Oklahoma Democrats mourn Fred Harris, former US senator and presidential candidateTEHRAN – Iran will host the 28th meeting of the foreign ministers of the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) in the northeastern city of Mashhad. The meeting, scheduled for next week, will bring together ministers and high-ranking officials from the organization's ten member states under Iran's 2024 presidency. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi will chair the summit, which will include participation from ECO's specialized departments and representatives of various multilateral economic bodies, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Esmail Baqaei announced on Sunday. The ECO, founded in 1985 by Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey, has evolved into a prominent regional bloc spanning Central and South Asia. Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the organization underwent significant expansion in 1992, welcoming seven new members: Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Headquartered in Tehran, the ECO functions as a platform to foster economic, technical, and cultural cooperation in a region that links West Asia, Central Asia, and South Asia, encompassing a market of over 500 million people.
He’s a fourth-generation rancher with one of the biggest spreads in one of the most beautiful parts of Montana. His ranch is so expansive, in fact, that he flies a helicopter when he needs to tend to his herd or put out a fire in a hurry. And he’s from a deeply entrenched and politically powerful family. But, no, he’s not John Dutton, the character who Kevin Costner played up until the start of its new season last month, on the hit “Yellowstone” TV show. He’s Bill Galt, and he’s well aware that art appears to be imitating his life. “Oh, I’ve heard that a lot,” Galt said of the comparisons. “But I think mostly that’s attributed to the fact that I’m a rancher that flies a helicopter and that those first few episodes of ‘Yellowstone’ had that helicopter in there. But that being said, they do use a lot of my sayings. I don’t know where the hell they get them.” People are also reading... Here's a list of Lincoln restaurants open on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day Lincoln native purchases Michael Jordan's iconic Chicago mansion for $9.5 million Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen hospitalized at UNMC after falling from horse Nebraska volleyball libero Lexi Rodriguez signs to play with Omaha pro team Amie Just: Lexi Rodriguez deserved a national title. For her career to end like this? Gutting Man killed by brother in Lincoln apartment complex shooting, police say Nebraska volleyball laments being a 'couple plays' short of finishing off Penn State 3 Nebraska starters still with team to miss bowl game with mix of injuries, opt outs 'Multiple wins for me': Lincoln North Star rallies from double-digit deficit hours after coach's son is born Inside Matt Rhule's 'pretty insane gesture' of getting former Huskers to the Pinstripe Bowl Man killed in Friday night crash north of Lincoln Teenage brother charged as adult in Christmas Eve shooting death Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen sustained fractured ribs, lacerated spleen in fall from horse Honor walk pays tribute to Lincoln man who made organ donation Transfer tracker: The latest on the Nebraska football roster One source might be “ The Cowboy Way: Seasons of a Montana Ranch, “ a nonfiction account of former Lee Montana editor — and current Arizona Daily Star editor — David McCumber’s year spent working on Galt’s ranch in the late 1990s. But Galt can’t be certain. And publicists from the Paramount Network, where “Yellowstone” airs, did not respond to questions about Galt’s role in inspiring John Dutton. “I’ve never talked to anybody from the ‘Yellowstone’ show or anybody that had anything to do with it,” Galt said. “One of the big reasons I wanted to work for Bill to do the research for ‘The Cowboy Way’ was that the ranch – both the ground and the family – represents a straight line through the history of Montana ranching,” McCumber said, “and I think that’s a lot of what ‘Yellowstone’ wanted to capture as well.” Like his fictional alter ego, Galt has made no secret of his desire to protect his big piece of Big Sky Country, even from the stray angler trying to fish on his property. And he has made his case, like Dutton, on television. In a 2016 episode of Anthony Bourdain’s show “Parts Unknown,” Galt and McCumber debated Montana’s 1985 stream-access law, which grants fishermen a right to use streams on private property, so long as they get where they are going within that stream’s high-water mark. Galt called that practice “thievery” back then. Nowadays, he begrudgingly accepts it. “Well, you know, stream access is a law, and we abide by it,” Galt said. “And I guess we’ll learn to live with it.” But there’s another form of encroachment on his land from sportsmen he’s less willing to look past: illegal hunting. “We have county roads running through each of the ranches,” Galt said. “So sometimes they just can’t resist themselves, and they shoot one off the county road.” And as Montana’s human population has grown, so has its elk population, especially on large tracts of private land like the Galt ranch. In hunting season, he said, his land has been “plagued” by such illegal shoots, even though he allows hunters onto his land through the state’s block-management program. For Galt, it all falls under a plainspoken philosophy, one you can almost hear coming out of Kevin Costner’s mouth: “I just think private land’s private land, and you should be able to do what’s legal on it. Put it that way.” While no one has yet proposed a subdivision or a golf course on the land around his 90,000-acre spread — a scenario from the hit television show — Galt doesn’t necessarily think there would be anything wrong with it if they decided to do so. “If they’re just selling to the highest bidder,” Galt said, “I think that’s the American way.” He said such development can sometimes be about preserving ranching, not pushing it out, by acting as a financial “parachute” for people looking to “keep their ranch running.” “I know a lot of ranches that have literally been saved by being able to carve off a piece of ground, whether it’s to sell to a neighbor or for development that actually saved their ranch