Tagged: Chuck Baldwin

Posted: December 17, 2011 at 9:37 am

Racism, Sexism, and Just Plain Dumb

“We’re NOT Racists”

The Southern Poverty Law Center’s latest Intelligence Report focuses on the recent uptick in extremist activity in Kalispell and the Flathead. In the article “A Gathering of Eagles: Extremists Look to Montana” the SPLC details the activities of the various far-right movements and their leaders, including Chuck Baldwin, who is running for Lt. Governor here. The good quick summary of the Baldwin’s son Timothy Baldwin takes issue with the report on the TEA Party blog PolyMontana, calling it’s reporting a “sinister” conspiracy. Apparently, this blog is a “group” that is somehow involved.

Look here where this SPLC-like group in Montana describes my formation of the institution as, “Right Wing Re-education Camp Opening in the Flathead.” Like SPLC, that “Montana group” did not attempt to contact me about my education program. Their journalism appears as un-credible as SPLC’s, if that’s possible.

He also says he is not a racist and that:

“Some of my closest friends are of African descent. The same can be said of Chuck Baldwin.”

Blame the Messenger

Kudos are due to friend of women Pete Talbot for calling out the idiocy in the comments following the Missoulian’s article on the “3 UM football players allegedly involved in sexual assault on campus.” Comments like the one that attacked the reporter for daring to report on the matter ”on game day” demonstrate why sexual assaults often go unreported.

Interesting how the article or slander or crap or hearsay or what ever was written by a woman…..is that why it was released on game day with no facts or proof?”

Throw Away

More evidence has come to light this week that the GOP has thrown away a major statewide office. It seems they couldn’t even find a candidate for attorney general that knows the disclosure guidelines for campaign materials. Pasted below are screenshots from a recent web ad Republican state legislator Jim Shockely (R-Bitterrooter) ran in the Billings Gazette. The ads, which are missing the legally required party affiliation, can be viewed in their original context on the Gazette website here and here.

He also lacks visible party affiliation on his campaign website (screenshot), so the omission does not appear accidental. Nor does the campaign appear to be active. According to the campaign calendar he just left for Alabama for two weeks.

I’ve written before that the GOP has strangely conceded the AG’s race, as evidenced by the fact that their guy doesn’t even know which way is up. His major contribution to Montana policy in my opinion is getting caught drinking a red beer in his car.

Posted: December 5, 2011 at 7:29 am

GOP Gubernatorial Race Update: Hill Still the Big Favorite

Rick Hill is still leading strongly in the nine-way GOP race for governor, according to a Public Policy Polling survey conducted this past week.

Hill polls highest among those who describe themselves as liberal or somewhat liberal, but that goes down to 31% with very conservative voters. Hill’s lead is unsurprising, given that no other candidate has any name ID– nor have they shown an interest in going after the front runner, nor even in trying to take some risks and attract attention to themselves. The percentage of voters who answered they’d like “someone else or undecided” is similar to or greater than the number supporting Hill among the full range of GOP voters polled. This is further indication that most people haven’t heard of any of these guys yet and that being a state legislator means jack in terms of name recognition.

The one wild card was Neil Livingstone, who is now known mainly as having been Muammar Qaddafi’s lobbyist. For a few million bucks worth of TV ads, Livingstone could have make up the deficit against Hill and probably surpassed him. But word on the street is that he is closing up shop and getting out of the race, his campaign having all but derailed. Perhaps he doesn’t have the cash, or else why would he have tried prostituting himself to Qaddafi for the big payday, in the middle of a governor’s race?

The rest of the field is a bunch of yahoos. Stapleton has raised a decent clip of cash but will not have nearly enough to close the gap. Essmann has spent all his money on munchies for campaign events; Ken Miller has a comb-over. The full results of the poll can be seen here.

Looking beyond the primary to the general contest, the Washington, D.C. based Politico has, for the third month in a row, declared Attorney General Steve Bullock as the “winner” of the moment– giving him that distinction every month since he joined the race. The the political news source has ranked the Montana gubernatorial contest as one of the top races in the nation.

Posted: November 17, 2011 at 7:12 pm

Political Quick Hits

Back in the National News

Rob Kailey at Left in the West this week highlights just what kind of wackos the fringe elements in Montana have attracted. It’s a must read, especially given the fact that Chuck Baldwin understands very well he his chances of becoming Governor. So is the latest piece by James Conner at the Flathead Memo. It’s a takedown of Baldwin’s introductory statements to Montana voters that the leaders of the old confederacy weren’t racists, and were people who Baldwin holds “in the highest regard.” In yesterday’s Daily Inter Lake,

Baldwin makes clear the Fanning-Baldwin political strategy in a field of nine gubernatorial candidates.

