There were some political stories that deserve attention from the weekend!

There were stories about Social Media, not giving credit to the bill’s sponsor, fundraising, and backroom deals that hit the political fan here at The Western Word over the weekend. So let’s take a look at them!　

Social Media:

Back in September, I wrote a column about the use of Twitter by politicians, and looked at the way the Montana Congressional Delegation was using it.

Always a day late and a dollar short, Lee Newspapers published a story over the weekend about the Montana Congressional Delegation using “Social Media” to get their message out. In reading the story, I wondered if the author even uses Twitter and/or Facebook…

Bottom line (and the same as what I had observed) is Congressman Denny Rehberg is far ahead of Senator Jon Tester in using these tools. We also found out that Tester doesn’t actually use Twitter, his staff does for him.  Senator Max Baucus probably still uses the fax machine…

Taking Credit:

The Great Falls Tribune does a weekly column (published on Saturday) they call “The Edge” where they sometimes poke fun at some issues.

In Saturday’s edition, the Tribune called out Senators Jon Tester and Max Baucus for not giving Congressman Denny Rehberg credit for his bill (HR 6166). Baucus and Tester sent out a press release saying how wonderful the passage of this bill was, but the Tribune said they, “somehow neglected to mention that it originated with Rehberg.”

Rehberg’s bill creates a palladium bullion coin. Palladium is mined in only one place in the United States (Montana).

It’s nice to see (at least this time) that someone in the Tribune newsroom actually understood the legislative process. Most of the time the Montana media takes the propaganda the politicians pump out as fact and never question them on it.

The fact is that it’s harder for a member of the House of Representatives to get a bill (there are 435 members) through and signed into law. The Senate only has 100 members. Baucus’ also had a bill dealing with the same issue, but it is stuck in committee (so much for that “powerful” tag that Baucus, not to mention the media, use frequently to describe him).

Fundraising:

There were some comments around the web about Senator Jon Tester sending out a fundraising e-mail for his 2012 re-election bid. I received the e-mail. He asked me for $5.00 because, “…even though the campaign won’t get fully underway for a little while, we need to start pooling our resources. Even if you can just chip in a few dollars, that’ll help us to come out of the gate strong.”

The fact is that Tester has been campaigning for several months. His campaign website went up months ago. He announced he was running last year.

Backroom Deals?

Any time there’s a lame duck congress, funny things can happen. Backroom deals are cut and sometimes we don’t find out about the repercussions from these deals for weeks or months.

The Great Falls Tribune published a story on Saturday about a Senator Jon Tester’s wilderness bill (S. 1471, Forest Jobs and Recreation Act) maybe getting attached to the omnibus spending bill in this lame duck session of Congress.

That’s a bad thing.

Tester’s bill has never been debated on the Senate floor. If fact, it never made it out of the committee in which it was assigned. It’s never been debated in the House. If you check the bill status on Thomas, then you will see there have been no major actions on the bill and it only has one co-sponsor (Baucus).

I’m all for protecting our valuable land and resources to a point, but wilderness issues are far too important to get rammed through without thorough debate and review. If Tester’s bill could not even make it out of committee (remember the Democrats still control the Senate and all the Senate Committees) it should die at the end of this Congress.

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