I find this sort of thing commonly on the web, and it troubles me. The ignorance and arrogance in the blogging world about "real journalism," whatever that is, strikes me as one of the least attractive aspects of this new medium. You can find my comments somewhere near the bottom of the linked post.

Ed Kemmick makes a good case for the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, but I have to admit -- dare I? -- that the argument is lost on me. I waded through "The Hobbit" in high school because I was dating a girl who thought I should, and what she thought I should do meant a lot in those days. I then bravely started the trilogy but abandoned it about the time the girl abandoned me. That fantasy world was not a place I wanted to inhabit.

I've never been sure why. I don't read much genre fiction, but I enjoy a good science fiction story and like detective stories boiled so hard they break your teeth. The surrealists stimulate me, and the magical realists delight me. I even read a romance novel once just to say I did. I would willingly read another, if public execution was the only alternative. But sentence me to read a fantasy novel, and I would ask for the hemlock. After what seemed like the 150th time Gandalf miraculously bailed out the hapless Hobbits, I realized that I had absolutely no desire to read about the 151st.

Same with the movies. I went to see the first of the trilogy at the buck theater, found it gorgeous and fully realized, and then I fell fast asleep somewhere in the first hour. Later, when I saw chunks of the film on HBO, I realized that I had totally missed long sequences, including the climactic fall of Gandalf near the end. I must have slept a long time. Since I tend to snore, I'm sure it was an enlightening experience for my fellow moviegoers, like having an orc in the next seat.

I waited for HBO to see the second film. Again, it was visually dazzling, grand in scope and brilliantly executed. I was engrossed. Then, about an hour into it, I realized that I had totally lost track of what was going on, cared nothing about any of the characters -- and was getting very, very sleepy. I went to bed.

I've rejected whole bodies of popular culture without a twinge of conscience, from Britney Spears to James Bond. That isn't always fair, but the sheer volume of popular entertainment is so massive that one has no choice but to make arbitrary decisions about what to see and what to avoid.

But I've always felt a bit guilty, even at fault, for failing to enjoy Tolkien. No doubt the trilogy is an important contribution to world literature. No doubt I will never figure out why.

Maybe it was the girl.

Former Billings resident Robert Struckman, writing in the Missoula Independent for Writers on the Range (but apparently not available on the web) has mixed feelings about Starbucks' "assault on Montana." He also ventures into other aspects of chain ownership: "Some corporate chains can bring a net gain to a community. You can crucify me for saying so, but Barnes & Noble Booksellers was a tremendous addition to Billings. The city had no large bookstores. It probably increased by a factor of 10 the number of titles on sale there."

There's truth, of course, that Billings had no large independent bookstores. What bothers me about Barnes & Noble is that now I suspect Billings never will.

This new report by the Property and Environment Research Center in Bozeman argues that the way to salvage the salmon fishery in the Northwest is to adopt practices used by Northwest Indian tribes.

Here's why we need labor unions. (Thanks to Jackie Corr for the link.)

Montana MUsIngs has a link to this interesting article in the New York Times. It appears that the easy standing ovation is no provincial aberration after all.

Jim Larson of the Outpost staff has started his own blog. Check out what Dick Cheney is saying.

John Clayton has thoughts on the bad-check discussion that went on somewhere down below on this blog. He also gives well deserved praise to a recent Harper's article by Bill McKibben on small businesses surviving in a big bad Wal-Mart world.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob Brown just announced a plan to use the Permanent Coal Tax Trust that might actually work: He proposes using coal tax revenues to match federal dollars for highways, water systems and other projects. Obtaining federal matches would bring $600 million to Montana over the next 10 years, compared to $65 million the money would otherwise earn in interest, he says.

The $688 million already in the fund would not be touched, Brown said.

A two-thirds vote of the Legislature would be required to put the plan up for public vote, he said. If the Legislature turns the idea down, he said he would work for a voter initiative to get the plan on the ballot.

UPDATE: Here's the response from Laurel Republican Ken Miller: “The best thing we can do to grow the economy in Montana is to allow Montanans to keep more of their hard earned dollars. If the coal severance revenues were used to lower taxes to employers and employees directly, then I would consider that a better use of the dollars. If they are diverted just to grow government spending, that would be a very unfortunate mistake.

"Many proposals to spend the coal trust have come and gone with little success. It seems to me we would be better served by a Governor that put the time and effort into finding and implementing 5 or 10 percent efficiencies in Government programs, without eliminating critical services. Inventing new ways to spend tax money is short sighted. We need leadership that thinks generational.”

U.S. News has released a detailed story following a five-month investigation of the Bush administration's extraordinary penchant for secrecy. Nut graph: "For the past three years, the Bush administration has quietly but efficiently dropped a shroud of secrecy across many critical operations of the federal government--cloaking its own affairs from scrutiny and removing from the public domain important information on health, safety, and environmental matters. The result has been a reversal of a decades-long trend of openness in government while making increasing amounts of information unavailable to the taxpayers who pay for its collection and analysis."

Not only has the Bush administration classifed as many documents in two years as Clinton did in his last four, Bush also has made it easier to reclassify documents so that information once public has gone behind the shroud again.

Just wondering: "Shattered Glass," the movie about Stephen Glass' journalistic fabrications at The New Republic, has been out for seven weeks now and still no sign of it in Billings. True, it's done lousy at the box office, but critics raved about it. Shouldn't us journalist types get at least one week to revel in Schadenfreude over a colleague gone wrong?

I don't usually think of Billings as a cultural backwater (how could a guy who has lived in College Station, Texas, ever think that?) but it is discouraging to look at the critical ratings on Rotten Tomatoes. At least nine other current movies that have gotten favorable ratings of 80 percent or better have never played in Billings, and most of them never will (although some have played elsewhere in Montana). It isn't that there aren't good movies out there, dear reader, it's just that we don't get to see them.

UPDATE: "Shattered Glass" has made it to Missoula, but the Independent hated it.

Wolfgang von Eitzen, the German citizen and former Billings resident whom immigration authorities were busy separating from his American family while foreign terrorists were learning to steer airplanes, sent along a packet of stories from the German press about the United States and the war in Iraq.

I'm about halfway through the packet, and it is fascinating stuff. If nothing else, it redefines concepts of what constitutes liberal bias in the media. As others have noted, what passes for liberal in this country would be firmly in the conservative camp in much of Europe. In general, the German press appears to view Bush and Iraq this way: He was a pampered child, fond of "Cowboy-terminologie," who never had a serious idea and never gave a flip about Iraq until he was "gekidnappt" by neoconservatives. Now he's gone from being a big talker to a supplicant for help from the United Nations to bail out a failed effort in nation building. As the editor of Stern, a popular German news magazine, put it, Germans should give Bush no money and no soldiers but rather some advice: Listen to your allies and don't view the Security Council as a self-service store.

In a withering critique of Bush, Stern asks, "How could it have come about that a politician who after the attacks of Sept. 11 had won the support of the entire world has become only two years later the most hated man on the planet?"

If there's a bright side, it may be that Stern doesn't seem to blame Americans themselves for the nation's sorry relations ("worst in history," Stern maintains) with the rest of the world. It blames Bush.

It all reminded me of the chuckle I got the other day when a caller to Sean Hannity's radio show announced, as if it were a fresh discovery he wished to share with the world, that people in other countries don't think like we do. It was a shocker, but he had an explanation: "They don't use reason." If only it were so simple.

UPDATE: I forgot to mention the most interesting quote, which I have not seen anywhere in the American media. According to Stern, Bush told three senators during a meeting in the White House in March 2002, "Fuck Saddam. Wir stuerzen ihn." The last part means, "We'll destroy him" or, "We'll take him down." The first part means the president was really annoyed at Mr. Hussein.

Outpost staffer Jim Larson sends a link to this story, which poses the question: "How much of what left and right think about each other is real, and to what extent are they railing against, and defending, Platonic ideals -- ideals so far removed from reality that they have ceased to be useful?"
His answer is a bit too reasonable for my tastes: He argues that the red and blue states aren't as different as politicos would have us believe. I prefer an iffier proposition: That conservatives and liberals have long since met in the middle and are now charging past each other in opposite directions. Thus we have conservatives who favor increased spending (as long as its for the military, energy companies and timber interests), huge budget deficits, preemptive wars and social engineering, which liberals rail about deficits, federal overreaching into private and state concerns and keeping the troops at home.

Clark Johnson, now the Bozeman city manager, will take over as Sen. Conrad Burns' chief of staff on Jan. 1. He will replace Will Brooke, who is leaving to manage the Bush-Cheney campaign in Montana and to return to his Bozeman law practice.
Johnson was born in Butte and raised in Billings. He is a Montana State University graduate and has been Bozeman city manager since 1997.

