MONTANA GOVERNOR

Here in Montana, it looks like Libertarian Stan Jones will make another run for public office. He has not officially filed yet, but says he plans to. You can read the story HERE. This time Jones will run for Governor, and that’s not good for Republican Gubernatorial candidate Roy Brown. Incumbent Governor Brian Schweitzer should be breathing at little easier now, and he will be really happy if Jones goes ahead and files for Governor by the March 20 deadline.

Jones was instrumental in 2006 helping elect Democrat Jon Tester to the U.S. Senate. Jones received over 10,000 votes in that election. Tester beat incumbent Conrad Burns by around 3,600 votes.

We’ve seen other races where a third-party candidate influenced the outcome of a race, The third-party candidate helped defeat a major-party candidate who they mostly agreed with on the issues and allowed the other candidate, whom they disagreed with on most issues, win the contest.

That’s why Montana should have a run-off election when a state-wide candidate does not get 50% plus one vote. The run-off election would be between the top two vote getters.

THE PURGE

You can’t always keep everyone happy in your political party and that’s a fact. It seems, at least in Montana, the Montana Democrats are better at keeping their problems internal, but at least some of the Montana Republicans want to air their problems out by grabbing a reporter and getting their unhappiness reported in the newspaper.

In this STORY, a fellow by the name of Roger Koopman, who is a state representative from Bozeman, wants to oust (Purge) 14 incumbent Republicans because he feels they “…have consistently sold out the cause of liberty in the Montana Legislature.” He wants to return the GOP to “its low tax, limited government, free market roots.”

I highly doubt Rep. Koopman will be voting for John McCain, but that’s just a hunch.

Maybe Rep. Koopman should be working to elect Republicans where the Democrats hold the seat? I’m not an expert on these things, but I’d rather try adding some fellow Republicans to the State House and Senate to replace Democrats, instead of causing some of my fellow Republicans to waste money in a primary, but that’s just me.

It also may be a sign that the Republican “big tent” is closing. At least by talking to a reporter about your unhappiness with fellow elected officials sure makes it look that way to the public.

THE AGE DEAL

The media in this country make mistakes. Most of my faithful readers already knew this. They also can tilt their story to their political leanings. Here in Montana, we see it often.

Late last night the Associated Press Special Correspondent, David Epso, filed a story called, “Clinton Wins Texas, Ohio; McCain Cinches.”

In the story, Epso writes about McCain, “The 71-year-old Arizona senator surpassed the 1,191 delegates needed to win his party’s nomination, completing a remarkable comeback that began in the snows of New Hampshire eight weeks ago.”

He wrote extensively about Clinton and Obama in this story, too. He did not mention the ages of Sen. Hillary Clinton or Sen. Barack Obama in the story. Was it just an oversight or a slam from Mr. Epso for McCain being 71 years-old? You can decide. By the way, Clinton is 60 years old and Obama is 46. Together they are older than McCain…