CHEERS: To the Cassia County School District for its enlightened new policy on sexual harassment and cyber-bullying.

The new rules proscribe bullying someone over sexual orientation and crack down on "sexting," the transmission of sexually explicit messages or photos electronically - primarily between cell phones.

Students and staff at Cassia County schools who engage in these behaviors could find themselves expelled from school or fired.

The new policy includes guidelines that define cyber-bullying as the use of any electronic communications device to convey a message in any format - including audio, video, text, graphics or photographs - that intimidates, harasses or intends to harm another individual.

It also explicitly protects any student or staff member who reports bullying from retaliation.

Harassment has taken on a whole new dimension with the proliferation of electronic communication devices. Good for the Cassia schools for getting out ahead of the curve; other south-central Idaho districts should follow suit.

JEERS: The Twin Falls City Council formally renamed the Twin Falls Municipal Golf Course this week, ending a five-month-long process that at one point included a contest to rebrand the links.

There were 63 entries, but "Twin Falls Golf Club" wasn't one of them. Golf Advisory Board members in September recommended the name, fearing that some other golf course would end up using "Twin Falls" in its name.

This whole endeavor was a lot more complicated than it needed to be, and we're not sure the marketing appeal of "Twin Falls Golf Club" is that much greater than "Twin Falls Municipal Golf Course."

This community has trouble renaming public property. In 2003, the City Council was set to rechristen downtown streets with the names of Twin Falls pioneers, but backed out at the last minute and opted to name them after neighboring cities and towns instead. In 1996, the city and Twin Falls County briefly transformed Joslin Field into "Idaho's South Central Airport: Gateway to the Great Rift and Sun Valley."

The Great Rift is a hard-to-reach, 62-mile-long volcanic scar in the desert 100 miles east of Twin Falls. Public ridicule quickly sank that idea.

It may be the Twin Falls Golf Club now, but it will long be "Muni" to local residents.

CHEERS: To Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo, for keeping up the pressure on the federal government to scuttle a rule change that endangers Idaho water rights.

In June, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works passed the Clean Water Restoration Act, which would dramatically expand federal jurisdiction under the current Clean Water Act by allowing government regulation of virtually all interstate and intrastate waters and their tributaries. Crapo, a second-term Republican, placed a "hold" on the bill, indicating his willingness to filibuster this legislation if the bill makes it to the Senate floor.

Then earlier this month, the Environmental Protection Agency released "The Clean Water Act Enforcement Action Plan," which claims that states are falling behind in meeting the requirements of the Clean Water Act. It proposes increased federal oversight and enforcement of the law at the state level, and many states are now concerned the EPA is laying the groundwork to revoke the authority of some states to enforce the Clean Water Act. Crapo argues that stripping states of their power tramples private property rights and threatens their economies.

He's right: Without control over its own water resources, Idaho can't do business.