It seems some people are confused about which political party best represents their views. So we put together this list of things to help you decide (with apologies to Jeff Foxworthy)
If you think it’s a good thing that our Governor, Congressmen and one US Senator are all rich men from out of state—- You might be a Republican.
If you think women and health care providers who help them get abortions belong in jail—- You might be a Republican.
If you think local property taxes should increase while income taxes on big corporations and rich people are reduced—-You might be a Republican.
If you think climate change is a hoax while we are seeing annual increases in freezing temperatures and record setting drought—-You might be a Republican.
If you think we should spend more money on putting people in jail cells than we spend on educating our children—-You might be a Republican.
If you are happy having delusional conspiracy theorists representing you on the Public Service Commission and in the Cascade County Sheriff’s office—-You might be a Republican.
If you think higher power bills with a guaranteed profit for utility corporations is good for our economy—-You might be a Republican.
If you think nursing homes and hospitals in rural communities aren’t important to the communities they serve—-You might be a Republican.
If you think family farms should be replaced by big agricultural conglomerates—-You might be a Republican.
If you think teachers are paid too much and class size doesn’t matter—-You might be a Republican.
If you think public access to Montana’s great outdoors should be reserved for wealthy landowners and their friends—-You might be a Republican.
If you think wearing masks and getting vaccines don’t help control the spread of Covid and other respiratory diseases—-You might be a Republican.
If you think America should refuse to honor treaty rights of Native Americans because they “lost the war”—-You might be a Republican.
If you think that college should be more expensive and put young people on the hook for mountains of debt owed to private lenders at high interest rates—-You might be a Republican.
If you think businesses are attracted to communities with crappy schools and crumbling infrastructure—–You might be a Republican.
If you think elections are being stolen using electronic voting machines—-You might be a Republican.
If you think you are a “self made person” who got ahead without using government services we all pay for like education, the courts, and roads and bridges—-You might be a Republican.
If you think Donald Trump is an honest, patriotic businessman— We don’t know what the hell you are—other than greatly confused.
It is often hard to understand the convoluted process of regulating electric utilities in Montana. But that doesn’t stop us from taking a stab at it.
The basics
Electric utilities in Montana (NorthWestern Energy and Montana Dakota Utilities) are monopolies. The benefit of allowing these businesses to operate as monopolies is that it avoids risks created by a competitive market. No one wants to see their utility collapse because they provide a vital service. But monopolies can charge customers whatever they want and customers have no choice but to pay up. To protect consumers and make sure power providers didn’t go out of business, utilities were allowed to operate as monopolies BUT the price and services they offer would be regulated by the government. Here in Montana that is done by the Public Service Commission.
Fast forward to the 1970s
Following the Arab Oil Embargo in 1973, America was in a panic about an energy crisis. Coal became “America’s Ace in the Hole” and utilities all over the country began building coal plants. The precursor to NorthWestern Energy, The Montana Power Company, and other utilities in the Northwest built four coal plants at Colstrip. Units 1 and 2 came on line in 1975 and 1976. Unit 3 came on line in 1983 followed by Unit 4 in 1985.
Colstrip Unit 3— Let the fighting begin
Though the Public Service Commission allowed Montana Power to charge customers for the cost of units 1 and 2 (including a profit for their stockholders), that was not the case with Colstrip Unit 3. Montana Power was not the only utility building generating plants in response to the Oil Embargo, and by 1983, utilities in the northwest were in surplus and the power from Colstrip 3 was not needed by Montana Power customers. To make a long story short, Montana Power asked the Public Service Commission to make customers pay for Unit 3. The Commission ruled that the cost of Colstrip 3 would not be covered by Montana Power’s captive customers because the power was not “used and useful”, the standard at the time for deciding if a power plant would be paid for by consumers. Montana Power went off to court and eventually succeeded in forcing its Montana customers to pay for Unit 3. It was a long and ugly fight and as a result Montana Power opted to sell power from Colstrip Unit 4 in the open market rather than try to put it into customer rates.
