It was a different world when I started contributing blog posts to 4&20 Blackbirds under the pseudonym “lizard” 15 years ago, but, looking back, some things don’t seem to change all that much, and one of those things is the disdain narrative controllers have for ANYONE who challenges their control.
When Missoula’s lead County Attorney, Kirsten Pabst, lashed out at local media 13 years ago, it was because she had already lost significant control over the rape scandal narrative that engulfed our community, a scandal brought to the attention of a national audience thanks to a book written by Jon Krakauer.
For an example of the important blogging work that was being done back then (which Krakauer credited in his book), this post is worth checking out, especially the comments, where Pabst decided to weigh in.
Before highlighting Pabst’s comment I’ll note that the specific issue Pabst was using at the time–anonymity–was being used as a deflection strategy, which was serving her larger effort to attack ANY messenger criticizing her actions in both the private sector, defending alleged rapists, and as a long-time County attorney working during the time Krakauer and other members of conventional media were exposing.
With that in mind, here’s the shot at “jhwygirl” taken by Kirsten Pabst, targeting the anonymity we correctly claimed we needed back then in order to expose these craven fuckers who despise REAL transparency.
Like a fine wine, this comment deepens and matures its aroma as the years go by. I’m particularly delighted at the specific list of RESPONSIBLE reporters, since I worked closely with Michael Moore in his role as narrative controller for homelessness at United Way.
One of my FAVORITE stories about Michael Moore is how he ran down the stairs with a little wooden bat ready to fight when a VERY mentally disturbed homeless man came into their building and began yelling and throwing papers around. I was already inside, getting physically threatened with bodily harm by this homeless man because a United Way staff member called ME instead of the police, putting me at great risk.
It’s kinda funny, looking back, that one of my program’s main funders (I was the Homeless Outreach Coordinator at the time) didn’t know that I only responded to NUISANCE issues, not SAFETY issues, a distinction I worked hard to make when promoting my main service, which was a daytime response via calls to my HOT line.
Going back to Missoula County’s Attorney, Kirsten Pabst, she was told in the 2012 comment thread that anonymity has a worthy history to consider. Here are two of the comments:
During that time period I also got shit for anonymously writing about local issues, even from the woman who turned what she knew about a certain state legislator into a cushy job with significant influence over local housing policies. But things get VERY serious, I have learned, when one drops anonymity for a brazen, full-frontal assault on the narrative controllers ability to provide cover for their actions and, sometimes, non-actions.
While I link to this post frequently, since it has over 40 links to articles I’ve written about the Sean Stevenson case over the years, there’s another case from 2020 I’d like to remind readers about, and that’s the case of Ben Mousso.
There’s more I’d like to say, but for now the better option for me is to say less. There’s no pseudonym to cover me anymore, or significant resources for me to fall back on, but I know plenty of you out there DO appreciate what bloggers have done locally to question the decision makers grip on narratives as they get shaped, manipulated, and sold to you by floundering corporations like Lee Enterprises.
If you appreciate the work I’ve done, and continue doing, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to help me out. Another way is to buy a copy of my upcoming zine, THE ART OF MOVING ON, which I’ve printed a few free copies of for supporters, so stay tuned.
There was a choice America made recently and the result of that choice has some people very upset. Apparently they thought the world worked one way, then they found out that something else might be happening, something radically altering their world view (emphasis mine):
The article notes “Mental health professionals say even people who don’t see themselves as directly affected by administration actions are feeling frazzled by the dizzying pace and Trump’s enduring ability to command attention.”
…
The piece further states that Andrea Bonior, a Georgetown University psychology professor “said she’s seen an uptick in patients, particularly Democrats, expressing a sense of burnout, guilt and despair at losing an old way of life.”
It adds that “Bonior pointed to federal workers who aren’t sure if they’ll be let go as well as others concerned about their immigration status or worried about loved ones whose refugee flights were canceled.”
“It feels, no matter which way you go, you’re like, ‘Oh, my God, I’m being ruled by a very different system that I thought I was living in,’” New York-based neuropsychologist Sanam Hafeez told Axios.
While I’d like to by sympathetic to this point of view, since I’ve gone through something similar, the reality is, I’m not sympathetic. I’ve been literally SCREAMING for years now that there is indeed a VERY DIFFERENT SYSTEM running the show, and it has nothing to do with laws, order, or justice, and EVERYTHING to do with control.
