Headscratchers / Yellowstone

• The Dutton ranch land is east of Bozeman, MT, which already has an established and expanding international airport. Why bother building another airport and a city around it for the sole purpose of tourism dollars when Bozeman already serves that purpose. Why not just invest their money expanding Bozeman instead? The infrastructure is already there, the businesses, the workforce, and the money has already been spent on most of construction (laying piping and building roads). All they'd need is a transportation link to their ski slope. Building a ski resort and the infrastructure to support it is going to have less of an environmental impact than an airport and an entire city.
  • In "Keep The Wolves Close", Beth effectively answers this question for us (and Summer, who asks the same thing). As she explains, it's not a matter of "need", it's a matter of "want". Market Equities' project is about making a lot of money without any concern for livelihoods or the environment.
  • The ranch is said to be an hour's drive from Bozeman. Presumably the prospective resort destination will be more attractive if it doesn't require lengthy drive times to and from it, especially since they hope to attract the wealthiest of clientele.
• When delivering her sales pitch about Schwartz & Meyer, Beth says that the company has a number of "pipe-hitting" investment bankers who earn millions of dollars a year for the company in profits. Why is Beth claiming that her company employs crackheads as part of her pitch? It seems like she's trying to evoke the "medieval" monologue from Pulp Fiction but thinks that "pipe-hitting" means something like "heavy-hitting." Beth doesn't seem to be the kind of person who makes pop culture references, much less ones she doesn't completely understand.
  • Pipe hitter's in the context of Pulp Fiction means people who will do anything for a hit, this term was then adopted by special forces operators who echoed the idea of a team of pipe hitter's who will do any job. Rick flag also uses the term in the movie Suicide Squad.
    • The phrase becoming popular among mercenaries would explain why Beth is using it without actively trying to quote a movie, but it still seems to be the wrong metaphor. For torturers and mercenaries, the willingness to follow orders beyond legal or ethical lines is a big bonus, but this isn't the quality that Beth is selling for her investment bankers in her speech. She's selling their ability to turn profits, so "pipe-hitting" is supposed to be speaking to that quality. That wouldn't make sense unless she's bragging about how her investment bankers make so much money because they're willing to break to law to turn a profit. But that would be a pretty stupid thing to say because she's just admitting that those profits come with a risk of being prosecuted, which undercuts her message rather than supports it. A smart businesswoman like her would want to make her books look as legit as possible.
• Why didn't Rip tell John that Teeter was branded immediately after John insisted that he fire her? A whole lot of hay has been raised about how unbreakable the branding is, to the point that Walker not getting killed for abandoning the ranch after getting branded was a huge issue. Further, Teeter was witness to murders. It seems awfully short-sighted to let her leave with a grudge against the ranch. She could drop an anonymous tip or even turn state's evidence to testify against the ranch in return for immunity. While Rip admits that he never mentioned the murders earlier due to all the other hubbub, it seems really out of character for him not to explain why firing Teeter isn't the greatest idea.
  • Perhaps because Rip was so caught off-guard by it that it didn't occur to him to mention it until Teeter brought it up.
    • Rip was never enthusiastic about women in the bunkhouse, so it seems like that would be a trivial matter in comparison to the branding, which Rip seems to take more seriously than anyone.
• Just how reckless is John and Beth's plan to turn the Ranch into a reserve or whatever it is that they are trying to do?
  • Not as reckless as one might think. They want to turn the bulk of the land into a conservation easement. This is from Michigan, but Montana should have similar language:
  A conservation easement is a voluntary, legally recorded agreement between a landowner and the State of Michigan that restricts land to agricultural and open space uses. The easement prohibits or limits any subdivision, development, or any activity that would diminish the property's agricultural or open space value. A conservation easement donation is a protection tool for landowners wishing to protect the quality of their farmland and natural condition of their property. It provides a flexible approach to permanently protecting land while keeping it in private ownership.
  • In effect, John and Beth are setting out to accomplish two goals: stop Market Equities' (and anyone who might follow) plans to develop anything on their land in its tracks and keep the land in their family. They might also get a hefty tax deduction out of it. That would make the ranch more economically sustainable in the long run. The problem is not so much can they do that (they own the land, so they can) but whether it interferes with any prior legal agreements. Market Equities was leasing some of their land and they were building a ski resort with the expectation that other areas near and around it would be developed as well. There's also John's actions as Governor that put even further hardship on rich non-residents and developers. Market Equities' immediate plan is to get John impeached and undo his executive orders. Then, assuming the courts rule in their favor, get the conversation easement ruled as being made in bad faith and thus undo it. At the very least, the head (or former head) of Market Equities wants to ruin the Dutton family. It's probable that the Duttons will succeed in keeping the conversation easement, but at great political cost to themselves.
• Would John's policies even work in real life?
  • At the very least, some of them will likely face legal challenges. Note that he's only planning to serve as Governor for one term, make policy changes that benefit (mostly) his family and the land and then go back to the ranch and live out his days. He doesn't care about being re-elected so he doesn't mind making waves and stepping on people's toes while in office.
    • This makes the whole situation even less realistic: the way he puts it, it seems that once someone is appointed governor they can do whatever they want until the end of their term. This is completely false. Not even presidents can do whatever they want. At least in a democratic country, of course. The moment a politician in a leadership position starts promoting policies or laws that too many other political figures disapprove of, there is always a way to remove the leader from office, once it has been determined by an appointed court that such removal is legitimate.
• Is Jamie a civil or criminal lawyer? Assuming I don't know anything about it, if I'm not mistaken, usually the lawyers who work for families or corporations are civil lawyers, but considering the kind of things the Dutton family has to deal with, I think Jamie would need to know a lot about criminal law as well.