Coen brothers present: "Clean Coal"

Rocky Mountain News R.I.P.

The Rocky Mountain News in Denver will publish its final issue tomorrow. Read all about it at http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2009/feb/26/rocky-mountain-news-closes-friday-final-edition/.

The newspaper was founded in 1859 by William Byers, one of the many hucksters to stake claims at the fledgling outpost located at the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte in Colorado Territory. Byers hauled his printing press in a wagon all the way to pre-Denver. The paper survived floods and fire and the ravages of time. It just couldn't deal with the Internet.

In the early 1980s, I covered high school sports for the Rocky. Just for a year. From 1978-1981, I wrote about high school sports for the competing Denver Post. I moved on to managing editor of a weekly newspaper, Up the Creek, which began its life covering the lively singles scene in Denver's Glendale enclave. It moved from drooling (in print) over wet T-shirt contests to covering arts and entertainment and culture in a rapidly growing city. We made fun of the Rocky and Post for their mistakes. We dueled with Westword over stories and ads (Westword won). I then moved on to other things, as people do. I love newspapers, and hate to see a good one go into the dustbin of history.

But here I am, writing on the Internet and reading newspapers such as the Rocky and the Post and the NY Times and the London Guardian and all the others for the price of a few cents of electricity.

Weird times, eh?

Obama's speech shows us the way

Alternative energy... health care... education...

The Big Three.

So glad that Pres. Obama revisited the three priorities that he hammered home during his race for the presidency.

Get busy on alternative energy to get rid of our dependence on the oil sheiks. Build windmills and upgrade the energy grid and build solar cells and design better hybrid cars. And clean coal? Nobody knows what that is but we can pour money and energy into ways that will make Wyoming's huge coal reserves cleaner and more useful in the alt-energy future.

Health care is crucial. Single-payer health care, the kind that Republicans (including our Wyoming delegation) hates. But the only kind that can solve our tangled health care system.

Tax breaks for college students. More college loans. A renewed commitment to post-secondary education. Everyone commit to at least a year of college? Why not? If I had my way, I'd always be taking a course.

Shovel-ready projects? We have plenty of those that require actual shovels -- highway construction, rebuilding cities, renovating homes. Then there are some that use metaphoric shovels. Projects in the arts and education and science.

I hear white noise in the background. Wait -- it's Bobby Jindal from Louisiana, another Republican naysayer. White noise, the droning of a political party with no ideas.

Stimulate the economy by cancelling student loan debt

I've been on Facebook for a few weeks. I have 29 friends, most of them far-away family members. My sister Mo in Tallahassee prompted my interest in FB, which had just been another PC time-waster until she started a family group. It's been fun to see what my four brothers and four sisters are up to. It's also educational viewing the posts by my nieces and nephews in college (and high school) in Florida -- and my son in college in Tucson. Exams, parties, rock concerts -- my niece Erin just went to a "wrock" concert, and I'm trying to figure out what it is. They post many more photos and videos that their elders. It's a multimedia melange to them. We're still figuring it out...

I've read a couple of anti-Facebook columns lately. I haven't been on long enough to be angry at this social networking site. One writer said that he didn't need FB to talk to his friends -- and didn't want to make any new friends who spend all their spare time on Facebook.

Facebook has a "groups" section. You can start your own group -- Red-headed Nazis for Christ, Recycling Geeks of America, etc. -- and you can invite all of your new friends to join. Some of these groups have gathered a huge number of joiners. One is Cancel Student Loan Debt to Stimulate the Economy. It boasts more than 83,000 members who want to wipe clean the student loan slate and spend their money on more important things, such as a faster laptop to accommodate all their new FB friends. I joined this one, as I'd like to persuade the lender of my grad-school loan to knock off some of the thousands in interest and fines it has piled onto my loan.

Some have commented that the group's members are just a bunch of whiners, people who took out loans voluntarily and now want to default on those loans, ruining the system for others. As if there was a "system" to student loans. If the act of finding, applying and receiving a student loan is systematic, I haven't seen it. My son gets tuition assistance from Pima Community College, but hasn't yet taken out a loan. I encourage him to avoid it if possible.

