I drove my wife and two other Montessori teachers over here on Friday afternoon so they could go to some training on Saturday.
After that I wrote most of this up and then I took my son to the Museum of the Rockies.
It was a fun time. He’s 5, so seeing all the dinosaur stuff was exciting. The planetarium was cool as well.
After that we drove back and got to Missoula around 6 PM.
So I missed the Women’s March in Helena.
Darn!
I’ll write about that in this post, as well as other issues like Trump’s inauguration, the special election, Elsie Arntzen’s troubles, and a bit more.
Enjoy!
President Trump
I watched it online yesterday morning, and I have to say…I was impressed.
I really liked Trump’s speech. It was about 16 minutes, really bashed the hell out of the establishment types, and said what a lot of us frustrated Americans wanted to hear.
I loved the isolationist stance to it, the part about putting America first. I do indeed hope the various halls of power around the world hear that.
I watched a bit on TV last night when the military ball was on. I liked that too.
And how about Melania Trump? My, she’s something. It’s been a long time since we’ve had a first lady you’d actually want to sleep with.
Anyways, Democrats spent most of the day being upset. I’m not sure why this is.
- The Republican establishment hates Trump.
- The Democratic establishment hates Trump.
- The media establishment hates Trump.
When you look at it like that, what’s not to like?
To me, Trump is our first independent president in some time, perhaps forever.
Heck, he’s even floating the idea of doing Medicare for All. As you know from reading this site, it was Democrat Max Baucus that really screwed us over on that one.
But as a society, we choose not to talk about that. Remember, the media is owned by big corporations, most of whom have their hand in the healthcare industry as well.
Besides that, we know Montana farmers are excited about Trump, mainly because he’s expected to get rid of restrictions that Obama put in place.
I wonder how Rob Quist feels about this. He’s counting on farmers and farm issues to carry him through. Remember, a generation or two ago Democrats could count on the support of the farming community.
However, like many in the rural areas, now they mostly just go Republican.
The Wrong Issues
A clutch of minority issues like gay rights, bathroom issues, women’s rights, and race issues won’t do it.
A woman's right to choose sure the hell won't.
Economic issues trump all, for the simple reason that no matter what color you are or who you like to sleep with, we all have to eat.
You need money for that, and let’s not even get into housing, transportation, and all the rest of it.
For that you need jobs, and not just crummy ones like we have in Missoula, but good ones, the kind America used to have and the kind that Trump likes us to think are coming back.
I doubt they’ll come back. That doesn’t mean we can’t make more of our everyday products right here in America, like we used to.
Never forget, people like Steve Daines sent those jobs to China in the first place. Montanans rewarded him for that by giving him 6 years in one of the most corrupt political bodies on the planet.
This is one of the main reasons I can’t be a Republican – they really do not care about American people at all, just the 1% at the top.
Sadly, Democrats know this, know they can get away with caring less about common Americans because of it, and they go ahead and do it.
For the Democrats, it’s not so much just the 1% at the top that they care about as the 10% at the top. The other 90% of us have been hoodwinked into believing the Democrats care about us, when in actuality they just benefit themselves while paying lip service to minority issues.
But now Trump’s in town.
It’s exciting.
It’s exciting to know that something in your life might actually change this time, that with this president we might get something more than window dressing mixed with bullshit promises.
And I could be 100% wrong on that.
I hope not.
I hope that Trump tears things up and knocks things around. America isn’t working for me. It isn’t working for most Americans.
That’s why Trump’s in the White House.
The Women’s March
But I’ll try.
Mostly, this event has gotten a lot of hype – the exact same guest post was on both MT Cowgirl and Intelligent Discontent.
A quick aside – how about the new MT Cowgirl? For the most part it now seems to be a place for guest posts and copy/pasting posts from other blogs. I wonder how long Democratic readers will unquestioningly follow and advocate what an anonymous male writer that writes under a female moniker tells them to.
But back to the march.
Personally, I think the name ‘women’s march’ was chosen because it was viewed as nicer than ‘a rally against that fascist, sexist, egotistical bigot in the White House’ march…but that’s just my opinion.
I view the march as bullshit.
It’s trying to promote a hodgepodge of minority issues with a woman’s right to choose being foremost among them.
You know how I feel about abortion – why are so many women needing one?
Most Americans are responsible and know how to practice safe sex. Because a small percentage of Americans don’t, however, the rest of us have to suffer under this abortion rights dichotomy where both sides have been bashing the hell out of each other since 1973.
How that helps my life is beyond me.
But a woman’s got to have that right to choose, right?
At this point in my life, I don’t really give a shit. Just give me a good job, healthcare, and the hope that some day I might be able to retire.
Reptile Dysfunction had some good analysis of this march.
I like this site. This article was good and that one they had on our bullshit healthcare debate was another good one.
Sadly, the person who writes this site doesn’t vote.
So you’re reading the complaints of someone that can’t even take the trouble to vote in local races because they feel that might taint whatever protest they’re making by not voting in the federal races.
But back to the march.
We learned a few days ago that pro-life women wouldn’t be welcome at the women’s march in D.C.
At that D.C. march, as many as 500,000 people showed up to “offer a loud rebuttal” to Trump.
Hey, crowds are great. Without wins at the ballot box, however, they don’t translate into lasting action.
Still, the people march. I guess it’s easier than voting.
There were marches all over the world. In London they had 2 miles of marchers.
- Boston had some big numbers, around 100,000 people.
- Denver had a turnout of 100,000.
- In LA they had 750,000.
Noticing a trend?
- Yeah, all big cities.
