US Politics

Republican Candidate for State Auditor Derek Skees: Out of Touch with Montana and Reality

by Don Pogreba on March 13, 2012 · 4 comments

in 2012 Statewide, Derek Skees, Monica Lindeen, Those Wacky Republicans

While I suspect that Republican candidate for State Auditor Derek Skees would himself be more

A Skees Campaign Video

inspired by another general, it seems that the words of Napoleon are most fitting for this most unusual candidate for statewide office. Napoleon wrote, “the great proof of madness is the disproportion of one’s designs to one’s means,” and no political candidate in Montana today better represents the divide between ability and ambition than Derek Skees.

Rather than an extended narrative about the reasons Mr. Skees is unsuited for the office of State Auditor, I thought I’d offer just a sampling of the arguments against his election.

James Conner at the Flathead Memo offered the best introduction to Mr. Skees in his 2010 run for the Legislature. In the piece, Conner describes Skees as a Civil War history revisionist with a penchant for right-wing conspiracy theories couched as history.
During his single session as a legislator, he offered 23 pieces of legislation—all of which died, despite massive Republican majorities. Among his priorities? Ending public input on nuclear power, allowing students to bring firearms to schools, and nullifying federal laws.
He offered a bill which would give Montana the right to allow human trafficking and slavery if we wanted, because of the “traditional Anglo-American conception of ordered liberty.” Don’t believe me? Listen to the recording.
He was publically mocked by Republican Representative Ken Peterson for presenting an absolutely idiotic bill to reduce the size of the Montana Supreme Court.
Specifically, he sports Confederate clothing and believes that the Civil War was “an unconstitutional war declared by Congress and President Lincoln and involved Yankee Trader greed and Southern honor.”
A high school journalist in Whitefish got Skees to admit that we should build nuclear power in the Flathead, that oil is a never-ending resource, that environmentalism is communism, and that “gays invented the idea hate language.”
He told a candidate forum that he opposed Social Security.
He supports a sales tax that Montana voters have repeatedly rejected.
He worries about the dangers of human micro chipping.
His keen sense of budgeting led him to believe the state of Montana was engaged in deficit spending, which was not only factually incorrect but unconstitutional.
He was a featured speaker at the John Birch Society, an odious hate group which peddles conspiracy theories of the worst kind.
He is connected to Rick Breckenridge and attended his white-power fueled Liberty Convention in 2010 that led to an FBI investigation of one of the key speakers.
He may have generated the best letter to the editor of 2011, when Mike Donohue described a a rambling two hour Skees speech, saying that “the pain was so excruciating most of his audience were fighting off sleep deprivation.”

I think you get the idea.

Mr. Skees is out of touch with Montana voters, out of touch with even radical Republican values, and frankly, out of touch with reality. His inflated self-worth is only matched by his complete lack of knowledge and experience for the position. Frankly, it’s an embarrassment to the Montana Republican Party that he will be their standard bearer in this race.

Make the easy choice. For competent, professional leadership of the State Auditor’s office, throw your support behind Monica Lindeen.

Monday: Secretary of State
Tuesday: Superintendent of Public Instruction
Wednesday: State Auditor
Thursday: Attorney General
Friday: Governor

A Pivotal Moment for the Democratic Party

by M. Storin on February 28, 2012 · 9 comments

in US Politics

Today, Senator Olympia Snowe announced that she will not be seeking re-election. No doubt, many of us have disagreed with some of the votes and positions elected officials like Sen. Snowe have taken. Read the comments on this blog (and others) and the same could be said about almost any Democrat serving in congress.

Senator Snowe is retiring because of the extreme partisanship that has dug its nails into our society. “I do find it frustrating…that an atmosphere of polarization and ‘my way or the highway’ ideologies has become pervasive in campaigns and in our governing institutions,” she said Tuesday.

Snowe’s retirement is great news for Democrats looking to keep control of the U.S. Senate, but it should also serve as a moment of reflection for our Party.

From Sen. Specter to Sen. Snowe, Republicans are leaving the GOP, are being pushed out of GOP, or feel that the GOP has left them. Where will these “moderate Republicans” go?

Democrats can either choose to embrace moderate Republicans or Democrats can shun them just like the TEA Partiers and extremists that banished them.

I encourage we Democrats embrace them. This is a pivotal moment.

We both extend our hand and build a party based on reasonableness and responsibility or we shut moderates out and become just as insolated, incestuous, and out-of-touch as the GOP of today.

Of course, extending our hand means compromise, but it also means we have a better chance of defending and expanding our most cherished institutions and ideals.

Simply put, we should avoid litmus tests and embrace those who are abandoning extremism.

Taxes: Mitt Romney and Me. Why Does the Job Creator Pay A Higher Tax Rate?

by Don Pogreba on January 23, 2012 · 150 comments

in US Politics

Mitt Romney paid a 13.9% tax rate in 2010, on an income of $21.6 million dollars.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney earned $21.6 million in 2010 and paid 13.9 percent of that amount in income taxes, using the preferential rate on investment income and charitable deductions to pay a smaller share of his earnings than top wage earners typically do.

I’m a public school teacher and small business owner. I paid 17.6% on an income just under 10% of the decimal point in Romney’s income. That’s what TurboTax tells me, anyway.