Pres. Obama has taken a step in the right direction, with tax credits for college expenses and other programs. But, as in the mortgage loan mess, many of us are carrying around student loans bloated by expanding interest and fees that drag us down. As is the case with "responsible homeowners" and their mortgages, we're just looking for a little relief -- not a bailout. Or default.

Wyoming to get $538M in stimulus funds

Today's Casper Star-Tribune has a list of funds coming to Wyoming through the Democrats' stimulus plan. It comes from the National Conference of State Legislators, via Sen. Mike Enzi's office. Enzi, of course, voted against the stimulus, as did our other senator and lone representative. It must be painful for them to release information about legislation that will bring much-appreciated help to their state -- and one which they had nothing to do with.

Here's the list thus far:

Fiscal Stabilization Fund $15 million
Medicaid $110 million
Highways and bridges $157.6 million
Transit capital grants $9.3 million
Drinking water state revolving fund $19.7 million
Clean water state revolving fund $19.5
Weatherization assistance $19.8 million
State energy program $20.4 million
Emergency food and shelter $200,000
Immunization $1.6 million
Foster care/adoption assistance $300,000
Elderly nutrition $500,000
Child care $2.6 million
Head Start $1.1 million
Community service block grant $5 million
Grants to local education authorities $25 million
School improvement $6.8 million
Special education Part B $25.8 million
Special education Part C $1.8 million
Vocational rehabilitation $1.6 million
Educational technology $3.1 million
School lunch equipment $100,000
Public housing capital fund $1.4 million
HUD affordable housing grant $3.6 million
Homeless prevention $1.7 million
Internet crimes against children $1.6 million
Violence Against Women Act $800,000
Unemployment insurance/state administration grants $900,000
Employment service $2.1 million
Law enforcement grants $5.6 million
Community service for older Americans $600,000
Job training for adults $1.2 million
Job training for youths $2.9 million
Dislocated workers $900,000

Less than $100,000 each for:
Community assistance/food assistance
Education for homeless
Crime victims assistance

Total: $538.6 million, give or take a few bucks.

I don't see anything in here for the arts, although $50 million in funding for the National Endowment for the Arts was included in the stimulus plan. Perhaps the NEA needs to figure out how they'll handle the funding before numbers can be released.

MoveOn meets with LarCoDems Feb. 24

Nicole Novotny sends word that the next meeting of the Laramie County Democratic Party will feature guest speaker Kate Wright, regional coordinator for www.MoveOn.org

The meeting will take place on Tuesday, Feb. 24, 7 p.m. at the Historic Plains Hotel in downtown Cheyenne.

After Kate's presentation, the Laramie County Democratic Party will discuss future fund-raising and the election of new officers for 2009 and 2010.

Nebraska and Wyoming share a trait: lack of children's mental health care services

The daily newspaper was invented for this.

On Feb. 1, the Omaha World-Herald published a long article, "Safe Haven kids finally got right help." The article, by staff writers Matthew Hansen and Karyn Spencer, was based on interviews and research into 10,000 pages of documents released to the paper by the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services. It takes time and patience it took to read that many pages of bureaucratese. It takes skill to translate that into an article that is heart-breaking. Read it at http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_page=2798&u_sid=10552927, and then read Judith Warner's column in the New York Times that alerted me to the OWH piece. Go to http://warner.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/19/is-there-no-place-on-earth/?emc=eta1

I've written several posts about the weird happenings surrounding Nebraska's "Safe Haven" law. Parents, at their wit's end with kids (mostly teens) who had mental health and behavior problems, abandoned them to Nebraska's authorities. One mother drove her child to Nebraska all the way from Georgia.

