• ALETRIS NEILS
• Namibian Caracals are being eradicated for lack of awareness.

Aletris Neils, a burgeoning researcher in mammalian conservation and PhD student at the University of Arizona, has been working in southern Namibia, South Africa, for the last several years to raise awareness for the Namibian Caracal. The caracal, a medium-sized predatory cat, are being killed by farmers and ranchers who fear for their livestock.

However, it is a misconception that holds a dire consequence when the cats, apex predators in their ecosystem, are completely eradicated.

• Mike McGowan via Daily Beast

The Daily Beast's Michael Daly tells the story behind this remarkable photo of Gabby Giffords skydiving with a Navy SEAL—and the challenges both faced since:

A friend of Giffords’s happened to mention the photo to The Daily Beast last week—and it becomes only more powerful these three years later, with the knowledge of what would befall the ascendant star of American politics and one of our most elite secret warriors. This image has been part of the skydiving photographer’s portfolio and now reaches public view for the first time as a portrait of the spirit they’d both bring to the ordeals that awaited them in the days ahead. To hear the story that accompanies it is to wonder if it isn’t the exact spirit we need as a nation to get us through these often bleak and fractious times.

Months after the photo was taken, the SEAL was shot and gravely wounded in a gunfight with the Taliban in Afghanistan. Giffords visited the SEAL at the hospital before she herself was shot in the head by a madman outside a suburban Arizona supermarket early last year. The SEAL then visited Giffords at the hospital. He found that Giffords was still Giffords, only more extraordinary given a circumstance that was too familiar.

Congressman Jeff Flake, who wants to win the retiring Sen. Jon Kyl's seat this year, stopped by Arizona Illustrated to talk with Andrea Kelly about the Arizona presidential primary, his shift on border security and his Senate campaign.

In a February Public Policy Polling survey, Flake led potential Democrat opponents Richard Carmona and Don Bivens by 11 percentage points.

I'm not feeling great about Arizona lawmaking so far this week, between Lori Klein and her attacks on public educators who might accidentally swear or teach something with a partisan slant and the Daniel Patterson story in general. However, even though the amendment was removed, I have to thank the Wyoming House of Representatives for letting me know that other states also manage to elect paranoid nutjobs. In this case, paranoid nutjobs that want to reserve the right to buy an aircraft carrier in case the world goes to hell in a handbasket:

On Friday, the Wyoming House of Representatives advanced a bill to set up a task force to prepare for the total economic and political collapse of the United States. Per the bill, the panel would investigate things like food storage options and metals-based currencies, to be implemented in the event of a major catastrophe.

Then it goes three steps further. An amendment by GOP state Rep. Kermit Brown*, calls on the task force to examine "Conditions under which the state of Wyoming should implement a draft, raise a standing army, marine corps, navy and air force and acquire strike aircraft and an aircraft carrier." As the bill's GOP sponsor, state Rep. David Miller, explained to the Casper Star-Tribune, "Things happen quickly sometimes."

Buying an aircraft carrier is, as a rule, a great idea, but there are a few hiccups, not the least of which is that Wyoming is currently landlocked.

According to Bamboo Sushi, the sustainable fishing focused Portland restaurant, this four minute film took seven months to create, using 100% handcrafted miniatures. However, I probably wouldn't have been inclined to watch a video about the ethics of sushi that wasn't so beautifully made (I'm bored easily, it's a problem), so the work was worth it, right?

So here's what it boils down to: Buy pork belly, cover it in equal parts sugar and salt, let it sit for a week while pouring off the fluid that accumulates and adding a little more sugar and salt each day, rinse it and slice it thin. I smoked mine for an hour or so over mesquite wood, too, but it was good even before that. You can also add in whatever spices you so desire. The garlic-infused stuff I cured came out the most fragrant.

Everyone who dined on it this morning agreed this project was well worth the effort, and I made three pounds of bacon for around nine bucks. Works for me.

As we reported last week, state Rep. Steve Farley is the next Democrat to get into the Congressional District 2 race in the hope of representing the turf formerly represented by Gabrielle Giffords, who stepped down from Congress last week to focus on her recovery from gunshot wounds suffered on Jan. 8, 2011.

Farley is set to announce his campaign tomorrow at a variety of stops in Tucson, Green Valley and Sierra Vista.

Farley joins state Rep. Matt Heinz and state Sen. Paula Aboud in the Congressional District 2 race, which will be settled in the normal election season later this year.