There was a story in the news recently where a woman expressed her concern that a scary man wasn’t being as harshly dealt with by the system as she wanted him to be. This woman runs a small clinic in Montana and had to stop treating this man after he tried unsuccessfully to get a date with one of her staff. The email he sent was awful and actionable, action was taken, and now he is going to be a convicted felon for the rest of his life.
But that’s not good enough.
After about eight months in jail awaiting trial on a charge of felony intimidation, Kovats was released on a dozen conditions to live with his brother near Stevensville. Last December, a jury found him guilty, and he is in jail awaiting sentencing. Before the trial, White Deeble worried about Kovats coming back to the clinic, despite his ankle monitor. White Deeble told Montana Free Press the stress and “constant vigilance” had worn on her.
“I can’t imagine doing any other work, and I always thought that I would sort of die in the saddle,” she said. “This has absolutely shortened my career, like this is that level of burnout. As much as I don’t want to give him this much power, at some point, something just gets broken.
If you’re curious about the kind of work Deeble was doing at her clinic, here is a screenshot from the website:
The man who is now a felon had been getting treatment at this clinic for 13 years, so it might be safe to assume whatever kind of treatment he was getting, it wasn’t effective. What WAS effective was the involvement of law enforcement, at least for the few years that this allegedly dangerous patient is going to be incarcerated at TAXPAYER expense.
But hey, at least Christine Deeble will be able to continue providing her questionable services to others if they have the money to pay (emphasis mine):
… It’s better now that he’s been convicted of a felony. It will feel better if we can get him sentenced to be not my problem for three or four years.”
Kovats’ sentencing is scheduled for Monday, Jan. 27. While the crime carries a maximum of 10 years in prison, White Deeble believes Kovats is unlikely to get that sentence, in part because he is a first-time offender. She hopes he gets enough time to “truly work a program.”
This “truly work a program” is where I suspect the fog of delusion is creeping in, and I say that having worked at the type of homeless shelter a man like Kovats will almost definitely be discharged to after his period of incarceration. When that happens, he will have VERY limited options for mental health support AND limited options for housing, since being a convicted felon is STILL one of the quickest ways to become and remain homeless.
The article continues with the clinician and her staff continuing to complain about how the world isn’t immediately bending to their collective aid now that they’ve acquired the divine status of VICTIM.
White Deeble, along with current and former Natura employees, raised concerns that a light sentence for Kovats won’t provide the necessary consequences. The burden of being protected from a potentially violent offender, she said, shouldn’t fall on the victims alone.
Um, if we’re talking FINANCIAL burden, then, as I’ve pointed out, the taxpayer is DEFINITELY sharing that burden. But there’s more:
“I get that going to prison may have some detrimental effects on his [Kovats’] mental health,” White Deeble said. “It is not my job to figure this out. I might be a naturopathic doctor. I might be all about finding the root cause. I might be all about holistic care and treating the whole person. … In the end, I am the victim, and I cannot overly sympathize with his particular situation because he’s threatened, brutally threatened, 20-plus people. At some point I have to care about something else more. I don’t think prison will fix everything. But man, I want a reprieve.”
If I may offer a suggestion, the entire effort being put forth with this article is ONLY going to make things worse. Especially when you keep reading to find out that patient/client constraints don’t apparently apply to a shit-talking victim terrified that 3 years in prison isn’t going to be enough of a reprieve for her (emphasis mine):
White Deeble was Kovats’ doctor for about 13 years. She said it was “clear he was not a hugely social person” but was typically pleasant. In early 2020, Kovats began romantically pursuing a staff member and didn’t listen when she told him she wasn’t interested, White Deeble said. The clinic administration decided to ban Kovats, but White Deeble told him she would continue to provide him care, just not at the clinic.
Kovats sent White Deeble six emails between March 2021 and December 2021, oscillating between criticizing her decision and asking for help, she said. White Deeble said she stopped responding when his emails grew angry but documented them with other clinic management.
In April 2023, White Deeble received an email from Kovats that didn’t directly threaten action but concerned her enough to report it to the Missoula police.
“You’ve probably blocked me already so (expletive) you for that,” Kovats wrote. “And (expletive) you for treating me like a sexual predator. I didn’t deserve that. I guess I have to accept that my brother is still a patron of your establishment. Maybe he’ll learn his lesson someday when you mistake his behavior for something it’s not and ruin his life.”