“The pie is going to be sliced mighty thin, and in Montana, there is no run-off in the primaries. That means, whoever gets the most votes — no matter what the percentage — wins,” Baldwin wrote. “It is very conceivable, therefore, that the winner will receive far less than 30 percent of the votes. Do you see the opportunity Bob and I have in this election?”

As a former presidential candidate, he poses a real threat to the candidates running for Governor, most of which have never run for statewide office before. Even those who have, such as Hill, or have some national media experience, such as Livingstone, face losing home turf to Baldwin, who is also from the Flathead.

This Is Embarrassing

Apparently flying a giant flag above a furniture store isn’t good enough for veterans to support Ken Miller.

After at least two months with a “Veterans for Miller” page up, (which can be seen here) he still only has one supporter. Maybe that’s because unlike Steve Bullock, who has a record of helping Veterans, Ken Miller has only ever flown a flag.

Sour Grapes

One angry loser in the recent Whitefish City elections was Rick Blake, who in an odd parting shot at the winning slate of candidates, hurled the tax and spend label, then bragged that he had spent an eye-popping $22,786 attempting to defeat the winners.

Posted: November 15, 2011 at 12:03 pm

Keeping Up with the GOP Gov Kandidates

There’s a whole lot of crazy tumbling out of the GOP Kandidate Klown Kar this week. The latest? TEA Party blogger Ed Berry writes on the Oathkeeper’s website that the Reverend Dr. Chuck Baldwin, the 2008 Constitution Party’s presidential candidate, has jumped onto the ticket of far-right candidate Robert Fanning to be the Republican Party nominees for the Governor’s office.

Now, governor candidate Robert Fanning, an expert in economics, finance, wildlife and resources, has been joined by 2008 presidential candidate Chuck Baldwin as his lt. governor running mate. Fanning made this historic announcement last night at a Gubernatorial Forum in Billings.

Speculation that Baldwin would run for Montana statewide office began earlier this year, when in a speech to a packed room at the Outlaw Inn in Kalispell last January Baldwin warned the audience that “There’s a fight coming.” In his speech, which some thought seemed to call for a civil war, Baldwin described “waking in the middle of the night and imagining himself as governor of Montana.”

he all but declared his candidacy, describing the prospect as, “so thrilling I just get goose bumps.”

To win a Republican nomination, a candidate has to move right, recant absolutely any past position that violates the current conservative dogma and never, ever dare to speak the truth that the Democratic Schweitzer administration has managed the state budget better than any time in state history.

Fanning and Baldwin are already so far right they won’t have to do much moving. Consider the anti-Semitic sermon written by Baldwin, in which he lashes out at the Jewish Banking Conspiracy and refers to Jews as the modern day “moneychangers” which Jesus banished from the temple. He also says these same moneychangers control the media and thus will never report on their own banking conspiracy, and so of course it is he, Chuck Baldwin, who must bring us the truth about them.

“They are destroying America,” Baldwin says, “but Christians don’t see it,” and so he implores Christians to wake up to the reality of what Jewish leaders are up to.

Baldwin was heavily involved in the modern-day incarnation of the White Citizens’ Council that supported segregation and opposed the Civil Rights Movement.

Baldwin said he was drawn to the Flathead and the Rocky Mountain West by what he described as a “freedom-minded spirit in that area that is superior to most places in the country.” He spoke in May at the “Liberty Convention” in Missoula, and at a conservative gathering in Hamilton last year.

The Liberty Convention was the event that included headliners several white-supremacist speakers including Red Beckman, Baldwin and a small handful of others. Red Beckman is guy whose name you have probably heard before. In addition to refusing to pay his taxes, Beckman believes that Jewish people are the literal children of Satan, and people of color are sub-human “mud people.”

In a recent Flathead Beacon article, it was reported that Baldwin has written a column in which he expressed this view:

“The South was right in the War Between the States, and I am not a racist,” he wrote. “Neither do I believe that the leaders of the Old Confederacy were racists.”

Fanning and Baldwin must know at some level that not all of their ideas are fit for prime time. Or maybe it’s just that there are some conspiracies that are too sensitive to discuss publicly. That’s because on their website, their position on Agenda 21, the insidious UN Black Helicopter agenda in favor of food for hungry people and bike paths, is for certain eyes only, and is password protected. Here’s a screenshot:

They should keep all of their ideas far from public eyes, because the more Montanans learn about this pair, the less there is to like.

