Viewpoint: Political sleaze – admired, tolerated or rejected?
Roger Koopman
We know the story. But how did we react to it? Montana’s highest federal office holder, US Senator Steve Daines, did what almost every small child is taught not to do. He was a bully -- the big kid on the block who would only let his close friends step onto the field and play the game.
That is the essence of the sleazy, deceptive, manipulative action Daines took by waiting until the last three minutes before withdrawing from his senate race. Although he had filed early on, he never actually intended to run. Five minutes earlier, the candidate Daines and the money-fueled Gianforte Machine decided should become our next US senator filed for office.
As Daines is proud to admit, this sly little maneuver had the intended effect of keeping every well-known Republican out of the primary and every well-known Democrat out of the general.
Stay off of OUR field, as if their money made the ballot their private property. Voters were denied a free market of candidate choice. Democracy was made a sham. And what of their sainted candidate – Kurt Alme – who they lowered down from heaven to bless our little lives?
What does he have to say about these tactics, in which he was an active co-conspirator? So far, crickets. How seriously are we supposed to take him?
If you are to believe the voice of the swamp-drenched Wall Street Journal, Steve Daines has become a modern folk hero over this. Their columnist Kimberly Strassel extolls Daines’ “calibrated hardball tactics,” his “savvy” timing and his “strategic thinking” that resulted in “clearing the field” of credible candidates and avoiding a “bloodbath (i.e., competitive) primary.”
Meanwhile, she condescendingly dismisses Montana’s “grassroots” (that’s us) for any “carping” we may do. This, of course, is a perfect example of how political junkies in the Republican establishment think. No discussion of ideas. No discussion of fairness or ethics.
Pure pragmatism. The only thing that counts is keeping a Republican majority by any means necessary, which includes avoiding being “too conservative” or otherwise displeasing Donald Trump and the GOP ruling elite.
Are the Democrats capable of the same kind of schemes and artifice that Daines pulled off? Without a doubt. They have their own big money establishment, and they are particularly driven by ideological purity within their ranks. (Liberal Republicans are everywhere. Conservative Democrats don’t exist.) If anything, they are more “top down” in their thinking. They follow their leaders and offer less resistance. So yes, if the tables were turned in these races, look for the Democrats to be just as controlling and anti-democratic as Daines has been here.
But we need to stop and ask ourselves just how much we care about honesty and fidelity in politics. How do we measure the people we elect? How do we feel when the same politicians who wax eloquent about their faith, their conservative values and their moral foundations, betray us to the extent Steve Daines did?
And how do we feel about a congressional delegation that has been thus far mute over this outrageous trickery and sleaze? Are we okay with this? Is it tolerable to us? Do we say, “Well, that’s just politics?” Or has this latest example finally awakened us to the fact that when our expectations of politicians are low and our memories short, we will get no more than what our apathy deserves?
Montana conservatives have tolerated for over a decade, a senator in Steve Daines whose voting record is frequently on the side of big government, and whose property rights-killing, water rights-killing CSKT water compact was possibly the worst legislation any Montana senator has ever authored. Now we are being told that to keep a Republican in office, we must ignore the unethical behaviors as well as the bad votes. “Good Republicans” should sit back silently, while our so-called leaders continue to grow government, bankrupt our country, burn our Constitution and bury our liberties in their “strategic” politics.
Well I don’t buy it. Neither should you. I’ll reserve judgement on Kurt Alme’s candidacy, to see if he will recognize the error of his ways. He has in a sense, created a counterfeit candidacy through Daines’ manipulations, and that will hang over him. He is already gut-shot without even realizing it. Yes, Bodnar is a liberal Democrat who is simply shedding the Democrat moniker to get elected. But if Alme doesn’t do the right thing – soon – it’s very possible that Seth Bodnar will be Montana’s next senator.
Roger Koopman is president of Montana Conservative Alliance. He served four years in the Montana House of Representatives and eight years as a Montana Public Service Commissioner. He operated a Bozeman small business for 37 years.