At over 3,000 towns and cities across the nation, a reported 8 million Americans took to the streets last weekend to exercise their First Amendment rights. There was a large political assembly in Whitefish as hundreds of Boomers and younger citizens voiced their free speech rights, hoping our government would redress their grievances.
Ten thousand Montanans took to the streets to tell Congress and any government listening that people are tired of war, the cost of living is outrageously high, and that Americans don’t like kings any better than we did 250 years ago.
With diesel pushing five bucks in Montana, a lot of locals are suddenly realizing that the cost of war hijacked pocketbooks here at home. The Iran war blasted more than $7 trillion from global stock portfolios. Interest rates jumped. Tariffs and a never-satiated, energy-hungry AI costs homeowners plenty extra.
Retirements lost trillions of dollars in mere weeks as Congress allows the constant chaos to choke the economic security which has taken locals a lifetime of hard work to achieve. Retirees hope the lost cash rallies back soon, but the one thing that Montana Republicans seem intent on delivering is more chaos and prolonged pain for hard working families.
Meanwhile, across the nation, Democrats flipped dozens of state and federal elections over the past year with independent-minded candidates. Montanans of all political stripes hope the trend continues as living got too expensive for everyday people. Almost everybody wants the political pendulum to swing back toward reason, less expense and more accountability.
Locals are much less partisan than the royal political insiders would have us believe. Only by royal edict can Montana Republicans continue to win. The party infighting is visible all throughout the state as the far right wing battles the almost-as-far right wing with pocketfuls of dark money from some secret billionaire. Dark money is the secret venom to modern politics.
Dark money perpetuates the status quo and allows the tyranny of the majority to bear down harder on everyday working people. The dark money that brought chaos into Montana politics is the same dark money now suing to stop citizen initiatives from participating in democracy.
The billionaires are secretly and legally funding politics from the planning of our local communities to the lobbying of Helena laws to how much homes are taxed and to how transparent democracy remains for the grandkids.
The Montana royals of democracy decide who runs for office. These monarchs aren’t even hiding. Rep. Ryan Zinke jumped from the safety of the congressional parapet into the crocodile-filled moat with days to spare to anoint Gov. Greg Gianforte’s former campaign spokesman to take the reins. Secret donors promised $1 million in dark money for the coronation.
In the other chamber, Sen. Steve Daines sensed the rout. With the palace left defenseless, Daines safeguarded the accession of Gianforte’s former budget director as the next heir apparent. Surrogates of Zinke and Daines promptly rolled out consultant driven ads.
Libertarians still remember that Daines blocked former Rep. Matt Rosendale’s bid to the Senate by shoveling divine legitimacy toward Tim Sheehy and the throne. There’s little wonder why Libertarians are running as Republicans or holding their own primary elections. Even Republicans are pig-biting mad, fighting other Republicans both here in the valley and across Montana trying to make the kingdom whole again.
The local sheriff’s race got caught in right-wing versus righter-wing politics as ardent Flathead Republican committee members took sides in the primary election and backed the challenger. In the race to control the Legislature, Rep. Courtney Sprunger is getting hammered with ads from Freedom Caucus Republicans saying that her firm pocketed millions of dollars worth of public relations contracts from the state transportation department.
All this chaos combined with economic distress and ongoing wars is bad news for everyone and especially for elected Republicans barreling toward midterm elections. A month before war in the Middle East erupted, internal stats from American Pulse Research and Polling held the resident’s favorability eight points underwater in the western congressional district.
Over the past six years, basic functional state government has been largely absent for working Montanans. The royal insiders remain focused on policy that matters less to every day working people and more to the donor class. Many on the streets said they feel like the government turned against everyday people and only caters to the manor houses.
There are great candidates on the ballot across Montana to help liberate freedom from the grips of chaos. Even loyal conservatives at local campaign events are suddenly saying that what is happening is no longer about partisanship. Under new realm rules, the monarchs are trying to make voting a privilege and no longer a fundamental right.
It’ll take more people standing with freedom, liberty and the pursuit of happiness before the royal leaders of Montana notice that change is pounding at the palace door. The solution isn’t for monarchs to raise the draw bridge at the castle of democracy, rather let the populace inside to run the government of the people. Our Constitution promises no less and free speech remains enshrined in the Bill of Rights.