24 August 2016

Political briefs

Green Party, Jill Stein, and Ralph Nader. In 2000, Nader received six percent of the statewide vote in Montana, but 15 percent of the vote in Missoula County. I’ve posted a special page on the 2000 presidential vote in Montana. At the Missoulian, George Ochenski reviews what Jill Stein and third party candidates offer Montana’s voters. At the Washington Post, Dana Milbank says that from Jill Stein, he hears disturbing echoes of Ralph Nader.

If Stein makes Montana’s ballot — we’ll know today or tomorrow — her candidacy could result in additional registered voters. That could, in theory, help Steve Bullock, Denise Juneau, and other Democrats. I underscore “in theory,” as there’s no guarantee Greens will deign to vote for Democrats in contests in which no Green candidate is on the ballot. I have difficult imagining that anyone supporting Jill Stein could vote for a Libertarian, but I do acknowledge that strange things happen.

Gianforte wants to sell the governor’s airplane and ground Bullock. Here we go again with another desperate, deplorable, attempt to get this solution for a problem that doesn’t exist off the ground. Bozeman businessman Gianforte knows governors in a state this size need to travel by air, just as he knows that traveling by company plane maximizes the efficiency of many chief executives in private industry. Therefore, his real complaint is not that there’s a State of Montana aircraft for the governor’s travel, or that the governor is flying when he should be driving at high speeds on bad roads — it’s that the governor flying in Montana’s King Air is named Steve Bullock.

This is not a campaign issue. It’s just another cheap shot.

Updated. Will Denise Juneau ever campaign vigorously for Congress? That’s the question asked at Logicosity today. It’s a good question. Her slow loading (for me) website finally has a dedicated issues page — but she’s been running since last year. What took so long? The best spin I can put on this is that she planned to bust out of the barn around Labor Day with a six-week blitzkrieg campaign. If so, it’s none too soon. Time’s been a-wasting.