Month: September 2023

by Travis Mateer

At the Arts Hotel in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, they encourage their guests to make art by providing a sketch pad, pencil, and inspirational quote from Pablo Picasso. I was definitely feeling inspired when I woke up this morning, bright and early before the sun, so I took the pencil and created the masterpiece you see above. I think this piece will look GREAT in one of the plastic-sleeve displays in the elevator they provide for exhibiting guest-art. Cool!

I hope Pablo is wrong because I’m imaging some crazy shit to explain the inability of Missoula to deal with dead bodies piling up. My masterpiece depicts a guilty-looking state with a blanket trying to cover up one dead body, while in the upper right-hand corner a shitty director named David exploits the violence to satisfy his own sick proclivities, which he foists on the rest of us by calling it a “movie”. Good one, Dave.

While I tell everyone I meet to NOT visit Missoula, or anywhere else in this vast state (since our corruption is a state-wide affair), an agency that gets your tax dollars (if you live in Missoula) is doing the exact opposite, and to be more effective in luring people to this corrupt state, Destination Missoula is embarking on a process to make a plan–a 10 year plan! Because that’s the kind of shit the nexus of influencers like to do with other people’s money. From the link (emphasis mine):

Nonprofits are looking to the future of Missoula’s tourism industry and they need your help.

Destination Missoula and the Missoula Tourism Business Improvement District are forming a ten year plan. The goal is to continue to grow tourism in the Garden City with a focus on sustainability.

They are currently forming a ten year stewardship plan. The goal is to continue to grow tourism in the Garden City while preserving the parts that locals hold near and dear.

Lovely, Destination Missoula, I’m sure your plan will be great, and even if it isn’t, no local media will hold you accountable for failing because that’s not their role. Nope, their role is the obfuscation of real news while promoting propaganda that protects those with power and influence in our community. It’s pretty simple.

Here’s more from the “news” outlet I called yesterday and left a message with with ZERO expectation I’ll get a call back. This content is so pathetic it would be funny if it wasn’t so sad (emphasis mine):

There have been two community meetings where locals spoke about what sets Missoula apart from anywhere else. ideas floated were Missoula’s outdoor recreation and numerous sporting events and concerts.

“It really is our community. Our community needs to be sound and healthy and happy before we can have visitors in and give them a good experience and that’s what the point of this is,” said Barbara Neilan, the executive director of Destination Missoula.

Um, I’m pretty sure LOTS of other communities have “outdoor recreation and numerous sporting events“, so we’re already off to a sketchy start. Then there’s the idea that Missoula needs to be healthy and happy before we have visitors. Does refusing to give proper investigative attention to people who keep showing up dead indicate a healthy community, Barbara?

The final place I’ll be staying in New York City once had Jack Kerouac as a guest, or at least that’s the claim being made for a tourist like me wondering where to drop hundreds of dollars for the privilege of staying in Greenwich village, the same part of Manhattan that Jodie Foster moved from in a flick made by another fucked up David, this one with the last name Fincher, which I watched last night.

Returning to Montana isn’t something I’m looking forward to, which is also very sad to me. I used to really enjoy the views of this town appearing on the horizon after a return drive from whatever destination we’d been at, but that joy is gone. I think it has something to do with the utter corruption of our entire criminal justice system and the professional victim who thinks she can manipulate the courts to punish me. So far, she’s right.

If you want a martyr, Missoula, I’m your man. So get ready for my return, because I’m more prepared than ever to expose each and every one of you who think you can get away with the shit you’ve been getting away with. That’s a fucking promise.

If you appreciate the work I’m doing exposing these fuckers, then please consider supporting Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF), or making a donation at my about page.

Thanks for reading!

by Travis Mateer

I just wanted something sweet, but the first place I stopped was closed, and so was the second place. Why would they be open? It’s only the middle of the day, in the middle of the week, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

They must have been closed so that I could experience the stratospheric irony of walking into a fucking wedding store as a newly divorced man on the day he would have been celebrating his 20th wedding anniversary. Thanks, universe, I needed that.

Sometimes I anticipate the needs of others before checking in with myself, but earlier in the day I felt strongly that BOTH City Council, and myself, needed to have a chat about my concerns, and what better place for that one-way chat than the Public Safety Committee, where our Police Chief, Mike Colyer, had to just sit there and listen as I expressed my concerns over the competency of SOME of his public employees.