Fast Forward to 2007—Pre-approval, NorthWestern Energy’s Holy Grail
After the Colstrip 3 fight Montana Power, and it’s successor NorthWestern Energy, never forgot how the requirement that power be “used and useful” had worked to their disadvantage. They argued that it takes a long time to build a power plant and no one could reasonably be expected to predict markets and energy requirements that far in advance. So, they came up with a nifty idea that they should be able to go to the Public Service Commission with their plan to build a power plant and get “pre-approval”. If granted, the cost of the plant (including a profit for their stockholders) would automatically be charged to customers— whether or not it was “used and useful”. They went off to the legislature, which they basically owned, and changed the law to grant them the ability to get pre-approval for future plants.
A brief editorial comment
Pre-approval screws consumers! It represents a huge shift in the risk of building big power plants from utility stockholders to customers. Reasonable people can disagree whether pre-approval is good or bad for maintaining a healthy power system but there is no question that it reduces the monopoly’s risk from requiring the power be “used and useful” when placed in customer rates. In theory, if the utility’s risk is reduced, stockholders profit should be reduced as well. But NorthWestern remains remarkably silent on this issue.
Enter our Hero, Monica Trannel
Yes, that Monica Trannel. In addition to being the Democratic candidate for the Western District Congressional seat, Trannel is also a consumer advocate and utility lawyer. Representing the environmental group, 350 Montana, she looked at the law which allowed pre-approval in the 2007 legislature and said, “Wait just a minute, fellas This law is unconstitutional” and off to court she went. Her argument was that the law violated a couple of “special legislation” rules in the Montana Constitution because it only applied to one business entity in the state, NorthWestern Energy. The courts agreed, and the pre-approval law was found to be unconstitutional.
NorthWestern Energy Returns to The Legislature
So here we are at the beginning of 2023,. and NorthWestern Energy is returning to the legislature to “clarify” the pre-approval issue. There will likely be several bills on the pre-approval issue but the first one out of the gate is by Rep. Jerry Schillinger, a Republican from Circle. This bill will make the pre-approval law apply to all utilities, not just Northwestern energy, in order to bring it into harmony with the Montana Constitution.
NorthWestern Energy says jump! Republican Legislators ask, “how high?”
WTF406 has already covered the attempt of Great Falls Senator Steve Fitzpatrick to muzzle the state consumer representative in utility matters in the legislative rules. https://wtf406.com/2022/12/senator-steve-fitzpatrick-great-falls-very-own-utility-slug/ Fitzpatrick now says he will not pursue his rule making effort. There will be plenty of bills NorthWestern Energy will try to pass given the Republican majority in the legislature. Rest assured that Great Falls Republican Legislators will be lining up to give them whatever they want. They always have.
Last night, Montana’s Superintendent of Public Instruction, Elsie Arntzen, hosted a forum at Heritage Hall at Great Falls College MSU and it was standing room only. Several Great Falls legislators, school board members, and school district superintendents attended the event.
Why such impressive attendance?
In the days before the event, Great Falls Rising had sent multiple emails with a forwarded message from Great Falls Public Schools Superintendent Tom Moore. In the message, Moore stated “none of the superintendents have received personal invitations to attend” the four events that were scheduled by the Office of Public Instruction (OPI) and he urged people to attend the meeting. To be honest, there has been a lot of broken trust between the OPI and Montana’s public schools. A year ago, the superintendent of every AA school in Montana signed a letter of no confidence in the OPI due to several failings during Superintendent Arntzen’s tenure. A motivation to rally around our schools might have packed the room.
What was the event’s purpose?
Ironically for a meeting about “bridging” communication, communication of the meeting’s purpose was poor. After the first 45 minutes of the forum, one audience member took the mic and asked the question on many of our minds. “What is the purpose of this meeting?”
Elsie Arntzen took back the mic and gifted us with an incoherent, rambling statement. I wrote, “WTF” in my notebook because her answer made zero sense.
