Big Sky Cairn

JC at Left in the West got himself all worked up over an article in the Denver Post that dares suggest that guns are litmus test issue in Montana. If he’s concerned about the big city folk not understanding the demographics of the state, maybe he should start his conversation with his big city Governor who, you’ll remember, told the press in April that McCain would win Montana on one issue.

While he thinks either Obama or Clinton running on his or her own has a 50-50 shot of winning the White House against presumptive Republican nominee John McCain, Schweitzer doesn’t think either Democrat can take Montana.

Asked why not, he had a one word answer: “Guns.”

Read the whole article. And then some commentary. And some more commentary.

For years, I have been telling friends and family that Butte, Montana is the only place to be on Independence Day. 

The third of July fireworks display over the “Big M” is spectcular.  Straight out of Mayberry, the parade is filled with over one-hundred floats and marching bands.  And when the American flag rolls by, everyone from the very old to the very young stands.

Yes, a Fourth of July in Butte is Norman Rockwell poster perfect.  Perfect enough for a DNC approved Barack Obama photo op.

This Friday, Democratic Presidential hopeful Barack Obama will attempt to shed his big city elitist image by joining Baucus, Schweitzer and the rest of the Montana Dems at the Butte Fourth of July parade.  I guess that abandoning his convictions and shedding public financing in favor of a huge campaign war chest makes these kind of sput of the moment outings possible.

Personally, I’m not sure how to feel about Obama’s decision to come to Butte for the 4th.  On the one hand, it’s kind of cool.  But on the other, there is the real possibility that his presence will ruin the very idyllicism that his campaign is trying to harness.

Police officers who would have had the Fourth off, will now be working security.  Thousands of out-of-towners will invade the parade route.  And journalists of all sizes and stripes will be working Harrison Avenue for B-roll and man on the street interviews.  Yes, it is going to be Mansfield-Metcalf part deux.

So, whether Obama’s presence will add to my love of a Butte Fourth of July or detract from it, remains to be seen.  But one thing is for certain, should anyone from outside the S.B.C. limits attempt to steal a seat in my family’s usual parade viewing spot, I’ll have to throw down Butte style.  Because some things (like your regular church pew, counter seat at Matt’s Drive-In and parade watching spot) are sacred.

In the past, Obama has said that he believes in an individual right to possess a firearm. However, Obama’s position on the constitutionality of Washington D.C.’s gun law, which fully bans ownership of handguns not registered prior to 1976 and forces long guns to be kept unloaded and disassembled (so helpful in an emergency), is less clear.

In November, 2007, an Obama aide told The Chicago Tribune that Obama “believes that we can recognize and respect the rights of law-abiding gun owners and the right of local communities to enact common sense laws to combat violence and save lives. Obama believes the D.C. handgun law is constitutional.”

The Obama camp is now disavowing that statement as an inaccurate representation of the Democratic Presidential hopeful’s views. According to the Obama camp the aide misrepresented the Senator’s position on the constitutionality of the DC Gun Ban.

Okay, I can see how that might happen. So, what does the candidate himself have to say?

In the past, Obama has “artfully side stepped” the question, telling ABC News’s Charlie Gibson:

“Well, Charlie, I confess I obviously haven’t listened to the briefs and looked at all the evidence.”

Really? I haven’t read the briefs? What a cop out. Bob Novak was also unable to get a definitive answer.

Obama believes that a municiplaity has the right to enact common sense gun laws. But when he was asked if a 32-year complete ban on the possession of handguns and the requirement that long guns be kept inoperable was a common sense regulation, the Senator demurred.

However, Obama has been very supportive of a Chicago city ordinance that includes a complete ban on handgun ownership. While in the Illinois State Senate he voted against legislation that prevented Chicago from prosecuting city residents who used handguns to defend themselves in their own homes arguing that the city had a right to impose these restrictions for public good. But now that the Supreme Court has called DC’s handgun ban unconstitutional, Chicago will be next on the block.

Shortly after the Heller decision was handed down, Republican presidential candidate John McCain came out with a statement praising the courts decision. He also put out a statement saying that in light of the Heller decision, Chicago’s ban is unconstitutional.

As for Barack Obama’s position on this morning’s decision, we’re three hours in and there is nothing from the Obama camp. My guess is that they’re reading Scalia’s opinion trying to figure out how to defend his chronic support of Chicago’s laws in light of Heller. I’ll post a link to his statement when and if his camp releases it.

On a related note, Cody asked me earlier if the Heller decision means D.C. residents can run out and buy guns today. The answer is no, they cannot. The District government will take several weeks to announce what its new (SCOTUS compliant) regulations will be. Until then, residents will be governed by the old rules.

And just because it’s funny, here is D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty’s quote on the Supreme Court decision.