Here’s the comment:

https://vimeo.com/868896910?share=copy

How many people around America have I told NOT to visit Montana because it isn’t safe? Probably just a few dozen, no biggie. And some of them may not even believe the stuff coming out of my mouth, but then I show them this picture and the reason WHY Sean is smiling next to Salma Hayek (besides the fact he’s next to Salma Hayek), and most people realize, at that point, something bigger than they understand is going on.

This picture, and Sean’s story, got me access to Falling Water, the house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. To really understand why I went there, you’ll need to read the book I’m working on, but the short of it is, it’s a place Sean’s family visited, like they visited the Mennonite communities that surround the town I’m currently staying in.

Not everyone receives Sean’s story, like the Pastor hitting on the French woman at the Red Parasol Cafe, in Philadelphia…Where you get a sip of history. I asked him if he wanted to hear a story, and his curt reply was “I only care about stories that are in the Bible.”

Another group of people who don’t seem to want to help me with this incredible narrative are some of the same people doing interesting work with synchronicities. I’ve even interviewed some of these folks, so it’s more than a little frustrating to have even their meager platforms unavailable for broader dissemination of what I think is happening.

Oh well, their loss. I’ll give the first part of my manuscript to someone else.

I’ve got a few more things to accomplish before I fly back west, then it’s time to really do some thinking about what comes next.

If you’d like to help me out, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to do that, and making a donation at my about page is another.

Thanks for reading!

by Travis Mateer

My travels have taken me all over this country, and I can safely say that most of the people I talk to seem genuinely shocked after just a few minutes of talking to me because I tell them stuff that’s happening and NOT happening in Montana.

There are basic things that ANY entity hiring and firing people must do when it comes to the role of Human Resources (HR), things like maintaining personnel files where employee reviews and complaints are kept.

Yeah, Montana doesn’t do that kind of shit. And a recent audit of JUST ONE state agency shows how problematic that could be if a state employee decides to litigate. From the link (emphasis mine):

Among the other problems within the Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department, auditors found next to nothing in the human resource files, which would include information on hiring, employee discipline and employee reviews. Auditors noted that the missing paperwork could potentially become a liability for the state.

“In trying to review the details of events that led to several members of enforcement management being placed on administrative leave, we learned HR claimed to have lost their performance reviews or they were never completed at all by enforcement and the director’s office,” the audit said.

State policy requires the FWP have a hiring plan for every time the department wants to add staff. Those plans include guidance for minimum qualifications, ranking qualified candidates and interviews.

“After hearing accusations of unfair hiring practices aired by multiple wardens, (auditors) requested to review all hiring documents for sergeants and captains for the last five years. HR staff indicated they could not locate those documents,” the report read.

See what I mean? The basic job that HR does is NOT BEING DONE in state agencies like Fish, Wildlife and Parks. And that’s a BIG problem.

When I read the Missoulian article about FWP my first thought was, geez, this sounds a lot like Mineral County, and if you read the excerpt above, you’ll see that having an inept FWP agency means that County Sheriff Offices will have MORE power when it comes to investigating or NOT investigating something.

The parts of the Writ of Mandamus hearing I attended in Mineral County (west of Missoula) showed me how inept BOTH the County Attorney’s Office AND the Sheriff’s Office were with HR basics, like maintaining personnel files. What is a Writ of Mandamus? It’s a way to force incompetent entities to do what they are legally REQUIRED to do, like following the fucking Constitution. Here’s Wikipedia’s definition:

Mandamus (/mænˈdeɪməs/; lit. ”we command”) is a judicial remedy in the form of an order from a court[1] to any government, subordinate court, corporation, or public authority, to do (or forbear from doing) some specific act which that body is obliged under law to do (or refrain from doing), and which is in the nature of public duty, and in certain cases one of a statutory duty. It cannot be issued to compel an authority to do something against statutory provision. For example, it cannot be used to force a lower court to take a specific action on applications that have been made, but if the court refuses to rule one way or the other then a mandamus can be used to order the court to rule on the applications.

Mandamus may be a command to do an administrative action or not to take a particular action, and it is supplemented by legal rights. In the American legal system it must be a judicially enforceable and legally protected right before one suffering a grievance can ask for a mandamus. A person can be said to be aggrieved only when they are denied a legal right by someone who has a legal duty to do something and abstains from doing it.

Are you beginning to see how bad shit stinks in Montana? Is that why some people, like the Sheriff of Mineral County, can’t call back someone like me who has information on the death of Joey Thompson? Yeah, this all smells VERY bad, Sheriff Funke.

