by William Skink
Had Montana Democrats not fucked up another congressional campaign, this state could have sent an exhilarating jolt to the resistance against Trump. I still don’t think Amanda Curtis would have won had she been selected, but her camp appeared to be where the energy and passion wanted to go.
The Facebook chatter amongst my FB “friends” does not bode well for Quist. There is no enthusiasm or excitement, just teeth-gritting acknowledgment that at least Quist is not a wealthy, creationist, Trump-loving monster like Gianforte.
The latest story about the barn/apartments is particularly bad for Quist. While plenty of ballots have already been marked and mailed, the fact Quist’s deception was exposed probably won’t inspire the fence-sitters to make the effort.
This whole campaign has been about who can claim authenticity as a Montanan, at least that was the main thrust of the Democratic strategy to elect Quist. Look at his Cowboy hat and relatable medical debt–he’s just like us!
But little discrepancies, like forgetting to disclose around $50,000 in income, started undermining the folksy caricature the partisan minions had cultivated for Quist. Then this barn story emerges, and Quist is caught in another awkward situation where his claims don’t seem to jive with reality:
Montana’s Democratic U.S. House candidate, Rob Quist has ties to a rental property not listed on state tax rolls, public records show.
Quist acknowledged the apartments Tuesday in an interview with The Gazette, but denied renting out the units. Advertising records and leasing contracts suggest otherwise.
“My son’s living there, so that’s not a rental property. It’s just something that’s kind of family-owned,” Quist said.
Quist is lying when he says the barn is not rental property. It is a rental property, says the Billings Gazette:
The Gazette identified four people who have rented from Quist in recent years. None wanted to be drawn into the politics of Montana’s U.S. House race by commenting on their relationship with the Quists, although two former renters provided leases active in 2015 and 2016 which put the monthly rent, paid to Bonni Quist, at $695 for one unit and $950 for another.
It’s hard to understand how Quist’s myriad financial problems weren’t vetted before his selection. Now Montana Democrats are facing, once again, a campaign imploding before their stupid partisan eyes.
When Quist loses, Democrats can blame the media, and they can point out the lack of national support for their candidate. Maybe there will even be some cosmetic reshuffling of the political hierarchy.
What won’t happen is an honest, critical analysis by party leaders regarding how they keep fucking these campaigns up so badly, election cycle after election cycle.
JC
If leaders of the two parties are essentially the same people wearing masks to please their differing constituencies, then it is a mistake to assume that either party puts up candidates actually wanting to win elections. They fill slots, knowing the outcome in advance. Quist may well have been selected by the hierarchy knowing there existed bombs to be set off at planned intervals to undermine any chance that he was going to win. Very little in politics is accidental. Perhaps nothing. This much is certain: Journalists do not research candidates. They recite lines handed them by overlords.
Nice try Mark.
Senator Daines and Sen. Tester vote opposite sides of an issue.
Swede,
Can you remember either casting a “deciding vote?” Most Senate votes are “safe votes,” which have no impact on the general (policy) trajectory, which is, and has been for decades, neocon foreign policy, and neoliberal economic policy. When either begins to seriously buck this trend, I’m all ears. Until then, sit back, relax, it’s all scripted, bought-and-paid-for.
So true, Steve. Voting records mean nothing.
Tester voted the deciding vote on Obamacare costing me thousands in increases for my family.
Good questions – I think Jon Tester has probably the most legitimate claim of a deciding vote of any Senator in recent history. To pass Obamacare, they needed every single Dem Senator to go along with it, including Senators bought off from Nebraska and Missouri, so if Tester had voted “No” he would have stopped all this heartbreak and fuss for the last 6 years. He had the deciding vote, along with 59 other Dems who can go down in history as having “deciding” votes.
Tester will need to thank The Donald next fall, because by October of 2018 Obamacare will be gone, and a distant memory, and Tester can’t be blamed for his vote anymore.
This is the essence of politics, Eric: The needed votes were there. Those who could openly vote for it did. If there were not enough, a few Republicans would have become turncoats. It was not a partisan issue. AHIP was running the show, and they are a far more powerful outfit than Congress, a bunch of actors and stooges.
