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Columns

October 12, 2023
Goats like the ones seen here can answer the

Goats can be a forest’s best friend

Goats are particularly good at one thing: Eating. Unlike a horse or cow that leaves noxious weeds behind, goats eat the whole menu of pesky weeds, bushes and small trees. That means goats can be one of the answers to the growing problem of tinder-dry, highly flammable forests.

October 5, 2023

Let’s blow the whistle on public-land abusers

Dozens of TVs, refrigerators, stoves, washers, dryers and abandoned cars had either been gunshot, torched or both. This place of destruction was what some locals called “Carnage Canyon,” roughly 30 acres off Lefthand Canyon in Boulder County, Colorado.

September 28, 2023

Facing a shutdown showdown

“I’d shut down the government if they can’t make an appropriate deal, absolutely,” Donald Trump said Sept. 14, on Meet the Press.

September 7, 2023

One day for Labor Day is not enough

The state of labor this year is so fraught, so weighted with issues and problems, that a single day of homage and reflection doesn’t seem enough. It’s as if a year or more is needed to engage the issues, challenges, and possibilities facing American workers today. Consider the following:

August 17, 2023

Tips for a new Westerner

Hurray, you’ve moved to the rural West from a crowded subdivision or city where the traffic has become an out-of-patience game, and now you want to fit in.

August 10, 2023
Colorado journalist Allen Best publishes a twice-monthly publication examining the impacts of a rapidly warming climate. (Courtesy of Writers on the Range)

A dogged reporter covers our roiling world

Usually seen with a camera slung around his neck, Allen Best edits a one-man online journalism shop he calls “Big Pivots.” Its beat is the changes made necessary by our rapidly warming climate, and he calls it the most important story he’s ever covered.

August 3, 2023

The problem that just won’t go away

When I read the Salt Lake Tribune editorial on July 2, my heart sank. A Utah man with severe mental illness had died in a poorly regulated care home, with a mere $8,000 fine levied against the managers.