Yellowstone County Commissioner Jim Reno wants to discuss turning over the county's troubled Public Defender's Office to state jurisdiction. He writes: "From my vantage point, I see many reasons to transfer the obligation to the State of Montana: 1. There may be a savings to Yellowstone County taxpayers. As we have come to know only so well, the state chooses not to reimburse Yellowstone County for all costs associated with running the department. 2. Most counties no longer provide this service. To my knowledge there are less than 6 counties (and the number is decreasing) that still have PDO as a county responsibility. 3. State assumption of the PDO will help insure a more uniform indigent defendants system across the state. 4. More involvement with the private attorneys. In most parts of the state, private attorneys provide indigent defense via contracts with the State."

While Conrad Burns fulminates about new snowmobile rules (see below), the state's Travel Montana division is putting the best possible face on the situation.

Now it's Brian Schweitzer firing off cannons. In a news release, he admonishes the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad to "start acting like a partner not a lord."
"The cozy relations between Montana political leaders and the railroad have led BNSF to think they can gouge Montana farmers," the release says. "Recent news reports state that former Governor Marc Racicot has been paid huge payments and received 4,400 shares in BNSF stock options as a board member of BNSF and Governor Martz received a $50,000 boost from BNSF when they paid for political ads attacking her opponent in her gubernatorial bid."
Calling BNSF one of the worst examples of consumer gouging he has encountered, Schweitzer says, "Montana is not a colony to be exploited by the puppet masters at BNSF headquarters in Fort Worth, Texas."
Wanna bet?

Lie of the Day: A billboard on Montana Avenue reads "Montana gets tough on DUI."

This in the Too Late for the Outpost category: Elks Lodge 394 in Billings will host a reception to honor soldiers returning from Iraq at 7 p.m. Monday, Dec. 22, at 934 Lewis Ave. Special guests are Adam Olivias and Alex Leonard. Music is by Marc Anthony Roman.

The invaluable Jackie Corr sends along this delicious link to a Drudge Report item saying that Bill O'Reilly's sales figures on his new book are vastly overstated. O'Reilly's response: "You can't believe a word that Matt Drudge says." Which actually is true, but it reminds me of a call that O'Reilly took one day from a woman who said that his book ranked No. 15 on the best-seller list rather than No. 1, as he had been claiming. O'Reilly called her a liar and hung up. I guess you can't believe a word that radio talk-show callers say either, but she sure didn't sound like a liar.

No big surprise here, but Brian Schweitzer just got the endorsement for governor of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners.

Sen. Conrad Burns has fired full-bore at the federal judge who vacated a decision allowing snowmobiles into Yellowstone Park this winter. Among other things, the senator says in a letter to Secretary of Interior Gale Norton that Judge Emmet Sullivan's decision is "completely insupportable," "cruel," "outrageous and offensive," "does not follow the law, is not balanced, and is gratuitously unfair," and "does not offer a balanced assessment of the facts." Of the judge himself, the senator says he "completely overstepped his bounds," is guilty of "judicial arrogance masquerading as law," and "shares the values of the environmentalist plaintiffs who despise the recreational choices of average Americans and who look to the courts, rather than the political branches, for their legislation."

No word on what the senator really thought.

South Dakota Politics notes that The New Republic has called for at least threatening to strip Democratic renegade Max Baucus of his Finance Committee seat.

I happened to be halfway through a story in Harper's magazine about the Slobodan Milosevic trial when news broke that Saddam Hussein had been captured. Milosevic's trial at The Hague started in February and is expected to last for a couple of more years. His is one of about 100 cases before the International Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Terrory of the Former Yugoslavia. Altogether, the cases are expected to keep the Tribunal busy until 2012.

Thoughts from the author, Guy Lesser, about bringing Saddam before a similar tribunal: "The several years of both direct and indirect preparation involved in, for example, marshaling adequate admissible evidence and finding witnesses is but one issue. Others include whose notion of a 'fair' trial will prevail, and whether the trial is to deal with almost twenty-five years of International Humanitarian Law and human-rights abuses or ought to be a brief proceeding limited in its scope. If the latter, victims' families are certain to raise passionate objections. A trial of broad scope, on the other hand, would undoubtedly drag on for several years. And it is quite easy to imagine that much would be made of active U.S. support of Hussein's regime during the conflict with Iran, that the 'legality' of the United States invasion would be vigorously contested by the defendant(s), and that every effort possible would be made to play to the region's anti-American audience, portraying Hussein as both a martyr struggling to defend Islam from the West and something of a pawn, turned upon and betrayed by his former ally, the United States. Doubtless, too, some attempt would be made not only to portray the current Bush agenda for the Middle East in a sinister light but also to implicate the United States during the period prior to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, perhaps even in the role of an accomplice that supplied and trained Hussein's armed forces while turning a blind eye to IHL crimes they were fully aware of and might have done something to prevent."

Just got offered a chance to teach a German class this spring. That will mean even less blogging than usual, except for the occasional beer-drinking song.

UPDATE: In München steht ein Hofbräu Haus …

Time to move to Klein: Just got official word that Starbucks is opening two Billings stores in February: one in Rimrock Mall and one in a "retail space neighboring the mall."
Bridget Barrett, regional marketing manager, says, "We are incredibly exited to bring the Starbucks Experience [her italics] to Billings.” Maybe she meant "excited." But up here in Klein, we take these things literally.

An incredibly exiting discussion is going on at City Lights about Bill O'Reilly's bizarre use of "secular" to describe major American newspapers. I weigh in, for what it's worth, somewhere down around comment 12.

This new website, U.S. Politics Today, which bills itself as a nonpartisan news service for political professionals, includes a roundup of Montana political news.

A former Bozeman resident has put together an entire calendar of items culled from Bozeman Daily Chronicle police reports.
Sample entry: "Aug. 22: A man in a chicken suit and a man in a cow suit were reportedly wandering around a parking lot on South 11th Avenue at 12:45 a.m. The man in the cow suit was allegedly wearing an Afro wig."

OK, and one more: "Aug. 26: A caller said he took a TV to a repair shop in August. When he went to pick it up on Tuesday, the shop was gone."

Romanesko has a roundup of lame story ideas editors have pitched to reporters. For the laugh of the day, scroll down three or four items to the one that begins "Perfect answer to toilet paper inquiry."

U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg, R-Mont., is taking a trip to Iraq with five other House members.

According to a news release: "The delegation will visit with American troops presently deployed overseas, and also meet with government leaders in both Iraq and Afghanistan. The Department of Defense has recommended that, due to security considerations, the delegation avoid disclosing specific details of the trip.

"However, Rehberg was able to disclose that the delegation will assess the progress being made in the rebuilding and stabilization efforts, including agriculture operations, in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

"'This trip will provide us with a good opportunity to see first-hand the great progress our troops are making toward protecting America from terrorism by stabilizing and rebuilding these countries,' Rehberg said. 'And I especially look forward to visiting with our own soldiers deployed from Montana.'”

From the tone of the news release, it sounds like he's already completed the assessment. Here's hoping no facts get in the way of his conclusions.

For what it's worth, people who have responded to the Outpost online poll favor the Democrats' energy plan over the Republican plan.

Interesting discussion going on below about bad check writers. But bad checks are just a tiny fraction of the whole bad debt problem. Debtors who simply refuse to pay their bills rather than write bad checks to cover them are protected from public exposure by a raft of laws that don't protect bad check writers.

Until I went into business for myself, I never imagined how many people there are who just flat refuse to pay -- from a $5 classified ad to a $500 full page. They ignore letters, won't return phone calls, avoid process servers and skip court dates. And there's very little businesses can do to expose them. Obviously, it isn't just an Outpost problem: Just look at court dockets. Bad debt is what keeps the court system at work.

It's especially tough on businesses like ours that have to give credit and can't repossess advertising once it has appeared in the paper. I've been tempted to run anti-ads for deadbeats, something along the lines of "Previous claims of superior quality and service by Thus & So Inc. are hereby retracted. The Outpost regrets any inconvenience to customers who may have been misled by these claims."

Obviously, some people intend to pay their bills and just get in over their heads. Others, clearly, never intend to pay. The mystery to me is what goes on inside their heads. Morally, I have trouble seeing much distinction between someone who breaks into my store and steals cash from the till and someone who reneges on a promise to pay for services. Yet there are far more deadbeats than burglars. I wonder what accounts for the difference? Cowardice? Laziness? Or is there a moral distinction that I'm not getting?

I keep more and more "bad check writer" signs around town, with a list of offenders underneath. Why so specialized? How about a "bad person" list? My list would start with a few choice names, for reasons that are none of your business. But I guess that undercuts the whole project.

Wanna find out what MSU-Bozeman will be like in five years? Just go here.

Gary Marbut, political activist and head of the Montana Shooting Sports Association, has written a book called "Gun Laws of Montana." Advance praise comes from Secretary of State Bob Brown and University of Montana law professor Rob Natelson, among others. "On the whole, Montana's gun laws are the freest in the United States, and they thus set an example for freedom-loving people everywhere in the world," David Kopel says in the foreward.

Amazing stat: Marbut says, "We estimate that between 90% and 95% of Montana homes contain firearms, and that the average number of guns in each Montana gun-owning household is 27 (yes, you read that correctly)."

And I have only one. Does that mean somebody else out there has 53 to balance me out?