Again, none of this is going to lead to a less angry dude. If I’ve learned anything from the Fidler on my roof, it’s the fact that public call-out culture leads to MORE strong emotions, not less.
Oh well.
Maybe, if we’re lucky, that asteroid coming is just a spaceship of benevolent extraterrestrials sent to remind us that the end of the world is really just an opportunity to make a new on. Yeah, that sounds like a nice delusion.
First, let me correct the mistaken reporting I did last week about a shooting I ascribed an inaccurate location for. Instead of a downtown shooting, like the one I was thinking that happened last fall, the recent gun activity occurred on the Southside of town, near the park that big concert was supposed to happen at.
This was part of TWO identified incidents with guns related to gang activity that has recently occurred, earning a VERY STERN warning from the Missoula County Attorney’s Office.
“Recently we have had a disturbing trend here in Missoula where we’ve seen some juvenile gang violence popping up,” Jennings said. “Last weekend we had a gang-involved shooting and then a couple days ago we had another firearm-related incident involving rival gang members at a grocery store. The police force here in Missoula is really skilled, they’re really ambitious, they have some great expertise, and they’re tackling this problem on the front end to make sure that things don’t get out of control.”
The gang with the monopoly on using state violence (because their badges shield them from accountability) is the gang Matt Jennings relies on to do his job, so obviously he’s going to use their threat of violence to put THE FEAR into the minds of these wayward youth who are “disturbing” local officials with their use of firearms.
Here’s more of the threat being issued from the County Attorney’s Office (emphasis mine):
“If we see someone who is involved in a gang or gang violence, there is going to be a 0 tolerance policy between our office prosecuting them and the Police Department making sure that they do apprehend them,” Jennings said. “We’re going to use all the tools necessary to make sure the community is protected in those circumstances. I hope that with that cooperation, we can snuff this out before we see some of the problems in Billings or larger urban areas that people may associate with gangs a little bit more. But sadly this is a real problem here and it’s something that we’re going to be watching pretty closely.”
When Jennings says ALL the tools what is he talking about? Is he talking about the alleged deterrent of jail and prison? And, if he is, what happens if those tools aren’t the deterrents we, as a society, think they are? What if jail and prisons are GREAT places for young gang members to network? What if CARTELS have significant influence INSIDE jails? What then?
One of the main tools our entire judicial system operates on is FEAR, and that fear, when used on both formal and informal informants, can lead to VERY bad outcomes. Just ask the family of Colton Peterson, who had to watch their young son spiral into the zero-sum, leverage-based system Matt Jennings now greatly influences:
Peterson’s family concedes a succession of poor decisions on his part, but they say Missoula police, who knew of his suicidal tendencies, also bear responsibility. There’s no better argument for mandatory crisis intervention training for law enforcement, they say, than the way their son’s case played out.
In quick succession in the week before his death, Peterson was assaulted by two men after reportedly brandishing a gun to collect a drug debt, was busted for growing pot, recruited as a confidential informant, and pressured to provide a list of other growers’ names by 5 p.m. on July 27.
He didn’t make the deadline.
At about 3:30 p.m., he shot himself.
Like I mentioned in last week’s post, I now consider badges to be a very troubling competitor gang for the organized elements running black market revenue streams in our region. With attention suddenly thrust upon FED-market revenue streams, I’ll remind readers that the program Project Safe Neighborhoods (lots of links in that post) has long been of interest to me, since it put the United Way in bed with the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office to fight meth.
Maybe it’s a matter of semantics, but wouldn’t FED money be considered a TOOL in the financial tool belt? That’s a question I would like to ask ALL the local media platforms that have enabled the falsehood, peddled constantly by Missoula’s shadow Mayor, Ellen Buchanan, that their ONLY tool to get things done around town is the TIF tool.
For evidence that this falsehood continues to have media-legs, here’s my reporting from five days ago where I quoted Ellen Buchanan saying this (emphasis still mine):
At city council this week, Missoula Redevelopment Agency director Ellen Buchanan raised similar concerns.
“I think it’s safe to say that SB 2 would literally be the death knell for tax-increment financing use in the state of Montana,” Buchanan said. “And it’s the only economic development tool we really have.”
My geographic inaccuracy, quickly acknowledged, pales in comparison to this load of shit Ellen shovels every chance she gets.
