We haven’t had any major rain here in Missoula for about a month.
Most of the state is the same way. They say 12% of the state has extreme drought, and they’re calling it a flash drought.
Of course, drought means fires and in Seeley Lake they’re losing serious business.
Is it really necessary to close the lake? I just don’t see a lot of forest fire potential there.
And how about campfires in campgrounds? Again, I don’t see a lot of risk there.
The state and the Forest Service might want to think about this. Fire season is only going to get worse, what with global warming. Is it necessary to destroy people’s livelihoods as well?
Maybe we should discuss cutting down some of these trees too, since they just seem to burn up anyways.
I see that four Great Falls-area fishing access sites have been hit by vandals, and that’ll cost $4,000 to clean up.
I wish I could remember the governor that, when out of office, often went to his local fishing access site to pick up trash.
We need more of that kind of attitude in Montana today.
Logicosity had a good look at Roy Lowenstein today, or at least one of his fundraising-appeal emails.
You’ll remember that we discussed Roy near the end of June when the Montana Democrats hired him from New York.
He joins Chris Meagher on the comms team. You might remember that Meagher is making over $4,700 a month...mainly to send out tweets and fundraising-appeal emails.
I expect Roy is making about the same, but we won’t find out until around the 20th of this month.
Mainly, the Montana Democratic Party HQ in Helena operates primarily as a money-raising venture.
Dems brought in $105,000 and spent $99,000 in June.
They now have $348,000 cash on hand.
To me, it seems like they’re just staying afloat...making enough to cover their salaries and benefits and the payroll taxes as well.
Sure, it’s the slow summer and people aren’t that interested in politics, so they’re not raising as much money.
But what’s the point of raising all that money, anyways? In the 3-4 months we’ve been digging into finance reports, it seems the lion’s share of donations to the Montana Democratic Party just go to cover the cost of the 10 main staffers.
It doesn’t seem like the money being raised is actually helping Montanans at all...unless you’re one of those staffers.
And boy, do people get mad at me for pointing this out!
Just another indication that something’s not right.