Hoping for best for Bison Range

Inter Lake editorial

The National Bison Range opened for the summer season recently, and now the reserve is under "new management."

That's because the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service signed an agreement last week with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes that calls for shared management.

We certainly hope this agreement works better than the last one, which collapsed in anger, recriminations and allegations of harassment nearly two years ago. Under the previous arrangement, the tribes had been left largely in charge, but ultimately it didn't seem like anyone was in charge.

This time around, the Bison Range manager will be a Fish and Wildlife Service employee, with final authority on policy, planning and implementation. He will be assisted by two deputy refuge managers, one appointed by the tribes and one by FWS.

There's also a new process to resolve disputes, but hopefully it will not be needed as desperately as it was before.

Is it just us, or does there seem to be a virtual surrender to panic and despair in the media these days? Sure, there is bad news out there, but the collective wailing voices of the media have risen to operatic levels.

Taking lead soprano this week was an Associated Press story headlined: "Everything seemingly is spinning out of control."

The story relies on public opinion polls, but mostly offers conjecture such as this:

"Midwestern levees are bursting. Polar bears are adrift. Gas prices are skyrocketing. Home values are abysmal. Air fares, college tuitition and health care border on unaffordable. Wars without end rage in Iraq, Afghanistan and terrorism."

At one point, the story comes back to earth with some perspective, noting that "recent natural disasters around the world dwarf anything afflicting the U.S.," including 69,000 dead in the China earthquake and 78,000 killed and 56,000 missing after the Myanmar cyclone.

But still, the story asserts that "a battered public seems discouraged by the onslaught of dispiriting things."

Nowhere in the story is there any analysis of what effect the media may have in this battering onslaught. Maybe it's time for a little self-reflection in the news business, especially in an election year.