Flathead Valley Continental Divides: Kalispell, Montana News

You don’t often see this kind of attention-grabbing protest in Montana. People here are more inclined to simply hold signs and chant slogans when exercising their Constitutional right to peacefully assemble.

In Great Falls Thursday, protesters gathered outside of Congressman Denny Rehberg’s office Thursday and drew chalk outlines around each other to “symbolize the 45,000 citizens who die every year in this country because they lack health insurance and can't get adequate care.” From KFBB:



Rehberg’s Spokesperson Jed Link told the station, “(Rehberg has) heard from thousands of Montanans, and the vast majority agree that health care reform is necessary but don't want to merely replace an insurance bureaucrat with a more expensive government bureaucrat."

The Beacon recently posted an online poll that asked, "Could Congressman Denny Rehberg beat incumbent Sen. Jon Tester in 2012?" By the time we sent our print edition to the press earlier this week, 171 people had voted and the majority of our online readers, by a margin of 53 to 47 percent, thought Tester would win in a head-to-head matchup. So, if you pick up our newspaper this week, those our the results you will see.

Well, in the two days since, Electric City Weblog has linked to the poll as has a facebook account. Coincidentally, Rehberg, with 433 votes cast, has taken a commanding lead (67 to 33 percent) over Tester.

Don't call it a comeback ... And don't call it a scientific poll.

It is well-known that California is in trouble financially. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger estimates that the state will run a deficit of up to $14.4 billion when he releases his budget in January. What – until now – has made fewer headlines is all the other states that are on the brink of budget disasters. According to a Pew Center on the States report, nine other states are in big trouble. From the Associated Press:

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — In Arizona, the budget has grown so gloomy that lawmakers are considering mortgaging Capitol buildings. In Michigan, state officials dealing with the nation's highest unemployment rate are slashing spending on schools and health care. Drastic financial remedies are no longer limited to California, where a historic budget crisis earlier this year grew so bad that state agencies issued IOUs to pay bills.

A study released Wednesday warned that at least nine other big states are also barreling toward economic disaster, raising the likelihood of higher taxes, more government layoffs and deep cuts in services.

The report by the Pew Center on the States found that Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island and Wisconsin are also at grave risk. Double-digit budget gaps, rising unemployment, high foreclosure rates and built-in budget constraints are the key reasons.

"While California often takes the spotlight, other states are facing hardships just as daunting," said Susan Urahn, managing director of the Washington, D.C.-based center. "Decisions these states make as they try to navigate the recession will play a role in how quickly the entire nation recovers."

Montana's state Legislature deserves a little credit.

A clever attack ad against U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg, blasting him for his vote against the American Clean Energy and Security Act, is in fact running in five other states against Congress members there. The Rehberg ad says it's paid for by the Montana Conservation Voters, while other ads are paid for by the national League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club and others. According to Ben Smith's POLITICO blog, the ads are also running against Reps. Michele Bachmann, John Boehner, Lee Terry, Blaine Luetkemeyer, Roy Blunt and Jason Altmire. All of which explains why the dude in the commercial lacks Rehberg's mustache – a detail that threw me the first time I saw it.

Here's the ad against Rehberg:



And here's the ad against Blunt:

I mentioned earlier this week that Billings Republican Sen. Roy Brown is planning on introducing legislation that would allow Montana to opt out of any health care reform plan that may come out of Congress. Well, lawmakers from at least 11 states are a step of ahead him (Montana legislators do meet bi-annually). According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, as of late October, formal resolutions or bills opposing certain aspects of federal health care have been proposed in Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Wyoming.


Map from National Conference of State Legislatures

Last week, U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., was the lone Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee to vote against his colleagues’ climate-change bill. This week, now that legislation is being discussed in the Finance Committee (which he chairs), Baucus used his opening remarks to say he is committed to “passing meaningful, balanced climate-change legislation.” From The Washington Independent:

I want our children and grandchildren to be able to enjoy the outdoors the way that we can today. So I’m going to work to pass climate-change legislation that is both meaningful and that can muster enough votes to become law. [...]

Let me be clear. We should work to minimize any job losses.

But we should recognize that in the case of acid rain [in the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments], the negative [economic] consequences were far less than projected. We should keep this in mind when similar claims are made about the effects of legislation to address climate change.

Liberal talk radio has often struggled to find a foothold anywhere but the some of the largest American markets. When Air America Radio launched in 2004 with hopes of competing with the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, it was forced to file Chapter 11 bankruptcy a little more than two years later.

But in Missoula, the most left-leaning city in the state, one would think that the format would work. It hasn’t. First 105.9 FM, which featured Air America, switched to music. Now 930 AM, that city’s now-former progressive talk station, has switched to conservative. From KPAX:

KMPT's format change began Tuesday, but market manager Scott Lindahl said they made the decision to switch months ago.

Lindahl said the station under-performed in a progressive format, and they had to either "turn it off," sell it or change formats. The station considered changing to an all-sports format, but after looking at ratings from independent survey company Eastlan, they found conservative radio to be one of the top performers in ratings and revenue in the Missoula area.

Those on the left (here) and the right (here) have different takes as to why this happened.

Former Montana gubernatorial candidate and current state Sen. Roy Brown, R-Billings, is already planning to introduce legislation that would allow the state to opt out of the federal health care reform plan being discussed in Congress. From KTVQ:

He and several other Republican legislators say the House bill will add 60,000 to 80,000 people to Medicaid in Montana, something Brown calls “a budget buster for Montana”.

So, the Republican says he will introduce legislation that takes back control for the state. “20 different states across the country are already looking into this very situation, where their states could opt out of what's going on in Washington, D.C.” Brown said.