“I’m disappointed in the Court’s ruling and believe introducing more handguns into the District will mean more handgun violence,” said Mayor Fenty. “But I want to emphasize that at this moment, our gun laws remain in effect. It may be several weeks before there are changes to announce.”

So, he concedes the point that the ban has done nothing to keep criminals from having guns, which I’m guessing was the reason for the draconian laws in the first place. So, this big city Mayor admits that the ban is a failure but wants to keep law abiding citizens from owning guns anyway. Awesome. I can’t wait to see what this guy thinks is a”common sense” SCOTUS compliant regulation.

**Update** Obama’s statement.  He does little sidestep…

I recently described Obama’s hasty exit from Montana as a bit like a frat boy’s exodus after a one-night stand. Empty offices, crying Democrats feeling a bit used. Well, it looks like those empty spaces are being put to use.

Exotic dancer Victoria Lindley plans to open her business, called Aphrodite’s Inferno - A Membership Only Theatre of Arts, in the former Casey’s Golden Pheasant at 222 N. Broadway. The building most recently housed Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign headquarters.

A building full of people willing to say anything to extract money from a desperate and emotional audience with no intention of following through on what they are implicitly promising? And now it’s going to be a strip club. One wonders if Billings will notice a change.

This is hilarious. Anna over at Left in the West has a post up about how impressed she is with the frank honesty of Democrat Presidential Candidate Barack Obama otherwise known as The Great Messiah of Hope and Freedom. Anyway, here’s the passage that got her all hot and bothered:

In an interview with Fortune to be featured in the magazine’s upcoming issue, the presumptive Democratic nominee backed off his harshest attacks on the free trade agreement and indicated he didn’t want to unilaterally reopen negotiations on NAFTA.

“Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified,” he conceded, after I reminded him that he had called NAFTA “devastating” and “a big mistake,” despite nonpartisan studies concluding that the trade zone has had a mild, positive effect on the U.S. economy.

Does that mean his rhetoric was overheated and amplified? “Politicians are always guilty of that, and I don’t exempt myself,” he answered.

Did you catch that? The passage that Anna thinks demonstrates her man’s impeccable character is really about the fact that this man has no integrity and will say anything to get elected.

During the Democrat Primary, Obama veered Left to attract the votes from the people who were criticizing Clinton for moving to the center (ironically making herself more electable in the General). Now that he’s secured the nomination, Obama is going to try to move into that center ground that Hilary abdicates with her Fall back to the Senate. But as he does so, he’s also going to have to abandon a lot of that far-left rhetoric that got him the Nomination. All we learn from that passage is that Obama will lie to fit what he thinks his audience wants to hear.

Newsflash Anna: Being honest about the fact that you lie doesn’t make you an honest person.

[Update: Looks like Dave Budge beat me to the punch by a few minutes…]

Obama was the Democrat Party’s nominee 24 hours before the polls closed in Montana. Of course, no one knew that was going to be the case and for awhile it looked like the Montana Democrat Primary would actually matter. So campaign staff - nameless and countless - invaded Big Sky Country - sort of like a senior frat boy acting like he is really interested in the high school stories of a cute freshman girl he met on his way to class. He listened intently, acting like he shared their values and would help show them around the glorious progressive campus. At every turn, he urged them to take another sip of the alcohol-spiked kool-aid until, slowly, they started to believe that he actually had their own interests in mind.

They let down their guard. They invited the frat boy up to their dorm room. One thing lead to another and… well, you know what normally happens in these situations.

Obama got his satisfaction. He got the votes he came for, and like so many upperclassmen frat boys in similar situations, it looks like he’s out the door as fast as he can run - not even bothering to ask Montana Democrats for their number.

Volunteers packed boxes, folded up chairs, scrubbed windows clean and loaded up a U-Haul sitting on the street. Balloons, half-empty wine bottles and glittery party hats lay around the room, evidence of the Tuesday night party.

Montana Democrats, feeling a little confused, still cling to the hope that their new lover will come back and that last night was just the beginning of a beautiful long-term relationship. They haven’t yet done the electoral math that almost guarantees that their romp was nothing more than a one-night stand and that the handsome frat boy is going to spend his time wooing older, more established girls who have the connections they need. They are still flattered by the attention, not yet savvy enough to realize that they have been used.

We can only hope that they used some sort of protection. It would really be a shame if the excitement of one night had permanent consequences for the entire state.

Republicans nominate Kelleher to challenge Baucus. Democrats nominate Driscoll to challenge Rehberg. Montana lives up to its reputation as a political black box, and many - myself included - wake up this morning wondering what just happened. So what happened?

Our friend Montana Headlines theorizes that it’s name recognition in a crowded field that pushed these candidates over the top. Jay Stevens sees protest votes. Both, I think, have a point and can explain Kelleher’s win pretty well. I want to take their thoughts and integrate them into a larger scenario. Here’s what I think happened yesterday.

