Wes Siler’s Newsletter

4 days ago | wessiler.substack.com | Wes Siler

According to E&E News, Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) responded in the affirmative when asked if he intends to revive a provision requiring the sale of over 500,000 acres of public land in Nevada and Utah, now that the Senate is marking up the House budget. Lee is a follower of extremist Mormon teachings that claim man has dominion over nature, and has previously stated a goal of selling off all public land. He’s also Chair of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.

1 week ago | wessiler.substack.com | Wes Siler

Matthew Barr is a longtime outdoor recreation industry creative from England who makes a podcast calledLooking Sideways, where he talks to big name athletes and examines that world through the lens of the action sports he participates in. He lives in Normandy, not far from the beaches where 29,000 Americans gave their lives defeating fascism the first go-round. It’s no surprise that he’s struggling to understand why Americans have chosen our current path, and called me to ask fro an explanation.

1 week ago | wessiler.substack.com | Wes Siler

Hurricane season starts next week. And long-term forecasts suggest it might be a bad one. What will happen to people who lose their homes, or in communities where infrastructure is damaged? All signs point towards desperate pleas for help on crowdfunding platforms, as the Trump administration dismantles the Federal Emergency Management Agency. One of the big pieces in the unravelling of America’s social contract that I’ve been watching is FEMA disaster relief.

2 weeks ago | wessiler.substack.com | Wes Siler

I just finished building my wife Virginia a Marlin 1894 in .44 Magnum for perimeter defense duty around our cabin, and during car camping trips here in the American west. Based on lessons learned from my own Marlin 1895, I think it’s an ideal combination of reliability, ease of use, handiness, and a hard-hitting caliber that should work as well on two-legged predators as it does on four. Here’s everything I learned along the way. I get it.

2 weeks ago | wessiler.substack.com | Wes Siler

Early this morning, the House of Representatives voted along party lines to approve its budget package. The measure will now be sent to the Senate. Republican leaders say they hope to pass it there by Monday. And while the measures contained in it still represent a massive redistribution of wealth from normal Americans to billionaires, still blow up the deficit, and still visit unprecedented harm to public lands, the measure to sell off more than 500,000 acres of our land has been removed.