Johnson v. Noem in 2026?

In 2014 the late Jean Rounds pleaded with her husband not to run for the US Senate but Reich Mike Rounds knew he had to run to stall then-US Attorney for the District of South Dakota Brendan Johnson from opening an investigation of Rounds' role in Bendagate to the public. 

USAs for the Districts of North Dakota and South Dakota, Tim Purdon and Johnson left their posts in 2015 to join Minneapolis-based Robins Kaplan, LLC. Both are enjoying successful law practices and could win statewide elections in their home states with their pants around their ankles. But, reaping the lucrative tort whirlwind is far more profitable than public service is. 

Brendan's father, Democratic Senator Tim Johnson brought the need for a research facility in the former Homestake Mine to Congress and worked tirelessly to bring the project to fruition. But Sen. Johnson and Earth hating then-US Representative Kristi Noem were on opposite sides of the Violence Against Women's Act in 2013. In 2016, Tim Johnson's South Dakota First Political Action Committee advocated for the establishment of nonpartisan elections in South Dakota: a forerunner of Amendment H. 

Today as governor Mrs. Noem failed on a COVID response, has failed on flood decisions and to bury her past criticisms of Donald Trump she deleted her old twitter feed so if Rounds resigned today she would simply appoint herself to the seat.

With NDN Collective and the Oglala Lakota Nation pressing the US Department of Justice to investigate the Rapid City Police Department Brendan Johnson was recently interviewed as part of a wider probe of rampant police brutality and "officer involved shootings" in the reservation border town.

So with the passing of Tim Johnson the future of the republic is too important to ignore.

A statement from Johnson’s family said “Tim always quipped that neither the left, nor the right, had a monopoly on all of the good ideas, but that working together, we can find common ground for the good of our country. In his work and life, Tim showed us never to give up. He will be missed. Our lives are fuller for having been loved and supported by him.” [Longtime Senator Tim Johnson dead at 77]

ip photo: Sen. Tim Johnson attending the 2014 South Dakota Democratic Party's State Convention in Yankton.

The good news? Hurricanes disperse hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico

Following the release of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's latest measurements Iowa Farmers Union President Aaron Lehman said that state's Nutrient Reduction Management Strategy is proving to be ineffective in controlling hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico. But, Lehman is concerned that without further financial incentives from the Biden administration Republican welfare farmers will simply continue polluting waterways.

In Gulf states like Florida insurance companies are pulling out as Deanne Criswell, the administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency is sounding the alarm over funding shortfalls following multiple climate catastrophes exacerbated by human impacts.

In 2020, Hurricane Hanna passed through the central and western Gulf days prior to the research cruise and mixed the water column, disrupting the hypoxic zone which forms in the coastal ocean west of the Mississippi River delta. While the size of the hypoxic zone fluctuates naturally throughout the summer, it usually forms again within days or weeks after the passage of storms. [Dealing with Dead Zones: Hypoxia in the Ocean]

Tropical cyclones cycle nutrients, too.

More cougars will be spared in the South Dakota Black Hills but in Wyoming not so much

This interested party lived in the Black Hills for nearly thirty years before seeing a cougar then saw three in the Two Bit drainage inside part of the Grizzly Gulch burn: two cubs in the Spring of 2006 and probably their mother the previous winter about four miles apart. The adult ran in the snow in front of my pickup long enough for me to reach for the camera in my glove box and realize there was no film in it. My friend, Herb watched six for an hour in his front yard near Devils Tower about ten years ago but he didn't have a camera on his flip phone.

South Dakota Game, Fish, and Plunder has been systematically exterminating the cougar population that had been discouraging wolves from migrating into the state and in 2015 mountain lions were nearly extirpated from the South Dakota side of the Black Hills.

The robust Black Hills mountain lion population has long been thought of as a conveyor belt of itinerant eastbound animals that will eventually culminate in Puma concolor reoccupying old haunts they were extirpated from long ago. The region’s reputation as a lion-dispersal factory is rooted in observation: Animals that have been fitted with tracking collars in the isolated bi-state mountain range have ended up treading into North Dakota, Minnesota, Colorado, Nebraska — and even well beyond. [Wyofile]

Since then the large felid has rebounded enough that SDGF&P considered removing them once again but after a public outcry the Republican-glutted commission has junked their plan. 

But in the Bear Lodge District in the Wyoming Black Hills the big cat may not be so fortunate because Earth haters in that state are shopping for outfitters and guides for hunting deer, wapiti, cougars, and wild turkeys. Each ranger district has this option but it tends to happen most often where congressional delegations are Republicans and Crook County is a colony of whiny anti-government welfare ranchers.

Paula Von Weller of Spearfish testified that mountain lions play a critical role as predators in the Black Hills, helping to reduce disease by preying on diseased, weakened animals. “Lions provide essential ecosystem services by removing chronic wasting disease from deer and elk populations,” Weller said. [State commission scraps plan to reduce mountain lion numbers after public pushback]

CWD is surging in Midwest states like Iowa and Minnesota but Wyoming and Colorado are seeing spikes, too. According to Wyoming Game and Fish, the disease, which occurs mainly in male cervids like wapiti, moose and deer, is found in 34 of the state's 37 mule deer herds and in 15 of the state’s 36 elk herd units. In parts of Canada 85% of male mule deer and 35% of females are infected. 

Colorado Parks and Wildlife's mandatory testing revealed increases in CWD in three of the state's mule deer herds. A warming climate is blamed for part of increased transmission rates but researchers say the federal government's feeding of elk, especially in Wyoming, in close proximity is also a factor. Hay fed to those animals is likely contaminated with Roundup® and other pesticides. Scavengers like American crows can move the disease from gut pile to gut pile and can remain in soils for years.

In Michigan where cougars are considered rare white-tailed deer are being decimated by CWD and by epizootic hemorrhagic disease or EHD.

Unaffiliated Spearditch candidate could help send a progressive to Pierre

Brookings County's pestilent plague is having a cow.

Shana McVickers is an unaffiliated candidate running for the Statehouse in South Dakota District 31 but she reads like just another member of the extreme white wing of the Republican Party. Also in that race is incumbent Republican Mary Fitzgerald who could lose a significant number of votes to McVickers and send the progressive, Victoria Greenlee to Pierre. 

Again, if you are a South Dakota conservative with the fire in the belly who can get on the general election ballot in 2024 and intends to run as an unaffiliated or third party candidate for the US House or for the legislature from your district I will support your efforts both with money and in print.