Opinion

CARA is a first great step against addiction

Few people would think twice if a friend told them they took a Vicodin, but if the same friend told you they’d been using heroin, you would likely be more alarmed. However, both are opioid drugs, both are highly addictive and one is a gateway drug to the other. Unfortunately, far too many Montanans will abuse prescription opioids, build a dangerous dependence on them and then start using heroin. This is a dangerous cycle with extremely serious consequences, not only to the addict but the entire community that surrounds them.

Stay the course with current city government

Dear Editor,
We need to keep Lewistown moving forward - we need to vote for the existing commission-manager form of government.
We have an effective and confident city manager, our current city commissioners are attentive to their duties and dedicated to Lewistown, and our city employees perform their jobs efficiently and conscientiously. Our community is showing vibrant growth, so we need our government to continue to perform smoothly. We do not need the confusion and disruption that a change to a different form of government would entail.

Sara Beth Times- I'm jumping off the drama train

I am not by nature a dramatic person, which I used to think was some sort of character flaw.
People respond to drama. If someone is making a scene, or making a statement, or crying in public, or laughing loudly, or talking with great expression, that’s who we notice.
Some people are effusive and dramatic in all the right ways. It is a healthy expression of an extroverted personality, and we love them for it.
But because drama distracts us from the quiet of our own minds, it is used by some to manipulate.

RMEF: I-177 bad for elk, wildlife management

The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation strongly opposes Initiative 177, a measure on Montana’s November ballot that would immediately ban trapping on all public lands in the state. If passed it would severely cripple scientifically sound management practices that maintain healthy wildlife populations across Montana.

Trump, the non-politician

Trump is not a politician -- he does not fit with the career Democrat and Republican political colleagues with whom I have associated for 50 years, beginning as an active Democrat in a traditional Democrat Party family. I organized college Young Democrats, worked on elections of governors, senators and all presidential campaigns starting with the Kennedy campaign when Pam and I had breakfast with Ted Kennedy.

The more things change...

Dear Editor, Ecclesiastes says that there is nothing new under the sun. “Surenuff,” we’re still having coal and cow problems 43 years later. Montana’s economy is going to take a terrible hit this year. The Colstrip Generating Station has been closed by Governor Bullock, and the calf income has dropped from $2.50 or so a pound down to $1.30 or so. Using the “Montana Agricultural Statistics” – State Series 1867-1991, there are 1,466,000 beef cows that have calved in Montana (1991).

Writers on the Range - Oh, goody, you can check your email in Yellowstone

Backpacking was made popular by the dropout generation in the 1960s. We were going to eschew the trappings of civilization and live intimately with Mother Nature. All things natural were good and groovy (except maybe hemlock and arsenic and stuff like that.) Turn on (to nature), tune in, and drop out, baby.

Heard Around the West

Montana
Billings
Are state fairs going to the dogs? No; at least in Montana, they’re going to the rabbits. During Billings’ annual Montana Fair, 22 kids from Yellowstone County participated in its first-ever rabbit-hopping exposition. Their animals, each harnessed and on a leash, competed on a “bunny-agility” course featuring five jumps.
The winner, named Squeakers, completed the race in what his handler, 9-year-old Dawson Harms, described as the “relatively slow time” of 32 seconds, explaining that “sometimes he finishes in five seconds.”

A dangerous campaign

Presidential campaigns, including the debates, are about the future; or using that favorite political buzzword: “Change.” There have been nineteen presidential elections during my lifetime and in every one of them Montanans and virtually all Americans wanted change; not necessarily the change of an incumbent President but always movement toward change known as progress... that particularly American idea of meeting the challenges of the time by voting for a “New Deal,” a “New Frontier,” or “Morning In America.”

Pipeline riots cost workers, companies and state

Dear Editor,
In my opinion, America is out of control with riots and murder organized by the “Black Lives Matter” hired terrorists directed by the Saul Alinsky group in Chicago (ACORN was the original group in the 2008 election), financed largely by American and international socialist money funneled through George Soros’ front organizations to create social chaos. Now it suddenly appeared in North Dakota.