Democrat Nan Stockholm Walden, who owns the pecan groves near Sahuarita with her husband, Dick Walden, is expected to join the race next week. Walden, who earned a law degree at Stanford, worked in Washington, D.C., in the 1980s and 1990s, including a stint as chief of staff for former U.S. Sen. Bill Bradley.

Before the CD2 race takes place, voters will decide an election to determine who will finish out the remainder of Giffords' term in Congressional District 8.

A half-dozen candidates are officially in the CD8 race. Nominating petitions for that race were due yesterday.

Barring some kind of successful petition challenge, Four Republicans will battle it out in an April 17 primary election for the chance to face Democrat Ron Barber and Green Party candidate Charlie Manolakis.

The Republican candidates include Jesse Kelly, who narrowly lost to Giffords in 2010; state Sen. Frank Antenori, who previously ran for Congress in 2006 before winning a seat in the Arizona Legislature in 2008; sports broadcaster and marketing businessman Dave Sitton; and former Air Force fighter pilot and squadron commander Martha McSally.

Two other Republican candidates, John Lervold and Mark Koskiniemi, failed to turn in nominating petitions, although Lervold tells The Range that he will try to get into the Congressional District 2 race later this year.

The Republican candidate have a short window of opportunity to introduce themselves to the voters in Congressional District 8, which includes Saddlebrooke, Oro Valley Marana, central Tucson, Green Valley, Sierra Vista and much of rural Arizona in the southeast corner of the state. Early voting in the race begins on March 22.

Okay, I admit it: I watch Dancing With the Stars.

Rather, I sit there while my daughter and wife watch it, mostly criticizing the cheesiness of it all. But I still do pay attention to who gets voted off and who moves on, secretly hoping that train wrecks (read: Bristol Palin, Kirstie Alley, Nancy Grace) keep sticking around despite not being very good dancers.

So, the news that Jaleel White (aka Urkel, from the very underrated Family Matters TV show of the mid-1990s) was among the 12 celebrities selected for the upcoming season, I instantly got WAY too excited to watch this show again.

Having White be a University of Arizona alum is just gravy.

Among the other people scheduled to compete on the show, some of my favorites include token African-American football player Donald Driver, token way-too-old-to-be-dancing-in-a-slinky-dress contestant Gladys Knight and Martina Navratilova, the robot-like tennis player who dominated the 1970s and 1980s despite never smiling.

The new season premieres March 19. And my DVR is set.

I don't know if there's necessarily a way to measure happiness, but the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index makes some effort every year to do so. Big surprise, Hawaii is on top, scoring 70.2 out of 100. Slide down the chart and you get to Arizona, which comes in as the 26th happiest state this year, slightly happier than Texas (well, sure), but less happy than Maine. I can understand Colorado and Minnesota ranking high on the list, but North Dakota and Nebraska? Is there some sort of ignorant bliss in effect in these states that they've forgotten where they actually live? Madness.

Hawaii: 70.2
North Dakota: 70.0
Minnesota: 69.2
Utah: 69.0
Alaska: 69.0
Colorado: 68.4
Kansas: 68.4
Nebraska: 68.3
New Hampshire: 68.2
Montana: 68.0
South Dakota: 67.8
Vermont: 67.7
Maryland: 67.6
Virginia: 67.4
Iowa: 67.4
Massachusetts: 67.4
California: 67.3
Washington: 67.3
Connecticut: 67.2
Oregon: 67.1
Wyoming: 66.9
Wisconsin: 66.9
Idaho: 66.9
New Mexico: 66.8
Maine: 66.7
Arizona: 66.6
Texas: 66.4
Georgia: 66.3
New Jersey: 66.2
North Carolina: 66.1
Pennsylvania: 66.0
Illinois: 65.9
South Carolina: 65.7
New York: 65.7
Rhode Island: 65.6
Louisiana: 65.5
Michigan: 65.3
Oklahoma: 65.1
Indiana: 65.1
Nevada: 65.0
Tennessee: 65.0
Florida: 64.9
Missouri: 64.8
Arkansas: 64.7
Alabama: 64.6
Ohio: 64.5
Delaware: 64.2
Mississippi: 63.4
Kentucky: 63.3
West Virginia: 62.3

It's an exciting time to be a music fan here in Tucson, with an intimidating number of bands coming through town over the next few months. Two of those forthcoming acts have new videos out, Grammy winning mopsters Bon Iver (TCC Arena, Apr. 3), with the above video for "Towers", and chipper Australian/English indie-popsters Allo Darlin' (Club Congress, May 4), with "Capricornia" below. Enjoy!