Lamnidae

This sportsman for Obama is going fishing on the Missouri for a few days. I’m sure my three readers will be heartbroken.

One note before I leave: Roy Brown’s uninspired pandering has reached new heights. Now he’s adopting Obama’s branding, referring to his campaign as, “The kind of change we can all believe in.” This struck a few of my friends as humorous so they came up with some of their own for the Brown/Daines campaign:

“Change…Because I Can’t Come Up with My Own Slogan”
“Change that Judy Martz Can Believe In”
“Change the Oil Companies Can Believe In”
Here some of my suggestions:
“Spare some change Roy so I can put gas in my car?”
“The change we voted out of office in ‘04.”
“Changes his rhetoric when Huckabee’s around.”
“You need this change like you need a hole in the head.”

I’m hoping when I get back this weekend, there’ll be some even better campaign slogan suggestions for the token candidates.

Bill Vaughn has a great piece on Bill Nooney, the black sheep of the Missoula legislative delegation, up at 4 and 20 Blackbirds today. It’s a maddening story of Nooney’s willingness to knife his neighbors in the back at the behest of his corporate keepers. It worth a read, even if you don’t live in the district with the great options of Willis Curdy and Gary Brown on June 3rd.

Also see Vaughn’s website Dark Acres for the lengthier post that also details Nooney’s other greatest legislative misses.

There’s a GOP Senate primary poll here that I think Bob Kelleher should win. Can anyone help out?

The State Chamber’s Montana Main Street blog continues in its quest to make its name more ironic today with yet another screed about the Montana Department of Revenue and its goal of chasing down out of state tax cheats. The irony comes in the blog’s recent self-positioning at the head of the spear when it comes of defending non-Montanan tax scofflaws. The very same tax cheats who likely end up hurting Montana’s “main street” businesses when they get left covering revenue gaps.

I assume the Chamber’s mission against Revenue’s effort to level the playing field for Montana businesses stems from their initial reaction to an agency request for additional FTE, but their recent anti-executive agency tone has become reminiscent of the U.S. Chamber’s transformation to a thinly veiled front for the GOP in recent decades. On the other hand, even the argument against increasing the workforce at Dept. of Revenue rings hollow when one takes into account that the Racicot administration had over 700 FTE in the office, Martz had at least 660, and right now the office is running on 647 FTE (I checked) while trying to do the work that the previous two admins ignored.

The Chamber also couches their defense of out of state interests in the argument that the last session’s measures would have complicated the tax code for Montana businesses and saddled them with additional work. However, this issue proves to be a non-starter when one considers that the most complicated of all the proposals (House Bill 74 that would have set up a new “withholding” system on mineral royalties) was supported by Montana oil, gas and minerals companies who feel that their competitors are given a competitive advantage due to their ability to ignore royalty payments.

Montana main street business must be asking themselves, “With friends like these, who needs enemies?”

I’m going fishing for four days on Fort Peck next week. When I was figuring out the costs, I realized that driving there (and gas for the boat) was going to cost more than any other part of the trip. I wonder what small fraction of my trip if any will end up in Roy Brown’s campaign coffers?

Good for Sen. Baucus. In a Capitol Hill press conference today, Sen. Baucus and other Senate Democrats announced a plan to roll back $17 billion in tax breaks director to major integrated oil companies. At the conference Sen. Baucus said, “Consumers are being hit hard as energy soar through the roof while the big oil companies continue to get billions and billions in tax breaks from the federal government and that’s not right.” He continued, “I’m here to stand up for consumers and to crack down on those who are already living high on the hog.”

This of course comes in the wake of simultaneous record oil prices and windfall profits for major oil producers. With Americans hurting at the pump and every time they take out the checkbook to pay the heating bill, this is no time to be subsidizing the most profitable companies in history. Not only would the new measure remove up-front deductions for petroleum producers, but it would also tighten tax loopholes involving foreign-source income.

Not a day too soon if you ask me. I’ll revisit this topic when I can find some documentation of the proposed legislation.