Nebraska is Wyoming's neighbor to the east. Both states reflect the fact that there is a severe shortage of mental health care practitioners and facilities in the nation's rural areas. Here's a paragraph from Warner's column:

In 1990, the Council on Graduate Medical Education estimated that by 2000, the United States would need 30,000 child psychiatrists; there are now 7,000. Many rural areas have no child psychiatrists or psychologists at all. Often, pediatricians end up providing mental health care, but they aren’t trained for it and often aren’t reimbursed for it by health insurance. The American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry is currently working with the American Academy of Pediatrics to try to formalize ways to collaborate on caring for children with mental health needs, but models for such joint care are scarce. And doctors have no financial incentives to talk to one another on the phone.

Many rural areas have no child psychiatrists or psychologists at all. Wyoming, with its 97,000 square miles of mostly "rural," doesn't have a single child psychiatrist. Psychologists? Yes, in the state's cities of Cheyenne and Casper, maybe a few others. There are licensed therapists who can provide counseling and possibly point harried parents in the right direction. There are non-profits such as UPLIFT and its outreach specialists who can do the same thing. (Note: I'm an UPLIFT board member). But when you are a parent faced with a mentally ill child, you need lots of guidance and professional help. Your child will likely need medication -- you need an M.D. for that.

Why do I care about this? My daughter just spent 2008 in a residential treatment facility. My wife and I are involved in our communities and know our way around mental health care and twelve-step programs. We have health insurance, but knew it wouldn't come close to covering the costs.

When it comes to long-term care for your own child, we often felt the way this mother described it to the OWH reporters:

Theresa Thomason, an Omaha native who lives in Oklahoma, said she had been struggling to get her adopted foster child into a residential program for his psychiatric problems.

She called an elected official and said she was taking her son to Nebraska unless someone helped her. A barrage of phone calls, e-mails and faxes followed. Her son was admitted within days.

"Why on God's green earth does it take all that to get help?" she asked.

Good question, Theresa.

More about some of the possible answers in future posts.

How much stimulus dough will come to WYO?

Ben Neary of the Associated Press reports that Sen. John Barrasso estimates Wyoming may receive up to $540 million from Pres. Obama's economic stimulus bill.

But Barrasso, a vocal opponent of the $787 billion stimulus bill, warned Wyoming lawmakers on Friday that they will have to consider carefully whether to accept federal dollars that may come with strings attached.

The Republican said only one copy of the lengthy bill was distributed in the Senate before last week's vote to approve it. He said that made it impossible for senators to read it before voting on it.

Gov. Dave Freudenthal has said this week that his administration is working to make sense of the bill and to determine whether accepting federal money would commit the state to future expenditures.

It's one hell of a deal when federal money comes with strings attached. Such as, when the feds give Wyoming money for highways, the gubment expects the money to be used for highways. The gall! The same goes for federal funds for education, toxic waste clean-up, even the arts.

Some Repub governors have made noises about not accepting the stimulus money. Louisiana's Republican Gov. Bobby Jindel, currently GOP Golden Boy, made some threats along those lines last week. New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin took time out from Mardi Gras festivities to say he'd take any of those federal funds that the Gov turned down. Still a lot of rebuilding to do in New Orleans.

That's the thing. Repub Govs may jabber all they want about not accepting stimulus money. But when it comes right down to it, they take it because their constituents -- Dem and Repub -- need it. Govs of southern states have been the most vociferous. They usually have sent Repubs to the U.S. House and Senate. But in the end, they'll take the money. State budgets are in touch shape. And Republican margins of victory weren't all that impressive in the recent elections.

In Wyoming, our budget surplus, brought to us by the energy extraction industries, have shrunk. All agencies in state government have been told to plan on 5 percent budget cuts this year and 10 percent for budgets in the next biennium. These are permanent cuts, not storm warnings that may be lifted in a few months. Wyoming is not exempt from the economic distress that's afflicting its neighboring states. A lumber mill shut down in Laramie this week, throwing 67 employees out of work. There's a lot of that going on.

Instead of worrying about some imaginary strings attached to the stimulus package, I'd suggest we take the money and keep people employed -- and put others back to work.