Other tools beyond the John Ashcroft-inspired FED money include MILLS and LEVIES, which I’ve ALSO criticized. In fact, in 2022 (the last year I was allowed on the radio airwaves of KGVO), I’d like to think my appearance on KGVO helped confirm the sneaking suspicion citizens were ALREADY having about how the three-horned orgy of non-profit/government/private sector money was being used. When the “crisis” levy failed at the ballot box, it was our local “leaders” who suddenly felt the pangs off financial fear descend, strengthening the disdain some people in this valley already had for me.
Amidst lost elections and a failed attempt to stop meth colonies from proliferating in public parks, the Lee Enterprises rag recent highlighted TWO SOCIALISTS on City Council talking about how popular their policy platforms are.
Huh?
City Councilors Daniel Carlino and Kristen Jordan told the audience of about 50 people that city policies are becoming more conservative, citing recent laws around homelessness and urban camping, and explained why they’ve been pushing for more democratic socialist policies.
“Socialist polices are super popular,” Carlino said at the Missoula Elks Lodge last Thursday. “Perhaps the ‘s’ word itself is not popular, but I think the policies themselves are super popular, especially in Missoula.”
If you’d like to REALLY see the bias of the corporation complaining about a recent cyber-security event, check out this post of mine about how the Missoulian covered the concept of “tactical civics”. Regarding the event that disrupted receivers of Lee Enterprises narrative control propaganda, here’s the news about news delivery I suspect most of my readers didn’t even know about:
A ‘cybersecurity event’ has disrupted many of the systems and networks this week at Lee Enterprises, the parent company of the Missoulian and dozens of other newspapers, the company’s CEO confirmed Friday night.
“We are now focused on determining what information — if any — may have been affected by the situation,” CEO Kevin Mowbray said in an email to company employees. “We are working to complete this investigation as quickly and thoroughly as possible.
“We have notified law enforcement of the situation.”
Mowbray said he could not speculate on details because the incident is under investigation “and we will not be able to share information that could compromise our investigation or any investigation by law enforcement.”
Sure, Kevin, I’m sure the gang with badges will be helpful in this situation. And if that doesn’t work, maybe the post-Skiggy era editors at Lee can scapegoat the terrible tech-bro fascists somehow.
If you’d like to support Missoula’s favorite scapegoat, then Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) still has room for your digital donation. Every little bit helps (thanks Warren!).
Law enforcement in Montana should be good at investigating gangs, since they are one, but whether or not the public is accurately informed HOW our gang deals with rival gangs is an entirely different question, one which I’ll be exploring in this post.
This gang question is getting some local digital ink NOT because a concerned mother has been shouting for months about gangs infiltrating our homeless community and high schools on Facebook, but because some youth shot a gun after allegedly flashing gang signs downtown while driving a stolen car.
This happened on a weekend, which means that plenty of college students were downtown that night killing brain cells with alcohol when the gunshots rang out.
Why is the presence of college students important to note?
Because, for our city leaders, college students are like little golden geese, and these geese represent a very important financial pillar propping up our mountain town. If college students get spooked by the idea of urban gun violence breaking out on the streets of Missoula, Montana, then that coveted “word of mouth” marketing that brings more of them to our valley could get polluted with reality, and who wants that?
The local reporting on this incident is a cooperative show of force between two entities that share the same goal, which is narrative control. If you thought “equitable enforcement of laws” and “accurate reporting of news” is what they respectively do, then I think you are cute and adorable and, also, very wrong.
Here’s STATE MEDIA (Montana Public Radio) making the mistake of distinguishing the investigators as separate from the other gangs allegedly involved (emphasis mine):
Missoula police say a shooting incident last weekend involving several juveniles was part of an ongoing dispute between rival gang members.
Nobody was hurt, but at least two people were arrested. The investigation continues and more charges may be pending.
Police say it’s not an isolated incident and they’re investigating several recent cases of gang activity involving young people who claim different gang allegiances. Missoula officials describe local gang activity as an “emerging issue”.
Our local officials, who also act as critical cogs in the machinery of narrative control, should pay CLOSER ATTENTION to people like Brandi, who had this to say recently on her Facebook page:
Instead of giving Brandi credit for actually TALKING to those living in the meth colonies our retarded officials insist on labeling “urban camps”, one City Council member texted Brandi about ME last September with incredibly UNTRUE and defamatory claims, claims that will have to be litigated at some point. For now, that card will remain in my hand of unplayed cards in this bullshit game of controlling how stories emerge and WHO they implicate.
