Plenty of dam problems in the West

And, 5 percent of them are believed susceptible to failure, and nobody knows where the money for repairs could come from. The cost is likely more than $50 billion.

On the Kern River, in California, if Lake Isabella Dam fails? Bakersfield could be in trouble:

The potential is for a 21st-century version of the Johnstown Flood, a calamitous dam failure that killed more than 2,200 people in western Pennsylvania in 1889.

Yes, the Corps of Engineers is right that the chances are minimal. But, they're not nonexistent.t

Westerners suck off government teat

So much for the U.S. Western states’ “rugged individualism.” Instead, the West is a hotbed of welfare state socialism. I have known the basics, already, but the new Pew search program linked inside this blog sounds very good.

Government sued over energy corridors

In what could be a major battle for today and tomorrow as well, that between environmental preservation and the development of Western-states energy resources, a variety of enviro groups have sued Obama Administration entities over power corridor siting in the West.

“It doesn’t make any sense for the agencies to invest all of this time and energy into a network of corridors that must be obsolete very soon if we’re going avoid the worst effects of climate change,” said Amy Atwood, a senior attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the 15 plaintiffs.

True enough as a stand-alone statement, Ms. Atwood. But, we’re going to face some of those same issues in the future, in the Southwest, over how to run electricity from solar and wind sites in the desert to the area’s big cities.

Same old Ken Salazar?

High Country News says his recent comments about the West being the “engine for the clean energy economy” may mean clean energy elsewhere, at the price of slapdash green energy development in the interior West.

The blog post concludes with some “tells” to look at in the

Climate change killing Western trees

In the western United States, especially the Southwest, where the area is in the grip of what seems to be the longest drought since the last days of Mesa Verde, global warming has brought dryer conditions – what seems to be climatic, not just weather – with it. And the combo, both directly and indirectly, is killing Western trees.

Trees are more susceptible, now, to pest like the various bark beetles, as well as drought itself, and certainly to foreste fires. Plus, they’re able to absorb less carbon dioxide.

The ‘other fundamentalists’ fight for Prop. 8

It’s not just Christian groups fighting for Proposition and the rollback of gay marriage in California. Golden State progressives, if you’re approached by a clean-cut white male in white shirt, black pants and black tie, run like hell — probably, it’s a Mormon trying to get you to vote Yes on 8. Per High Country News, in June, the church's top prophets commanded Mormons “to do all you can” to work for Prop. 8.

But, Prop. 8 is just the tip of the electioneering, highly centralized out of the temple in Salt Lake City, by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormons or the LDS — or the Morons or the LDS, depending on your take.

The HCN story goes far beyond this, though — it’s a full-blown roundup of the Religious Right’s top advocacy groups out West. Give the full story a good read.

In case you haven’t heard, more than a quarter of Oregonians are irreligious in some way, shape or form, and the West as a whole, despite the strong presence of Hispanic Catholics (and Hispanic evangelicals), is the far and away the least religious part of the country. And, it’s the most libertarian area as well.

Yet, since James Dobson’s move to Colorado Springs, Colo., the West has become the promised land for much of the Religious Right, too.

And, there’s plenty of irony — the Mormons, like John Winthrop’s Puritans and Plymouth’s Pilgrims fled persecution elsewhere only to re-establish it themselves when they were the masters.

Oh, and I’ll also bet you didn’t know that by percentage of population, Idaho is more Mormon than Utah. Nor did you probably know that, sociologically speaking, Idaho Mormons are stricter.

If you didn’t, read the full story. You’ll also find, on page 4, that Idaho Mormon repression hasn’t made human nature any better, and from the police blotter of Rexburg, Idaho, you’ll get the details of that.

Jim Stiles tells us what he thinks America needs

Gadfly Utah journalist Jim Stiles, with at least somewhat a claim to Ed Abbey’s mantle, gives us his take on what he’d tell the American public, were he elected president.

He says we need to stop buying so damned much on credit. He would subsidize affordable housing up to 1,500 square feet. He’d limit income tax deductions to just the first two children in a family.

And, that’s just for starters.

The flip side of estate taxes on display in rural West

GOP efforts to eliminate them entirely aside, large ranch spreads in the rural West, with McMansion developers surrounding you on all sides, offer a new angle on the issue.

Basically, Western ranchers in places like Steamboat Springs, Colo., are having their land driven up to the price level that heirs often have to sell at least part of the farm or ranch. That’s especially with re-evaluation of the property at the death of the old owner.
Conservative easement deductions help somewhat, but not enough.

It’s a problem that the presidential candidates will need to address. But, part of the solution is at the state level, addressing reappraisal issues.

Some Western reading for the next president

High Country News corralled a posse of Western historians, novelists, and essayists, including former Texan and Palo Duro homilist Dan Flores, and asked them what they’d recommend the next president read.

Their broad-ranging list includes Marc Reisner’s “Cadillac Desert,” Charles Mann's “1491,” Jared Diamond's “Collapse,” Doug Peacock’s “Grizzly Years,” Ed Abbey’s “Desert Solitude” and David Stuart's “Anasazi America,” among others.

Recommended books that might be less familiar include “Blood Struggle: The Rise of Modern Indian Nations,” by Charles Wilkinson, which is THE go-to book for American Indians battling Washington on tribal sovereignty issues.

