Letter to the editor

I have been visiting the backcountry of the Southwest for many years. Craig Childs’ statement in “Pillaging the Past” that 90 percent of archaeological sites have been vandalized seems accurate from what I have witnessed (HCN, 4/28/08). When I first set foot on Cedar Mesa in southeast Utah almost 30 years ago, artifacts such as […]

I was shocked and saddened to read Childs’ grim report (HCN, 4/28/08). I looked on eBay under “Anasazi” – sure enough, there was all kinds of stuff for sale. Shocking. There’s a way to enjoy this art without robbing graves. I bought a pot at the Acoma Pueblo. It sits in my living room. The […]

The personal right to self-defense is not so broad as to include the intrusion into the safety and well-being of others in order to exercise that right (HCN, 4/28/08). Guns are not only in the homes of the households they are supposed to protect, they are violating our communities. They are in fast-food restaurants, on […]

I’ve lived in rural eastern Oregon for 37 years, and in that time have known several suicides (HCN, 3/31/08). Some are variations on the scripts that Ring discusses. But there is another type of suicide that is not unusual in the rural independent West – the elderly or terminal individual who clings to control over […]

April Reese’s analysis of the leasing protest game told a story familiar in California as well as the Intermountain West (HCN, 3/31/08) Recently, Los Padres ForestWatch, in partnership with rural landowners, protested a lease sale of more than 20,000 acres adjacent to the Los Padres National Forest. Later, all but one of the parcels were […]

I think it is worth remembering that for every “crazy” person who kills himself, there are many more suicide victims who show no evidence of “craziness”at all. I’ve lost three dear friends to gunshot suicide. None of us saw the signs, and indeed, they were hard to detect. But maybe, as the world itself becomes […]

Jonathan Thompson’s use of the phrase “self-murder”is ill-advised, and “crazy”(as used by both Thompson and Ray Ring) arguably is, too, in this context, in particular as a major heading on the front page (HCN, 3/31/08). Yet more telling, however, is Thompson’s – and to a degree (and surprisingly) Ring’s – apparent ignorance of how mental […]

I just finished reading “My Crazy Brother” (HCN, 3/31/08). I cried. I’m a 30-year teaching veteran, 22 of which I’ve spent in a tiny community college in Colorado, where higher education is 49th in the nation. My classrooms are filled with under-, un-, wrongly and oddly prepared students. Social workers, school counselors, and other do-gooders […]

Ray Ring’s article about his “crazy brother” really touched me (HCN, 3/31/08). I lost my older sister to suicide this past Oct. 31, and our mother killed herself when I was 14. I, like Ray, believe the problems started with childhood emotional traumas that were never dealt with, and as the years wore on their […]

How could HCN, well known for its hard-hitting investigative journalism, publish such an uncritical article on the Yuma Proving Grounds (HCN, 3/31/08)? It doesn’t take a trip to Yuma to uncover some contrary opinions (just a few mouse clicks reveal that there is a serious problem there with depleted uranium pollution) and those cool pictures […]

Drew Pogge believes he is without friends, finding himself “magnetically repelled” by both environmentalists and good ol’ boys because of his empathy for both (HCN, 3/31/08). He is, however, sadly mistaken. He is magnetically repelled because of the stereotypes he insists on articulating. He writes that the conservation movement is often “tainted with hypocrisy” and […]

Having just read the (for the most part) well-written article by Matt Jenkins on Navajo water rights, I just couldn’t get one phrase from the opening paragraphs out of my head (HCN, 3/17/08). He describes tribal water rights commissioner Lena Fowler as possessing a “… cool intensity and a vaguely sexy set of crow’s feet […]

Matt Jenkins’ article on Navajo water claims seemed to exhibit a subtle bias against the grassroots Dine folks on the outside of the tribal bureaucracy (HCN, 3/17/08). And maybe the activists are a little unfair to the white lawyer – after all, there are also Indian lawyers, elected officials, water consultants and bureaucrats who are […]

As a Teton County commissioner, I thought HCN’s readers would appreciate some additional information about the expansion of the Grand Targhee Resort in Teton County, Wyo., described in a recent “Two Weeks in the West” item (HCN, 3/03/08). The decision balanced the legitimate need for a historic resort to expand with the protection of natural […]

I thought that Alaska was crazy over wolves, and yes, they still are, but in Catron County, where I now spend my winters, things are crazier yet (HCN, 2/04/08). I’m not sure how the threatened child issue became so prominent in Catron County. Of course, wolves could kill a child, or an adult, for that […]

The “Unnatural Preservation” article, like nearly everything else in HCN, is generally excellent (HCN, 2/04/08). However, the authors miss, I think, an important element of the National Park Service management philosophy, and thus distort their conclusions about the agency. While the Park Service still holds onto the general thrust of the policy toward its natural […]

“Havana goes West” by Nathaniel Hoffman felt like something out of a socialist trade journal (HCN, 3/03/08). In Cuba today, no more than three people are allowed to meet on the street or they can be locked up by the police. Nobody changes jobs and nobody changes where they live. Opposition writers and journalists are […]

The prospect of “high wage” mining and energy jobs is one reason Western communities might welcome extractive industries (HCN, 2/18/08). Indeed, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data confirm that mining and construction pay well, averaging $20 per hour, while workers in the “Leisure and Hospitality” industry make just $10 per hour. So does the […]

I feel the issues in “Unnatural Preservation” were presented in a very dichotomous way, that is, scientists versus managers, now versus never, all versus nothing (HCN, 2/04/08). Yet there are plenty of examples where we are addressing the gray area by trying different things at different scales, creating multidisciplinary collaborations, and envisioning alternative future landscapes. […]

About five times a year we fly a small private plane from Arizona to California and back, and our route often takes us just to the north of the Salton Sea (HCN, 3/03/08). We’ve often wondered what it’s like on the ground. Now we know, and we don’t need to land to see it for […]