My Page: Courtney Lowery
From The New West Blog
Gas Prices Hit Rural Northern Rockies, New Mexico
Montana, Wyoming and Idaho are the hardest hit in the West by $4.00 gasoline, according to a study in today's New York Times.
The study looks at percentage of income spent on gas, so rural areas in the Northern Rockies, Great Plains and southeast look the worst because of low median incomes and high use of vehicle travel.
Most of Montanans spend 7-10 percent of their income on gas with one pocket in eastern Montana between 10-16 percent. In Wyoming, most counties are in the 8-16 percent range. Most of Idaho is in the 5-8 percent range. Click on the map at right for an interactive map from the Times.
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Missoula Summer Season Opens
Downtown ToNight, Out to Lunch Kick Off Despite Rain
Rain kept some people away from Caras Park and the first Out to Lunch, but the Missoula Downtown Association is more optimistic about the turnout for tonight’s first Downtown ToNight.
Linda McCarthy, executive director of the MDA, said this marks the fourth year in a row to kick off Out to Lunch in the rain.
“We live in Montana,” McCarthy said. “We’re not going to cancel because of the rain.”
Downtown ToNight at Caras Park, which runs from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. follows up yesterday’s Out to Lunch and together, they mark the beginning of Missoula's summer events season.
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From The New West Blog
Everyone is Perplexed About Kelleher’s Montana Win
Two days after Bob Kelleher, a longtime political character in Montana, won the Republican U.S. Senate primary (by 10,000 votes), everyone, pundits and party officials alike, knows how it happened.
Even Kelleher himself is in awe. Kelleher tells Jennifer McKee of Lee Newspapers' State Bureau, "Honest to goodness, I see the hand of the Almighty in this."
McKee's story, headlined, "So Kelleher finally won a race: Now what?" is full of Montana's most seasoned political watchers scratching their heads. It's a fun read.
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From The New West Blog
The “Ron Paul” Effect Alive in Idaho, Montana
The Idaho Statesman's Kevin Richert has a good column today making the case for the "Ron Paul Effect" in Idaho and previewing how it might play out in the upcoming state GOP convention.
From Richert: "The Paul voters influenced the process in much the same way as Idaho Democrats hope the Barack Obama phenomenon will energize younger and disaffected voters to support other Democratic candidates."
In Idaho's May GOP primary, Paul grabbed 24 percent of the vote. In Montana yesterday, Paul, who tends to resonate with the more libertarian conservatives in the West, won almost 22 percent of the vote. Despite some disappointment among his supporters (read Robert Struckman's story from Montana here), the Paul factor is alive and well in the Northern Rockies. The question, which Richert poses, is: Will those Paul supporters return to the party when he's not on the ballot?
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Quick and Dirty Number Crunching
Democrats Surge (95%) in Montana PrimaryMontanans went to the polls in droves for Tuesday's primary, and predictions about an "energized" Democratic party were realized, surpassed even. Unofficial results show 181,986 Democratic ballots were cast, compared to 93,543 in the 2004 presidential primary, a jump of 88,443 Democratic voters and a 95 percent increase.
Overall, turnout was more than 45 percent, according to Secretary of State Brad Johnson's office. And, that's likely to climb a little higher as final tallies come in. If numbers hold, it will be the highest turnout for a primary since 1994 (when turnout statistics were higher before the National Voting Rights Act).
Sen. Barack Obama's 102,544 votes (56 percent) surpassed the number of votes the entire Democratic field got in 2004, and Sen. Hillary Clinton's 75,053 was more than John Kerry and John Edwards combined. Click here for the unofficial results from the Secretary of State's office.
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Montana Primary Live Blog
Obama Wins Montana, NominationAfter enjoying an unprecedented turn in the national political spotlight, Montana voters went to the polls Tuesday, and confirmed Sen. Barack Obama's nomination as the Democratic presidential candidate. As the last primary voters of the season (although its not quite over) Montanan relished the chance to, as several said, feel like Iowa or New Hampshire for once.
“It’s just been electric. That’s all I can say. Everybody, young and old, wants to vote and that’s the way it should be," said Phyllis Vining a volunteer in Missoula.
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Presidential candidates courting Montana
Bill Clinton Enjoys Mo Club Burger, Greets MissouliansFormer President Bill Clinton swung through Missoula Saturday night and stopped by the Mo Club for one of their famous burgers, a diet Pepsi and a little hand shaking.
In Montana to stump for his wife's bid in the upcoming Montana Democratic primary this Tuesday, Clinton held events in Stevensville, Helena, Great Falls and Anaconda while his daughter, Chelsea, campaigned for her mother in Billings.
Hillary Clinton's opponent, and if polls prove true, the front-runner, Barack Obama, was in Great Falls rallying on Friday and his wife, Michelle will be in Billings and Kalispell Monday for get out the vote events.
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From The New West Blog
Presidential Politics and the Rural/Urban Divide in the West
Shea Anderson has a thorough story in this week's Boise Weekly hashing out how the presidential election is playing out in the Mountain West.
While at first, the story in general looks at the standard pontifications of the West-worthiness of each candidate, it gets at more than that, diving in with analysis and research on how the growth of urban Western towns is coloring the approach and reach of the two Democratic candidates.
Shea writes: "As places like Boise and others grow in influence and population in the West, both parties hope that it transforms the electorate as well. Democrats, who typically do better in urban areas in the West, are staking their hopes on the growth of cities."
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Trouble in Paradise
Edra Blixseth to Seek Control of Yellowstone Club
A high-stakes battle over the future of the Yellowstone Club, the private retreat for the mega-rich near Big Sky, Mont., took a new turn Thursday when Edra Blixseth, co-owner of the club and estranged wife of club founder and co-owner Tim Blixseth, promised to file a lawsuit to install herself as COO of the club and bar Tim Blixseth and his managers from any role in the club's operations or finances. [more]
From The New West Blog
USDA Opens Conservation Reserve Land to Grazing, Haying
The USDA today announced that it will authorize 24 million acres enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program, about 65 percent, to be grazed or hayed for "critical feed" for livestock.
The agency cites rising crop prices, high demand for feed and steep competition for acres as its reasons for opening up the CRP lands, which it estimates will generate 18 million tons of feed worth $1.2 billion.
The program, which pays landowners to take their land out of production for 10-15 years to restore habitat, curb erosion and improve water quality, is hailed as the largest public-private conservation effort in the country. But, it has its criticisms and this new program highlights, in my mind, the most pressing one with one little provision: "The most environmentally-sensitive land enrolled in CRP" will not be allowed to be grazed or hayed.
So, 24 million acres in a program meant to rehab delicate farm land aren't environmentally sensitive enough to be left alone?
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