from going broke,” Galt said. But Galt said “that’s just about impossible anymore. You know, they’re so heavily restricted.” In what’s been viewed as a landmark case as the state tries to balance demand for development with laws that protect land and water, Galt’s brother Errol Galt was on the losing end of a recent District Court order that stopped his plans to build 39 homes and two commercial properties on 442 acres of land on the east side of the Canyon Ferry Reservoir. Bill Galt said he has “never tried to do any of that kind of development on my ranch. So I understand my brother has issues with it, although, amazingly, we don’t talk much about it. When we’re talking, it’s about ranching stuff.” And there’s lots to talk about. Recent drought has shrunk the size of Montana’s cattle herd. That means ranchers have less livestock to sell, but it has also meant they can get a higher price from the feed lots that buy the yearlings they produce. And as Montana’s population has grown — partly due to the popularity of “Yellowstone” itself — so has the demand for land, hemming in some ranchers who rely on the state’s wide open spaces to give their cattle a place to roam. Like the character he seemingly inspired, Galt has been on his land long enough to feel the forces of change swirling all around his ranch as new neighbors move in and bring with them new ways of doing things. “I’m surrounded by what we call the non-resident ranchers,” Galt said. While “every one of them does run some cattle and tries to make them look like a ranch” and “most of them do a pretty good job,” Galt said the fact that his neighbors aren’t making a living off the land is a sign of a broader shift. It’s a shift that ranchers and brokers from across the state say they are seeing too, as wealthy buyers, often from out of state, purchase agricultural properties for prices that cattle production can’t possibly pay for. “All the ranching they do won’t pay the interest on that ranch that they bought for that $1,500-an-acre price,” Galt said. While his business is focused on raising black Angus cattle and quarterhorses, Galt has embraced the use of new technologies to do the traditional job of cowboying. “The basics of ranching I don’t think have changed much,” Galt said. “We still raise calves that we make into yearlings. But the mechanization is what has really changed. We used to go, when we were weaning, we would have a crew of maybe 16 riders down to now we do it with four just because of mechanization, because of the helicopter and four-wheelers and better hand machinery. We’ve become way more efficient as time goes on.” McCumber said his interest in Galt had to do with this approach that combines old-fashioned and modern approaches. “There was a mix of old and new in everything – fencing, feeding, gathering, range management, predator control, irrigating, haying, you name it,” McCumber said. “Things like big irrigation pivots, swathers and balers, artificial insemination, and the helicopter are modern ways. But lots of things don’t change. One of those is helping your neighbors. All of that seems to show up in ‘Yellowstone,’ and that authenticity is what makes the show as enduring as it has proved to be.” Though he acknowledged “Yellowstone” undoubtedly takes liberties with reality, Galt said he’s a devoted viewer of a show that deals with real issues that ranchers like him face, including everything from how to resist “the encroachment on ranches by the big money people” to how to handle estate taxes. “There’s parts of it that are absolutely correct,” Galt said of the show. “Yellowstone” has closed its run, with the seemingly Galt-inspired character killed off after Costner quit the show. Or was supposedly killed off. “I guess I’m not real sure he’s dead,” Galt said. “Just watching it, it seems to be there’s some doubt.”In a significant development, Crime Branch was directed on Sunday to investigate the alleged attack on Dharmasala MLA Himanshu Sahoo. Police have formed a special team comprising six members, led by the Deputy Superintendent of Police (CID) Saroj Kanta Mohanta, to probe the incident in detail. The probe will cover three main issues: alleged attack on the MLA, staging of roadblock, and gherao of the Town Police Station related to the attack. Allegedly, the attack on MLA Himanshu Sahoo took place near Budhapola locality of Jajpur district, in the evening on November 20 by supporters of BJD organisational secretary Pranab Prakash Das. However, interacting with mediapersons on the same day, the senior BJD leader refuted the allegations against him. According to reports, a group of individuals targeted the legislator, resulting in heightened tension in the area. Following the incident, BJP supporters quickly gathered at the spot, leading to a heated confrontation with the BJD supporters. Local administration has expressed concern over the rising law and order issues and is closely monitoring the situation. Authorities have promised swift action against the perpetrators. Meanwhile, the Crime Branch has been tasked with gathering detailed evidence and identifying those responsible for the violent incidents. The attack on the MLA raises questions of political unrest in the region. Police are looking into the criminal and political motives behind this incident. Denizens anxiously wait for updates from the inquiry and hope justice and peace prevail in the district. The probe team is likely to submit a report shortly.
Voting stations across Uruguay closed on Sunday after a fiercely contested presidential runoff. Moderates Yamandu Orsi and Alvaro Delgado found themselves in a tight race as the nation awaited results. Pollsters had predicted a close battle, indicating fewer than 25,000 votes could separate the candidates. The election spotlighted Uruguay's centrist political landscape. Unlike neighboring countries with stark ideological divides, Uruguay remains relatively tension-free. Major issues include high living costs and crime, but economic indicators like employment and inflation have shown improvement. The candidate debate largely centered on economic successes and government continuity. While Delgado hopes to extend the current administration's tenure by leaning on President Lacalle Pou's popularity, Orsi offers a 'modern left' approach without drastic policy shifts. Both strive to sway undecided voters for a decisive win. (With inputs from agencies.)