George Ochenski, over at the Missoula Independent, says that "George W. Bush broke new low ground for a president of the United States by intentionally lying to the national press about spending Thanksgiving at his Texas ranch." Pare away Ochenski's corrosive rhetoric and there's still a good question left: Does the president have a right to lie? We all sort of take it for granted that presidents do lie -- my favorite may have been the senior Bush's assertion that his nomination of Clarence Thomas to the U.S. Supreme Court had nothing to do with race. It was an almost obligatory lie, and we all understood that he was lying, and no particular repercussions followed. Bush the Younger's Thanksgiving lie would seem to be even more defensible since it was for security rather than political reasons.

But can a good Christian lie with honor even under these circumstances? I doubt it. It's a bit like cursing: Sean Hannity took John Kerry to task yesterday for saying "fucked" in Rolling Stone, but Hannity was merely amused when Bush called a New York Times reporter an "asshole" back during the campaign. In my realm of Christian orthodoxy, the words carry roughly the same weight, and the onus on Bush to be behave would appear to be greater because he is so public a believer.

By the way (for Ed's benefit, all use of BTW has been suspended) Kerry was featured on "Unfinished Symphony," a superb documentary about Vietnam Veterans Against the War that aired on one of the independent film channels last night. Too bad that younger Kerry isn't running for president: He was eloquent, thoughtful, sincere. The compromises of political life must have worn him down, just as they wear down the president.

Ken Miller, the Republican gubernatorial candidate from Laurel, says in a news release that one of his first acts of Governor would be an executive order requiring that no further roads on state public lands will be closed without a review by the governor's office.

"In addition Ken Miller said that he would request from Federal Land managers that the Governor be given the opportunity to review all planned road closures on Federal Lands and notification when a road is closed. 'Faceless Bureaucrats in D.C. may want to close our roads, but as Governor I'll fight to keep them open,' Miller said."

A fellow Democratic senator says "shame, shame, shame" on Max Baucus for caving in to demands by pharmaceutical companies that the government be prohibited from negotiating lower drug prices for senior citizens. Thanks to Jackie Corr for the link.

This is a couple of days late, but I haven't seen it elsewhere: Gubernatorial candidate Pat Davison has written a letter to opponent and Secretary of State Bob Brown criticizing him for running TV ads that he says blur the line between political ads and public service announcements.

"I am requesting that you immediately terminate the use of taxpayer dollars for advertising promoting you and your candidacy for Governor and that you reimburse the taxpayers from your campaign for the funds that have already been spent on this advertising campaign," Davison wrote.

Anybody seen the ads? I haven't, but apparently they are about provisions of the Help America Vote Act. A similar ad ran in newspapers statewide, including the Outpost. According to Davison, Brown is spending $24,000 in state money on the ads, including $10,000 at KTVQ in Billings.

Provisions of the new act include a requirement that voters identify themselves at the polls. That's probably all Brown intended to do in the ads: Show us his I.D.

The Montana GOP E-brief is remarkably candid about the true purpose of the Healthy Forest Restoration Act: "The legislation is a step in the right direction toward increasing the timber industry’s ability to harvest off of federal land by limiting legal abuse from environmental groups."

When President Bush signed the Healthy Forests Restoration Act into law on Wednesday, a news release said that Rep. Denny Rehberg called the "landmark legislation a 'literal breath of fresh air.'" That may be the only fresh air this bill generates.

My brother the English teacher collects what he call "literallies" from student papers and newspapers and occasionally sends them along to me. My two favorites, of those I recall, were one about the battleship gun crew that "literally stuck to its guns" and one about two track stars who raced down the homestretch "literally joined at the hip." Naturally, I sent my brother a personal favorite from the Gazette by a letter writer who said a public official who had "literally been caught with his proverbial pants down."

Shouldn't proverbs wear suspenders?

This Helena letter writer accuses Hillary Clinton of treason for comments she made during her visit to Iraq.

If I were still a soldier, I can't imagine a circumstance under which I would want my elected representatives to express anything other than their honest opinions about the situation troops were in. Those folks overseas aren't children, and they aren't just soldiers. They also are citizens and voters. They not only should be up on the public debate, they should be helping to shape it.

Besides, as one TV commentator pointed out, soldiers in Iraq aren't exactly marching across the Russian steppes with Napoleon. They are watching cable news and reading newspapers. A senator who told the troops one thing and the folks back home something else would be quickly exposed as a fraud.

By the way, I couldn't find any other source for the quote the letter writer used that claimed the U.S. would lose the war. Even Hillary's harshest web critics didn't fire off that particular piece of ammunition. Probably, it's a dud.

Sorry to have been out of touch. Nothing has been holding me back but a typical, life-altering, small-business crisis at The Outpost. But I can't let Joseph Perkins' column, which ran in today's Gazette, pass without comment. Once again, Perkins has provided clear and convincing evidence that he is the dumbest nationally syndicated columnist in the business today.

He starts this way:

'War," wrote John Stuart Mill, one of the 19th century's greatest thinkers, "is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.
"The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight," Mill continued, "is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."
That brings to mind the anti-war crowd – those stumping for the Democratic presidential nomination, those opining on the nation's liberal editorial pages, and those protesting on the streets of the nation's capital and other cities throughout the fair land.
They are, in Mill's words, miserable creatures. They think nothing is worth war, not even the mass murder of nearly 3,000 of their fellow countrymen (and women and children) on Sept. 11, 2001.

But what those in the "anti-war" crowd, including Democratic presidential candidates, who supported the war in Afghanistan but opposed the war in Iraq? Can they have fallen so rapidly into a "decayed and degraded state"?

They have nothing for which they are willing to fight, not even to prevent a madman like Saddam Hussein from developing or acquiring chemical, biological or nuclear weapons with which he could one day threaten the United States or her allies.

Notice how rapidly the threat recedes into the future. By this standard of waging war, we could invade Switzerland.

Those in the anti-war crowd perfunctorily profess their support for American military personnel fighting on their unworthy behalf in Iraq. Yet, they derive a certain perverse satisfaction, it seems, with every fresh news report of a truck bombing, a helicopter crash, a suicide attack.

Just this morning driving to work I heard a report of another American soldier dead. I am a card-carrying member of this anti-war crowd, but I felt no satisfaction, perverse or otherwise. Just sad, and a bit angry.

The United States suffered more than 58,000 fatalities in Vietnam, some 47,369 of which were combat-related. That's nearly 1,500 percent more fatalities than the United States has suffered in Iraq.

And it took only 10 years! Let's see, 81 American soldiers died in Iraq in November. At that rate, it'll take 59 years to catch up.

The reality is, more Americans have been killed in Los Angeles alone this year than have been killed in Iraq.

Of course, millions of people live in Los Angeles. We have about 130,000 troops in Iraq. A more useful comparison would be to imagine that 441 murders had taken place in Yellowstone County since last spring. That would be considered a nightmarish disaster -- and those are the odds our troops are up against. Casualties are remarkably low by combat standards, but Iraq ain't LA.

The opposition to the war in Iraq is less about principle – on the parts of the Democratic presidential hopefuls, the liberal opinion page writers, the anti-war street protesters – than it is about politics. For the politicos and journalistas and activists who were bitter about the outcome of the 2000 presidential election, who have never stopped hating George W. Bush, are the same miserable creatures who are so loudly decrying the postwar campaign in Iraq.

It's always helpful when a guy like Perkins lets us know what we really think. I would have sworn it was about principle. What about those of us who think the 2000 election was just the luck of the draw and who have never gotten around to even starting to hate George Bush? How miserable are we?

They almost don't care if the postwar reconstruction in Iraq fails, if Saddam returns to power, if the Iraqi people are once again subject to his genocidal rule, so long as they can play the Iraq card against Bush.

They almost don't care? Translation: They do care.

Indeed, just last week, a secret strategy memo, prepared by Democratic staff on the supposedly nonpartisan Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, suggested that Democrats ought to launch an investigation of the White House next year to have maximum impact on the presidential election.

The memo is here. Judge for yourself.

Then there are the Bush-hating opinion writers – and they know who they are – who insinuate that the commander in chief has somehow lost the peace in Iraq because he supposedly neglected to consider an "exit strategy."

Notice that Perkins doesn't suggest that there actually was, or is, an exit strategy. He just objects to the notion that there might not have been one. Our nation's stumbles in the early days of the post-World War II occupation are often cited in defense of what's happening now in Iraq. But the situations are wildly different. Nobody on Dec. 6, 1941, was thinking about an exit strategy in Berlin. On March 18, 2003, with the war on Iraq imminent -- and discretionary -- and with military victory a foregone conclusion, post-war strategy should have been the top priority.

The opponents of the Iraq war, the knee-jerk critics of the postwar reconstruction, reveal the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling of which Mill wrote nearly two centuries ago.
Their opposition, their criticism is fueled not so much by reason, but by hatred – toward their president or toward their country.

And what fuels Perkins? It sure ain't reason.

Subject line on the e-mail I will have the most difficulty not reading this week: "European girls really know how to f"

Secretary of State Bob Brown has responded to rumors that Rob Natelson may be planning to run for governor again, getting into lobbying or launching a policy institute. (For more on Natelson's plans, see Brad Molnar's column in the Dec. 4 Outpost -- not yet available in stores).

