Planatlaw

Carbon County News in Red Lodge, MT recently printed Gerald Davidson’s editorial regarding infrastructure came at the end of two candidacy announcements for mayor. On their face, these news pieces would not lead one to compare and relate, but if the City of Red Lodge is to move forward at this juncture it is important the electorate take a holistic look to gather the factors that will eventually lead to an informed vote. I know something of this issue, and here is my opinion. Betsy Scanlin extolled her accomplishments during her reign as mayor in making her announcement, while Brian Roat lashed out at Betsy mistreatment of employees as his reasoning to again seek the mayor’s seat. While one can only hope these two will concentrate their vituperative attacks on each other so full disclosure might eventually be achieved. The truth is that neither candidate has a good administrative record. If it were not for the extremely good decision to hire Debbie Tominich as City Clerk years...

THE REAL IDEAL A professor I had in college once told me he rarely read the front page of a paper because the writer’s agenda was obscured. Instead, he recommended I read the opinion pages and judge the advocacy evocated by those writers. I still followed that advice, which is why I read Karl Isberg’s editorial every week in the Pagosa Sun . Last week, Karl was advocating for a position I judged as flawed. The title was “A Slice of the Ideal”. The “ideal” he spoke to was the dream of a perfect mountain community people were expecting Pagosa Springs to be, but his is a simplistic assumption. He was pushing a myth lauded by residents who had been here from birth, which demeans new-comers and extols the virtues of the old-timers. It has been tried many times in many mountain towns, and with the same result. Karl has a folksy style that lulls one into thinking he really is a “salt-of-the-earth” common sense kinda guy. However, after reading his editorial a couple of times,...