Opinion

Granted, we live in crazy times. But imagine my bewilderment when I was going through my quarters jar to buy stamps at the post offi ce. Lo and behold, I found a soviet-era coin, replete with the image of Lenin, the letters CCCP, and a hammer and sickle on what I had believed was a U.S. quarter. Imagine my surprise, in Alpine, Texas. Steve Stainkamp Alpine, Texas

Dallas may be a long 500-mile drive from Alpine, but every year Visit Big Bend makes that trip and takes a little piece of Far West Texas to the State Fair. The DFW area is a major contributor to visitation in the Big Bend region and the staff of Visit Big Bend, along with several contract workers, man a booth for the full 24 days of the Fair.

“Everything exists to end in a photograph.” – Susan Sontag (1933 – 2004) American writer, philosopher, and political activist. “Going to get your picture struck,” my grandmother asked me once.

“All to Jesus I surrender; At His feet, I humbly bow, Worldly pleasures, all forsaken; Take me, Jesus, take me now.” — Traditional hymn lyrics by Judson W. Van DeVenter, 1896 Despite the old joke about getting to church “early to get a good seat — one in the back,” the front seat is where I sit.

Texas has a lot to offer which includes over 80,000 highway lane miles. We also have world-class rail and air facilities for freight and passengers. Nearly 2,000 people move here every day, steadily increasing the pressure on our infrastructure. That’s one of the reasons why my Texas Transportation Commission colleagues and I made history this month with the approval of a record $142 billion total investment for Texas’ transportation infrastructure, including the $100 billion 10-year Unified Transportation Program (UTP). This funding will help ensure vital transportation projects will improve safety, congestion, preservation, and connectivity for Texas drivers.

World Climate Declaration Recently an organization of 1609 climate scientists and professionals signed off on an agreement that the so-called Climate Change “Climate Emergency” was nothing more than a fictional ploy designed by corrupt scientists, politicians, and businessmen for the acquisition of political power and undeserved financial gain. You don’t hear much about that on mainstream media, do you? What this means is we all need to stop believing corrupt politicians, scientists, businessmen, and their mainstream media servants.

Alpine- Casparis Municipal Airport, also known by its Federal Aviation Administration location identification E38(Echo 38), is located northwest of Alpine. The airport is owned by the City of Alpine and is considered a general aviation facility being primarily for small commercial and private aircraft. Our airport is non commercial meaning it does not have a scheduled air service for passengers. The airport has two intersecting runways, 01/19 and 05/23, with the longer being 6003ft and the latter 5018ft. The runways are identified with two numbers because they can be used in either direction for take offs and landings, with pilots usually choosing the runway with the more favorable wind direction.

“If these walls could talk, I wonder what secrets they’d tell.” — Gayle Forman, writer That question was evidently on my mind many years ago. April 3, 1975, to be exact.

“The most disastrous crisis we face in the next two decades will be the food shortage crisis.” — Jack “Spot” Baird, Professor of Possumolgy Fifty some-odd years is a long time to chronicle people, places, and events. Maybe that’s why, ever so often, one of the well-known or illustrious individuals I’ve been privileged to interview comes to mind.

As residents of the Chihuahuan Desert, individuals in West Texas know better than most just how precious of a resource water is. With a skyrocketing population infl ux, coupled with historically dry conditions, Texans everywhere are becoming all too familiar with the uncomfortable feeling of water insecurity. This instability in water availability serves as a reminder that we must all do our part to take conservation-based approaches to managing our natural resources.