It’s been a busy morning here at The Western Word, so thanks for stopping by.  It’s Wednesday which means it’s OK to start looking forward to Friday!

Today I take a look at the Rehberg campaign’s new television ad, I talk about the Lugar loss in Indiana, I mention robots.txt, I share a couple of flyers I received, I talk about the ballots, and I close out the column talking about a possible match-up.  There’s a lot more, so read on…

Rehberg Launches “Honest” Video

Montanans for Rehberg launched a new campaign commercial this morning called, “Honest” which I think is “compare and contrast with Jon Tester” campaign commercial.  You can watch it HERE. Although the Rehberg campaign did not send The Western Word a press release or script regarding the ad, here’s a rundown of it from their YouTube site:

“Senator Tester’s dishonest attacks hide his voting record: in favor of higher taxes, to raise his own pay, spend your tax dollars on bonuses for Wall Street executives, and side with President Obama 95% of the time. Denny Rehberg cut taxes, opposed bailouts, and voted against pay raises — because it’s your money, not theirs…”

Tester Campaign spokesman Aaron Murphy said:

“We look forward to comparing Dennis Rehberg’s record to Jon Tester’s record of holding himself to the highest ethical standards in Congress.  Congressman Rehberg promised Montanans he would never vote to give himself a raise, then voted five times to raise his own pay.”

My Analysis:

It was interesting to me that Rehberg came out of the gate with his first campaign commercial sort of blasting Tester instead of releasing a “Hi, I’m Denny Rehberg intro” video.  The recently released poll showing Rehberg being down to Tester by five points might have scared the Rehberg campaign so much that they went into an attack mode.

The Tester Campaign called it an “Attack Ad” in their Fact Check info that was e-mailed to reporters and bloggers shortly after the video was posted.  Tester’s people contend their ads “have been positive in nature.”

It’s going to be interesting watching the two sides going after each other.  Hey readers – what do you think?  Leave your comments below!

Lugar loses:

The U.S. Senate lost another one of their moderate voices last night when U.S. Senator Richard Lugar was defeated in the Indiana primary by state Treasurer Richard Mourdock – the Tea Party’s guy.  Lugar had served in the senate since 1976.  He is 80 years old.

The victory by Mourdock means the Democrats have a better chance of winning the contest this November in their quest to retain control of the Senate…plus it could be a warning to all incumbents (although here in Montana the U.S. Senate race is a lot like incumbent versus incumbent).

Sadly, this is another example of how extreme the Republican Party has become – today’s GOP is no longer the party of Reagan…

Robots.txt:

Montana Watchdog.org published a story yesterday about Senator Jon Tester saying, “Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Tester touts his record on transparency in a new television ad this week, but his campaign is hiding information on the Internet.”

The Montana Watchdog contends that someone in the Tester organization “is preventing the Wayback Machine, the Internet’s only web page archive tool, from storing screenshots of his 2012 website, JonTester.com, as well as the site he used for his 2006 Senate run — TesterforSenate.com, which now redirects to his current site.”

I checked out the Wayback Machine and entered TesterForSenate.com and received this message:

“We’re sorry, access to http://testerforsenate.com has been blocked by the site owner via robots.txt.”

I use the Wayback Machine often.  Fortunately, I am like a “hoarder” and save a lot of political stuff from the internet anyway – like information from Tester’s 2006 campaign website plus all previous and current campaign e-mails from the candidates.

The information I have accumulated is not just on Jon Tester.  For those who have sent me nasty e-mails have no fear, they have been saved, too.  I would bet (not $10,000 like Mitt Romney bets) that I have stored (for safe keeping) more information on candidates and elected officials than anyone in the state…

In closing, was the move to deny access by Tester to his campaign site criminal?  No.  It’s his website funded by campaign donations and he can do with it what he pleases.  I’m glad he has not blocked the taxpayer-funded U.S. Senate website – then he would have a problem.  But it is somewhat ironic that Tester touts his openness while blocking access to his old campaign site.

Primary Ballots:

I am so glad the Postal Service was able to deliver the 2012 Montana Primary Election ballots to my home yesterday!  Is this a great country or what?  I do have two concerns:

First, I received a Republican Party ballot and a Democratic Party ballot.  I can only vote on one ballot.  I would like to see primaries changed and everyone’s name put on one ballot and then the top two vote getters for a single seat (regardless of political party) would then face-off in the General Election.

Second, on the return envelope, it tells me to “Place Sufficient First Class Postage Here.”  Why doesn’t the election department place the required postage on return envelope or use their “Non Profit Org. Postage Paid Permit Number” for free return.  The return address is the Election Administrator’s address, so if I don’t put any postage on it, will it get there?

Note:  You can download a digital “I Voted” sticker from the Montana Secretary of State’s website.  Click HERE.

More Flyers:

-Pam Bucy, a Democrat running for Montana Attorney General, graced my postal mailbox with an 11.5″ by 6″ flyer (two-sided) yesterday.  It arrived with the ballots.  Here it is:

-The Americans for Job Security sure are spending some big bucks trying to get Rick Hill to win the Republican Primary for Montana Governor.  I received another 11″ by 8.5″ flyer from them yesterday.  Here it is:

Teske v. Tester:

This is probably a long-shot!  Since their last names are somewhat alike, it would be interesting to see how a Dennis Teske versus Jon Tester race would turn out in the General Election.  First Teske must get past Denny Rehberg in the Republican primary.

The fact is that voters are not that intelligent and some could easily become confused with the last names.  Back in 2008, many folks believe that Bob Kelleher was mistaken for Bob Keenan on the Republican Primary Ballot for U.S. Senate.  Kelleher won a six-way GOP primary by about 9,900 votes over his closest competitor.  He then lost (big time) to Max Baucus in the General Election by about 219,000 votes.

Hey…you should really follow the life and times of Jack on Twitter @TheWesternWord