I like implicating Detective Guy Baker in LOTS of my stories, which is probably why he texted me for a meet-up awhile back, which I declined. Some of the cards in my fucked up hand include the collection of anecdotes I’ve gathered about Baker with my SHIT TALKING ECHO-LOCATION strategy, which I commissioned a pal to make an image of (before I started getting to know ChatGPT)
When you’re part of a GANG task force in the 90’s, shaking down high school weed smokers, it’s AMAZING how many of those former high school kids are now adults with NOT fond memories of the Guy nick-named GAY BIKER.
One story I’ve mentioned publicly (and privately, in more detail) is the story of a dead body found hanging from a tree on October 4th, 2023, in the expansive Reserve Street area, a former homeless encampment zone that was a disgusting, fire-prone disaster area. This dead body was hanging, I believe, from an electrical cord, and he had neck tattoos. Isn’t that interesting? And I’m sure probably just a suicide and NOT some gang-related activity.
Part of the narrative control regarding this “emerging issue” will be to relegate it to youth. If you can imagine a narrative quarantine zone, then think in terms of words like YOUTH and GANG getting medical clearance to be released to the public. The word CARTEL is too infected with fear, though, so that word must stay quarantined.
Sticking with the medical analogy, a form of treatment being prescribed for this YOUTH/GANG “issue” is to ask PARENTS to do surveillance then, if need be, snitch on their kids (emphasis mine):
Local police urge parents to monitor their children’s social media activity for indications of gang involvement. Those include posts involving gang graffiti, threats of violence or a focus on specific colored clothing or bandanas.
Police say minors involved in gang activity have also gained access to guns, primarily from family members or stolen vehicles.
Fuck me, where to begin with this bullshit?
I’ll begin with expressing my hope that Detective Smith has become more knowledgeable about graffiti since I talked to him about graffiti. Then, because I love educating people, I wrote about graffiti, knowing a few cops read my shit.
I’ve also written about the allegedly violent young WOMEN engaged in violent activity, including that social media post that freaked everyone out and put my own kids in lockdown.
And then there’s the murder of Lee Nelson (warning, graphic image at post), a brutal act of horrific violence committed SOLELY, the jury was told, by Charles Covey. The jury agreed with the prosecution and ignored the strange claim from Detective Guy Baker that a blunt weapon somehow created TWO different kinds of head contusions, both “blunt force” injuries AND “sharp force” injuries.
Since I attended the entire trial I got to see how Detective Baker directed the investigation as the lead investigator, and I DO NOT BELIEVE that only one person was involved in Nelson’s death. The other suspects (one in particular) all wore a certain color, and the other main suspect, I think, may have received some sort of protection for his cooperation in claiming Covey acted alone. At the very least, he smartly relocated to the other side of the state after the murder.
Another story I’ve told, but not in a blog post, is about the casino near the Poverello Center, on West Broadway. This casino, tired of seeing the obvious drug dealing constantly happening on their property and, I’m assuming, not satisfied with what calling the police had been producing, this private business decided to hire private security, and that security was EFFECTIVE.
Good outcome, right? Except it wasn’t, at least not for elements WITHIN our police department, since pressure was exerted, I am told, behind the scenes, and that contract with the private security company was terminated.
Another aspect of this youth gang story I detect the odor of manure wafting from is WHERE the guns among our youth could be coming from. Perhaps it’s just my cynicism (combined, of course, with direct knowledge) when I hear explanations about an “emerging issue” from the gang with badges about guns primarily coming from Daddy and unsecured vehicles.
If cops didn’t already know this, I would suggest they talk to the Russian criminal element operating in this region about guns, or, to be more specific, how about that youngster I tied to the death of Joey Thompson? My sources tell me he likes to sell illegal guns to teens, but what the fuck do I know? Just the kind of specific name that made a friend’s son face turn WHITE when she found out he had obtained a hand gun and confronted him with my intel.
If I had any faith in the FBI, which I don’t, I’d be interested in seeing what they think about the shit I know, but considering Detective Baker first contacted me years ago on an FBI line when I reported a young girl selling roses on the street in what looked to be a trafficking situation, well, you see my dilemma.