Twists and turns in arts-funding story

In the Feb. 15 New York Times, reporter Robin Pogrebin chronicled the odd story of how the $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts managed to stay in Pres. Obama’s economic recovery bill. Not a pretty story, but it does illustrate some of the horse-trading that goes on in Congress. And the importance of government funding for the arts.

Here are excerpts of the story interspersed with my commentary based on 17-plus years as an arts worker, including a two-year stint at the NEA:

There was a whiplash quality to the action surrounding the arts money. As the week wore on, things weren’t looking good. Although a House version of the bill had included the $50 million, the Senate version approved no arts money at all. The Senate even voted 73 to 24 on Feb. 6 for an amendment ruling out stimulus money for museums, arts centers and theaters. And some conservative Republicans had denounced the arts as bonbons for a leftist elite with no place in an emergency stimulus bill.

The challenge for culture boosters in Congress was to convince a House-Senate conference committee that the arts provide jobs as other industries do, while also encouraging tourism and spending in general.

"We had the facts on our side," said Representative Louise M. Slaughter, a New York Democrat who is co-chairwoman of the Congressional Arts Caucus. "If we’re trying to stimulate the economy, and get money into the Treasury, nothing does that better than art."

A 2007 Americans for the Arts report, Arts & Economic Prosperity III: The Economic Impact of Nonprofit Arts and Culture Organizations and Their Audiences, contained the following economic stats:

Nationally, the nonprofit arts and culture industry generates $166.2 billion in economic activity every year -- 63.1 billion in spending by organizations and an additional $103.1 billion in event-related spending by their audiences. It included 5.7 million full-time equivalent jobs, $104.2 billion in household income, $7.9 billion in local government tax revenues, $9.1 billion in state government tax revenues and $12.6 billion in federal income tax revenues.

That's a lot of simoleons. Big numbers cause Congress to sit up and listen. It also helps that arts supporters were contacting their reps and senators. People like you and me and our close personal friend, Robert Redford.

In his conversation last week with Ms. Pelosi, a California Democrat, [Robert] Redford said he drew on his film experience to argue for the arts as an economic engine. "Ticket takers or electricians or actors — all the people connected with the arts are at risk just like everybody else is," he said in an interview. He said he also reminded Ms. Pelosi that his Sundance Film Festival brings more than $60 million to Park City, Utah, each year.

You have to wonder why Utah's entire D.C. delegation voted against the stimulus bill. Sen. Hatch has not always been a friend to the arts, but he's had his moments. Sen. Bennett is a longtime arts supporter. But both are Republicans. They were only taking orders from their leadership, as were Wyoming's Sen. Enzi and Sen. Barrasso.

Did you know that Utah has the nation's oldest arts council? That's a fact. Arts are huge in the state, especially in Salt Lake City, with its symphony and ballet companies and Mormon Tabernacle Choir and public art programs and museums and... The list goes on and on. And earlier this year, the Utah Arts Council got rid of its folklorists as it faced budget cuts. One would think the stimulus funds for highways and airports and building renovation would have appealed to Utah's delegation. After all, you need all those things so people can get to the arts.

As the details of the final bill were being hammered out, tens of thousands of arts advocates around the country were calling and e-mailing legislators... The tide turned. In addition to preserving the $50 million allocation, the final bill eliminated part of the Senate amendment that would have excluded museums, theaters and arts centers from any recovery money.

That Senate amendment, proposed by Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, had grouped museums, theaters and arts centers with implied frivolities like casinos and golf courses.

During debates on the bill, some Republicans had labeled the arts "highbrow" and "a luxury" that was populated with leftist artists and arts supporters. It was reminiscent of the so-called "Culture Wars" of the late 1980s and early 1990s, when a few NEA-funded projects casued an uproar and became a rallying cry for Jerry Falweel, Pat Robertson, and his fellow travelers in the Religious Right.

