So, the transplanted gray wolf gunned down while chomping on a calf near Salmon was in the wrong place at the wrong time? That’s what the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says. And I agree. O’ Unlucky No. 13 was hundreds of miles and one country south of where she should have been. She’d be alive today if the U.S. government, in its infinite wisdom, hadn’t ordered her trapped, radio-collared, and dropped into a hostile environment as part of a critter experiment. Fortunately, rancher Gene Hussey found the dead predator with a belly full of evidence, or he would be in big-time trouble today with the feds. Someone - Hussey says it wasn’t him - caught Sister Wolf in the act and dispatched her with a single shot through the lungs. At least she didn’t suffer like the poor calf that died watching a wolf gobble its entrails.

Stoicheff calls solons `gutless.’ He’s right

Idaho legislators probably deserve small increases in pay and per-diem expenses - even in this tight-fisted era. But they should vote for them, just like county commissioners and city council members do. Now, solons automatically receive the raises recommended by a citizens’ commission unless the Legislature rejects them. State representatives, probably fearing a public backlash, unanimously voted this session to do just that. The raises will go into effect, however, because the Senate won’t act on them. Quotable Rep. Jim Stoicheff, D-Sandpoint, sums up this act of cowardice best: “I just think, egads, we scream about accountability in our schools. What’s the one agency that’s not accountable? The Legislature. That’s terrific.”

Where were you when I needed you?

You don’t know who your true friends really are until you lose an election. Ask former congressman Larry LaRocco. He had no trouble raising campaign dough while he was an incumbent and everyone thought him unbeatable. But the tap slowed to a trickle last fall after “Don’t Call Me Congresswoman” Helen Chenoweth upset him. LaRocco raised less than $1,000 after the election and owes almost $29,000, according to financial reports. Meanwhile, Chenoweth raked in $55,000 after the general election - all, I’m sure, from ardent admirers who would have stood by her even if she’d lost.

xxxx?