I think we saw the consequence of split ticket voting on strict party line ballots.

First, Montana voters are notoriously independent, and split-ticket voting (voting simultaneously for candidates from multiple parties) is quite prevalent. It’s why, for example, Republican Conrad Burns lost on the same ticket that Republican Denny Rehberg won on in 2006. As a state, we famously buck national trends and party distinctions.

Second, the highest billed ticket in this primary was the Presidential contest between Obama and Clinton. Given the unpopularity of President Bush and the skepticism many Montana Republicans feel toward McCain, there is a sense of discouraged inevitability among many Republicans that the winner of the Democratic Primary will be the next President. Since the Republican ticket was already set, I think many Montanans who lean Republican may have voted on the Democrat ticket in order to voice their opinion on this important question. Some probably voted for Hillary to continue the in-fighting on the left (Operation Chaos). Some probably voted for Obama because they really like him and will vote for him in the General Election. Most, I’m guessing, voted for Obama because he’s a much better option in their minds than Clinton and they don’t want to be stuck with another Clinton Administration. It was the importance of this race, and the fact that there weren’t any other hotly contested primaries among Republicans that made voting on the Democrat Ticket attractive.

Third, the Republicans who voted for the Democrat Presidential Candidate were locked into voting Democrat for the remainder of the ballot. Congressman Rehberg is still popular in Montana, especially among Republicans who may have selected what they considered to be the weaker of the two significant candidates in order to help ensure his seat was unthreatened.

Fourth, the Republican exodus to the Democrat ballot (again, not for insidious Operation Chaos reasons) left the Republican ticket vulnerable to greater influence from a smaller number of people with an axe to grind (see Jay Stevens’ analysis). Coupled with a crowded field in which no candidate was able to get in front of the pack (see Montana Headlines’ take above) an overall minority of voters (36%) was able to nominate the winning candidate as the majority of voters (64%) split their votes among the remaining candidates.

And pre-emptively, no, I don’t have any hard proof. Like most Montanans I know, I’m still scratching my head. This is my guess.

Democrats have been eager to convince Republicans that their vote doesn’t matter in today’s primary elections. Missoulapolis and Montana Headlines have already done an excellent job of disproving this misrepresentation, so I’m going to take a different tack and suggest that contrary to what you are probably reading in the Montana media, voting in the Democrat Party’s primary probably isn’t going to matter that much either.

Here are five reasons the Montana Democrat’s Presidential Primary is irrelevant on the national stage.

1) Super Delegates - Surprise, you’re voting in an elitist Democrat Party system that is designed to reign in the unpredictable vote of the people - your vote if you dare to buck who The Party thinks you should vote for. In Montana, unless you’re one of eight super-delegates whose single votes can cancel over 100,000 opposing plebiscite ballots, the Democrat Party doesn’t really care who you think should be the Democrat Nominee for the Presidency. Hope you vote correctly!

2) The Democrat Party already knows what you want - In Michigan, no votes were cast for Obama because - well - he wasn’t on the ballot. Hillary Clinton was on the ballot - against the will of her party - and earned 55 percent of the vote. The Democrat Party decided to award Obama the majority of Michigan’s delegates anyway because, well, they already know how the people of Michigan were going to vote so why actually go to the trouble of counting their votes? If Montana gets it wrong, well, thank God super delegates can save Montana Democrats from their own ignorance.

3) Puerto Rico - So even if Montana minds it’s p’s and q’s, and does what it’s supposed to do, it doesn’t matter. The Democrat Party doesn’t really care that much about what Montana thinks anyway. See, there are 50 states (unless you’re Obama) and the Democrat Party has determined that what the people of Puerto Rico think is more important than more than half of them (27, to be exact). Puerto Rico has 55 Democrat delegates. Montana has 25 or less than half of Puerto Rico. Really want to the Democrats to listen to you? Avoid U.S. citizenship - and all hail the international community!

4) It’s already over - It’s really gotta be hard on the Montana Democrats who have been so excited about their votes making a difference today. There’s got to be some frustration that Hillary couldn’t keep a lid on her plans to concede for 24 itsy-bitsy more hours so they could have their fun (and for that matter, she spoiled the fun for Andrew Hammond too). Not that her exit is really that important since pundits have been calling her challenge mathematically impossible for months now.

5) McCain wins Montana anyway - Doesn’t matter who gets the Democrat nomination. McCain beats ‘em both in Montana - land of the bitter gun-clinging racists.

I just got back from taking an extended vacation. It was nice to get away from everything - but, now of course the downside is that I have to get caught back up on work, life, and what is going on in the world.

I plan on sitting down and typing away like a madman tomorrow.

But for starters, somehow I doubt this will be the last we hear about the Trinity United Church of Christ this campaign.

Maybe if we had more maps America could learn about all 57 states Obama has visited, excluding Alaska and Hawaii of course.