But even that battle had shades of gray. The NEA's budget was cut in half following Newt Gingrich's "Contract with America" and Republican victory in the 1994 elections. Newwt got his way and almost all of the fellowship programs for individual artists were eliminated. All but the ones in creative writing, as various high-profile writers and Hollywood types appealed to Mr. Gingrich's vision of himself as a writer. He is a writer, of speculative fiction and history. So the creative writing fellowships were spared on the turn of an artistic ego and a few well-placed words.

Here's a few final words from the NYT article:

In arguing for the $50 million in arts money on the House floor on Friday, Rep. Obey made similar points. Arts workers, he said, have 12.5 percent unemployment: "Are you suggesting that somehow if you work in that field, it isn’t real when you lose your job, your mortgage or your health insurance? We’re trying to treat people who work in the arts the same way as anybody else.

Enzi/Barrasso/Lummis pout -- and won't release stimulus details to Wyoming

On Sunday, Jared Miller of the Casper Star-Tribune wrote about Wyoming’s share of Pres. Obama’s national stimulus legislation.

One of the strangest aspects of the story is that the state doesn’t yet know how much money will come to us via the stimulus. Here’s why:

The Associated Press estimates that Wyoming's share of the funds will be roughly $400 million, including millions for education, weatherization projects, nutrition programs, grants for Internet crimes against children and other recipients.

Lynne Boomgaarden [Gov. Dave Freudenthal's point person on the stimulus package, who also serves as director of state lands and investments] said Friday she was working with a number of sources in Washington, D.C., to create a clearer picture of Wyoming's share of the federal stimulus funds. At this point, she said, the figures are largely speculative."I think when you are seeing numbers you are seeing people's best guesses at numbers," Boomgaarden said.

One reason for the lack of public information about the stimulus in Wyoming could rest with the state's congressional delegates.

Congress members from some other states released detailed lists of proposed stimulus spending after Friday's vote. U.S. Sens. Mike Enzi and John Barrasso declined to provide information about Wyoming's share of the stimulus Friday night.

Enzi, Barrasso and Rep. Cynthia Lummis voted against the bill.

Enzi, in a news release, noted that the legislation is the "single most expensive bill in the history of the United States."

"Unfortunately, the legislation we have before us is partisan and reads like a list of liberal priorities bundled together that could not gain support individually," Enzi said in the statement.

Obama to sign stimulus bill in Denver

It's fitting that Pres. Obama is signing the new stimulus bill Tuesday at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, just 100 miles down I-25 (which is closed right now due to blizzard conditions). The stimulus bill aims to put people to work (and back to work). It also features money for the National Institutes of Health and various other science and medical facilities.

Not sure why the president chose Denver. It is the site of his nomination as the Democratic Party's candidate for president. Without Denver's Democrats, Obama would not have carried Colorado on Nov. 4. O.K., Boulder contributed too. Denver is smack in the middle of Colorado and not far from the center of the nation. With a bit of a stretch, Denver might be able to claim "Heartland" status. It's also my birthplace, which doesn't count for much. I do love the place though.

I've spent hundreds of hours in the DMNS, first as a kid and later as an adult. We've taken field trips to the museum, mostly when our kids were young and impressionable. I loved the dinosaur skeletons that used to be the place's main attraction. The bones were dug out of formations in Colorado and Wyoming. Reconstructed in the museum as a brontosaurus, it had to be taken down and reassembled as scientists continued to uncover more info. That's the way it should be, right? Science marches on. Change happens.

When the economy needs a fix, you get started fixing it.

Rep. Lummis doth object too much

Wyoming's brand-spanking-new Rep., Repub Cynthia Lummis, is wasting little time learning how to tow the party line, especially when it comes to the economic stimulus legislation. She voted against it twice -- joining the rest of her naysaying right-wing brethren and sistren. For eight years -- four terms -- Lummis's predecessor, Barbara Cubin -- never met a spending bill she didn't like. The Repubs ran up a huge deficit and now they've rediscovered their fiscal conservative roots.

