Signs of the times in California
Since its passage in 1986, California Proposition 65 has been a prime example of why voter-passed initiatives are, more often than not, half-baked, useless and misdirected. Instead of building public...
View ArticleEditorial: The bird that likes farming — and airports
The streaked horned lark is a breed apart. It likes airports. In fact, the largest known breeding population is at the Corvallis, Ore., airport, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Another...
View ArticleEditorial: Trump fulfills only half of his trade promises
President Trump has been busy in recent months fulfilling campaign promises on trade, which might be a good thing for farmers and ranchers if he were fulfilling all of his promises on trade.One of...
View ArticleEditorial: Is there a method to Trump’s trade madness?
The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that the Trump administration is quietly talking with China in an attempt to work out differences and dial down trade tensions.During the campaign...
View ArticleEditorial: Omnibus bill a home run for U.S. agriculture
With the start of the baseball season, it’s time to take a swing at the recently passed Omnibus Spending Bill with the help of our collection of metaphors related to the national pastime.Overall,...
View ArticleEditorial: Food Producers of Idaho an effective voice for ag
Food Producers of Idaho can best be described as lightning in a bottle. While groups in many states endeavor to “tell ag’s story,” in Idaho the Food Producers provide the message writ large.Food...
View ArticleEditorial: State creates its own elk problem
The farmers and ranchers in the Skagit River Valley of northwestern Washington state have a problem.Elk.The state, at the urging of area Native American tribes, has been rebuilding the elk herd there....
View ArticleEditorial: SNAP a wild card in new farm bill
Republicans in the House Agriculture Committee last week passed a draft of the next farm bill on a partisan vote.As in past years, the issues dividing Republicans and Democrats are the welfare...
View ArticleEditorial: Bitcoin miners may threaten NW’s low-cost power
The quest for bitcoins, the cryptocurrency that exists only in cyberspace, probably doesn’t weigh heavily on the minds of most farmers.But it should.Bitcoin “miners” are proliferating around the world,...
View ArticleEditorial: Redrawing California’s map won’t solve ag’s...
A proposal to split California into three states offers much to think about. A state of 40 million people that’s deeply in debt, short on leadership and whose politics are skewed toward cities such as...
View ArticleEditorial: Time has come for solving wild horse problem
The concept of wild horses running as free as the wind across the open spaces of the West is admittedly appealing. The horses, which over the centuries have become a part of the Western landscape,...
View ArticleEditorial: Washington tries to hijack interstate trade
The American Farm Bureau Federation is joining the legal battle against Washington state’s efforts to block the export of coal from ports within its boundaries.We agree with the Farm Bureau. Further,...
View ArticleEditorial: Organic’s great divide scuttles checkoff plan
The great divide among organic growers appears to be getting bigger. The USDA recently canceled a planned organic checkoff that would have paid for marketing and research.In its announcement, the...
View ArticleEditorial: It’s time to free the Hammonds
We are hearing renewed rumblings that action in the clemency cases of Dwight and Steven Hammond is imminent.President Trump should commute the sentences of the father and son and allow them to return...
View ArticleEditorial: Bizarre grizzly plans should be shelved — forever
On the heels of the painfully misguided efforts to bring gray wolves back to Washington state, a federal plan to add grizzly bears to the mix seems, well, bizarre.Wolves were never transplanted into...
View ArticleEditorial: Sea lions expose conflicts in environmental laws
It must have been quite a sight. As U.S. Rep. Kurt Schrader tells the story in his latest newsletter, he and representatives of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife were at Willamette Falls,...
View ArticleEditorial: Statewide officials, statewide perspective
A ballot initiative to carve California into three states reminds us of another idea that surfaced three years ago in eastern Oregon and Washington. It would make those largely rural regions a part of...
View ArticleEditorial: Congress should legalize industrial hemp
We support efforts underway in Congress to make industrial hemp a legal crop for U.S. farmers.Hemp is a cousin of marijuana that lacks the chemical properties that produce pot’s high. Nonetheless, it...
View ArticleEditorial: It’s time for Trump to prove himself on trade
The sight of President Donald Trump making nice with Kim Jong Un, a sworn enemy of the U.S. who has threatened to nuke our nation along with Japan and South Korea, provided a jolting contrast to the...
View ArticleEditorial: Western governors offer prudent ESA proposal
Since it was passed in 1973, the Endangered Species Act has been all but untouchable by members of Congress, who consider amendments to the law with the same trepidation they would if they were...
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