Excuse me, what?
The questioning audience member tried to ask her question again, but Elsie either didn’t want to provide the real reason and/or was unable to articulate a response. Great Falls Public Schools Superintendent Tom Moore stepped in and briefly explained that he understood the purpose of the meeting was to have a conversation with the newly elected legislators in our area. To engage our parents, school leaders, and legislators in discussing issues of mutual interest before the upcoming legislative session. It was nice of Moore to try to hypothesize why Arntzen decided to host these forums.
Okay, Superintendent Moore’s answer made some sense – but – an astute audience member asked a great follow-up question. Why were these meetings only scheduled in the “more red” cities of Kalispell, Great Falls, Billings and Stevensville? Why weren’t forums scheduled in Helena, Bozeman, Butte or Missoula? On brand, Superintendent Arntzen’s response was a confusing paragraph of buzzwords. While her answer made little sense, she implied meetings would be held in the bluer cities in the future.
Nothing political to see here people!
If Superintendent Arntzen was expecting a venue to spew anti-public school and “parental choice” gibberish, she sure didn’t get it. When newly elected Daniel Emrich (SD-11) stood up and said that if you want to raise teachers’ salaries, you need to cut administrators’ – the crowd booed! A teacher spoke up and said that we need to keep public dollars in public schools and loud applause broke out.
What did other Republican legislators have to say?
Besides Emrich, a couple other Republican legislators in the room spoke and had tense interactions with GFPS Superintendent Moore. Jeremy Trebas (SD-13) pressed Moore about accountability for student achievement. Moore responded with a graph visually demonstrating all of the extra demands we have put on the shoulders of our educators over the past decades. Scot Kerns (HD-23) complained that communication between the schools and the public needed to be a two-way street. Moore responded by saying there were procedures in place to request information, fill out a form to release salary information. Kerns loudly interjected that he had filled out the form. Moore responded that other legislators have made an effort to go to the schools and work with administrators and teachers directly. It seemed as if he was calling out Kerns’ accusations of non-transparency as being in bad faith.
Tough subjects were raised. I’m glad our legislators were there to hear them.
People brought up the fact that taxpayers are tapped out for increased property taxes. Multiple audience members mentioned that our students needed more mental health and prevention services, not less. That subject was raised in a direct response to Arntzen’s proposed elimination of mandated school counselor ratios.
Based on the mood in the room, I felt hopeful. Because the word had gotten out, there was a strong, pro-public school sentiment in the room. We didn’t have the attacks on our schools seen at the Kalispell and Stevensville forums. People were speaking out and paying attention. If we want improved student achievement, we need to invest in our children. We can’t do that by asking more and more of individual taxpayers. The state needs to allocate monies properly to fund our PUBLIC schools. An audience member asked, “Who is going to want to teach in five years with these attacks on our public schools?” You heard us, Great Falls legislators. SUPPORT OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
Had enough of election politics? Well, that’s true for most of us here in Montana. But then came the news that Montana’s former Secretary of State – turned mediocre country western singer – Corey Stapleton is running for president. Stapleton obviously has no lack of ego and a certain attraction to delusional thinking, that’s for sure. So let’s take a quick look at his illustrious political career just to see what kind of president he might be.
Is he a political hack?
In 2020, a court ordered Stapleton to remove the Green Party from the ballot following revelations that the Montana Republican party spent $100,000 to qualify the Green Party for a slot on the ballot. It was an obvious underhanded attempt to siphon votes from Democratic candidates. As Secretary of State, Stapleton not only supported this kind of game, he appealed the court decision to the US Supreme Court . . .twice. His petition was denied both times.
Is he ethically challenged?