Anyway, here are the parts of the stimulus bill that Rep. Lummis found objectionable:

1. $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts;
2. $2 billion for the Neighborhood Stabilization Fund, providing funds to organizations such as ACORN, which has been accused of practicing unlawful voter registration in recent elections;
3. $8 billion for a High Speed Passenger Rail Program, after the House did not include any funding for the program and the Senate included $2 billion, which will fund at least one project from Las Vegas to Los Angeles
4. $1 billion for a Prevention and Wellness Fund, which can be used for sexually transmitted disease education and prevention programs at the CDC
5. $500 million to replace a 30-year old computer system at the Social Security Administration
6. $500 million for a health professions training program -- funding which an earlier committee report said were allocated because, “a key component of attaining universal health care reform will be ensuring the supply of primary care providers.”

Let's take these one at a time.

1. The $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts stipulates that the funding goes for grants to activities and projects “which preserve jobs in the nonprofit arts sector threatened by declines in philanthropic and other support during the current economic downturn," with 40 percent of the amount going to state arts agencies and regional arts organizations (“in a manner similar to the agency’s current practice”) and the remainder going out in competitive grants from the NEA. Matching requirements are waived.

So, if 40 percent of that total equals $20 million. and it's divided equally among 62 state/territorial arts agencies and regionals, that would mean $322,000 for the Wyoming Arts Council, where I work. That means a lot of grants to arts councils and schools and libraries. Also, the other 60 percent of NEA funding will go out in grants to organizations in all states, including Wyoming. That's a nice infusion of capital in tough times. Not to mention the fact that arts orgs in the state could apply directly to the NEA.

In her press release, Lummis didn't have to mount any specific objection to arts funding. Her Repub clan knows that "NEA" is a code word for "the agency that funds pornographic art." So, in Lummis-speak, $50 mill to that outfit is a big waste of taxpayer money -- and a slap in the face to all good fundies.

2. ACORN. Remember how Sarah Palin objected to community organizers, notably anyone involved with ACORN. Registering voters? What kind of commie crap is that? So, all the right-wingers have to see is ACORN and they go bat-shit crazy.

3. Railroads. Not sure why Republicans hate mass transit so much. Americans are crazy about their passenger trains, especially new light-rail systems that are springing up everywhere, notably in the cities of the West, e.g. Denver and Phoenix. Trains settled the West and drove off the buffalo and the Indians. Since Wyoming Republicans hate wolves so much, you'd think they'd come up with a plan to build a train through Yellowstone. But a top-notch train system would be great for the country and help make us more energy efficient. A high-speed rail line along the heavily traveled I-15 corridor from L.A. to Las Vegas could save us millions of gallons of fuel a year. Oh, now I see. Rail systems mean energy savings. No need for foreign oil. Or Texas oil companies. That will never do.

4. Why would Rep. Lummis be against disease prevention? Again, we're dealing with those right-wing code words. "Sexually transmitted diseases." Only "those people" gets STDs, you know, the darker-skinned populations. And the licentious ones, those people with no morals and no means. Non-Christians. Non-Republicans.

5. Social Security Administration? Is that thing still around? I thought Dubya banished it?

6. Uh oh. "Universal health care." Those are fighting words to Republicans. Again, it's code. Universal health care equals single-payer system equals socialized medicine equals "We're no better than the Canadians." A program to train more primary care providers would lead to a ready supply of doctors for rural and underserved communities, something desperately needed in states such as Wyoming. You'd think that Wyoming's lone U.S. Rep. would support a program that would get doctors out into small communities where they're really needed.

Gosh, I could go on and on but it's getting late.

We deserve better representation than this.

Shocker! Barrasso/Enzi vote against Senate stimulus bill

No surprise here. Wyoming's two Republican senators -- Mike Enzi and John Barrasso -- both voted against the $838 billion economic stimulus package in the U.S. Senate.

The bill passed the Senate anyway, by a 61-37 margin, mostly along party lines. All the "no" votes were cast by Republicans. What a bunch of naysayers.

In an AP story, Barrasso said that the legislation is not a stimulus bill but is a spending bill. He says the bill does little in the way to create jobs now. Enzi ridiculed the bill, saying it spends a lot of money without knowing whether it will work.

