Montana! DON'T FORGET TO VOTE!
 

AGAINST THE GRAIN

GOP Gets Jitters About Montana Race

Even though national Democrats have barely invested in next Thursday’s red-state House election, it’s a lot closer than anyone expected.

May 21, 2017

A whop­ping $30 mil­lion has already poured in­to next month’s spe­cial elec­tion in sub­urb­an At­lanta, which both parties view as a bell­weth­er to the 2018 midterms.

But next Thursday’s quieter con­gres­sion­al con­test in Montana may provide a bet­ter in­sight in­to the coun­try’s polit­ic­al mood, and it’s shap­ing up to be more com­pet­it­ive than either party ex­pec­ted. Re­pub­lic­ans hold a nar­row ad­vant­age, but are con­cerned that this week’s worsen­ing Trump scan­dals—and the grow­ing un­pop­ular­ity of the GOP’s health care le­gis­la­tion—come at the worst pos­sible time.

The race pits two lackluster can­did­ates in a polit­ic­al en­vir­on­ment tail­or-made for a Demo­crat­ic shock­er. Re­pub­lic­an busi­ness­man Greg Gi­an­forte, who lost the gov­ernor race last year, made his wealth in New Jer­sey and lacks deep roots in his ad­op­ted state. Demo­crat­ic mu­si­cian Rob Quist is a true-blue pro­gress­ive with loads of per­son­al bag­gage, and is be­ing slammed over tax and fin­an­cial prob­lems. Re­pub­lic­ans have held a sig­ni­fic­ant fin­an­cial ad­vant­age for the en­tire race, with 71 per­cent of the ad­vert­ising money in the race spent on Gi­an­forte’s be­half. But Quist re­ceived a late in­fu­sion of small dona­tions, swell­ing his war chest to $5 mil­lion.

The latest GOP polling shows Gi­an­forte with a nar­row lead. And for the first time, the pres­id­ent’s ap­prov­al num­bers have dropped un­der­wa­ter in this Trump-friendly state. A Re­pub­lic­an poll con­duc­ted May 14-16 found just 46 per­cent of Montana voters view­ing Pres­id­ent Trump fa­vor­ably, while 47 per­cent viewed him un­fa­vor­ably. This, in a state where Trump won 56 per­cent of the vote, one of his strongest per­form­ances in the coun­try.

Demo­crats have been wary about rais­ing ex­pect­a­tions too high, know­ing their nom­in­ee is ser­i­ously flawed and re­cog­niz­ing the dif­fi­cult demo­graph­ics in this solidly Re­pub­lic­an state. But un­like in the Geor­gia con­test, which is be­ing con­tested in a much more af­flu­ent dis­trict, Demo­crats have been ag­gress­ively tar­get­ing Gi­an­forte over health care.

The latest ad from the Demo­crats’ top House su­per PAC por­trays Gi­an­forte as a wealthy, un­car­ing car­pet­bag­ger. “Greg Gi­an­forte: our pain is his gain,” the ad con­cludes. It’s no co­in­cid­ence that Gi­an­forte has hedged on wheth­er he would have voted for the un­pop­u­lar House health care le­gis­la­tion.

Quist is an even worse can­did­ate. His pop­u­list charm is an as­set in a state will­ing to elect work­ing-class Demo­crats, but that’s about all he has go­ing for him. He has a dec­ade-long re­cord of fin­an­cial troubles, with a his­tory of tax li­ens and stiff­ing con­tract­ors. He’s talked about his life-sav­ing gall­blad­der sur­gery as in­dic­at­ive of the im­port­ance of af­ford­able health care, but that opened up scan­dal­ous ques­tions about his health his­tory. (It’s nev­er good when “preex­ist­ing gen­it­al herpes” is brought up by polit­ic­al op­pos­i­tion.) One of his former band mem­bers once sued him for fraud.

Make no mis­take: If Demo­crats win in Montana next Thursday, it would send shock­waves in­to an already-frazzled Re­pub­lic­an Party. Montana is ra­cially ho­mo­gen­ous, cul­tur­ally con­ser­vat­ive, and filled with work­ing-class voters who drif­ted away from the party last year. Wash­ing­ton Demo­crats barely in­ves­ted in the race be­cause Montana isn’t the type of place to make a stand. There are 110 oth­er House Re­pub­lic­ans rep­res­ent­ing dis­tricts less Re­pub­lic­an than this one, ac­cord­ing to the Cook Re­port Par­tis­an Vot­ing In­dex.

The Re­pub­lic­ans’ slim lead is mainly due to early, well-fun­ded ef­forts by the Con­gres­sion­al Lead­er­ship Fund su­per PAC and the Na­tion­al Re­pub­lic­an Con­gres­sion­al Com­mit­tee. But if a not-ready-for-prime-time Demo­crat­ic play­er can pre­vail in Montana, it’s a glar­ing warn­ing that Trump’s prob­lems threaten to weigh Re­pub­lic­ans down al­most every­where in the coun­try.


https://www.nationaljournal.com/s/65...V8HJ4QZYZGD2I1

Love Montana but living there would be a bit difficult for a very liberal minded democrat (like me)...you're definitely in the minority and you feel it every day...but people (there) value truth and when you look at trump (of late) it doesn't escape their attention this guy has no idea what honesty is... :fastdraq:

BUMP! VOTE TODAY!!



It matters!

MONTANA!!

Important to note, Montana allows same-day registration, which is open until 8:00. If you want to vote but didn't register, you still have the chance.

I was so hopeful the democratic candidate would win considering the scandals in Washington and the horrid behavior of Gianforte....what does this say about Montana's people? What does it say about our society? It says "society" is fine to see in "Make America Great Again" country that peaceful protesters are beaten within steps of the White House by Turkish thugs who don't even belong here. It's fine (even great) when one candidate beats up a reporter the night before the vote and still wins a seat in Congress.

The banality of evil--------->Indifference,has crept into our society and it's name is trump, who is dismantling our freedoms and our sense of decency right under our feet.. j/s