Judge says Commissioner of Insurance can investigate massive Blue Cross data breach.

By DARRELL EHRLICK | Editor-in-Chief

“And this illustrates that, and if it’s this easy for individuals who are highly functioning to fail in a simulation, imagine what it’s like in reality.” – Katie Weston, Montana Women’s Prison warden on an exercise that simulated what getting out of prison is like.

Depending on what study or outlet you look at, Montana is always on some list for the most expensive places to live. We’ve spent dozens upon dozens of stories teasing out the reasons for that, including low wages, labor costs, building materials and high demand. But on Monday we received another study from WalletHub, which puts out a number of different analyses using different metrics. This time, they measured what percentage of household income goes toward housing. For the most part, anything much over 28% is high enough to be concerning. The WalletHub study examined both the cost of owning a house and the cost of renting (and now drum roll, please):

In terms of housing ownership, Montana is the 9th at 30.47% of the household income, but still far away from the most expensive state, Hawai’i which needs 50.02% on average.

When it comes to renting, Montana does not fare much better. Montana ranks 18th, with renters needing 31.05%. The most expensive state? Hawai’i again at 62.25%.

After the United States Supreme Court ruled that the tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump were an unconstitutional use of his power, people have been trying to figure out how to get the money back from the Americans who had to foot the bill for the tariffs. Now, there is a line of businesses that are trying to navigate a rebate program.

President Trump’s Secretary of Labor has been sacked after a host of rumors swirled about her misuse of government funds. The former Oregon Congresswoman was leaving to take a job in the private sector, said Steven Cheung, the White House communications director, but that particular job was not specified and bears a remarkable resemblance to how the departures of Kristi Noem and Pam Bondi were treated.

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The New York Times reports that nearly all males, if nature were allowed to take its course, would eventually lose hair, many even going bald. But thanks to a wide variety of products and medication, male-pattern baldness is becoming more rare and reporters said it is reshaping the very definition of male beauty.

The former director of the art collection at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., writes a first-person account of what went on behind the scenes of the venerable art center after President Trump assumed control of the institution. His summary? It’s even worse than what you probably think, according to his article in The Atlantic.

And California authorities thought they had their nutria problem solved way back in the 1970s when the oversized South American rodent was eradicated from The Golden State. However, as Smithsonian magazine reports: much to conservationists chagrin, the pest is back in the state, disrupting the balance of ecology there, and genetic testing —think 23-and-Me for varmints — has shown that these California transplants are really from Oregon. But how these animals, which resemble a cross between a capybara and beaver, returned to the state is a mystery.

Attorney Doug James and longtime legislator Dorothy Bradley team up to write a column that says: Of course, we all love Montana. But if we truly love so many aspects of it, we must restore the civility and common heritage that we share.

A great hat tip to several of you Hooksters out there who were kind enough to send this piece about Montana history and airwaves.

WARNING: This isn’t your “normal” “The Hook” — as if there’s such a thing as normal. But this isn’t about songs, it is about airwaves.

Producer Marshall Granger went back and put video to the audio from a popular call-in radio show on Yellowstone Public Radio, which ran from 1997 to 2007, called “Your Opinion, Please.”

For a decade, callers could phone into the radio station for a half-hour every week to voice their opinion about nearly anything. Some people talked politics. Some asked existential and philosophical questions. One of the very cool features of this video is as callers would identify from different spots around Montana, viewers can see those places. And one of the best parts about being from Montana is traveling to these spots, seeing familiar landmarks, all while oooh-ing and ahh-ing over places we need to see.

The entire segment, which runs just a little less than 15 minutes, just sounds like Montana, even though it was nearly two decades ago. Here’s the description provided by Granger:

“Between 1997 and 2007, residents of Montana were invited to call into the Yellowstone Public Radio show Your Opinion, Please each Friday evening to discuss ‘any subject that is on your mind that can be discussed in public’. This documentary from the U.S. director Marshall Granger pairs a series of static shots from across the scenic, sprawling and sparsely populated state with archival audio from the show, where radio waves provided residents a public square for civil discussion. Throughout, recurring subjects include the Iraq War, the effects of regional development and the search for the meaning of poetry. Deliberately paced and composed with care, the resulting short makes for a gentle yet captivating portrait of time and place that, for many U.S. viewers, likely brings to mind what’s changed and what hasn’t in the decades since.”

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