Wonder what else Congress spent a lot of money on without knowing whether it would work? The Iraq War, to mention one. Jury still out on that one. No Republicans (except Nebraska's Chuck Hagel) and some Dems voted for war bills over and over again, with nothing to show for it.

And what about Bush's crackpot plan to cut taxes for the richest Americans? That cost the U.S. treasury $1.3 trillion. It led to the current crisis. And Enzi and Barrasso want more of the same?

I wish I had someone in the U.S. Senate that represented me.

I attempt to explain U.S. history

While I blog, my daughter Annie sits next to me doing her U.S. History homework. The topic tonight is World War I.

"Who -- or what's -- The Big Four?" she asks.

I reel off names of three of the allied countries in the war: England, France, U.S. Can't think of a fourth. Russia?

"No, Italy." She's looking at a list in the book, "The Americans: Reconstruction to the Twentieth Century." The Big Four were the allied powers who assembled at Versailles on 11/11/09 to screw the Germans which led to the economic collapse of Germany, which led to Hitler, Blitzkrieg, The Final Solution and all the rest.

"No Man's Land?" She searches her text, which is the size of the Unabridged Oxford English Dictionary. No wonder these kids have bad backs. Get them a couple good paperbacks about the war and toss out the text. I recommend "All Quiet on the Western Front," "Johnny Got His Gun," "The Good Soldier Svejk," and "Soldier of the Great War." Just pick two.

I Google "No Man's Land" and come up with some photos showing dead soldiers hung up on barbed wire. I tell her that No Man's Land was the hellish space between trenches where most of the dying took place.

"What kind of weapons were used?"

I see what she's doing. She knows I'm keen on history and knows, with little prompting, I will blurt out a very long and convoluted answer. "What kind of weapons do you think they had?" I ask.

"U-Boats."

Check.

"Tanks?"

They started out with horses, which were obsolete when the tanks appeared. Your great-grandfather's Iowa cavalry unit went to France with all their horses and never rode them into battle. Too dangerous, what with tanks and machine guns and barbed wire.

"Did the horses get hurt?"

This kid loves her animals. Not a kid anymore, 15 with a birthday in March. "I don't think the horses got anywhere near the front lines."

She nods, puts away her work sheet and closes the book. "I'm going to work out."

She heads to the basement treadmill, leaving me thinking about World War I. What a pointless slaughter that was. My grandfather was gassed and ended up spending a year in the hospital after the war. On the plus side, that's where he met my grandmother, an Army nurse. This union led to my father and then to me and, eventually, to my daughter.

High school history doesn't track the vagaries of people's lives -- just the big themes like weaponry, world leaders and treaties. Those books I mentioned earlier, that's where you get the individual stories that illuminate the big picture. Svejk just wants to make it through in one piece, but people keep trying to kill him. Those people tend to be on his own side, which also baffles American pilot Yossarian in "Catch-22."

As often happens, we have to leave the final word to the poets. Here's Wilfred Owen, who was killed a week before the Armistice: "My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity."

Praise the Darwin -- and put up a billboard

Darwin even looks a little God-like (in the Old Testament sense) on this billboard erected outside Grand Junction, Colo. Grand Junction was chosen, along with sites in Dayton, Tenn., and Dover, Pa., due to some anti-evolutionary nonsense perpetrated by these communities.

The Tennessee and Pennsylvania towns had landmark court cases about the teaching of evolution. In Grand Junction, the Freedom from Religion Foundation has complained to the Mesa County commissioners about denominational prayers in public meetings.

The foundation is made up of agnostics and atheists who fight government displays of religion.

I tend toward agnostic. I'd like to see one of these billboards in Wyoming, although don't want to suffer through any fundie creationist hoo-ha to get one.

"Red Dawn" Wolverines strike again

Some of you may recall this "Cold War" scare film that was set in Colorado after the Soviet invasion.

Thanks to crooks and liars.