Brown said he welcomed Natelson's participation in any capacity. "What would a race for governor be like without Rob Natelson?" Brown said in a news release. Natelson ran against Marc Racicot in 1996 and against Judy Martz in 2000.

Brown disputed a recent claim attributed to Natelson that Brown "has already called for tax increases." Brown said he declined to take a no-new-taxes pledge, which is a different animal. But Brown did say here that he would support a small tax increase to raise teachers' pay.

For what it's worth, Natelson's and Martz's appearances on Yellowstone Public Radio's "Home Ground" before the 2000 primary constituted one of the most lopsided political exchanges I've ever heard. He smoked her on the issues, but, of course couldn't get elected. I still don't think he can, although I have a lot of respect for Natelson. He's the real deal, a genuine conservative who probably isn't well enough plugged into the political machinery to get past a primary.

Molnar, another real-deal conservative, raises an interesting question: If Natelson doesn't run, who will get his base? Beats me. I can't see it going to Brown or Davison, and it's not clear yet whether Miller or Keating can raise enough money to make a serious run. It didn't seem outlandish to me that some of Natelson's base could go to Schweitzer, if Schweitzer can dodge the big-spender label that follows Democrats around.

Subject line on the e-mail I am least likely to read this week: "There is 'Life After Hair Color.'"

Thane Peterson makes a point in Business Week that I have been arguing for a couple of years: "I think a major push is under way to move back toward the highly personal and politicized style of journalism that prevailed in the early days of the Republic."

Lots of people seem to think that the principle of journalistic objectivity was enshrined in the First Amendment, but as Peterson notes, it is a relatively recent convention. What journalism is now becoming is something that the Founding Fathers may not have admired but would have understood and expected.

This story about a compromise agreement to raise broadcast ownership caps appeared last week, but I missed it at the time. But Fritz Hollings says it was no compromise at all.

Pat Dawson notes that the Great Falls Tribune has administered a firm spanking to PPL Montana.

Most Montana bloggers (including this one) took it easy over the holiday, but mt.politics.net did enough blogging for all of us.

Jackie Corr sends along a great column on Wal-Mart, but you have to register.

A new group is forming in Lockwood to push for yet another vote on a sewer system. Citizens for a Better Lockwood elected Carlotta Hecker as president, Lois Logan as vice president and Glenn Seavy as treasurer. Dave Riley was asked to handle media relations.

A news release said, "Those who attended the [organizational] meeting noted the high level of misinformation and the lack of voter turnout in the last election. That election saw a critical vote on a new community sewer system for Lockwood receive a majority of the vote but fail to reach a 'super majority' by just 37 votes."

Carl Peters, president of the Lockwood Water and Sewer board, said mail-in ballots for the next attempt will go out on Jan. 20. For my money, the group already is ahead of previous efforts just by sending an e-mail announcing the effort. I covered the sewer issue for the Gazette for a couple of years and know Carl Peters pretty well. Yet the Outpost has gotten zilch from the sewer board about previous elections. It's not that we're the most important people in the world, but when you're only a few dozen votes away, every e-mail and news release counts.

I've been quoting all the criticism of Max Baucus for his vote on the prescription drug benefit, so the least I can do is give some of his spin:

“'We have passed landmark prescription drug legislation and delivered on our promise to America’s seniors,' said Baucus, who as the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee one was of only two Democrats picked to iron out the final details of the bill. 'I’ve worked with doctors, pharmacists, hospitals boards, and seniors all across Montana for more than a decade to provide seniors with a prescription drug benefit. This bill is not perfect. But it brings us one step closer to ensuring seniors will never again have to choose between paying the bills and buying the medicine they need. I’m very proud of my work on this bill.'”

Baucus also defended the provision allowing a role for private insurers in the bill, arguing that it was superior to the earlier House bill. "Baucus opposed that plan because he said it would have led to higher monthly premiums for seniors. Instead, the senior senator negotiated a time-limited pilot program in six major metropolitan areas that won’t take affect [sic] until 2010 and won’t be in Montana, he said. "

Thanks to Paul Whiting for this link about media conglomeration, Dean Singleton style. Big quote: "The founders of this country believed a free and rambunctious press was essential to the protection of our freedoms. They couldn't envision the rise of giant megamedia conglomerates whose interests converge with state power to produce a conspiracy against the people. I think they would be aghast at how this union of media and government has produced the very kind of imperial power against which they rebelled."

Full disclosure: Dean Singleton once interviewed me for a job. I didn't get it.

Montana Republicans held a news conference today to announce their energy strategy. The crux appears to be in this line in the news release:

"Overall, the Republicans stressed that the key to long-term affordable energy was new production.

'The outlook for new clean-coal generation facilities in Montana is very good,' pointed out Rep. Alan Olson. 'There are several new projects at various development stages. If we can get one or two or three of these new facilities online, and include that new power in the energy contract, then I believe we will see immediate effects in our electricity bills. These coal plants, combined with new wind and gas generation, are the future of stable Montana energy.'"

I've been hearing that argument for years now, and it still doesn't make sense to me. Montana already produces twice as much energy as it uses, and it appears that the nation as a whole will have excess (and increasing) capacity for at least several years to come, judging from this chart.

Theoretically, I suppose, if you keep dumping more capacity into the market, prices will fall. And if the people producing the electricity are dumb enough, they will keep building power plants and selling power for whatever they can get forever, no matter how little profit they make. But Bob Gannon doesn't run a power company anymore. You can't store electricity until the prices go up, and you can't increase market share by refining a better brand, and you don't automatically use more just because it's cheaper. And just because electricity is produced here doesn't mean it will be used or even available here. I'm not sure who's going to invest millions in all these new plants without some sort of assurance that there's a profitable market out there.

It may make sense to generate more electricity as an economic development measure (jobs, jobs, jobs) and it might even have some long-term national impact on pricess somewhere down the road. But nobody has showed me how it does much of anything to lower or even stabilize the cost of energy in Montana. Does somebody want to try?

A Billings readers sends along this message from a friend in Jordan (no, not Jordan, Montana):

Earlier this week I spoke with a young man who was also passing through on his way back to the USA. He was ex-Special Forces and had been with them since 1995, in Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. (He too was in the Al Rashid Hotel that was hit.) He retired from the military, went home to GA and purchased some land to start his own construction business. Then he "got an offer he couldn't refuse." He was hired at a salary of $400,000 a year to go back to Iraq as a private security person (mercenary). Yes, $400,000--I asked him to repeat the figure because it was so unbelievable. He took the job, thinking that in one year he would be able to get his business going without having to take a loan.

However, after a short time, he had second thoughts and was going home for good. He told me that conditions in Iraq were worse than before. Humvees and the military are easily identifiable targets. Whoever was his employer brought in Toyota trucks, banged them up, and tried to make them appear more 'local' so they'd blend in. He said it's best to drive in the middle of the road because many bombs are placed on the edges and camouflaged, some with Styrofoam that has been painted or covered with sand. He also told me it's safer to drive after 12:00 noon, because by then most of the bombs have been detonated. He said a few of the explosives are rigged with wires, but those require someone to set them off and require a line of sight. So you become more cautious if you're not in the desert but someplace where there's a structure or place for someone to hide, watch and wait.

In the military, he had all the latest, sophisticated equipment and worked side by side with those who were trained as he was. But when he returned, he had a gun and not much else. I think the main reason he left was that he also lacked confidence in others with whom he worked, some vintage Viet Nam era.

He said Royal Jordanian had a few flights from Marka Airport in Amman to Baghdad and that they took evasive action, such as circling down steeply instead of an expected straight-in landing pattern. (You probably heard about the DHL plane that was hit by a heat-seeking missile on takeoff yesterday.)

Since returning to Amman, Malcolm has completed training of 30 Jordanian consultants and is now working with a company that makes kitchen equipment for hospitals, the big hotels, etc. It has been difficult for him as one of the females he's training is completely covered except for her eyes. Hard to judge whether someone understands something when you cannot see a response or reaction.

He now has several days off since the Eid al-Fitr feast (marking the end of the fasting month of Ramadan) should begin tonight, depending on the moon. Then, hopefully some of the 'singing' from the minarets will ease up, and the dogs will stop trying to emulate them. I swear one dog near us has a sore throat trying to keep up with the imams.

Severe sandstorms in the south affected power stations in Jordan yesterday and left most of the country without electricity for an hour or two. The Inter-Con has an emergency generator, so the elevator and some of the lights worked.

There was a big to-do in the Jordan Times this week. One of the new Ministers stated that part of the MPs salaries came from foreign funding. This offended her fellow parliamentarians and she made a public apology saying she was mis-stated. However, Al Rai newspaper commented that there should not have been such a reaction because she's right. Finance Ministry figures for Jan. through Sept. of this year show that about 30% of the treasury revenues came from foreign donations; 24.3% per cent from the US. It appears that next year Iraq will get the most US taxpayer money.

