Category: Law, Government, Politics

About ten years ago, Ken and Norma Eberts decided to sell their Bad Lands ranch and retire. The ranch is directly across the river from the Elkhorn Ranch Site, home to our 26th president, Theodore Roosevelt. It is where he developed his famous conservation ethic, before becoming America’s greatest Conservation President. Ken and Norma knew … Continue reading The Saga of the Elkhorn Continues: What’s a FONSI?

I’m an old liberal who, my conservative friends say, “never met a tax he didn’t like.” Well, they’re pretty much right. Taxes generally do good things for people, especially those at the local level. The federal government is often another story. But that’s our own fault, for electing the wrong people sometimes, and leaving them … Continue reading Finally, A Tax I Don’t Like

Note: This article appears in the current issue of Dakota Country magazine, a monthly outdoors publication headquartered in Bismarck. I write a regular monthly article for the magazine focusing on the oil industry’s impact on the North Dakota Badlands. You can find subscription information on the magazine’s website, http://www.dakotacountrymagazine.com. I’ve shot probably half a dozen, … Continue reading Last Dance of the Sage Grouse

Two hundred years ago today, on May 17, 1814 (Syttende Mai in the Norwegian language), a young couple, Mons Olson Fuglen, and his wife, Ragnhild Knudsdatter, likely sat across the table from each other and toasted the newfound freedom and independence of their country. They may have toasted with a glass of aquavit, a traditional … Continue reading Happy Syttende Mai

Okay I’m going to get a little preachy again. It’s about the Clean Water, Wildlife and Parks Amendment (you can read the text of the proposed amendment here). You’ll remember I said I was going to sit this one out this year because I have some differences with the measure’s authors. But at least they're … Continue reading Sons of the Fathers

I’m pissed off about so many things this week I don’t know where to start. That’s what I get for taking a few weeks off to play. Things pile up. I’m about to go on a rant that will surely get me another admonishment from my friend Wayne Tanous: “Jim, lighten up. It’s spring.” Okay. … Continue reading Next: Planting Potatoes

You may be reading in the papers this week a letter to the editor from a young man named Jacob Odermann.  If you haven’t read it, go here. It’s about the proposed Clean Water, Wildlife and Parks Amendment headed for the ballot this fall if all goes right. I don’t know Jacob, but his dad, … Continue reading Getting The Facts Straight

Okay, History/Current Events/Sports Quiz. Do you recognize the name Private Frazier? No? Well how about if it was on a list with Sergeant Pryor and Privates Goodrich, Gibson, and Hall?  Aha. Lillian Crook and David Borlaug and Tracy Potter think they know. As do Stephenie Ambrose Tubbs and Clay Jenkinson. Well, then, for the rest … Continue reading Right Off The Cliff

While going through some old papers this weekend, I came across a speech given by former Governor Art Link at the 4-H camp near Washburn in the Summer of 1977. Here are some excerpts. “You, as young people, are the vital and important basis for our state’s future. Your personal growth can certainly have an … Continue reading Art Link: “Consider Continuing The Prairie Lifestyle”

So, George B. Sinner is running for Congress. Good for him. I wish him well. Remember this: George B. Sinner is the State Senator from Fargo. He’s about 60 years old. His father is George A. Sinner, also from Fargo. He’s the former Governor. He’s about 85. Remember that. A = 85. B = 60. … Continue reading The Price of Politics