Gov. Steve Bullock, who took office in 2013.
The most recent special session was a one-day session in September 2007, called by Gov. Brian Schweitzer to replenish the state’s wildfire firefighting fund. Among the tasks of the session next week is to restore money to the firefighting fund. (See related story.) Continue Reading →
Editor’s note: Veteran state political reporter Chuck Johnson will be covering the special legislative session for Last Best News and Missoula Current.
He will be covering his 19th special session out of the 33 special sessions in Montana history. Continue Reading →
In the preface to “The Bible in Spain” by George Borrow, the strangely engrossing book I am now reading, Borrow begins like this:
“It is very seldom that the preface of a work is read; indeed, of late years, most books have been sent into the world without any. I deem it, however, advisable to write a preface, and to this I humbly call the attention of the courteous reader, as its perusal will not a little tend to the proper understanding and appreciation of this volume.” Continue Reading →
Nothing evokes the hazards of theatrical entrepreneurship like introducing the company’s first season with a play called “Doubt.”
But the Yellowstone Repertory Theatre’s maiden production quickly removed all doubt about the quality of its work, if not the sustainability of its venture. “Doubt: A Parable” was performed superbly and suggests high promise for the season to follow. Continue Reading →
In a few short years, Tyson Slocum says, advances in the efficiency of power-storage batteries will have reached the point of making renewable energy “grid-comparable.”
That means the cost of installing and maintaining a small-scale energy generation and storage systems will be on par with the costs of buying energy from a utility company. Continue Reading →
On a mild spring night in 1965, nestled in cots on a screened-in back porch in South Texas, my brother and I started listening on the radio to Houston Astros baseball games. I was 14 and he was 13. Continue Reading →
Bill Cole won a decisive victory in his campaign to be Billings’ next mayor on Tuesday, winning 17,588 votes to Jeff Essmann’s 9,905.
In final, unofficial results Tuesday night, Mike Yakawich and Shaun Brown held onto their City Council seats in Wards 1 and 5, respectively, while Frank Ewalt won in Ward 2, Denise Joy in Ward 3 and Penny Ronning in Ward 4, all by wide margins. Continue Reading →