Roy Brown is either being dishonest with Montana, or sadly doesn’t understand how the state budgeting process works after a decade in the legislature. While my vote is for the prior, Brown’s willingness to try to manipulate the truth isn’t going to win him a lot of favor in Montana.

If we all hadn’t been reading the words “belt tightening session” coming from budget director David Ewer day-in and day-out lately, Brown might have gotten away with his flier. When confronted with his dishonesty, Brown responded flippantly, “But it’s still an increase.”

In Brown’s mind, it’s apparently okay to campaign around the state with a governor who grew bureaucracy in his state by 20% on one day, and then criticize Gov. Schweitzer over a funding wish list his office doesn’t control the next. I don’t think Montanans are going to buy his line.

Thank god reality has finally set in with the pundit class and everyone’s willing to admit that math is math. I’ve hated getting grumpy with some of my Hillary supporting friends lately, but I just couldn’t stand what a distraction this had all become.

Now we can get back to the business at hand. First, we’ve got to elect a president who’s going to have a job cut out for him that my visiting grandma said she “wouldn’t touch for the bloody life of me.” Still, this country can’t handle more of the same.

We’ve also got an oil exec, two mustachioed boors, an alien hunter, a person who appropriates the slogan of past failures and makes it even creepier, a guy with a rainbow on his website (carefull, your GOP brethren are sensitive about those), and many more to beat come November. These guys are up to the task. Are you?

These eight people hold the hold the key to the near-term future of the Democratic Party:

Donna Brazille (DC)
Mark Brewer (MI)
Ralph Dawson (NY)
Yvonne Gates ( NV)
Alice Germond (DC) - DNC Secretary
Jaime Gonzalez, Jr. (TX)
David McDonald (WA)
Jerome Wiley Segovia (VA)

Of the thirty members of the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee, only these eight are uncommitted to one candidate or another. The Clinton camp has already signaled its intent to go with what’s been dubbed the “nuclear option,” in which it will seek to overturn the committee’s December decision to not seat Florida and Michigan’s delegates for ignoring primary and caucus rules. Seating Michigan’s delegates would be particularly egregious given the fact that Clinton was only able to muster 55 percent in the state’s primary, while 40 percent voted “uncommitted” and the remainder went to minor candidates. Obama, Edwards and other major contenders weren’t even on the ballot.

While Montana doesn’t have anyone on the committee, the closest geographic representation is Sharon Stroschein of South Dakota who has endorsed Obama. Nevertheless, the meeting should make the run-up to Montana’s primary very interesting, as our state could end up even more critically important in the race to the nomination. Personally, I sincerely hope that some kind of compromise is reached well before this point, because I don’t think that the fallout of a “nuclear option” victory for Clinton includes the induction of a Democratic president next January.

Given former Rep. John Sinrud’s lack of respect for the law when it comes to professional licensing, I’d imagine his new astroturf outfit, the Western Tradition Partnership, will probably push their 501(c)(4) designation to the legal limit as well. In fact, Sinrud tips his hand a few times right out of the gate, coming after the Governor’s office in his newspaper comments, and being suspiciously avoidant in answering questions about their association with Montana Citizens for Right to Work.

In recent years, 501(c)(4)s have become the new 527 in the right’s dirty politics playbook. As defined by the IRS, they are supposed to be non-profit social organizations. Their popularity with Swiftboaters in recent years is due to the fact that donors can secretly contribute unlimited amounts of money. Campaigning is supposed to be limited to social issues, but there’s a lot of leeway in the code, and groups will often dovetail their campaigns (most likely illegally coordinated if it could be proven) with candidates for office.

I’d expect this group to become another mouth for the foundering Roy Brown/Steve Daines ticket. I’d also expect that their 990’s will be filed well after the election is over to avoid any embarrassment for donors. When that 990 is filed, I also imagine it will show that Sinrud and Marlenee will probably take a hefty cut of those donations in the form of direction fees. It’s so predictable, I’m surprised Chuck Johnson gave them over 1000 words. There are still benevolent 501(c)(4) organizations out there working hard for Montana, but they’re apparently not as sexy when not thinly-veiled front groups.