While Mr. Romney seems to believe that I am envious of his success, he’s wrong. I’m not envious; I’m angry. I’m angry that he has the gall to be proposing a tax cut that would decrease his burden when he’s already paying less than his fair share. I’m angry that he demonizes a government and regulations that have largely been built to benefit his kind of income at the expense of the rest of us.

As my friend Matt Singer said, I’m angry that “he won’t pick up his share for roads, schools, defense.”

Now, Mr. Romney’s supporters will say that he deserves those tax breaks because he is a “job creator.” How, precisely, living off the sweat and misery of others in “destructive capitalism” creates jobs remains a mystery to me, but Mr. Romney certainly isn’t creating any jobs now—other than for Republican operatives.

But I am a job creator. I create jobs every day. I help students realize their potential to reason, to write, and to achieve their ambitions. Every teacher in America is a job creator far more important than Mr. Romney.

But we’re not the only ones.

My union brothers and sisters who plow the roads so we can get to work are job creators and those men and women who build the roads, rails, and ships that carry American goods are job creators. The single parents who struggle give their kids opportunity working two jobs are job creators, as are the public servants who keep us safe and keep us informed.

Another famous Massachusetts politician once famously asked Americans “ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country."

Isn’t it time for Mr. Romney to start asking—and starting doing—for the America he so loves?

Montana Wingnut Watch: Marxists Everywhere!

by Don Pogreba on January 22, 2012 · 126 comments

in 2012 Statewide, Montana Politics, Those Wacky Republicans

Part of a periodic series of reminders that, when Republicans in the Montana Legislature and members of Montana TEA Party organizations tell you they represent the mainstream of Montana views, they might just be wrong.

Park City Republican member of the House David Howard believe that Obama is little different than German, Japan, and Italy during World War 2. No word on WW2 Hungary, though.

TEA Party stalwart Eric Olsen believes that statues of athletes and entertainers are part of the Marxist agenda. You can criticize my President, my nation, and my party, Mr. Olsen, but leave your lies about baseball off my Internet.

Republican candidate for State Auditor and opponent of government (confused as I am?) Derek Skees might want to work a bit on his campaign messaging just a bit. He’s certainly right about that “least capable” bit, but he should probably apologize to the good people of the Flathead. I’m certain they wouldn’t vote for him again.

Bob Fanning’s running mate, Chuck Baldwin, in his typically understated way, argued that the passage of the NDAA has turned the United States into a war zone:

Pastor Chuck Baldwin, the Constitution Party’s candidate for President in 2008, wrote, “Americans should realize that, coupled with the Patriot Act, the NDAA, for all intents and purposes, completely nullifies a good portion of the Bill of Rights, turns the United States into a war zone, and places US citizens under military rule.”

Fanning and Baldwin also have a Confederate-style plan to save Montana:

Which of the Gubernatorial Candidate teams have a plan to set up and execute a sovereign state economy, independent of the federal economy, with our own banking system independent of the Fed Money Monopoly, as needed for our state’s survival for when this End Game of Federal, State, and County collapses occur? Only the Fanning/Baldwin team have a contingency plan, or even a clue as to what to do and how to do it. This is the reason for their strong 10^th amendment stand as part of their campaign message.

Vote for Reason. Vote for a Democrat.

Montana Blog Round Up 15 January 2012

by Don Pogreba on January 15, 2012 · 70 comments

in 2012 Senate Race, Blogs, Denny Rehberg, Jon Tester, Montana Politics, Those Wacky Republicans

Highlighting some of the most interesting and provocative posts in the past week at Montana blogs.

D Gregory Smith pointed out, that despite constantly talking about his availability to Montanans, Representative Rehberg has been awfully unwilling to meet with them lately.

Montana Cowgirl found it interesting that Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Hill would depict himself as someone who struggled as a single father, given the reasons he became one.

I’m not sure that I agree with much of anything Ed Berry says, but I wonder if he’s right that far right conservatives will not support Representative Rehberg because of his support of the Defense Authorization Act and HR 1505.

Rob Natelson managed to blame liberals for the Citizens United decision. It’s really a conservative jurisprudence must-read.

Barb Rush showed once again why she should not ever be elected to the School Board.

Over here, I kept yammering on about Representative Rehberg’s continued dishonesty about Pell Grants, new poster Winston wondered why campaign web sites weren’t in better shape, and Gabriel Furshong argued for the Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act.

Post Office Used Bad Data To Determine Closures

December 29, 2011

The Washington Post reports that the Post Office used bad data, including inaccurate information about profitability and distance when it decided which offices to shutter: The U.S. Postal Service relied on questionable data to identify more than 3,600 post offices and other retail operations to study for closure, an oversight panel has concluded. In many [...]

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My Endorsement for the GOP Candidate for President

December 14, 2011

Given the national media’s apparent interest in the endorsements of former fringe candidates for public office and that I ran to become Montana’s governor at least as credibly as Christine O’Donnell ran to become one of Delaware’s senators, it only seems appropriate that I offer my endorsement today for the best GOP candidate for President: [...]

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Poverty in a Time of Thanks

November 22, 2011

I’ve been thinking a great deal about poverty lately. When people ask me why I am a liberal, it’s always this that comes first to my mind: the fact that in the richest country in the world there are so many people who lack access to basic economic and health security—and our systemic unwillingness to [...]

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