That case, I’ll note, involved an explanation from Detective Baker that this RUSSIAN family from Washington State, who he was able to track down, was doing just fine, and it must be my cultural inexperience that had fueled my concern, which I acted on, unlike the diners outside Pangea, who just saw the scene and worried about it, then thanked me later when they saw what action in that kind of situation looks like.
So yeah, gangs. And youth. Tsk tsk, kids. We can’t have our collegiate geese getting frightened, and don’t even get me started on the HOLY TOURISTS who our cognitively-impaired leaders desire to levy new taxes on in order to provide cover for their terrible TIF addiction.
One final point before wrapping up this screed, and that’s how impressed I am that our Sheriff’s Office took the opportunity of an “emerging issue” of snow falling, and a significant portion of it, so such so that administrative staff got to GO HOME EARLY.
If Sheriff Jeremiah Petersen actually exists, which I’ve been jokingly dubious of, I suggest NOT taking a move like this because it only encourages mouthy citizen like myself to hashtag PUSSIES on social media, and what does that actually accomplish?
In reality one of the BIG problems we have, societally speaking, is that law enforcement should actually be paid MORE, and trained MORE, and, if they deserve it, RESPECTED because of the very real threats they face on more fronts than any human should be expected to be responsible for. They have become a gang with badges because we, as a society, expect them to fight gangs without becoming one, and that’s just not going to happen.
Ok, I think I’ve said quite enough in this post. If you would like to reward my brazen assertions, then Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to do it.
My personal mission to understand how local narrative control can downplay and disappear the role of the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office in euthanizing and executing two black men in a liberal town like Missoula is getting a helping hand from Elon and DOGE. Thanks to the continued exposure of how money flows from USAID to media organizations, like Politico and the New York Times, it’s becoming more clear to me how a story like George Floyd can become a NATIONAL headline, while Sean’s story gets relegated to being told by a blogger like me.
How this works is pretty simple. Politico, for example, sold 37 special subscriptions to the FDA that cost TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS each, which came to nearly half a million dollars. Impressive.
Here’s another screenshot from their Zerohedge piece showing additional money flowing to the BBC and NYT.
How does this play out in our little BIG SKY sandbox? Let’s take an issue that I have reported on VERY effectively, and that’s the terrible local addiction Missoula has to TAX INCREMENT FINANCING. When you click MY link you will see that I took my tax battle all the way to Helena last session, which putt the fear of municipal insolvency directly into the heart of Missoula’s REAL Mayor, Ellen Buchanan.
But, when you click THIS POLITICO LINK, what you get is pro-Democrat Ryan Busse bullshit about taxes that begins with this deceptive framing of the tax dilemma (emphasis mine):
Across the Mountain West, an influx of coastal out-of-staters are causing property taxes to skyrocket, sparking a backlash that could scramble politics across the region.
…
In Montana — where the part-time legislature won’t meet again until 2025 — upstart Democratic gubernatorial candidate Ryan Busse is putting calls to cut the property tax rate at the center of his campaign, while far-right Republicans push for reform from the other side of the political spectrum.
“I travel around the state and Republicans all across the state, Democrats, all of them, tell me the same thing,” Busse said. “Property taxes don’t discriminate. They go into every kind of mailbox, red mailboxes and blue mailboxes, and people cannot believe that this governor raised taxes like this.”
What you are reading is pro-Democrat propaganda, and it gets worse when, further down, the article admits Gianforte did NOT actually “raise taxes” (emphasis mine):
While Republican Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte didn’t raise the tax rate, per se, Busse says that the governor’s refusal to lower it after he knew tax bills for homeowners would go up amounted to accepting an increase.
And while Gianforte has heralded some tax relief programs passed by the legislature, his critics say he hasn’t dealt with the underlying problem. He launched a property tax task force in January, but political leaders in the state resisted calls from the state’s far-right Freedom Caucus to open a special legislative session this year to pass long-term reforms to the way the state does property taxes. After the proposed special property tax session failed, the Freedom Caucus asked voters to “remember these votes” during 2024 primary elections.
“You would think a Republican like Gianforte and the legislature would jump at the opportunity to cut taxes like this, but they haven’t,” said Montana State University Billings political science professor Paul James Pope.
Yes, this is crap, but it’s the kind of crap Democrats uncritically put into their retarded brains, especially when they see a PROFESSOR at a UNIVERSITY is being quoted.