Leslie Marmon Silko, Cormac McCarthy, Wallace Stegner, Rudolfo Anaya and Ivan Doig lead the recommendations on the fiction side.

Read the whole list; you just might find yourself some new reading.

Say goodbye to Western cottonwoods

The combination of an ongoing global-warming induced drought, drier seasons and higher temperatures, along with ever more competition from tamarisks, probably spells the death knell for these trees.

(This is a subscription-only story, but, whether you live out West, you’re a lover of the West’s environment, or you want news of social, cultural and political trends in the West, you’re missing a lot by not subscribing.)

Is the West going to get the election short shaft again?

At the best Western-issues magazine around, High Country News, Ed Quillen expresses exactly that worry.

Despite the fact that Barack Obama has put some previously-Red states, like Montana and Nevada, in play, and gotten red-leaning Colorado to start changing colors, Western issues like water supply aren’t being discussed yet.

And, even though John McCain is also, along with Obama, concerned about the reality of global warming AND comes from Arizona, they’re still not being discussed.

If you’re wondering what some other Western issues might be, and how they should be addressed, read the full story. Then, get yourself a subscription.

The future of Western GOP gets fractured

High Country News, the premier all-around progressive magazine of Western states environmentalism, politics and sociology, has an excellent take on the future of the conservatives vs. the ultra-conservatives of the GOP in the West, starting with the ground zero of Idaho.

Environmental issues, especially with mushrooming natural gas and coalbed methane production in a number of states, is at the top of fracture points between conservatives and ultras.

But, it’s not just conservatives vs. ultras. It’s also the stereotypical hook and bullet Republican against the big business one, or at least, the big extractive industries one.

That said, allegedly “green” Western Republicans still fall short. Witness Wyoming Republican Congressional candidate Mark Gordon:

The modern Sierra Club “is more ideological -- not talking about management (of grazing), but talking about getting cows off public lands. ... There’s been an incredible retrenchment on both sides.”

All straw man here, of course.

Sierra (and others) are about not letting you graze your cows on federal land at subsidized rates and above good carrying capacity.

Anyway, read the full article; it’s long but in-depth.

Then, consider subscribing to HCN.

‘Cowboy’ professor still won’t give up the myth of the West

Gregory Lockwood says the West needs more, not less, of the capital-M Myth of the cowboy. He’s talking about myth in the literary sense.

However, myth in the literary sense often becomes myth in the philosophical/religious sense, and Lockwood well proves that by waxing idolic over the cowboy, starting with citing the protagonist of the Louis L’Amour dime novel “Conagher” as a prototype for the cowboy hero the West needs today.

To that, I say bullshit, as I did in detail with a response to High Country News:

No, what really gets the goat of many people is NOT the "Cowboy Myth" but Western ranchers all too willing to rail against "welfare," except when it comes to paying below-market grazing rates on federal land.

As for myth with the small letter, “Conagher” illustrates the problem entirely. I read Louis L’Amour novels 20 years ago, until I outgrew two-dimensional characters and stereotyped plots.

As for myth, much more myth, Lockwood’s prototypical 19th-century cowboy may have been tolerant, but real-life Wyoming was the home of Matthew Shepherd. Beyond that, Louis L’Amour never wrote about a black, Indian or gay cowboy, though he did finally get an Indian protagonist in his last long book.

If you want a modern novelistic character for the West, why not choose Sgt. Jim Chee from Tony Hillerman’s books? He's a far more realistic model.

As for broader Western myths, let's not forget federal subsidies to the transcontinental railroad, federal military "subsidies" for settlers and ranchers alike to violate Indian treaties, subsidies of massive irrigation damns with below-market irrigation water prices and below-market hydroelectric prices, as just a few things refuting the myth, very much with Lockwood’s lower-case “m,” of the “independent” westerner in general.

A perfect example of this: In 1964, Barry Goldwater was all for privatizing the Tennessee Valley Authority, but the idea of charging market rates for Hoover Dam and Glen Canyon Dam electric power down in Phoenix? Nary a word ever crossed his lips.

In short, Mr. Lockwood, you explify why the authors you deride say the West needs to move beyond its myths — and its continued fascination with mythmaking.

Occasionally, HCN has a clunker in an issue, and this is definitely it.

Western ranchers want welfare but won’t admit it — hypocrisy alert

Neither will their PR flacks like Bonnie Kline, in a less-than-stellar article from the normally top-notch High Country News.

When your opening sentence is:

The extremists who are on a mission to eliminate the Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services would do well to spend time with ranchers who live and work on our Western landscape.

The truth?

Large predators kill less than one-tenth of one percent, or 0.1 percent of Western cattle. Weather kills nearly four percent.

Victories for the West Nov. 7

As one of my favorite magazines, High Country News, points out, in January, with the swearing in of Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House and Harry Reid as Senate Majority Leader, for the first time ever, Westerners will lead both houses of Congress.

But the election has many cautions.

Montana Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer, so heavily touted as presidential material by liberal and self-focused blogger Markos Zuniga, shows himself to be more and more an anti-environmentalist in many ways.

However, Schweitzer should beware. If a House committee chairman like arch-antienvironmentalist Dick Pombo could be beaten by a groundswell movement, Schweitzer could be unseated in a primary race.