In my conversations with people around America, after I tell them how the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office can euthanize and execute black people, I tell them NOT to visit our state. I would also NOT send my kids to any institution of higher learning here because it’s not safe.

Sometimes I get cynical responses about corruption being everywhere. Ok, well, my kids aren’t growing up everywhere, they’re growing up in Montana, and if something bad happens, then I want competent people doing actual investigations. Is that too much to ask?

I may be sitting in a hotel room on the other side of the country right now, but that doesn’t I won’t call in a public comment today to the Public Safety Committee to tell them how UNSAFE citizens are in Montana, especially after I took a peek at the agenda.

Ah, yes, in Missoula we hire shitty private security to supplement the strained responses of law enforcement while directing advertising money to a shitty media corporation with CIA connections. Do you see the problems here?

Dealing with problems can be hard. I know, because I ignored problems in my own marriage until they became too big to resolve, and now I’m divorced sitting in this hotel room on the exact day 20 years ago I said I DO at Holland Lake, where the sewer is currently failing.

While Montana pretends like it shit don’t stink, I’m wrapping up the eastern portion of my trip and thinking about what comes next.

If you appreciate the work I’m doing, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to support me, while making a donation at my about page is another.

Thanks for reading!

by Travis Mateer

As I left my second message at his office number, I didn’t think that I would actually get a chance to speak with Dr. Wecht about the death of Sean Stevenson and my magic chokehold theory, but the call came back from his assistant with his cell number, so I called, and he answered.

All I wanted to hear was this man’s confirmation of the obvious: a chokehold that renders a man unconscious cannot produce bruising on limbs and torsos. And that is EXACTLY what I got from my brief conversation from this famous pathologist

It was strange being in Pittsburgh yesterday because this city on the other side of the country has three rivers that meet, like Missoula, and the arts and culture have a rich history, especially as it relates to Black history.

Is this a picture of two Missoula Detectives investigating the death of Sean Stevenson? No, it’s a photo taken by “Teenie” Harris, a well-known photographer who I was hoping to see an exhibit of, but it was closed. Instead I was sent to the “entry portal” of the library, part of the Carnegie Museum, where I saw my last name on a classroom. Huh?

I tried putting this appearance of my last name in context, but so far Penny Mateer, a quilter, is my only lead.

Names have resonance, as do numbers, beyond just their surface-level values. if you think that sounds crazy, I really don’t care because I stayed in Harrisburg yesterday after checking out “Teenie” Harris’ work, then I got some Tarot cards, and the artist who created Crowley’s Thoth set is Frieda Harris. Also, did you see Cyril’s middle name?

Harrisburg was established by John Harris Jr. with a little help from a guy by the name of William Maclay, who also had an important account of the very first Congress, since he was the only Senator keeping a diary. Curious.

Another person I have more context for is Andy Warhol, who was born in Pittsburgh. I checked out his museum yesterday before leaving Pittsburgh, so I’ll conclude this post with some of the pictures I took.

Thanks for reading!

by Travis Mateer

I woke up this morning in Pittsburgh with this view outside my camper. After an hour to get about 15 miles (because my map-app can’t keep up with my wrong turns) I found the essential coffee to kickstart my day.

Today I’m seeking the expertise of a famous medical examiner who called bullshit on the magic bullet theory, but it’s a long shot. Why? I don’t pretend to understand the forces of narrative control that have been exerted over the past three years, but in order to break something, is it really all that important to understand it?

There it is, the church in Pittsburgh where scenes from the movie Dogma were filmed. Every day Sean’s story gets a little bigger because every day someone new listens to me tell them how the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office euthanized Sean by pulling the plug on his life support BEFORE his family was notified.

Then I tell them how a magic chokehold deployed by a drug addict with spider monkey abilities bruised and battered Sean’s body, leaving marks everywhere. Clearly this is a job for the man who saw the Warren Commission for what it was, right?

The writing continues to pour forth as I explore parts of Sean’s life before the corruption in Missoula killed him and the man set up to take the fall for his death.

Did the Sheriff’s Office assume no one would care about Sean because he was homeless? Or do they understand that the entire legal community are a bunch of fucking punks who can’t function without the scent of money to motivate them?

Well, I don’t think the calculation of taking Sean out and framing Johnny Lee Perry for his death included a wily blogger like me dedicated to exposing everything I can expose in the time I have.

I would write more, but using a phone to write posts is very annoying, and my morning patience was drained by city driving, so that’s all for now.

Thanks for reading!