In Aqaba I would ask the front desk for the Jordan paper every day. One day the guy said, "It's always bad news." The next day I said, "Is there any good news today?" He said, "Same, same, just new picture."

The Republican National Committee notes, with glee, this quote from former Democratic Sen. (and triple amputee) Max Cleland: "We cannot afford to have a leader who weaseled out of going to Vietnam on a medical deferment for a bad back and wound up on the ski slopes of Aspen like Howard Dean."

Reminds me a bit of the criticism once aimed at Joe Namath for getting a draft deferment because of a bad knee while he was healthy enough to play quarterback in the Super Bowl. But there's a big difference. If the knee blows out in a Super Bowl, a ref blows a whistle, the networks cut to a commercial and everybody stands around for a couple of minutes while the trainers haul the quarterback off on a stretcher.

No whistles in combat.

Subject line on the e-mail I am least likely to read this week: "Never Say No to Zucchini."

E.J. Dionne in the Washington Post is easier on Max Baucus than Al Hunt was in the Wall Street Journal, but it's still painful sledding for Max. One longtime Billings Democrat sent me this note: "It seems to me that Montana Democrats ought to consider "censuring" Mr.Baucus and suggest to him that if he runs for re-election in five years(!) Democratic party support now won't be automatic. Bob Ream needs to be asked what he will do about this, too. Yellowstone County Democrats need to take a position as well--as I am sure th[e]y will. I imagine the Montana Republicans can't wait for the next Senate election cycle. A much better Democrat than Max noted that "all politics is local" -- Max forgets Montana Democrats to[o] often, not just because he forgets, which is bad enough, but because he might not just be bright enough to handle Washington politics. Max might just be the best Democratic Senator the Republicans can count on.

On one of the first days of my first newspaper job, my first managing editor said he wished there were no holidays: They made it too complicated to put out a newspaper. I looked at him with pity and disgust: How could a newspaper guy become so shriveled inside that convenience at work outweighed national celebrations?

Twenty years later, and I still think of what he said every time a holiday rolls around. And every year what he said makes more sense. This week I'm buried under monthly billing and subscription renewals, plus early deadlines because of the holiday. So yesterday I worked 15 hours on my day off so I could take a day off on Thursday. Then Friday there's another paper to get out.

I know, I'm old and rotten. Happy Thanksgiving.

John Morrison's announcement was that he plans to run for re-election as state auditor. You can read about it here, or you can move on to InstaPundit.

This is too late for many people to see, but Dennis Kucinich apparently will be in town today after all. He is scheduled to speak to the Northern Plains Resource Council at 1:30 p.m. at the Sheraton. He had been scheduled to speak earlier but was considered likely to cancel.

Ron Selden passes along a link to the Dictionary of Bureaucratese. Sample definition: "abvise: v., to give bad council or counterproductive assistance. (L. ab viseo: blindfolded)"

The cheap shot of the week comes from the Republican National Committee, which plans to include this line in TV ads that begin running tomorrow in Iowa: "Some are now attacking the President for attacking the terrorists."

Jackie Corr found a link to the full Al Hunt bashing of Max Baucus in the Wall Street Journal.

Askar Akaev, president of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan, will visit Montana Dec. 2-3. According to the governor's office, this marks the first time a president of a foreign country has visited Montana.

This from the GOP E-brief: "In a letter to Governor Martz this week, State Auditor John Morrison requested that the $1 million fine he collected from a recent lawsuit be directed into the Children’s Health Insurance Program. That letter was then purposely leaked to the press. The whole situation reeks of the worst kind of politics. Governor Martz has no legal authority to spend the money, and Morrison, a lawyer himself, likely knew it. This sort of blatant dishonesty by a public official would garner front-page newspaper headlines anywhere else but Montana."

Hey, well, it made the front page of a blog.

UPDATE: Here' s the letter that upset Republicans:

Dear Governor Martz:

I wrote you on July 22nd to ask that you invest $3 million of the Medicaid savings in the Children’s Health Insurance Program. You declined citing the uncertain costs of fires.

Since that time you have taken action to provide funds for children on the CHIP waiting list. I applaud you for that action. But, our most recent information says that there is more than $25M of federal funds still available for the Children’s Health Insurance Program in Montana.

Today I am bringing you a check for $1 million dollars. It is the result of a fine in an enforcement action. It is general fund revenue that was not anticipated in any revenue estimate.

I am again asking you to expand CHIP. Investing $1M of general fund in CHIP will bring $4M of federal matching funds already available for Montana. It will allow us to insure approximately 3,000 additional children. Providing health coverage to Montana’s children should be one of our top priorities. Now that unanticipated funds are available, I urge you to act.

Reducing the number of uninsured Montanans is one of the most important things we can do to improve Montana’s economy.

Providing health insurance coverage for more Montanans will reduce the cost of insurance for those already insured. When one of the 33,000 uninsured kids in Montana gets injured or sick and their parents can’t pay the bills for the emergency room or doctor’s office, the costs are shifted to others through higher provider fees and higher insurance premiums. The uninsured often delay medical care until a condition is more serious … and more costly. That is bad public policy and bad economic policy. Providing more CHIP coverage would reduce our cost-shifting problem.

I hope we can work together to use these new funds to extend health insurance to more Montana kids.

Sincerely yours,



JOHN MORRISON
State Auditor

Doesn't sound too blatantly dishonest, does it?

Rob Natelson of Montana Conservatives is blasting Gov. Judy Martz for spending the federal tax windfall. The money should have been returned to taxpayers, he says.

"They had a historic opportunity to reduce property taxes while preserving all their spending – and they blew it," he says. "The reason Montana salaries are the lowest in the nation is because we’ve been misgoverned by this group of insiders. This is another example of an inside job."

In remarks today to the Board of Regents, the governor said she had spent $27 million for fire suppression last summer. On Thursday, she announced that $2.7 million would go for K-12 education. Today's announcement included $450,000 for community colleges and $250,000 for distance-learning programs. $11.8 million is left to fight fires next year, she said.

You can read more about Natelson's take here.

State Auditor John Morrison has called a news conference to announce his "plans for the future" on Monday. The Billings conference will be at 9:45 a.m. at the Mansfield Center.

This may be the most complete story on the decision by Rep. Jeff Laszloffy, R-Laurel, not to run for re-election.

I wrote a column here about the study of environmental journalism in the West conducted by the Institutes for Journalism and Natural Resources in Missoula. Now Frank Allen, who heads the Institute, has written a column for Headwaters News discussing the study, and he responds to numerous reader replies. Read all the way down the right-hand column, then hit the link for more responses. This is good stuff.

Think the Lewis and Clark County Democrats were hard on Max Baucus? The Wall Street Journal's Al Hunt blisters Baucus in this column (available only to subscribers). Key quote: "The Montana Democrat is a case study in legislative weakness. More than ideology or seniority, effective legislators, whether a liberal Democrat like Sen. Ted Kennedy or a conservative Republican like Rep. Bill Thomas, are knowledgeable, resourceful, tough and politically calculating; they know when to hold, and when to compromise.

"In more than 30 years as an elected legislator -- 25 in the Senate -- these are skills Max Baucus never acquired. He's always looking over his shoulder politically, usually willing to accommodate and often more interested in a
result than the result."

A reader sends along this critique by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. of the Bush administration's environmental policies. It's one-sided as hell, but also comprehensive and impassioned.

Secretary of State Bob Brown is attacking Democratic governor candidate Brian Schweitzer for remarks he made about public access earlier this year at a Democratic Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner in Libby.

The inflammatory quote, as reported by the Western News: "We love access to our public lands. If we have leadership that takes access away from us, then what are we left with? Open the gates. Cut a padlock. We have a right to be there."

Says Brown: "That law has stood up over time, and if we need to fine tune it some, we can. But it serves no good purpose for Mr. Schweitzer to be throwing verbal bombs at Montana's private property owners. Both sides of the issue need to cooperate and compromise to make this law work. Telling recreational users to cut padlocks on private land is so over the top that it clears Granite Peak by a mile."

Why so lame an attack so early in the campaign? Maybe Brown heard the same rumor I did -- that both the AP and the Lee State Bureau are working on stories on Pat Davison's role with the Mountain States Legal Foundation, which represented landowners who sued the state of Montana over its stream access law. Davison is still listed as a board member on the Legal Foundation's website, and he has not, to my knowledge, repudiated the unsuccessful suit, which the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear on appeal.

Could Brown be a sneaky -- I mean, astute -- enough politician to take an easy shot at Schweitzer while establishing his public access credentials without directly attacking a Republican he hopes to defeat in the gubernatorial primary? Nah.

UPDATE: Maybe this is a repudiation.

SECOND UPDATE: Brian Schweitzer fires back: "Bob Brown’s recent press release sounds like nothing more than a professional politician’s attack. As a third generation Montana farmer who has owned land in Flathead, Sanders, Rosebud, and Judith Basin counties, I understand private property rights better than a lifetime lobbyist, bureaucrat and politician. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: sportsmen have a right to access public land, and they have a responsibility to respect private property rights. This is exactly why Montana needs new leadership that draws people together for common sense solutions, instead of relying on the politics of personal attacks."

