According to preliminary election returns, former Flathead County Commissioner Joe Brenneman defeated incumbent School District 5 Trustee Ivan Lorentzen 330–325, a margin of five votes, which is 0.76 percent of the total votes cast. That excludes an automatic recount, but permits Lorentzen to obtain a recount if he pays for it (state recount handbook).
Unless there was a blunder or a systemic error that skewed the counting, the outcome is likely to stand. Random errors are just as probable to be distributed in Brenneman’s favor as in Lorentzen’s. In the meantime, congratulations to Brenneman on his victory, and thanks to Lorentzen for his long and responsible service as a trustee.
With yesterday’s defeat, multi-million-dollar building reserve levies for the Kalispell high school district have failed in three consecutive elections. The latest levy lost by less than 200 votes, which might tempt the trustees to run another election as soon as possible — a temptation to which the trustees ought not yield.
Another low key campaign in the spring has a low probability of success. My recommendation: put the levy on the 6 November 2012 general election ballot. Use the next six months to mount an effective campaign for the levy.
And, avoid mistakes like the yard sign at left. It lacks name and contact information for the person or group behind it, an omission that basically says “Go away. We don’t want your help.” The sign gets the issue wrong as well. Education was not on the ballot. A building reserve levy was.
Ed Berry reports it is so — and if he’s right, it’s downright shameful that a man so worldly, accomplished, and intelligent has put his name on a document — the Montana Constitutional Governance Pledge — that’s inciting dry rattles of approval from the bones of Jefferson Davis, John C. Calhoun, Robert E. Lee, James J. Kilpatrick, and Harry F. Byrd, Sr.
That’s what the latest PPP survey of Montana U.S. Senate and House races reports. But is that differential believable? Why would any woman running in a Democratic primary do so much better among men than women?
A poll released today by Public Policy Polling, a firm associated with Democrats, reports that incumbent Democrat Sen. Jon Tester leads Republican challenger Rep. Denny Rehberg 48–43 percent with nine percent undecided.
Montana’s look inward forces have reason to celebrate this weekend. PBS television station KSPS from Spokane is finally gone from Optimum Cable’s services for Western Montana. And with that, cable’s blackout of TV from Spokane is complete.
Updated. Why Gov. Brian Schweitzer thought it helpful to offer his thoughts on Mitt Romney and polygamy continues to escape me. It’s not that Schweitzer got the overall picture wrong: Mitt’s father, George, was born in Mexico to parents living in a colony of dissident Mormons. Although Mitt’s grandparents were monogamous, his great-grandfather reportedly did practice polygamy.
But that was five generations ago. Today’s Church of Latter Day Saints, of which Mitt Romney is a conventional member, renounced polygamy in the late 19th Century. Polygamy does survive, but only in a few small communities; Pinesdale, Montana, is one. They’re social curiosities, and administrative headaches for the states in which they’re located, but they’re not a political threat.
So what possessed Schweitzer to try to connect Mitt Romney to polygamy? Was his tongue loosened by Demon Rum? Was he frustrated from dealing with Pinesdale? Or with reactionary Republicans who also happen to be Mormon? Perhaps we’ll learn the answer when he publishes his memoirs. Meanwhile, he’s ignited a lively discussion.
Republican State Senator Bruce Tutvedt’s re-election campaign became visible last week when his election signs, often side-by-side with Rick Hill for Governor signs, began popping up across his district, sometimes within a softball’s throw of GOP challenger Rollan Roberts II’s signs. Tutvedt also updated his website to say he’s running for a second term.
More is undoubtedly happening, or will be soon: direct mail, telephone calls, door-to-door, and advertisements in the print and electronic mass media. Two weeks ago, for example, Roberts sent out a 4-page letter (an expertly written and formatted letter) and is conducting honk-and-waves. The third GOP candidate, Jayson Peters, a former Kalispell city councilman who now manages Sykes, has a few yard signs out and a website. Like Roberts, Peters is running to the right of Tutvedt, a feat of some distinction as Tutvedt is not known as a Ripon Society Republican.
So far, I’ve not detected third party activity in this primary, but it would not surprise me if it occurs.
Occupy Kalispell met the Northwest Montana Patriots at solar high noon on 15 April — and nothing extraordinary happened. There was a brief commingling of signs, a brief exchange of pleasantries, then the Occupiers, who started at noon, returned home, replaced on the sidewalk by Depot Park by approximately as many NW MT Patriots.
Ken Miller, candidate for the Republican nomination for governor, worked the small crowd. He was in town for the Lincoln-Reagan Dinner that evening. Gill Jordan, Democratic candidate for county commissioner, and Occupy’s chief organizer, worked the crowd and waved at the noon hour traffic.
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Tomorrow at noon, Occupy Kalispell begins its 27th consecutive honk-and-wave in support of percolate-up economics, and a fair and responsible distribution of wealth. Occupy’s chief organizer, Gil Jordan, has stayed the full hour for all 26 honk-and-waves, and intends to stay the full hour for the next 26 events.
Jordan, a life long social activist, filed for the Democratic nomination for county commissioner for the north valley seat that became open when Jim Dupont died. Unlike one of the candidates (photo) for the Republican nomination for the commission, Jordan is proud to have been photographed at Occupy Kalispell.
After Occupy Kalispell concludes its honk-and-wave at 1300, the tea party types will take over Depot Park for a three-hour protest against taxes and most everything else since 1910.
The conventional wisdom is that Bruce Tutvedt, the Kalispell Republican representing Senate District 3, will stomp the toe jam out of newcomer Rollan Roberts II in the June primary. Tutvedt, goes the wisdom, is so well known, so well liked, and so much a native of the Flathead as to be de facto local royalty, that only a lightning bolt to the head while plowing during a thunderstorm could deny him a second term. That was my initial take when Roberts filed for the SD-3 GOP primary.
There are facts pointing that way. I could not find the word "Democrat" or a Democratic logo on his website. An ad on CBS affiliate KPAX TV pictured Tester saying he was for common sense Montana, not partisan infested Washington, D.C. He said he approved the ad, but I neither saw nor heard anything telling us he's a Democrat. And two new 30-second video ads aimed at veterans omitted all mention of political affiliation.
A new Rasmussen Poll reports that Republican Rep. Denny Rehberg leads incumbent Democrat Sen. Jon Tester by three points. This is consistent with other polling results over the last 18 months. Tester is in trouble with the voters, and no amount of partisan spin-doctoring can obscure the facts.
A comparison with the polls (graphs below) for the 2006 Senate race, which Tester won with a narrow plurality, brings Tester’s predicament into sharp focus.
What happens if the Supreme Court strikes down the Affordable Care Act — aka Obamacare — in part or entirely?
One body of opinion, typified by E.J. Dionne Jr., holds that a single-payer system becomes more likely if the individual mandate is struck down: