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Last Saturday, May 3, was World Press Freedom Day, a day proclaimed by the United Nations in 1993. “May 3 acts as a reminder to governments of the need to respect their commitment to press freedom,” the UN explains. “It is an opportunity to celebrate the fundamental principles of press freedom; assess the state of press freedom throughout the world; defend the media from attacks on their independence; and pay tribute to journalists who have lost their lives in the line of duty.” In the United States, freedom of the press is guaranteed in the...
Days ago, a federal court dismissed a parental rights case filed against Sweetwater County School District No. 1 for hiding a child’s “social gender transition.” The ruling didn’t say the district was right—it simply said federal law doesn’t clearly give parents the right to be informed. Let that sink in: An Obama-appointed federal judge just told Wyoming parents that schools may keep them in the dark about life-altering decisions involving their own children. If you’re a parent in Sweetwater County or anywhere else in Wyoming, you should be...
I heard the poem “The New Colossus” recited two different times recently. The first was a reading by Wyoming Poet Laureate and Sweetwater County Native Barbara Smith. She shared the poem during the protest that took place in Rock Springs on April 19. The second was a recitation by Green River Native Timothy Laboria, who enjoys sharing historic poems and speeches at Castle Rock Rehabilitation Center. He read the poem for me and gave me a copy of it. The poem was written in 1883 to help raise mon...
Dear Editor, Respecting the use of words, we should be able to succinctly and accurately define them. Starting with the word respect…. “You have to respect the Constitution, you have to respect your parents, you have to respect religion, and truth, and the First Amendment, the opinions of others, national defense, the land and water, wildlife and nature (when convenient), free enterprise, the rich and successful, business and banking people, insurers, agriculture, industry and construction, all workers (with the exception of those at a for...
"I have never heard someone say so many wrong things one after the other consecutively in a row." This quote from the series "Schitt's Creek" may be redundant, but it gets the point across, and it pretty well sums up how I felt when I heard Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s recent comments on autism. Not only were his comments wrong, they were dangerous. As someone who knows and loves many people with autism, and someone who has somewhat recently realized I'm neurodivergent myself, I was both angry and...
Living in Wyoming, we don’t ask for much from our government. More freedom. Less regulation. But something that always makes the top of the list is a system that ensures our votes count. In short, the integrity of our elections forms the bedrock of our nation’s trust in our republic. This is why basic, common-sense election integrity reforms, including safeguards to ensure that only United States citizens, and only Wyomingites, are voting in our elections, are so important. And it is for this reason that Congress’s recent reintroduction of the...
On Friday, April 4, Senators John Barrasso and Cynthia Lummis voted against an amendment that would have blocked the federal government from selling public lands to help fund the budget. Wyoming Democratic Party has released the following statement: Senators Barrasso and Lummis’ votes to leave Wyoming’s public lands on the auction block are a slap in the face to the voters they are supposed to represent. Wyomingites spend more time on our public lands than residents of any other state. These lands aren’t just beautiful, they’re central to our w...
On Tuesday, April 8, President Donald Trump signed several Executive Orders connected to his “Unleashing American Energy” order, including an order titled “Reinvigorating America’s Beautiful Clean Coal Industry and Amending Executive Order 14241.” The order directs agencies to remove barriers to coal mining on federal lands and streamline and prioritize coal leasing, and amends a previous Executive Order to designate coals as a “mineral” in order to accelerate the permitting process for new mines on federal lands. Wyoming Governor Mark...
With April Fools’ Day earlier this week, there was more misinformation going around than usual. Some of the stories were easy to spot as jokes right away. Others weren’t. The Sweetwater County Sheriff’s Office’s “press release” shared on social media about establishing High Wind Enforcement Zones sounded official enough to make some people question it. However, the parts about officers being able to issue citations for “obstructed windshield from rogue sagebrush or tumbleweeds” or officers using special equipment to identify “variable wind...
Over a hundred members of the Wyoming bar came together this week to denounce increasing attacks on judges and the independence of the judicial branch of government. They delivered a letter to Senators Barrasso and Lummis and Representative Hageman asking each of them to publicly denounce these attacks. Retired former Wyoming Supreme Court Chief Justice Michael Golden explained, “The judiciary lacks the Executive’s bully pulpit or the Legislature’s power to defend itself. It does not have its own social media platform. Sitting judges are not p...
On January 31, the 30th anniversary of wolves getting reintroduced to Yellowstone National Park, congressional representatives Lauren Boebert (R-CO) and Tom Tiffany (R-WI) and introduced their “Pet and Livestock Protection Act.” It would abolish Endangered Species Act protections for wolves in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Washington, Oregon, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Colorado and Michigan, among other states. “Protective listings, wrote Boebert, are the work of “leftists (who) cower to radical environmentalists.” As Boebert notes, populations o...
Last Saturday afternoon I sat in a room full of our own community members and listened to them yell at each other to shut up, call each other liars, tell each other they didn't know what they were talking about, and basically treat each other more like nameless strangers on the other side of a computer screen than like neighbors. The Town Hall event with Representative Harriet Hageman was interesting, to say the least. Personally, I had friends and family members on both "sides," both cheering...
What’s the difference between the press and the media? Media derives from the Latin, “medium,” which is neither rare nor well done. What better time to drag out this old joke than Sunshine Week, when newspapers across America remind their readers of the First Amendment? Like a religious text, the Constitution of the United States, and its amendments, are forever subject to interpretation, thanks mostly to preachers, in the case of the former, and attorneys in the case of the latter. But the press (that’s us) in particular, has sustain...