The Lewis and Clark County Democratic Central Committee has issued a news release condemning U.S. Sen. Max Baucus for supporting the Medicare bill.

“This horrendous bill is a first step toward the goal of the Republican Congress and the Bush administration to destroy Medicare through privatization,” said Paul Edwards, Vice-President of the County Central Committee. “We condemn Senator Baucus’s contribution to that effort.” The release favors a compromise bill that passed the Senate earlier.

The release calls on other Democratic central committees in Montana to condemn Baucus as well. First the Republican attack him; now the Democrats do. Can't a fellow just get along?

I wonder if all those Reagan fans who blasted CBS for putting made-up quotes in the former president's mouth will take similar umbrage at a History Channel documentary that accuses another former president of murder. Oh, never mind. He was a Democrat.

The group blog from the Online News Association conference last weekend is worth a look. My favorite entry gave panelists' one-line predictions for the online future. The best prediction was from Ruth Gersh, editorial director of AP Digital: "The Nigerian e-mail will turn out to be true."

The interview with Gus Koernig is in the can, and you can see it on KULR 8 at 9 a.m. Sunday. Or not. It was pretty fun, but Dick Wesnick nearly screwed the whole thing up. He violated all of the known canons of journalistic ethics by actually doing research before making a TV appearance. I was shocked, but recovered in time to fake my way through my small end of the conversation.

As long as we're talking about Wal-Mart (or was that last week?) here's the most in-depth piece I've ever seen on how Wal-Mart pressures suppliers -- sometimes into bankruptcy -- to ensure ever-lower prices.

In the Too-Late-for-The-Outpost category comes this from the Wayman Chapel A.M.E. Church, 402 S. 25th St.: Members of 'Team Hollywood' from the ESPN 'Streetball ' series will be worshiping and ministering at the 11:00AM Worship Service [on Nov. 23]. The public is invited.

Harsh words from Scott Proctor in this week's Montana Green Party Weekly Bulletin about Bob Kelleher's plans to run as a Green Party candidate for governor:

"I'm frankly tired of seeing people like Kelleher, who have shown no interest in the party since it received ballot status, waltz right into the general election with no opposition. If people are willing to donate a little money so that I can pay my entry fee, I will put my name in the ring if nobody else will. For those who say that a Green Primary will make us look bad because we're costing the state money, I would say that it looks like we'll be having one in 2004 anyway, because there will be a range of different choices in the presidential race.

"As the Green Party candidate for Governor, I would try to promote actual Green Party ideas, and push things like "Living Wage" and "Instant Runoff Voting" rather than ideas such as changing the Montana Legislature to a "One House Parliament" or other such ideas that will result in our party being marginalized by the media for the rest of its existence."

Proctor, a Billings computer technician, ran for the Legislature in the last election. Paul Stephens, who edits the Bulletin, was a bit kinder to Kelleher but said the Green Party needs multiple candidates in the primary. He suggested going after such names as Ken Toole, a state senator and Montana Human Rights Network director; Tom Power, a University of Montana economist (you can read his take on the Healthy Forest Initiative in the Nov. 20 Outpost); Steve Kelly, who ran against Denny Rehberg as a Democrat for the U.S. House seat; and Jim Jenson of the Montana Environmental Information Center.

"The important thing," he said, "is to break with the past image we've somehow accumulated as being the 'junior league of the Democrats.' In my opinion, the Democrats as a party is doomed, and as long as we stay tied to it, they will drag us under, as well. We can provide a lifeboat for those survivors who sincerely wish to join us."

The Missoula Independent has a pretty devastating analysis and critique of Qwest phone service. The story covers not only the company's financial shenanigans and customer service complaints, but also includes a fair number of interviews with Qwest employees about how lousy the company is to work for. It also refers to this website, which catalogs Qwest gripes.

Several times a week, the Republican National Committee distributes a feature called "They Said It!" that attempts to point out contradictory or disingenuous quotes from Democrats. Today, Max Baucus makes the feature for this: "If Democrats stand up and filibuster and oppose the [Medicare prescription drug] bill, I think frankly, Democrats will be blamed for failure to pass legislation that would finally begin to help our senior citizens."

I'm supposed to tape a show tomorrow with Channel 8's Gus Koernig on the 40th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination. Also appearing will be my old pal, former Gazette Editor Dick Wesnick, so I want to look and feel my very best. If anybody out there has any insights in the Kennedy legacy, I would be interested in hearing about them here no later than noon Wednesday.

Here's my not-terribly-original take so far: John F. Kennedy was one of the most gifted politicians ever to hold public office. He was handsome, smart, witty, vigorous, married well and had smart kids. He was a speed reader and wrote a Pulitzer Prize-winning book. Is that enough for a presidential legacy? No, of course not. And his actual achievements were fairly small. The Bay of Pigs was on his watch, and civil rights came later. He got us started in Vietnam, but would that war have turned out better if he had survived? Who knows?

I've always thought that one way to judge Kennedy's place in history would be to see whether we would eventually remember him on his birthday, as we do Lincoln, rather than on the date of his death. After 40 years, we still remember him more for how he died than for what he did while alive.

Kennedy's most important legacy may have been the grace he brought to office. He made public service -- especially through the Peace Corps -- seem desirable and honorable, and a whole generation of, well, bureaucrats were inspired by his example. But it's remarkable how little of that legacy survives. The notion that government workers are lazy, incompetent and corrupt is thorougly ingrained in Americans. The only exception is for soldiers. Why military service is considered honorable while the peace-making arts are belittled is one of those mysteries of American life that I have not been able to get my imagination around.

I have an old LP record of Kennedy's press conferences that I retrieved from a library that was about to discard it. Some of the fun in the record comes from the anachronisms: It's delicious to listen to a Democratic president making the case for tax cuts and defending himself from attacks by Republicans that he was spending too much on defense. He didn't like spending so much on defense either, he said, but "we live in a dangerous world."

Listening to the record yesterday, I was struck less by Kennedy's wit -- which was formidable -- than by his utterly relaxed and candid manner. It was striking how many of his answers began with a chuckle at the question. He seemed thoroughly at ease and utterly unintimidated. I don't believe we will ever see a president like that again.

As a wit, he was no standup comedian, but he was sharp. Asked about reports that Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater had been "captured by the radical right," Kennedy said it wasn't clear who had captured whom. Asked about former President Eisenhower's endorsement of term limits for congressmen, Kennedy said that sounded like the sort of proposal he might endorse in his post-presidential period. Asked if his administration was trying to "manage the news," Kennedy said, "Well, we're not managing it very well, if that's what we're trying to do." Asked to comment on a resolution by the Republican National Committee that declared the Kennedy administration a failure, he said, "I'm sure it passed unanimously."

Comedian Mort Sahl used to tell a story about riding on Air Force One. While Kennedy was joshing with the passengers, Sahl made a smart-alecky comment, and Kennedy looked at him. You know, he said, if this plane were to crash tonight, tomorrow in the papers your name would appear in very small print.

That was Kennedy: sharp, sure of himself, and on target. Too bad we lost him so soon.

More bad news about the environment from the Bush administration? Gee, it must be Friday.

My annual Veterans Day proposal (inspired by Mike Royko) drew its annual underwhelming indifference from the public. Maybe that's because it appeared only in the Nov. 11 Calendar entry of the Outpost. To reach an even smaller audience, I am reprinting it (in slightly edited form) here:

This is Veterans Day and time to push our annual editorial campaign to honor U.S. veterans with a genuine holiday each year on this date. The rules are simple: If you are a veteran, you get today off, no matter who you work for, no matter how lousy your other benefits might be. It’s a way of returning to veterans at least a small portion of the time they devoted to their country. And it’s a small price to pay: If this holiday had been in place in 1945, a World War II veteran now well past retirement age would have been returned fewer than two months of the service time spent during the war. Too expensive? Then what the heck does “Support Our Troops” mean? If the goal is to honor veterans, then why are bankers and bureaucrats the only ones who get the day off?

Sometimes it seems that the two major political parties not only sit on opposite sides of the aisle, they are at opposite ends of the earth -- or maybe on different planets altogether. Witness the opposing guest columns that appeared in today's Gazette, here and here.

Corey Stapleton's piece accuses the Democrats of aiming at "confiscating or 'condemning'" assets from PPL and possibly other companies. The Democratic article by Jon Tester and Dave Wanzenried proposes no such thing -- indeed, it proposes almost nothing substantive. Instead it "promotes" diversification, "calls for" conservation and a Montana-based solution, "encourages" better technology and "benefits" Montanans. At one point, the two Democratic legislators came dangerously close to using a verb that actually requires action: the plan "gives" Montanans -- but Montanans are given only a say, not any actual energy plan.

If you look at the real plan, you become slightly better informed. There the Democrats straightforwardly propose that a cooperative or public power organization should purchase and manage NorthWestern Energy's Montana system. Democrats are less straightforward about PPL than they appeared to be in a news conference last Monday. They say in the plan only that PPL's hydropower should be "dedicated" to Montana use. If Democrats have a plan for how to do that, I couldn't find it. Instead, they propose to form an Energy Action Group to determine how to proceed.

