Some of the land recently marked for drilling in Utah may be pulled from the oil and gas auction block. In late summer and early fall, six resource management plans were rushed through at a break neck speed, opening up 80 percent of the 11 million acres in the planning areas for energy development. Cultural […]
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Posted inGoat
The bluest of blue states
Prior to yesterday’s election, New Mexico was just about evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. While Dems controlled the State House and Senate, and a Dem lived in the Governor’s mansion, two of the three U.S. Congressional seats were held by Republicans and the state was represented by one Republican and one Democrat in the […]
Posted inGoat
Arizona stays red
Well, there weren’t too many surprises coming from McCain’s home state yesterday. All of the incumbents, even Harry Mitchell, D, in the 5th Congressional District, held onto their U.S. Congressional seats, and the Mac nabbed the state’s presidential contest, albeit by a narrower margin than most talking heads expected. Ann Kirkpatrick, D, bagged only open […]
Posted inGoat
So goes the West?
After two almost-too-close-to-call presidential elections, New Mexico is now considered safe turf for Barack Obama. But more interestingly, in a poll taken just two days ago, things were looking up for the rest of New Mexico’s Democratic candidates. Currently, Republicans hold one of the two U.S. Senate seats and two of the three U.S. Congressional […]
Posted inGoat
BLM steamrolls another protection for public lands
On Oct. 10, the Bureau of Land Management proposed a rule change that will make it harder for the Department of Interior secretaries and Congress to protect public lands through an “emergency withdrawal.” In June, the House Natural Resources Committee used the rule that the BLM is attempting to change when it called for an […]
Posted inGoat
Power to the people
The burning question in Sevier County, Utah, to build or not to build a new 270-megawatt coal-fired power plant, will be answered by voters in November. Sevier County citizens collected enough signatures to place Proposition 1, which would amend the county’s land use ordinance to require a vote before approving any permits for coal-fired plants, […]
Posted inGoat
Drilling setback in Nine Mile Canyon
This week, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation sent letters to the Bureau of Land Management raising concerns about plans to open Nine Mile Canyon for new energy development. The canyon, situated in eastern Utah’s Tavaputs Plateau, is home to ancient rock art, which has already endured damage due to increased truck traffic from the […]
Posted inGoat
Roan battle rages on
Yesterday, the BLM issued leases for natural gas drilling on the Roan Plateau. The leases were auctioned off about six weeks ago for a record-breaking $114 million. Environmental groups, hunters, anglers and Colorado politicians, including Governor Bill Ritter, opposed the BLM’s management plans, advocating for stronger protections on the unique and beautiful sanctuary in western […]
Posted inGoat
The Palin Effect
A couple of weeks ago, New Mexico traded its “toss up” status in the presidential election for “leaning Democrat.” And as of yesterday, the Rasmussen prediction market showed a 58% chance of an Obama/Biden victory in the Land of Enchantment. After many near-too-close-to-call election years, political winds seemed to be blowing moderately leftish. Tom Udall […]
Posted inGoat
Read our tweets
The High Country News team is jumping headlong into the Web 2.0 world. Our most recent social networking adventure is happening on Twitter — an online application that allows our reporters and editors to provide short, quick updates, via cell phone or computer, about our work as it unfolds. In addition to writing blog posts, […]
Posted inDnc 08
Video: Coalition rallies for peace
On Wednesday evening, a coalition of peace groups organized a march in an effort to elevate the voices of anti-war veterans.
Posted inDnc 08
Rocking the Native vote
Health care, tribal sovereignty, education, economic development and criminal justice. These are some of the most critical issues with which Native Americans are currently wrestling, and there’s a lot on the line in the 2008 election. This was the message at Wednesday’s “Native Nations United for Change Policy Discussion.” “We’ve suffered through a long, cold […]
Posted inDnc 08
Johnny Five and the bomb squad
After a long day of meetings and protest-following, a police officer informed us that the road to our car was closed. A half a block away, we found a small group of re-routed pedestrians staring across the street — enchanted by an odd little robot that was inspecting a “suspicious package.” The wheeled machine, which […]
Posted inDnc 08
Freegin’, part 2
Yesterday, Andrea and I tried out Freewheelin — a free bike sharing service that helped us traverse downtown. No bus fare, no carbon emissions and no aching feet. We just signed up, selected a bike and rode to our hearts’ content. Faster transportation = more reporting. We also scored free DNC t-shirts, a fanny-pack (!), […]
Posted inDnc 08
Choirs on the corner
Two groups of singers bumped into each other on the corner of 16th St. and Wynkoop. A barbershop quartet had just sung for Dick Gephardt and a jolly band of Denver locals was singing “Goodnight Bush” (a parody of Goodnight Moon) up and down the mall. We had the good fortune of hearing each of […]
Posted inDnc 08
Little consensus among energy experts
One of the near-unanimous take home messages from the Energy and Climate Change panels held at the Denver Performing Arts Complex on Tuesday was this: start pricing carbon emissions as soon as possible. The most important role that government will play as the U.S. moves to new, cleaner energy sources is pricing carbon, whether it’s […]
Posted inGoat
Does Tom Udall put families before fish? NO!
Front and center are two peace-seeking, fish-loving, tax-hiking, tree-hugging, jewelry-wearing, long haired hippies. The brains behind the Pearce campaign seem to think that connecting Udall to 1960’s and 70’s-style environmentalism will be enough to discredit him. Whether or not this will be a successful strategy amid the West’s shifting political winds remains to be seen. […]
Posted inGoat
Democratic? National Convention comes to Denver
The 2008 Democratic National Convention is looming – and the recurring questions about free speech, public spaces and national security are on the minds of freedom-loving people everywhere. Not surprisingly, those who plan to protest at the Democratic National Convention next month will most likely be confined to a fenced in “designated protest zone.” This […]