While some of our community members stood on the steps of the Wyoming Capitol last Friday, others stood on the stage of the Broadway Theater, but both groups shared a message about the importance of workers and their need to be protected. This week, three different plays are being performed in our community, and while they all have very different stories, they all have very timely messages. I feel especially connected to the three plays this weekend. One of them, I'm performing in. One of them...
Dear Editor, I recently gave a reading of the iconic “I Have a Dream” speech by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., which he gave at the March on Washington in 1963. I gave the reading at Castle Rock Rehabilitation Center and the Villa for President’s Day and Black History Month. The speech is a solemn reminder. The words not only speak for themselves, but they are necessary. It is heavy stuff, but is there anything more important? The speech mentions President Abraham Lincoln as well, and the key to the speech is what it says about hopes for chil...
Dear Editor, I recently found out that the Rock Springs City Council intends to revisit the chicken ordinance on March 4. I urge the Mayor and council to maintain the current prohibition for the following reasons: It is currently unsafe to allow backyard chickens in our community due to public health concerns. - Newly Confirmed Cases: The Wyoming Department of Health (WDH) has recently confirmed the state’s first human case of H5N1 avian influenza in an older adult from Platte County. This individual marks the third confirmed hospitalization li...
There’s a famous quote from Mr. Rogers that talks about “looking for the helpers” when tragedies happen. This week’s newspaper is full of its share of tragedy, but we’re thankful that it’s also full of stories of “the helpers.” Last Friday, our community faced a horrific tragedy. This week’s front page is filled with the devastating details of the accident at the I-80 tunnels. From those who lost their lives to those whose lives will be forever changed by injury and trauma to the brave and dedicated first responders who will continue to feel...
Dear Editor, Today’s attack on the U.S.A. is not coming from China or Mexico or Canada or even Greenland and Denmark, and not from Cuba, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, or Panama, likewise it is not coming from Ukraine, Europe and NATO, nor Taiwan, Okinawa, South Korea, Japan, Australia or New Zealand, or even Samoa, and not from immigrants or even Democrats and Socialists. Today’s attack is coming from an odd collection of highly insecure, lying, abusive, and narcissistic billionaires. They have done this by using democracy to gather the many votes of...
With Valentine's Day this week, the subject of love may be on people's minds more than usual. Unfortunately, the subject of empathy, often connected to and associated with love, seems to be under attack and up for debate these days. Empathy is simply defined as "the ability to understand and share the feelings of another." Merriam Webster goes into even more detail, defining it as "the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings,...
Muley Fanatic Foundation recently shared a press release containing a letter addressed to Wyoming legislators regarding Senate File 0118. Together with other sportsmen groups, Muley Fanatic explained how the bill proposes transferable landowner tags and forces a move towards privatization of wildlife. They also expressed their concerns about why this would be an issue. The following is the content of the letter: Dear Wyoming Legislators, On behalf of numerous outdoorsman organizations...
There’s a lot going on in the political realm right now, both on the state and national level. As the Wyoming legislature debates hot-button topics in the general session and President Trump continues to issue executive orders in his first two weeks, there are lots of discussions, and lots of strong feelings, connected to politics. In the midst of discussions and strong feelings, words tend to get thrown around, often without people having a full understanding of what the terms they’re hearing and using actually mean. Some of the terms that hav...
Dear Editor, Unfortunately, HB 172 to repeal gun free zones is back and even worse than the Governor vetoed HB 125 from last session. This legislation has come before the Legislature for many years but never gained much traction until last year when the gun lobby started putting the full court press on Legislators. Public poles show that a majority of Wyomingites DO NOT want gun free zones repealed! - March 2024 KGAB Poll: “Do you agree with Governor Gordon’s Veto of House Bill 125” 63.3% indicated YES. - August 2024 Wyoming Tribune Eagle...
Dear Editor, The Freedom Scholarship Act seems to be a departure from the Freedom Caucus’s usual stance of ‘smaller’ government. This Wyoming bill is no more than a blatant effort by the Freedom Caucus to encourage the establishment of religious-based schools to further the Freedom Caucus’s “Godly” ideology and make the state pay for it. How this bad piece of legislation got as far as it did is inconceivable to me, and it is clearly designed to hobble public education. My daughter and son-in-law in New York pay $7000 a year to have their son a...
On Monday, January 20, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the United States. Several Wyoming officials released statements congratulating President Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance and sharing their optimism for the new administration. On the same day, President Trump signed multiple executive orders, including several related to energy, which multiple Wyoming officials also praised. Governor Mark Gordon, who was also present at the inauguration, released the following statement: “The energy-related executive orders signed b...
Dear Editor, Your Year in Review issue (1-6-25) started out with the Green Belt Taskforce celebrating new Lighting. Not everyone is celebrating. The Taskforce and the City have helped create a truly remarkable path along the River. There are National Parks that don’t have the amount of Wildlife we have. Beaver, Otters, Muskrat, Fox, Coyote, Raccoon. The large birds include Swans, nesting Bald Eagles and Red Tail Hawks. Pelicans, Heron and Cranes. It’s a GREAT place to walk! I realize some will like the new Lighting . Just wanted you to kno...
