A reality based independent journal of observation & analysis, serving the Flathead Valley & Montana since 2006. © James Conner.
Remembering the 9/11 attacks. Fourteen years ago, 11 September was a golden late summer’s day in Kalispell, just like today. When I opened CNN’s website, there was a large photograph of smoke bellowing from the north trade tower in New York City. At first I thought CNN might have been hacked, but television confirmed that a passenger jet had crashed into the building. I knew immediately it was a terrorist attack: airliners do not accidentally fly into skyscrapers. But some people denied the obvious until another airliner slammed into the south tower.
As a nation, we were shaken. And shaken, we did not react well. President George W. Bush flew west at 500 knots, his face stricken with shock and fear, before returning to Washington, D.C., to deliver what I thought was a terrible speech (see the speech he should have given). The so-called Patriot Act followed, as did our invasion of Afghanistan and our war of choice in Iraq. More Americans were killed in those wars than on 9/11, and we are less free, and more fearful, than before.
Fear of terrorism overcame objective fact. Air travel was safer after 9/11 than before — there were 19 fewer terrorists to hijack aircraft, the cockpit doors were locked, and passengers, as on Flight 93, no longer passive, overpowered hijackers — but most people did not conduct that kind of rational analysis. Many still do not.
Willman comes to Ronan. Yesterday Chuck Tanner, Jr., who writes for the Institute for Research & Education on Human Rights, published a long report on Elaine Willman, an anti-Indian activist who recently moved to Ronan, MT, to work against the CSKT water compact. Here’s an excerpt:
News of Willman’s move to Montana appeared following the June interview with the John Birth Society’s New American magazine. The New American’s Alex Newman wrote that, “The implications of the [CSKT-State of Montana compact] fight are so serious that Willman is moving to the area in an effort to defend liberty and the rights of besieged Eastern Montanans.”[8] While the Flathead Reservation is actually in western Montana, the Bircher’s claim about Willman proved true. In May 2015 the Concerned Citizens of NW Montana declared, “We, the Concerned Citizens of NW Montana, wish to fund Elaine Willman’s move to Montana. She has agreed to the move.”
In a letter published by the Western Ag Reporter, Willman described, “I became convinced that the CSKT Compact is a template for federalizing all state waters and implementing communalism and socialism consistent with Agenda 21 and that it is intentionally aligned to spread tribalism as a governing system while eliminating State authority and duty to protect its citizenry. It is my belief that Montana is Ground Zero for test-driving this model in a highly-prized state of small population. I so seriously believe this peril is a fight worth fighting that I have walked away from an excellent employer and moved my family, household, and consulting business to Ronan, Montana.”
Newstalk KGVO radio had previously distributed a letter written by Willman declaring that “The Proposed CSKT Water Compact is the Revolutionary War for citizens of Montana. Its consequences are as severe.”
There’s more, a lot more. The opponents of the compact have not given up. They’ll try to prevent Congress from approving the compact. They’ll enrich lawyers trying to kill it in court. And they’ll look for ways to persuade the Montana Legislature to rescind its approval. I admire their tenacity, but I question their judgment. In some cases, I think their fear or hatred of the compact makes them easy marks for activists and attorneys who promise much but deliver little.
Much of this fear may date back 30 years, when the CSKT were asserting themselves, and some members were issuing rather inflammatory irredentist statements that could make one wonder whether the tribes’ goal was expelling white people from northwest Montana.
Yesterday, incidentally, the Flathead Beacon published an oped by Verdell Jackson, whom I know slightly. Several years ago, I helped him draft some dear colleague letters concerning his bills to subordinate hydropower water rights to all other water rights. The bills didn’t pass, but the principle on which he based them was sound. His oped lacks numbers, but does a good job of articulating the fears of those opposing the compact.
A Montana view of Kim Davis’ predicament. At Montana Cowgirl, retired Montana Supreme Court justice James Nelson, has an excellent guest post on Kentucky county clerk Davis’ argument that she should be able to keep her $80k/year job without doing all of it.
Talking Points Memo reports that the Oath Keepers are willing to interpose themselves between Davis and federal marshals should she be ordered back to jail for defying Judge Bunning’s order. This probably is mostly strutting to help fundraising and recruitment, but one of these days an overzealous Oath Keeper with show up with his firearm, start shooting, and end up dead or in jail. Meanwhile, Davis is asking a federal appeals court to overturn Bunning’s order that she not interfere with deputy clerks who issue marriage licenses. It’s hard to view this as anything but seeking martyrdom.