It is like yelling at a brick wall, but stop listening to news and start thinking.
ACA passed in 2010. Tester was reelected in 2012. I’d call that a “safe vote.”
It still was the deciding vote, a vote that could cost him his re-election.
Here’s another one. Senator McCain was the deciding vote a couple days ago on federal drilling leases. If we had another Republican Senator from MT that vote would have been tie broken with Pence.
You of all people should’ve been aware of that one.
Even a one vote outcome is rigged. It is all staged. if Tester had changed his mind, not likely, they would have called on a different senator to change his vote to osss it.
These stooges don’t write the bills they carry. tester’s FJRA was written by the Timber Lobby. ACA was written by a health insurance industry committee headed by WellPoint VP Liz Fowler, who pretended to work for Baucus during the Kabuki Dance called debate and passage. Since it was preordained to pass, the bill that passed that fall was the same bill introduced that spring, with no changes.
Occasionally, and this is true of Britain too, if public opinion is unified and strong on some issue, a very rare thing in our propaganda systems, the Congress is allowed to appear to listen to public opinion. This is why you will occasionally hear of the House of Commons doing something unusual, like voting down a new war. They were given permission to do so. It appears like representative government, and seals the illusion.
We don’t have representative government, but it is very important to TPTB that we appear to.
This reminds me: Obama voted against the Iraq invasion … his was it turns out, to be a “hidden yes” vote. He needed to appear to be antiwar for his coming presidential run.
I was a early supporter of Quist for the nomination as I liked what he was saying and his effort to do out to rural areas. Well that sure ended quickly after nomination and Montana Democrat Party took over the campaign with all their high paid out of state staff. Can no one from Montana run a winning campaign? It seems like the Montana Democrat Party leadership has learned nothing in last 20 years with one lose after another, I keep hearing well we won with Bullock but look where we are at now with right wing wackos in 4 state level offices and state legislature firmly in hand of the right wing of the GOP. The Quist campaign has failed to get out of the western urban cities and hit hard those rural area he would need to win some of those leaning GOP to take a look at him. Gianforte is not well liked by Montana republicans as was seen in primary for governor. I have not voted yet and with each drip drip of bad news about Quist doubt I will vote for him Nor will vote GG.. We keep hearing Sanders is coming to campaign for Quist surely to late now as nearly 35+% absentee ballots are cast. I heard and liked Curtis but doubt she could of done better with party running her campaign. I really doubt state party leadership will change at state convention this spring as same people in county leadership positions who only can vote there have not changed either. Well Montana is always known as just wait till next year.
The problem with Democrats in MT is when the Hollywood checks start arriving in the mail the candidate is more likely to swing left as in gun control, health care, immigration, environment, and taxes.
They accept the money on those terms to receive even more.
Perhaps today’s Dems will luck to the past and FDR for guidance. http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v15/v15n3p6_weber.html
should be “look”
This election was over before it started – because the Trump Tsunami isn’t over yet. Can anybody here vision a voter who voted against Hillary last November supporting Quist?
The news media has been in a state of shock / hysteria since election night, and are trying to say Americans hate the Donald now, and are going to start electing Dems to spite him, but I wouldn’t bet the farm on it.
Using Bullock’s re-election as some sort of success really is a stretch, because as I’ve pointed out, Montana has a habit of giving Governors second terms. Since I came here, almost 40 years ago, no sitting Governor who has ran for re-election has lost his office.
Good lord, this has been going on since 2006 when I first became aware of you in City Lights, or maybe I am confused and you were one of the imbeciles that caused Crisp to shut down comments on his blog. We all must, at some point, become self aware. I’ve made mistake that embarrass me, but we only learn in that fashion. Imagining we are right all the time offers no challenges. You have passed through all the opportunities to learn and thing or two, and none of it ever sinks in. You’re dense, impenetrable, and stupid.
Oh, have a nice day. I forgot to be polite.
Monty?
You were conned, my friend. He’s not even that good. If you have ever done what I do, look in the mirror, you might detect fallibility and need to advance in your thinking. Mistakes are the key to learning.
Monty – I almost forgot about Marks many blogging personalities being busted by Rob Kailey. I guess the Troll is under your bridge JC !
