MT-AL: Rob Quist (D) vs. Greg Gianforte (R) vs. Mark Wicks (L), May 25

[The_Doctor]

Rob Quist @RobQuistforMT

**UPDATE** Saturday's Billings rally with @BernieSanders has moved to MetraPark, due to overwhelming excitement for Rob! #BigSkyBern

The Missoula rally was moved to a bigger venue, too.

Say what you want about him, but Bernie can fill a room pretty much anywhere in the United States.

Rob Quist @RobQuistforMT

**UPDATE** Saturday's Billings rally with @BernieSanders has moved to MetraPark, due to overwhelming excitement for Rob! #BigSkyBern

The Missoula rally was moved to a bigger venue, too.

Crowd size is not necessarily an indicator. I still feel, barring a major collapse among GOP support, Gianaforte will win. Polling seems close, but I don't see anything indicating Quist is ahead.

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

OMG Quist smoked pot!!!111!!!!11!!!!!(one)!!!!!!11

[Figueira]

Gianforte on donating to suspected white nationalist: 'I was unaware of some of his views'
Missoulian/JAYME FRASER

This story is in the Montana media today.  Apparently, Gianforte donated money to all Republican state house candidates last cycle, including one or two who the Southern Poverty Law Center and liberal Montana bloggers think are white nationalists. 

My views on the SPLC are fairly well known -for reasons better explained by this recent article in the Federalist, the SPLC is a partisan Democratic group masquerading as an anti-hate group whose word about things should not be taken at face value.  They tend to label all conservatives as hate groups.

Look at the links provided in the SPLC page--e.g. the interview with the neoconfederate group. It has "white nationalist" written all over it. Now you can argue about whether it's fair to criticize PF for this, but you can't convincingly deny that Rose is a white nationalist.

[Shadows]

Can Gianforte just behave himself for the next week? Doesn't he realize that if he loses, a BERNIECRAT gets elected? This is honestly getting a little scary.

Stop.

I'll stop when I feel like stopping.

I guess that means never. Neat.

It is kind of amusing that any politician with ties or support to Bernie Sanders can't be supported but you can support a radical extreme religious person that says dinosaurs were passengers of Noah's ark, the earth is 6000 years old, Social Security, Medicare & the concept of retirement is against the bible, who supports Trumpcare because it gives him & his billionaire friends 100's of Billions of $ in tax breaks.

Any1 but a Berniecrat !

[The_Doctor]

Can Gianforte just behave himself for the next week? Doesn't he realize that if he loses, a BERNIECRAT gets elected? This is honestly getting a little scary.

Stop.

I'll stop when I feel like stopping.

I guess that means never. Neat.

It is kind of amusing that any politician with ties or support to Bernie Sanders can't be supported but you can support a radical extreme religious person that says dinosaurs were passengers of Noah's ark, the earth is 6000 years old, Social Security, Medicare & the concept of retirement is against the bible, who supports Trumpcare because it gives him & his billionaire friends 100's of Billions of $ in tax breaks.

Any1 but a Berniecrat !

This isn't really the forum to do this.

[cinyc]

OMG Quist smoked pot!!!111!!!!11!!!!!(one)!!!!!!11

He's ducking the marijuana and health questions, instead of taking them head on.  That doesn't look good.  He intially lied about his citation for smoking pot, then immediately hung up on the reporter.  His spokeswoman had to set the record straight. 

Quist should have taken the Clinton route and just admitted it.  What hippie musician in the 70s didn't smoke pot?

[publicunofficial]

OMG Quist smoked pot!!!111!!!!11!!!!!(one)!!!!!!11

He's ducking the marijuana and health questions, instead of taking them head on.  That doesn't look good.  He intially lied about his citation for smoking pot, then immediately hung up on the reporter.  His spokeswoman had to set the record straight. 

Quist should have taken the Clinton route and just admitted it.  What hippie musician in the 70s didn't smoke pot?

Honestly, what Montanan hasn't smoked pot?

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

OMG Quist smoked pot!!!111!!!!11!!!!!(one)!!!!!!11

He's ducking the marijuana and health questions, instead of taking them head on.  That doesn't look good.  He intially lied about his citation for smoking pot, then immediately hung up on the reporter.  His spokeswoman had to set the record straight. 

Quist should have taken the Clinton route and just admitted it.  What hippie musician in the 70s didn't smoke pot?

Yeah. I think this is definitely his lack of experience and charisma showing. What would you do if someone asked you out of the blue if you'd done something illegal?

[The Other Castro]

House Majority Pac (D) is making a last minute $25K TV ad buy for Montana. Probably just so they don't get accused of not doing more. The DCCC before this had only spent $28K, while outside Republicans have put in more than $4 million.

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/18/montana-special-election-dem-super-pac-ads-238576

[cinyc]

Yeah. I think this is definitely his lack of experience and charisma showing. What would you do if someone asked you out of the blue if you'd done something illegal?

It's not out of the blue, though.  The marijuana story has been circulating for a few days now.  Quist was definitely aware of it.  He reportedly ducked interviews yesterday because reporters wanted to ask him about his marijuana and health history.  

Quist should have been prepared to answer the question - yes, I smoked pot and got cited for it in 1971.  It was the 70s.  Who didn't smoke pot in the 70s?