In August of 2020 the Billings Gazette wrote an editorial with the following title: “Stapleton Shows Why He is Unfit for Any Office.” The editorial says it better than we possibly could: “There was the issue of the nonexistent voter fraud that Stapleton referred to in public, then blamed the media for reporting. There was the problem with the unauthorized expense to the state for a personal ‘big truck’ he used to commute to work. There was the attempt to declare a bill vetoed by the governor as the law of the land, a move a judge found to be ‘without constitutional or statutory support.’ There was the botched voter guide and rush-job $265,000 correction, commissioned from a political ally’s print shop without bid. And there was the fine for using resources from the Secretary of State’s Office to announce his campaign for governor — a campaign he later abandoned to run instead for Montana’s House seat when that position looked more easily attainable.” Thank you, Billings Gazette.
Is he an ambitious politician?
In 2000, he was elected to the Montana Senate where he sat for two terms. In 2012, he ran for governor and lost the Republican primary to Rick Hill. In 2013, he announced he was running for the U.S. Senate but withdrew when Steve Daines also announced. Instead, he ran for Congress, losing in the 2014 Republican primary to Ryan Zinke. In 2016, he ran for Secretary of State and won – going on to prove his arrogance and incompetence in public office as summarized by the Billings Gazette above. In 2019, he again announced his intention to run for governor but withdrew and ran for Congress, losing in the 2020 Republican primary to Matt Rosendale. And now he is running for President of the United States.
Wait! We almost forgot. . .now he is a country western singer. He just released his second album. So is he a good country singer? Um. . . meh. Check it out for yourself. https://ffm.to/westernson
Well, there we have it. Now Corey is running for president. Who on earth would vote for an ethically challenged hack with a record of failure and mismanagement? Maybe country music fans? Of course he won’t win. . .will he? Well, most of us thought the same about Donald Trump. Stay tuned.
It’s been a couple weeks since the 2022 general election and What the Funk is here to talk you through the shitshow facing Montana. In Cascade County, with a 59% voter turnout, in every contested race, the Democrat lost. Republicans flipped two senate seats and retained all of their house seats. And yes, that means Republicans now have a supermajority in the state legislature and the governorship. They’re already introducing constitutional amendments left and right. We were worried this would happen if voters gave Montana Republicans a supermajority. You can read our full blog post about it here, with an overview excerpt below:
First, they will be able to propose constitutional amendments by referring them to the ballot, if they garner the support of two-thirds of legislators. That means that 100 politicians in Helena can put amendments to our constitution on the ballot. Currently, amendments can only be proposed by gathering enough citizen signatures. It’s hard to do, meaning that lots of amendments are proposed, but few actually make it to the ballot.
Second, a supermajority can call for an unlimited constitutional convention by referring a convention call to the ballot. If approved, a convention can propose changes to virtually anything in the constitution by a vote of the delegates.
What other impacts can we expect from this election?
Beyond the changes to the legislature due to the election, the Cascade County Commission is now a completely Republican board. Rina Fontana Moore is also out as Clerk and Recorder (pending the results of a recount in a race with only a thirty vote lead by her opponent). Republican County Commissioner Joe Briggs has stated that he plans to propose an ordinance change to move elections under the county commission.
Things look pretty bleak, but we did see a few glimmers of hope from our statewide elections. The State Supreme Court Justices Gustafson and Rice handily retained their seats. Gustafson was especially impressive – withstanding a full court press of Republican endorsements and campaigning for her opponent. A strong judicial branch is still part of Montana’s government!And LR-131, the truly shitty bill that attempted to interject the government into grieving families’ healthcare decisions for their dying infants, was voted down with a statewide vote of 53% Against to 47% For.Montana voters realized how shitty that bill was!
What fresh hell can we expect in the upcoming 2023 legislative session?
As mentioned above, the Republicans are already proposing numerous constitutional amendments. On the abortion rights front, Republican Representative Jennifer Carlson out of Manhattan has already requested a draft bill “to establish an infant born alive is a person.” Wait a minute, that is some loaded-ass language. Where have we seen that misleading wording before?…….THAT IS FUCKING RESURRECTED, ZOMBIE LR-131!!! A draft of the bill isn’t available yet, but that working title has the exact phrasing that was in LR-131. Did Montana voters not send a loud enough message to Republicans on what we think of LR-131???