So is Stapleton attacking a straw man? Probably even he doesn't know for sure. If Democrats have a real plan lurking behind that Sunday op-ed piece, then it remains in the shadows. And voters who might actually be willing to support a genuine plan are in the dark, too.

UPDATE: In his upcoming Unplugged column (see Nov. 20 Outpost), Pat Dawson notes that Republicans don't have much of a plan either.

Pat Davison, a Republican candidate for governor, is touring 32 Montana cities in eight days. He started Friday in Fort Benton and finishes Nov. 21 back in Billings.

TL Hines attacks the alleged victim who is suing the Billings teachers union for defamation. I don't know if Trey Ransom has a case or not, and neither does Hines, which just shows how powerful defamation can be. I do know that I wouldn't take Brian Ehli's word for it.

BTW, that story first appeared here. Weeklies don't get to break that many stories, so kindly give us credit when we do.

Ed Kemmick's defense of fairness in journalism is today's required reading. Just scroll through the comments in the "Victory in the other war entry."

State Sen. Debbie Shea, D-Butte, announced today that she is running for Public Service Commission. In a news release, she said she will "seek election to the seat now vacant because of redistricting."

"As a member of the legislature that approved deregulation only to see the promise of free enterprsie and competition fall way to mismanagement, greed and the sale of MPC Generation, I know only too well the need to be ever vigilant in protecting consumer rates," she said.

But she may need a tad of brushing up before she's ready for prime time. The news release says that she has served for four years on the "Consumer Council." It's the Consumer Counsel.

The Outpost poll asks why Missoula voters turned out at a higher rate (27 percent) in the Nov. 5 election than Billings voters did (26 percent). Of course, the difference is too slight to mean anything for sure, but it does kind of undercut the stereotype that conservative Billings has a stronger sense of civic obligation than loose-living Missoula, doesn't it?

Apparently it was just me, but I was fascinated by the 39-hour Senate debate over Bush's judicial appointments. Monday Night Football puts me to sleep, but I watched C-SPAN for hours and would have watched longer if I had had time. Dunno why. It all boils down to a quite simple question: Should judges be required to get 60 Senate votes (the number needed for cloture) or just 51?

I thought Republicans were right on substance but the Democrats won on the hypocrisy issue. I can't see that the Democrats' tactics are unconstitutional, as some Republicans claim, but it is a safe bet that a half-plus-one majority is all the founders had in mind, and they were smart guys. It makes sense, too: It's better to have slightly-less-than-perfect judges hearing cases than to have cases languishing because nobody can carve out a 60-vote majority to get a judge on the bench.

But the Republicans may have lost points on legislative theater. They could argue, correctly, that there's a difference between a filibuster against an appointment (which they say they would never do) and a "hold" against an appointment (which they often did to Clinton) but it's a distinction that's lost on many voters -- and even on quite a few congressmen.

And not all Republicans were sure they wanted to win this fight. I heard Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., say on Sean Hannity's radio show that perhaps a dozen Republicans would rather keep the filibuster option open in case they need to use it to fight liberal judge appointments under some future president.

Moreover, Democrats capitalized on the extended debate to repeatedly draw attention to all of the things the Senate wasn't discussing: minimum wage, jobs, health care, etc. It was all beside the point, but I suspect it worked.

The Dullest Blog in the World is back, and it is as dull as ever.

Interesting discussion of partial-birth abortion at mtpolitics.net by way of Res Ipsa Loquitur. The nub appears to be whether the new law allows partial-birth abortions when the health of the mother is at risk, as opposed to cases where her life is at risk. The link to the actual bill doesn't work, but you can find it here.

But the discussion doesn't deal with my two questions:

1. Why is this a federal issue? Crimes against fellow human beings (rape, murder, robbery, etc.) are nearly always governed by state law, not federal law. What makes this different? I mean, except for the politics, of course.

2. Why does the bill punish only abortionists for violations? It specifically excludes women who have abortions from prosecution. Isn't that a bit like saying the hitman should go to jail but the godfather who orders the hit gets off free? And doesn't this language betray a bit of underlying queasiness about the whole idea of getting government involved in such intimate and private concerns?

In the Too-Late-for-the-Outpost section is this note by way of Paul Whiting: "Jaq Quanback passed around flyers announcing a forum on the Patriot Act to be held at 7:00 pm on 11/12 at Cisel Hall on the MSU-B campus. Speakers will be Bill Mercer, US District Attorney for District of Montana and Scott Crichton, Exec. Director of ACLU-Montana. It
is sponsored by the Billings Unitarian-Universalist Fellowship and Yellowstone Public Radio."

Details of the Democrats' energy plan are here. The Republican response, snarky even by the increasingly snarky standards of the GOP E-brief, advises, "Please contact your local news media and alert them to exactly what this plan is - a campaign tactic."

Thanks for the heads-up, guys. Although I must admit that it isn't exactly clear what's wrong with campaigning on a plan to fix one of the most serious problems Montana faces. Isn't that what campaigns should be about?

Oh, now I get it. If you read down a bit further in the GOP response, you find this: "We can't help but be a bit Skeptical of the the [sic] so called energy plan offered by the Democrat candidates since the sponsor of the plan is the infamous Ken Toole, author of the 'buy back the dams' billion dollar bad idea."

That's one bad idea that's sounding better all the time. And anyway, if one bad idea disqualifies a citizen from ever advocating any other ideas, then we had all better shut up.

Want to know what it's like to interview with Brian Schweitzer for lieutenant governor? The Missoula Independent was there.

Paul Whiting sends along this link to a local account of last weekend's National Conference on Media Reform in Madison, Wis. Lots of big, if somewhat predictable, voices.

Musician and newspaper fan Steve Earle weighs in on media consolidation and media bias:

"It's not that it's right-wing or left-wing, it's just that they're doing the same thing radio is doing -- doing market research and pandering to a market they've identified. I'm ready to do the Bill O'Reilly show on Fox this month, but equating that with a real political discussion is like believing pro wrestling is real. It's just pandering to our worst instincts, and it works. They've just identified a market and can sell to it. It sells more beer.

"I don't have a problem with the existence of the right, but the right has a problem with my existence. We just have a different definition of patriotism. One day this country will be remembered maybe for rock 'n' roll, maybe for baseball, and a few other things, but our Constitution is going to be like Hammarabi's code. It's a hipper document than its framers intended it to be. ...

"Newspapers have always had to turn a profit and they lived and died. It was a volatile industry and now they have sort of stabilized with nearly everything being owned by a few corporations. It comes back down to every three months, they have to report to the stockholders. For the same reason a public stock offering is a bad way to subsidize art, it is a bad way to subsidize journalism."

This interesting piece in the New York Times traces the way that the meaning of media bias has changed over the years.

Ken Miller, the Laurel Republican running for governor, has responded to questions at mtpolitics.

If you love your country -- and even if you don't -- you should look at this website.

Subject line on the e-mail I am least likely to open this week: "Correction: Dalmatian toadflax story."

Jackie Corr wanted me (and Ed Kemmick) to mention this website of Butte political cartoons. It's worth a look.

Montana Democratic legislators plan to unveil their energy plan at 11 a.m. Monday at the Capitol. The plan is called "ReFuel Montana: A Democrat Plan to Get Montana's Power Back to the People," but a news release offered no details other than these: "The Democratic legislators said Montana faces two problems: Assuring that Montana's energy needs are met and assuring an affordable, reliable energy supply for Montana customers, businesses and our economy.

"Senate Democratic Leader Jon Tester, House Democratic Leader Dave Wanzenried and Helena Senator Ken Toole will discuss how the plan meets the state's power needs while bringing affordable, reliable power back to homeowners,
renters, churches, charities and businesses."

The editor and publisher of the Pacific Northwest Inlander reflects on 10 years in the alternative weekly biz.

Lewis Lapham, editor of Harper's magazine, is as confused about the "liberal" and "conservative" labels as I am. From the November issue:

"The meanings of the words 'liberal' and 'conservative' has been so mercilessly abused over the last twenty years that they offer more information about the person who employs them as insults than they do about the person on whose head they fall like stones."

His conclusion: "The anti-liberal" prides himself on the clarity of his intellect. ... The anti-conservative prides himself on the quality of his emotions."

The Montana Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence claims it is having some success in getting Montana retailers to cover up or remove copies of the Nov. 11 tabloid Globe. That's the issue that identifies the accuser in the Kobe Bryant sexual assault case.

"Albertsons and Osco Drug – including their Montana stores – have joined Walgreen's, Kroger's, Safeway of Colorado, King Soopers and the City Market of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming in pulling this issue of the Globe from their stores’ shelves," a news release says. Other major retailers were receiving a letter today, the release said. (The release also identified the group as the Montana Coalition Against Domestic & Sexual Violence Coalition, which qualifies it directly for the Department of Redundancy Department Hall of Fame Hall.)