Marriage defenseless in wake of bill defeat

House Joint Resolution 17, the so-called "Defense of Marriage" resolution, was defeated on a 35-25 vote after impassioned testimony from lawmakers.

"I look upon this state as the Equality State and I urge you to maintain that status as the Equality State," said Rep. Patrick Goggles, D-Ethete. Rep. Goggles was a delegate at last summer's Democratic National Convention in Denver.

But you can't kill a bill in our lopsided legislature without some Republicans going along for the ride -- sometimes even leading the charge.

Rep. Roy Cohee of Casper, an opponent of the bill, was mentioned in a story this evening on Wyoming Public Radio.

Rep. Roy Cohee says despite claims by fringe groups that the constitutional amendment is needed, he says he believes that the average citizen disagrees and feels that the public thinks they have much more important work to do.

Sen. Enzi: "Thanks for all the pizza"

Fed up with all the crazy talk about a trillion-dollar stimulus package, Wyoming Sen. Mike Enzi and GOP Senate colleagues took time out today to accept delivery of dozens of pizzas delivered to the Capitol steps. The Senators were grateful to GOP PAC Americans for Posterity (motto: "No Stimulus Without Pepperoni") for its generosity in times of great stress. "Dig in, fellas," urged Enzi. And they did, with great relish.

Republicans: Crazy or loony?

After the past two weeks, I have to wonder if bipartisanship exists. Are Republicans merely being the opposition party? Or are they crazy?

Quote from John Cole's Balloon Juice at www.balloon-juice.com:

I really don't understand how bipartisanship is ever going to work when one of the parties is insane. Imagine trying to negotiate an agreement on dinner plans with your date, and you suggest Italian and she states her preference would be a meal of tire rims and anthrax. If you can figure out a way to split the difference there and find a meal you will both enjoy, you can probably figure out how bipartisanship is going to work the next few years.

Art teachers conduct civics lesson in legislative action

Some of my colleagues in the world of arts education have jumped into the legislative battles with both feet. HB0218 is designed to revise the Hathaway Scholarhips to include arts courses. The Hathaways are awarded to high school seniors attending the state's only four-year university or one of its community colleges.

I posted about this bill on Jan. 28. Here's the latest update from wyomingarts:

We had a very exciting day at the Legislature yesterday! The House Education committee was unanimous in their acceptance of the proposal to change HB0218 to reflect Fine and Performing Arts, and unanimous in their acceptance of the bill. Four teachers presented in support of the bill: Cindy Schmid, Cheyenne; Amy Simpson, Cheyenne; Sheila McHattie, Casper; and Kelly Bembry-Hennings, Cheyenne. Many other teachers, and some administrators, also attended to show their support.

The House Education committee made a number of supportive comments about this bill, and several representatives commented that they had received a lot of email on the topic. The committee was joined by the chair of the Senate Education committee (Senator Coe), and also Senator Dockstader. Senator Dockstader, who is married to an art teacher in Star Valley, was kind enough to give the presenting teachers advice on the process, and help us all by talking to a number of legislators. Superintendent McBride was also there and provided some comments on the bill.

This bill still has a number of hurdles to overcome before it is law, but it is well on its way.

What’s next?

The bill is waiting in line on the docket to be presented to the Committee of the Whole (the House). The Majority Floor Leader sets that schedule. The House Floor Majority Leader is Edward Buchanan (Torrington). The bill must be read by the end of the day on Monday, February 9 in order to continue through the process.

If it does get read by end of day Monday, February 9, it will then be voted upon by the Committee of the Whole (House). If it passes, it goes to second reading. It must be read and voted on by the end of the day on Tuesday February 10 to continue to its third reading. It must have its third reading and voted on by the end of the day on Wednesday, February 11. If it passes, it moves on to the Senate Education Committee. If it doesn’t pass, it is dead.

All House Bills must have achieved third reading by Wednesday, February 11, or they are dead.

These are the stages that must occur between now and the time the HB0218 is presented to the Senate side. So, still a ways to go before it becomes law.