The problem may be that Quist has been recently smoking pot, which would be more controversial.  That's the next logical question any reporter would ask.  According to the Free Beacon article, Quist admitted to smoking pot on his medical forms in the 90s, too.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

House Majority Pac (D) is making a last minute $25K TV ad buy for Montana. Probably just so they don't get accused of not doing more. The DCCC before this had only spent $28K, while outside Republicans have put in more than $4 million.

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/18/montana-special-election-dem-super-pac-ads-238576

Just enough money to try to say that they did something with a straight face. Sad!

[cinyc]

House Majority Pac (D) is making a last minute $25K TV ad buy for Montana. Probably just so they don't get accused of not doing more. The DCCC before this had only spent $28K, while outside Republicans have put in more than $4 million.

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/18/montana-special-election-dem-super-pac-ads-238576

Just enough money to try to say that they did something with a straight face. Sad!

A $25,000 ad buy will go pretty far in Montana.  It's not Atlanta.

[Holmes]

So smoking pot in 2017 is "more controversial" than in the 70s?

[Shameless Lefty Hack]

So smoking pot in 2017 is "more controversial" than in the 70s?

Well it's gotten stronger, you see.

But in all seriousness, while I think pot smoking is probably pretty acceptable to most of the population, it's still a pretty big deal for a federal candidate to casually admit to committing a contemporaneous felony.

[Chief Justice Keef]

OMG Quist smoked pot!!!111!!!!11!!!!!(one)!!!!!!11

Only makes my opinion of him go higher

[Gass3268]

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This could be a big deal here, especially with Quist making preexisting conditions the closing argument of his campaign. Unless something big comes out on Russia/Trump, all of the news across the country is going to be about AHCA less than 24 hours before voting starts.

[_]

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This could be a big deal here, especially with Quist making preexisting conditions the closing argument of his campaign. Unless something big comes out on Russia/Trump, all of the news across the country is going to be about AHCA less than 24 hours before voting starts.

If all coverage is on the AHCA before the election then it'll be tilt R instead of Lean R.

[MT Treasurer]

As of 5/18 (vs. the day before):

County (2016 Presidential vote, Gubernatorial vote) % returned

Cascade (voted for Trump by 22%, Bullock by 10%) 60.7% of mail-ins returned (+1.8 )

Flathead (voted for Trump by 36%, Gianforte by 15%) 62.4% of mail-ins returned (+4.1)

Gallatin (voted for Clinton by 1%, Bullock by 15%) 56.8% of mail-ins returned (+2.1)

Lake (voted for Trump by 21%, Bullock by 1%) 67.3% of mail-ins returned (+2.2)

Lewis & Clark (voted for Trump by 7%, Bullock by 23%) 66.3% of mail-ins returned (+2.5)

Missoula (voted for Clinton by 16%, Bullock by 34%) 55.6% of mail-ins returned (+2.2)

Ravalli (voted for Trump by 38% Gianforte by 14%) 69.0% of mail-ins returned (+1.9) 

Silver Bow (voted for Clinton by 14%, Bullock by 44%) 63.0% of mail-ins returned (+2.4)

Yellowstone (voted for Trump by 27%, Gianforte by 1%) 63.4% of mail-ins returned (+1.5)

Statewide: 61.8% of mail-ins returned (+2.2)

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

...No one cares about smoking pot.  Anyone who insists otherwise, I invite them to 2017.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

I mean honestly, look at some polls.  The only people who are against legalization are hardline social conservatives, who are becoming smaller as a portion of the voting population each year.  And even the evangelical crowd is warming up to pot faster than, say, gay marriage.

And Montana isn't even in the Bible Belt.

[Attorney General, LGC Speaker, and Former PPT Dwarven Dragon]

...No one cares about smoking pot.  Anyone who insists otherwise, I invite them to 2017.

Yeah, this. If Gianforte is seriously going to attack Quist over pot usage, he should win an award for stupidity.

[cinyc]

I mean honestly, look at some polls.  The only people who are against legalization are hardline social conservatives, who are becoming smaller as a portion of the voting population each year.  And even the evangelical crowd is warming up to pot faster than, say, gay marriage.

And Montana isn't even in the Bible Belt.

A majority of seniors still oppose legalizing marijuana.  Seniors are the most likely group to turn out in a special election.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

I mean honestly, look at some polls.  The only people who are against legalization are hardline social conservatives, who are becoming smaller as a portion of the voting population each year.  And even the evangelical crowd is warming up to pot faster than, say, gay marriage.

And Montana isn't even in the Bible Belt.

A majority of seniors still oppose legalizing marijuana.  Seniors are the most likely group to turn out in a special election.

A majority, but that's hardly unanimous.  But if Piano Man wants to make pot an issue, that's fine by me.

[MT Treasurer]

Lol, pot isn't a major issue in this race.

[cinyc]

I mean honestly, look at some polls.  The only people who are against legalization are hardline social conservatives, who are becoming smaller as a portion of the voting population each year.  And even the evangelical crowd is warming up to pot faster than, say, gay marriage.

And Montana isn't even in the Bible Belt.

A majority of seniors still oppose legalizing marijuana.  Seniors are the most likely group to turn out in a special election.

A majority, but that's hardly unanimous.  But if Piano Man wants to make pot an issue, that's fine by me.

It's the Montana press that's making pot an issue, not Gianforte.  But you're viewing pot use in isolation.  Quist's marijuana use plays into the irresponsible hippie cowboy narrative that the Gianforte campaign seemingly has been trying to build against him, as does today's Lee Newspapers article regarding apartments that Quist or Quist's family rented out on property owned by them without paying the proper amount of property taxes.