Eric, Kailey was Monty, but that is beside the point. That ship sailed years ago. You choose to believe I was that person because it gives you a sense of revenge for my calling you stupid. I hereby withdraw the word “stupid,” as it is unkind. You are simply swimming in the shallow end of the political pool, unable to see through intrigue, manipulation, deceit, imagining that news is real, and existing in a highly suggestible state. You need to rid yourself of some cherished beliefs that make you feel intellectually superior to what you call “Democrats” or “liberals” and examine your own shortcomings rather than theirs. I don’t think it is possible, but I’ve been wrong many many times.
Hey Mark, anyone with a lick of sense would’ve never sold their Apple stock.
The world is full of people who give sound investment advice after the fact. And I did OK. I know a word that you might know too: “enough.”
Hey Eric, if you could ascend to the level of Mark’s intelligence you could run a shape shifter blog.
I could never be as entertaining as Mark !
To both Eric and Swede: I do not claim to be the smartest person around. There is a level of intelligence to which we advance in which we become self aware, and also aware that below that level we cannot achieve self awareness. In other words, incompetent does not comprehend incompetence, stupid cannot grasp stupidity. I recently went through a long mirror session where I saw, with great pain, mistakes I had made. I have moved forward. I will continue to make mistakes. I note that neither of ou have changed an opinion since I first came on board in 2006. I am sensing stupid.
Stay tuned, this fraud case vs. the DNC could become very interesting. https://medium.com/@zachhaller/7-jaw-dropping-revelations-from-hearings-on-the-motion-to-dismiss-the-dnc-fraud-lawsuit-bee1723b713f
Go back to the Michigan primary, Steve. It was obviously rigged to give Bernie a surprise victory and keep voter interest churning before he finally bowed out. My only question is whether or not he was a willing patpicipant in a hoax, to which my answer is “Well, duh.”
Maybe you intertwine this story with your sham Bernie candidacy?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-05-16/murdered-dnc-staffer-seth-rich-shared-44000-emails-wikileaks
In the last couple of years I have learned to take stories like this with a huge grain of salt. The guy probably faked his death, Wikileaks is an Intelligence front. You’re being jerked around. Or someone is. Maybe this story is not intended for your mindset.
One of these days you should compile a list of all your political theories in the last couple years so we can get a true measurement of the depth of your psychosis.
That is a common refrain among the clueless, people like you who believe every story, suck up every fake event, and then even get angry when some of us point out that you operate strictly on belief without evidence. You of the ovine persuasion are so locked in that you react with anger and engage in ridicule when it is pointed out that you simply don’t know anything. It’s all you got.
Good lord, “psychosis.” I would suspect a guy who listens to and parrots Rush and only reads the words above his fingers as fast as his fingers and lips can move had to look up the spelling of that word. That is a long insult. I know I lost you at “suspect.” You want to mess with me Swede? Come to my website, you moron, and open up. Give us all you got, full blast. Show us that magnificent brain. Or STFU, dweeble.
Touched a nerve?
Still waiting on that list.
Yeah, rock hard stupidity affects me that way.
The Democrats are going to be very puzzled by this special election, even if we aren’t.
They are going all-in, thinking they can maybe pull off a “Tester” and fool enough voters to win a Congressional seat.
If you remember, Tester lied with ease, in both his elections, and refused to hold town halls, and refused to defend his Obamacare vote.
When Quist hits the 40% threshold, (maybe) I think the National Dems give up on Montana, and let Dems be a permanent minority here until the Dems figure out for themselves that they need to pick candidates that are real, not candidates who claim to be hunters, yet waive a borrowed 30-30 around while their finger is on the trigger.
Anybody watching politics here know it’s fake – the Dems don’t like hunters. They don’t like guns, and they hate the idea of anybody stepping into a wilderness area. Just look at the votes in recent history, for gun rights, late hunts, etc, and all the “no” votes come from that side of the aisle.
I’m waiting patiently for a Gov. Tim Fox, or Gov. Stapleton to come along for 8 years, and finally undo all the damage done by Gov. BS, and prolonged by Bullock. It’s coming.
Aye, Carumba.