- All places that went for Hillary.
- All places that turned out the vote, just not the places that mattered.
The big women’s march in Montana took place at noon at the Capitol in Helena. “Thousands” of people gathered in the 16-degree weather.
Organizers figure 10,000 showed up. I highly doubt that.
Helena has a population of 29,596…at least it did in 2013. So assuming we had 3,000 people show up, that means 10% of Helena turned out for this march.
Not too shabby.
Sadly, it won’t mean a thing.
A Note on the Special Election
I think about 3,000 came to see Trump in May. When you get to local politicians, you’re lucky if a roomful of people show up.
That’s frustrating.
It makes you feel hopeless, like what you’re doing doesn’t matter.
Well, it matters to you and it matters to your base. Democrats are very good at getting out that base, but they can’t extend beyond it.
Brian Schweitzer can, but the Montana Democratic Party can’t rely on him as their savior. For one thing, he simply won’t be around forever, and he doesn’t always want to run.
I’m still waiting to hear how Amanda Curtis is going to win in 2017 when she couldn’t win in 2014.
Now we even have a new entry into the race, a Bozeman lawyer that’s just getting into Montana Democratic politics.
If he somehow gets the nomination, I’ll probably vote for him.
I don’t think he’ll get it, though. It’ll probably be Curtis or Quist, though if it’s Zeno Baucus I’ll go ahead and vote for Gianforte.
It’ll be interesting to see if it is Gianforte. Zinke should be stepping down this coming week and then things will move quickly.
Rob Quist is the one I’d like to see get the nomination, but I feel he’ll still lose.
I feel all our Democrats will lose this one, at least all that have announced for the spot.
If Quist does get it and does lose, it’ll be interesting to see what effect this has on Schweitzer. Could it hurt his influence in the Party? If I wanted to be Machiavellian I’d suggest giving the nod to Quist with the knowledge that he’d lose, which would hopefully hurt Schweitzer’s prospects for 2020.
That’s the viewpoint of whatever Democrat wants to win the governor’s office in 2020, Democrats that aren’t named Schweitzer.
I guess what we’re getting at here is that Democrats have failed to find issues that resonate with rural voters.
Sure, Bullock squeaked through twice, but the first time was coattails and the second was staying on the same horse midstream.
Schweitzer’s the only one that can blow away the competition, not just limp past it. We’ll see if that still holds true in 2020.
My opinion is that if Rob Quist loses in 2017 to the GOP candidate, Schweitzer’s brand will be tarnished. He’ll have a tougher primary fight in 2020, and thus a tougher fundraising battle as well. The latter could prove his downfall.
Arntzen’s Pliancy
- First it was her pick for senior policy advisor stepping down because of comments he made about Hillary on Facebook and the subsequent backlash over this.
- Then it was some waffling over Graduation Matters, saying the program was dead, then it wasn’t, and then killing it off from the website anyways.
- Now Arntzen is claiming Denise Juneau “knowingly submitted misleading student test results to the federal government.”
This latest issue comes down to the ACT test, which doesn’t have a proficiency score, but which is the test that’s taken by most students.
To get federal money, Juneau fudged a bit and put in a ‘3’ on the 1-to-4 proficiency scale.
Wouldn’t that technically qualify as falsifying a government report?
Maybe, but no federal agencies or officials are complaining about this (corruption, anyone...or just incompetence?). At the same time, Arntzen has no idea which test she’ll have students use for the proficiency rating in 2017.
So Arntzen is very good at pointing out problems. She’s horrendous when it comes to offering up solutions to those problems.
When you go to your boss with a problem, in this case the taxpayer, you want to present them with solutions as well.
Why Arntzen isn’t doing this is beyond me.
Anyways, I feel Arntzen is a very pliant politician in that she’ll change her tune very quickly depending on which way the winds of public opinion – or media reporting – are blowing.
- I can’t help but think she called up the policy advisor and told him to withdraw because of the media attention.
- I can’t help but think she waffled on Graduation Matters because of the media attention.
- I can’t help but think this proficiency rating snafu will be walked back a bit, again, because of the media attention.
Democrats are lucky. Elsie Arntzen doesn’t have much of a backbone, at least not compared to politicians like Trump.
People like Trump will decide something, announce it, then stick to their guns whether it’s popular or not.
People like Arntzen, however, will reverse themselves very quickly if a newspaper, TV station, blog, or even a commenter on Facebook says something disparaging about them or their policies and procedures.
There’s been a lot of ruckus lately over the lack of attention to the OPI race, which may have helped Arntzen get in.
Now we see her doing what most of us expected, and that’s changing up education in Montana, and not in a way that Democrats like.
Suddenly we have the reporting, and far from it being too late, we know from Arntzen’s pliancy that it’s not – she’ll walk back on a lot of things if we just apply the pressure.
So apply it.
Other Happenings
Over on Logicosity they talk about her replacement, mentioning the person will likely be from “a list consisting mostly of a host of old-timers and former candidates for the legislature who have lost at least one election.”
Again, the lack of a viable Democratic bench in Montana, and in all areas of the state.
Even the cities are having their rural fringes picked off by hungry Repubicans. Democrats seem powerless to stop this.
Moving on…I see there’s been yet another pre-release walk-away.
What is that now, about 5 over the past month we’ve seen in the news?
Also in the news, $1 million worth of pot was seized at the Idaho-Montana border, or 378 pounds.
What a waste of my tax dollars.
We could be making money off this for our schools. Sadly, idiots are in control of both states’ governments.
And that’s it, folks – have a good Sunday of football.