It’s official, we are in the bad place.
We have to keep calling out this bullshit and informing the public when these elected officials hurt Montanans. What the Funk is keeping an eye on other poisonous draft bills requested for the 2023 legislative session. We will keep you posted as these hateful attacks on our rights wind their way through the legislative process.
Election deniers- the stupidest of the right-wing MAGA stupid. The folks that WON Republican victories in Cascade County in 2020 and now 2022. These people, who have won for two terms, continue to claim that our free and fair elections are a lie. And their extremism is getting way out of hand.
On Friday, election deniers attempted to intimidate staff of the Clerk and Recorder’s office. They surrounded the building, took pictures of staff cars and license plates, and made every effort to make election workers feel unsafe. Read about their disturbing anti-democratic tactics here: https://dailymontanan.com/2022/11/12/absolutely-insane-cascade-county-election-official-says-cops-called-after-skeptics-escalate/
Today in the Exhibition Hall at the fairgrounds, election workers publicly tallied the remaining ballots. Despite widespread Republican wins in Cascade County, dozens of election deniers showed up, many in their finest army-man cosplay, to continue their intimidation attempts. It all seemed rather over done when looking at the election workers themselves. The small group of folks tallying elections were almost entirely senior citizens, one of them an older gentleman with his Vietnam veteran hat on. Personally, it’s the first time I’ve ever seen a large assembly of folks acting like they’re hell bent on beating up someone’s grandma. And yet, here we are.
One man watched carefully through binoculars, a rather amusing sight as he was just a few feet away from where the tally was openly happening in front of all of us. A woman in head-to-toe camo and combat boots stood behind me. She made an accusation that the ballot box wasn’t actually sealed. (It was.) She got angry that I was taking pictures. She made several comments about election fraud and claimed she’d seen extra, illegal ballots being delivered the prior week. This was allegedly the same woman who had been taking pictures of staff’s cars on Friday. Like most bullies, she was utterly infuriated when faced with even the slightest pushback. Still, her litany of conspiracy theories continued.
And then? Her candidate won. The officials handed the results to candidates. A Republican woman tried to lead a cheer to spell out SANDRA. The group got lost somewhere around the “D” which is fine; spelling is hard.
With the Republican wins official, I asked the group of election deniers if they still believed the election was rigged. Unsurprisingly, they wouldn’t provide a straight answer. One woman claimed they were simply there to watch the process, yet had no comment when I mentioned the camo-clad woman next to her had spent all of Friday harassing election workers.
And here we approach the cognitive dissonance that belies the entirety of the far-right. Election deniers claim that our election system is broken. They cry foul and accuse election staff of fraud. Even with today’s results, none of them would admit that the election had been won freely and fairly. So, which is it, Cascade County?
Did Rina Fontana Moore run a free and fair election?
OR
Are the results of the 2022 election not to be trusted?
These are “Yes” or “No” questions. The answer cannot be both. You cannot be simultaneously claiming victory in the election while claiming that the election is fraudulent. I mean, you can, but if you do you’re an idiot.
As disappointing as the election results are, we accept those results. That’s what rational people do when confronted with challenging concepts like “addition.” We don’t create a complex web of conspiracies when things don’t go our way. Nor do we dress up like soldiers (which is likely really insulting to actual soldiers, btw) and go harass folks who are trying to do their jobs.
But these election deniers have likely done themselves a real favor electing Sandra Merchant. Merchant now has a full time job that she is neither qualified for nor even understands. May these election deniers band together in their stupidity. Cascade County has elected Merchant, and we’re about to get exactly what we deserve by doing so- a goddamn mess.
With the elections being openly counted mere feet away, we can only assume this man was looking for Sandra Merchant’s qualifications.
Decked out in camo, these women were clearly not attempting to intimidate anyone. Just perfectly normal matching combat outfits. Two law enforcement officers were present after election staff faced intimidation and harassment last week.
