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Montana State researcher to present on space computers

A Montana State University researcher who has spent more than a decade developing an innovative radiation-tolerant computing technology for spacecraft will give a presentation at the Museum of the Rockies on Wednesday, April 19, as part of an ongoing lecture series.

MSU
Professor Brock LaMeres, left, with electrical engineering doctoral student Chris Major, center, and master’s student Colter Barney in their lab in August 2022. Photo by Ty Kernea.

Brock LaMeres, professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering in MSU’s Norm Asbjornson College of Engineering, will speak about NASA’s need for specialized computers for its missions and the development of an MSU computer that will travel to the moon in 2024. The talk, which is free and open to the public, begins 7 p.m. in the museum’s Hager Auditorium.

The talk is part of the 2023 Science Inquiry Series, which is sponsored by the Gallatin Valley Friends of the Sciences and the nonprofit community service organization Hopa Mountain. The series explores cutting-edge science topics, their latest developments and their relevance to society through speaker presentations followed by question-and-answer sessions.

A schedule of upcoming lectures is available at gallatinscience.org.
Contact: Brock LaMeres, 406-994-5987, lameres@montana.edu.

Cuts Wood School – Browning, Montana

Our Montana home is full of some pretty amazing places and some pretty incredible people.

Darrell Robes Kipp (1944-2013) upon after working as a technical writer, in the early 1980s, he returned to the Blackfeet reservation to study Piegan (Piegan language), the Blackfoot language. Learning that its practice had declined and many native speakers were elders, he and a small group of friends began to work on language revitalization.

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They first organized the Piegan Institute, a nonprofit devoted to the restoration and preservation of Native American languages. To develop fluent speakers, they also organized a center for language immersion studies, opening it in 1995 as the privately funded Nizipuhwahsin (or Real Speak) Center. It originally taught students in grades from kindergarten through eighth grade.

The mission of the Piegan Institute is to serve as a vehicle to research, promote and preserve Native languages. Founded in 1987, the Institute has its national headquarters and community-based programs on the Blackfeet Reservation in northwest Montana.

Cuts Wood School was named for a Blackfeet man who was raised by his sister.

As a boy he was playing alone by the river when another boy approached him. The boy taught Cuts Wood many things about the sacred ways of the Blackfeet and gave him power.

He told Cuts Wood that any time he traveled he would be protected if he kept track of his days traveling by notching a stick. Cuts Wood grew to be a successful member of the tribe and shared much of the knowledge he learned with his fellow tribal members. The boy who taught him the sacred songs and gave him power was Morning Star.

To learn more about the Cuts Wood School, you can either call or write:

(406) 338-3518 — 308 Popimi Street Browning, Montana 59417

See also:

Native Languages of the Americas: Blackfoot (Siksika, Peigan, Piegan, Kainai, Blackfeet)

Native American Languages – BY MICHELLE NIJHUIS

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piegan_Blackfeet

https://www.pieganinstitute.org/our-schools

Malmstrom Air Force Base media advisory

We’ve all seen the convoys complete with armed forces law enforcement rolling through town with air security forces provided by the 40th Helicopter Squadron.

According to a Malmstrom Air Force Base media advisory, there will be somewhat of an increase in activity as military training exercises commence from April 11th to April 19th.

Military training exercises on base and around central Montana will be conducted by Malmstrom Air Force Base (MAFB).

From April 11 to April 19, people can expect to see an increase in the presence of emergency vehicles and helicopters while exercises are in progress.

Installation gate access may be affected as enhanced security procedures are performed on inbound traffic.

Extensive planning and coordination across Malmstrom as well as other installations provide unique training for assigned units and partners according to MAFB.

For more information or questions, you can contact the 341st Missile Wing Public Affairs office at 406-731-4050.

Read the Media Advisory

Welcome to Nevada City, Montana

I’ve always said that you could live in Montana your entire life and never really ever see it all.

There’s history here in every mile you travel — some history may not be real obvious, but it’s there if you took the time to look.

Montana is chocked full of rich history and Nevada City is just one of the very obvious places where that history can be touched, experienced, and lived.

Nevada City
Nevada City main street (tap or click image to enlarge)

Nevada City, was settled around June 6, 1863 — Archaeological evidence found between the Music Hall and the Nevada City Hotel would indicate earlier than mining era habitation, possibly by white hunters or trappers. The earliest white hunters and trappers in the area had no conscious intention of establishing a city on the site, because the existence of a city would have presumably destroyed their economic base, which was based on the harvesting of beaver.

Nevada City was contemporary in settlement with Virginia City, as miners following the Fairweather party settled the length of Alder Gulch, and established homes, and businesses in convenient locations, the length of the gulch was known as 14 mile city. Nevada City was the first to become an incorporated city, on February 9, 1865.

Nevada City
Nevada City (tap or click image to enlarge)

Today, the town is managed by the Montana Heritage Commission, Department of Commerce, State of Montana. Businesses in the town are Alder Gulch Accommodations, Nevada City Hotel and Cabins, Just an Experience Bed and Breakfast, The Star Bakery, and the Nevada City Hotel Coffee Shop.

Some of the businesses are operational year round, others are operational during the summer season.

The town has been restored as an outdoor living history historical museum, linked by railroad to the Virginia City Historic District with numerous historic buildings, artifacts, and furnishings.