“The message that this edition of the Globe sends to victims of sexual assault is chilling," said Inga Nelson, the coalition's outreach coordinator. "Sexual assault is the most underreported violent crime in America, and Montana is no exception. Fewer than one in five victims ever report their assault to law enforcement.”

I haven't read the Globe and won't defend its handling of the story, but the larger issues here are a closer call than the coalition indicates. Rape victims are uniquely stigmatized among all crime victims, which is why newspapers historically haven't reported the names of alleged victims. I've always suspected that the failure to report only serves to perpetuate the stigma. But few editors are willing to break new ground on this touchy issue, even when the facts appear to be seriously in dispute, as they are here, and even when the alleged perpetrator will suffer great damage whether or not he's guilty.

Guess you could say that Tuesday's election results indicated a preference for the status quo. Road bonds were approved, all the incumbents were returned to office, and one former councilman was sent back to the council.

Even the exceptions serve to prove the rule. Jack Johnson failed in his attempt to return to the council, but his opponent, businesswoman Nancy Boyer, is well known and respected and ran a vigorous campaign. Even in the Ward 3 race, which had no incumbent, Vince Ruegamer, a retired banker, would have been considered the "establishment" candidate over Eric Coobs. That's true despite Coobs' endorsement by the Billings Area Chamber of Commerce, which seems bent on making itself increasingly irrelevant in local affairs.

The most resounding evidence of voter satisfaction, I suppose, was the 26 percent turnout. Win, lose or draw, most voters just don't give a damn.

Here's this week's entry in the Too-Late-for-the-Outpost category:

The Eastern Wildlands Chapter of the Montana Wilderness Association is sponsoring a free lecture entitled "Wilderness and ... Fair Chase." The lecture will be at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 12, in the Madison/Jefferson Room in Marillac Hall at St. Vincent Healthcare.
Conservationist Jim Posewitz will discuss the history of hunting in America, the issues that surround ethical hunting, and the challenges that hunters face in modern times.
Posewitz believes that hunting in North America is a remarkable expression of democracy that has its roots in the American struggle for independence, a news release said. Posewitz will also discuss how fragile the political resolve historically has been (and still is today) towards the ideas of conservation, wildlife as a public resource, and the protection of wildlife habitat.
A passionate defender of hunting, Jim Posewitz spent 32 years as a biologist with the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks, and he headed the agency's ecological program for 15 years. Posewitz is the founder and executive director of Orion - The Hunter's Institute, a nonprofit conservation organization dedicated to the preservation of hunting opportunities for future generations. The institute focuses on hunter ethics and the role hunters play in conservation.
Posewitz is the author of numerous books, including “Beyond Fair Chase” and “Inherit the Hunt.” Posewitz writes, "Fundamental to ethical hunting is the idea of fair chase. This concept addresses the balance between the hunter and the hunted. It is a balance that allows hunters to occasionally succeed while animals generally avoid being taken."
Posewitz is working on a new book about Theodore Roosevelt and the impact that he had on both the preservation of hunting and the preservation of federal lands for the public.
Posewitz also serves as executive director of the Cinnabar Foundation (a Montana-based environmental philanthropic organization), and he is an adjunct professor of history and philosophy at Montana State University.
Awards he has received over the years include Educator of the Year (Safari Club International), Conservationist of the Year (Montana Hunting Hall of Fame), American Motors Conservation Award and Montana State University's Blue-Gold Award.
In addition, Orion - The Hunter's Institute has twice been named as the Conservation Organization of the Year by the Montana Wildlife Federation, and a Beyond Fair Chase video won several awards from the Outdoor Writers Association of America for its script and editing.
The program is free and open to the public. For more information, call Eastern Wildlands Chapter of the Montana Wilderness Association at 256-3874.

Writer John Clayton has launched another Montana-based blog.

And this article in Slate argues that firefighters aren't necessarily the heroes we make them out to be. It brings up a point that I keep meaning to get around to, which is that our notions of heroism may need to be rethought from the ground up. The word has been used awfully loosely since 9-11 to categorize whole groups of people: soldiers, firefighters, astronauts, police officers, U.S. presidents, Oliver North, even an Army colonel accused of criminal assault for firing a revolver to scare an Iraqi prisoner into revealing information.

I spent enough time as a volunteer firefighter to vouch for some of what the Slate article says. Finding people to fight fires was the easy part of running a volunteer fire department, a job I did for a couple of years. The heroes, if any, were the people who put together the barbecues and bake sales to keep us afloat.

Even the Army recognizes that not everybody who puts on a uniform deserves a medal for heroism. Soldiers in difficult combat circumstances, such as troops who spent years in the trenches in World War I, for instance, exhibit more courage just getting up for breakfast than most of us do in a lifetime. To become a hero, the Army decided, you have to exhibit valor "above and beyond the call of duty." So an infantry soldier who ran toward opposing trenches with bare chest exposed to machine gun fire wasn't a hero, just a soldier doing his duty. The same could be said for New York firefighters who ran up the Twin Towers as ordinary citizens were running down. They weren't heroes -- just good, brave men doing a difficult job -- but a job all the same. That should be enough.

Similarly, I have heard it argued that airline pilots who manage to land a damaged plane aren't heroes because they are acting in their own self-interest. They may be courageous, skilled and cool under pressure, but their motives aren't fundamentally heroic.

Sometimes when I think about all this I fear that I push the standard of heroism so far that no one can meet it. Once, trying to come up with a working definition of evil, I composed one that let even Hitler off the hook, at least during his insane years. That's no good. Any definition of evil that leaves out Hitler obviously needs to be reworked.

And, I sometimes think, maybe I'm too demanding of heroes. At least most people now recognize that being a professional athlete doesn't make you a hero. That's progress.

Then I ran across an item about Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German theologian who left Germany when Hitler came to power and then returned to help resist Nazism. He was executed in 1945 for helping Jews escape.

Now that's a hero.

Remember that study by the Center for Public Integrity that found that the Bush administration favored its cronies and campaign supporters in awarding contracts to rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan? This Slate article says that the Center's research doesn't justify its conclusions.

I keep hearing Bill O'Reilly calling Bill Moyers a socialist. Those are fighting words where Moyers comes from (East Texas), so naturally I had to follow this link to a Moyers speech from Paul Stephens' always-interesting Montana Green Party Bulletin. Big quote:

"[Y]ou have to respect the conservatives for their successful strategy in gaining control of the national agenda. Their stated and open aim is to change how America is governed – to strip from government all its functions except those that reward their rich and privileged benefactors. They are quite candid about it, even acknowledging their mean spirit in accomplishing it. Their leading strategist in Washington – the same Grover Norquist has famously said he wants to shrink the government down to the size that it could be drowned in a bathtub. More recently, in commenting on the fiscal crisis in the states and its affect on schools and poor people, Norquist said, “I hope one of them” one of the states “goes bankrupt.” So much for compassionate conservatism. But at least Norquist says what he means and means what he says. The White House pursues the same homicidal dream without saying so. Instead of shrinking down the government, they’re filling the bathtub with so much debt that it floods the house, water-logs the economy, and washes away services for decades that have lifted millions of Americans out of destitution and into the middle-class. And what happens once the public’s property has been flooded? Privatize it. Sell it at a discounted rate to the corporations.

"It is the most radical assault on the notion of one nation, indivisible, that has occurred in our lifetime."

A socialist might say that, I suppose, but it's more in keeping with the odd populist streak that runs through East Texas politics. These are, in most respects, profoundly conservative people, suspicious of government, unwilling to give or accept a handout. But populism runs deep in the red-dirt country, and it helped keep Democrats in power for a century after Reconstruction.

This Washington Post article says that sportsmen's groups and gun clubs along the Rocky Mountain Front, including some in Montana, are upset with the Bush administration's environmental policies.

Byron Williams suspects that Wal-Mart may not be as innocent as it claims of knowledge that illegal workers were cleaning its stores. And Robert Scheer blames employers for immigration problems.

And here's more bad news for Clear Channel Communications.

TV news hits another new low.

This letter to the editor (second one down) sums up a lot of my feelings about grocery shopping these days. I won't shop at Wal-Mart because I don't feel inclined to prop up the Chinese economy, because Wal-Mart destroys jobs and small businesses, because Wal-Mart won't advertise in newspapers (my evil selfish motive), because Wal-Mart has been sued a couple of dozen times for union busting and for forcing "associates" to work unpaid overtime, because I find the whole place a little creepy and because I have a friend who used to date a Wal-Mart heir and gave him up because the billions weren't worth it.

But the preferred shopping cards absolutely infuriate me. I don't think Albertson's headquarters in Idaho needs to know how much toilet paper or beer I bought last month. We shop more and more often at the IGA and at the Good Earth Market, but Good Earth doesn't have everything and my wife complains about the selection at the IGA. So many stores, and so few choices.

For more on Wal-Mart, read the extensive Oct. 31 discussion at City Lights. And here's yet another reading suggestion from Jackie Corr, this time on Costco (but you have to register -- which I won't do either because the Times wants to know my income. Forget it, pal; stick to Schwarzenegger's private life).

UPDATE: Michael Erickson also weighs in on the Wal-Mart issue.