Why should anyone listen to a professor like Paul James Pope? That’s a good question, and it’s a question a Montana Democrat will NEVER ask themselves, just like they didn’t ponder the actual senility of their candidate until it became too obvious for their Democrat-promoting media to hide.
When Biden bowed out, local media tapped Paul James Pope to hold the hands of Democrats and whisper nice sounding bedtime stories into their stupid little brains. Here’s how he started the hand-holding (emphasis mine):
President Joe Biden announced his exit from the presidential race earlier Sunday and has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as the new democratic nominee. MSU Billings political science professor Paul Pope said much is still up in the air regarding the nomination but Montana will be impacted by the change.
With 15 years as a political scientist under his belt, Pope described President Biden’s announcement as unprecedented.
“We’ve never seen this before. This is a game changer. It shakes everything up,” said Pope. “Biden, unfortunately, even though he has a long history serving this country since the 1970s, yeah, he reached a point where his performance and his abilities were obviously problematic.”
No, Paul, THE MEDIA reached a point where they couldn’t hide reality anymore from the American people, and the narrative of Biden being competent utterly collapsed.
Here’s more propaganda from Professor Poop. I mean, Pope (emphasis mine):
Pope said Trump’s base of voters has remained relatively stagnant, even despite the recent assassination attempt on his life.
“I doubt there was any impact. In fact, Trump didn’t even get a good bump in the polls,” said Pope. “Anybody that the Democrats put up that’s even a little bit more exciting than Biden, more energy, that’s going to hurt Trump. Every bit of that is going to be taking away from Trump’s ability to win this race.”
No where in the Politico article about taxes was the mechanism of Tax Increment Financing (TIF) mentioned, which is pretty weird when you consider how integral TIF money is to gentrifying Missoula with its skimmed-off tax incentive handed over to private developers and, you know, sometimes banks.
When TIF is mentioned, like The Pulp recently did, it’s usually to give the Queen of TIF, Ellen Buchanan, space to defend it from attacks, like MORE legislation this session targeting this bullshit slush fund for developers.
Here’s the setup from The Pulp:
TIF districts allow local governments and/or redevelopment authorities to earmark potential property tax increases from improvements to blighted sites for future development of public infrastructure in the area. To put it simply, they serve as incentives for private owners to collaborate on intensive redevelopment projects with the city, which can use the tool to guide growth.
But tax-increment financing has also piqued the interest of legislators in Helena, where property tax reform is a constant topic of conversation as the state enters another year in the throes of a housing crisis. Republicans in particular have taken aim at municipal policy and spending that might increase tax rates.
That’s the genesis of Senate Bill 2, carried by Sen. Greg Hertz, R-Polson, at the behest of a legislative interim committee that drew up the basics of the proposal before session began.
And here’s the fear-based Pro-TIF lift Ellen and Company get every time this issues comes up in local media (emphasis mine):
“If this bill passes, the TIF provision will no longer be a tool that local governments are able to use,” Jennifer Olson, the government affairs director for the Montana League of Cities and Towns, told lawmakers.
Olson acknowledged the change would reduce property taxes for individuals. But she said the savings on property taxes would be miniscule in comparison to the potential boost to the city budget provided at the end of a TIF district’s life under current law.
At city council this week, Missoula Redevelopment Agency director Ellen Buchanan raised similar concerns.
“I think it’s safe to say that SB 2 would literally be the death knell for tax-increment financing use in the state of Montana,” Buchanan said. “And it’s the only economic development tool we really have.”
If TIF funded double-ended dildos for Jennifer and Ellen to go fuck themselves with, I might warm up to the use of this tool, but, as it stands, I think it would be GREAT to fully gut this method of gentrification once and for all.
When it comes to TIF, I don’t think Ellen and Company have anything to worry about. Republicans in Montana are much more concerned with genitals than taxes, so I doubt reform of TIF will go anywhere, but maybe I’m wrong. Regardless, I’ll keep my eye on this issue as the session drags along, so stay tuned to this NON-COMPROMISED source of information I provide WITHOUT any funding from the Feds.
If you appreciate my efforts to wage information war against these craven fuckers who cry like little babies when their money flow gets interrupted, consider donating to Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF). Though hobbled by lawfare, I’m not out of figurative ammo YET.