Nevada City
Nevada City main street (tap or click image to enlarge)

On December 19, 1863 a miners’ court trial took place. The trial was for the murder of Nicholas, a Dutchman. After a 3 day trial, George Ives was convicted and in less than an hour he was hanged in the middle of town while nearly 2,000 residents watched. Ive’s life ended 58 minutes after his conviction on December 21, 1863. This first trial, conviction, and execution would become the catalyst for forming the infamous Montana Vigilantes. Within the next month, some 24 men found guilty by the vigilantes would also be hanged in the area.

Initially, the entire mining district was part of the Idaho Territory. Until Virginia City became the Montana territorial capitol in 1865, there was no law except that of the miner’s court.

Many of Nevada City’s original buildings were destroyed when the Conrey Placer Mining Company began to dredge the entire length of Alder Gulch (1899 – 1923)

Nevada City
Nevada City living room (tap or click image to enlarge)

The few original buildings that remained were saved by the last residents in Nevada City – Cora and Alfred Finney. Later, in the 1950s, came a couple named Charles and Sue Bovey, who had been “collecting” old Montana buildings since the 1940s. Many of these buildings were first displayed at the Great Falls fairgrounds in an exhibit known as “Old Town.”

In 1959, Bovey was asked to remove the Old Town exhibit at the Great Falls fairgrounds. Soon, careful disassembly of the buildings began to take place, with their new home becoming that of Nevada City’s back streets. The town’s original layout was retained on sites where previous buildings once stood.

These days, as Montana has been being over run by out-of-state building interests, places like Nevada City still shine as a testament to how life in the Treasure State once was — A bit of Montana history preserved for future Montana generations.

If you ever get the chance, visit Nevada City if you can. I’m pretty sure that won’t be disappointed.

Why limit health care competition?

West Virginia goes out of its way to block health care competition. Investors cannot open skilled nursing homes, launch opioid treatment programs, expand long-term care facilities or add residential beds for people with intellectual disabilities anywhere in the state.

Strict moratoriums criminalize all of these economic pursuits, even when doctors line up their own funding. Other health care projects are possible, but most entrepreneurial activity cannot move forward in West Virginia without a government permission slip called a “certificate of need” or CON.

Getting the piece of paper is not easy. Applicants must demonstrate a need for their services, meaning they must prove to the state’s satisfaction they won’t take market share from established providers.

If a startup threatens the status quo, then industry insiders can rally to squash the competition before it begins. West Virginia sanctions this interference. State law allows established providers to participate in the CON application process, giving them an official platform to sabotage potential rivals.

Business leaders in other industries would love similar veto power. The Home Depot could stop mom-and-pop hardware stores from opening nearby. Planet Fitness could block smaller gyms. And McDonald’s could push away rival burger joints.

Even when investors clear the CON hurdles, the process wastes time and money. “Conning the Competition,” a nationwide report from our public interest law firm, the Institute for Justice, shows West Virginia CON applicants must pay up to $35,000 and wait two months or longer for government approval.

The report also documents an expansive CON regime in West Virginia unseen in many parts of the nation. California, Texas and 10 other states — representing about 40 percent of the U.S. population — completely repealed their CON laws years ago. Ohio, Indiana and Montana apply CON requirements only to long-term care facilities, and Arizona targets only ground ambulance services.

West Virginia, in contrast, targets just about everything. No other state maintains a moratorium on opioid treatment programs. And few other states enforce CON requirements in more categories of care. Until recently, West Virginia hospitals even had to navigate the entire CON process just to add ventilator services.

COVID-19 prompted 24 states and Washington, D.C., to adopt emergency measures, suspending their CON requirements during the early weeks of the pandemic. But West Virginia refused to budge.

The state passed its CON law in 1977, meaning government bureaucrats have been picking winners and losers in health care for nearly 50 years. The protectionism runs deep, but state lawmakers took a step toward leveling the playing field with Senate Bill 613.

The measure, which Gov. Jim Justice signed on March 28, scales back some of West Virginia’s most onerous CON requirements. The new law exempts birth centers, for example, allowing service providers to create these niche facilities without begging the state for approval. The law also allows hospitals to add services without a CON, and increases the expenditure threshold for requiring a CON from $5 million to $100 million.

Entrepreneurs will benefit from lower barriers to entry. Health care professionals will benefit from expanded job opportunities. And patients will benefit from increased consumer choice.

Ultimately, the entire economy will benefit.

The reform should be celebrated, but West Virginia still has far to go. The ultimate goal should be total CON repeal.

Hospital associations disagree. They claim CON laws are necessary to keep balance in the health care system, preventing redundant investments and reducing waste. Yet federal antitrust agencies debunked these arguments long ago. “By their very nature, CON laws create barriers to entry and expansion to the detriment of health care competition and consumers,” the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission concluded in 2008.

Decades of real-world experience confirm this finding. States without CON laws have more hospitals and surgery centers per capita, along with more hospital beds, dialysis clinics and hospices.

Why would West Virginia try to prevent this type of growth? Rather than artificially restricting health care investment, the state should kill its CON law and expand opportunities for everyone.

Jaimie Cavanaugh is an attorney and Daryl James is a writer at the Institute for Justice in Arlington, Va.

sourced: This article was originally published by RealClearPolicy and made available via RealClearWire