Posted: October 3, 2011 at 5:14 pm

Americans for Prosperity Sends Its Luxury Bus Over the Cliff

It is every astroturf special interest front group’s worst nightmare: the moment when, despite their best efforts to carefully orchestrate each facet of the campaign, reality comes crashing down–sending the movement careening into crackpot-ville for good.

This is that moment for Americans for Prosperity, the group funded by the Koch brothers to trick people into thinking that the TEA Party was a grassroots uprising. Rumors are circulating that the front group has selected a new leader for the Montana chapter. Henry Kriegel is to be the group’s new figurehead, replacing Scott Sales, if the rumors are true. Right now, Kriegel is the organization’s number two, but word is he’s getting called up for prime time.

Montana Cowgirl readers know Henry Kriegel well. He’s a right-wing nutjob, former New Yorker, radio-host, and the leader of the Bozeman TEA Party.

A few years ago, Henry Kriegel was busted by the IRS for failing to pay a fortune in income taxes. Somehow, he got a bankruptcy court to let him off the hook on a large portion of it. Kriegel told reporters that he didn’t believe his tax history should keep him from speaking out about tax reform (in the Bozeman Daily Chronicle on June 15, 2009). It may not keep him from speaking out, but it keeps him from doing so with any credibility. Having Kriegel lead the charge against taxes is like tapping Bernie Madoff to campaign against tighter securities regulation.

That’s not the only skeleton in Kriegel’s closet. It turns out that Kriegel has been a high-ranking member of the Church Universal and Triumphant, also known as CUT. In fact, Kriegel was actually featured a while back in an LA Times article about people who wander off and get caught up in cult-like religious movements. An “out-of-stater” (to use a Republican phrase), Kriegel is from New York and left the east coast on a soul search, came to Montana, and joined up with CUT. During the 1990s, Kriegel spoke out against the deprogramming efforts of anti-cult activists, saying he was the “victim of an attempted deprogramming” by people opposed to his CUT membership. (Bozeman Daily Chronicle, March 15, 1992.)

Wikipedia says that CUT members worship, among other things,

“esoteric mysticism, the paranormal and alchemy, with a belief in angels, elves, fairies, and other beings…such as Sanat Kumara, Maitreya, Djwal Khul, El Morya, Kuthumi, Paul the Venetian, Serapis Bey, the Master Hilarion, Lanto, Lady Master Nada, Godfre, Lady Master Lotus, and Lanello, Enoch and Elohim.”

But even better, CUT was the bunch who believed that the world was going to end of a nuclear holocaust at a particular hour and minute on April 23, 1990. They built a massive underground bomb shelter up near Gardiner, MT and stocked it to the rafters with illegally purchased semi-automatic weapons, in preparation for The End (as reported by the Bozeman Daily Chronicle, Feb. 27, 1995; Bozeman Daily Chronicle, March 14, 1995).

But I guess none of this was enough wacky for Kriegel, so he went looking for another fringe sect. He definitely found it in Americans for Prosperity.

Posted: August 19, 2011 at 5:13 pm

Is Rick Hill A Muslim?

I’ve received several e-mails from people who were listening to the radio program Voices of Montana yesterday (Thurs, August 18) about a comment made by GOP gubernatorial candidate Rick Hill who was the featured guest.

When asked by a caller if his past marital indiscretions would affect his ability to promote a Christian Conservative agenda as governor, Hill declared “I’ve been a Christian for 30 years.”

Hill is 64 years old. This presumably means that for the the first 34 years of his life, Hill was something other than a Christian.

Might Montana have its first Muslim governor? You will recall that President Obama did not become a Christian until he was an adult. And this led people of Rick Hill’s ilk to conclude that he was a Muslim.

This would mean Montana would incorporate Sharia law. Lobbyists would no longer be allowed to eat those lovable pork hot dogs that are sold on the third floor cafe during the legislature. (And during Ramadan, there’d be no eating anything at all for a month. Restaurants would be shut down.) Construction of a local mosque would be required.

Now it might also be possible that Rick Hill is Jewish. Dietary restrictions would be roughly the same. Or he might have been born a Hindu or Buddhist, which could bring the state some good Zen.

Regardless of what Hill’s birth religion was, one thing is for sure: if he’s only been a Christian 30 years, he won’t be getting Chuck Baldwin’s endorsement.

Posted: August 16, 2011 at 7:02 am

Hate Movement “Backed by God”…But Trounced in Elections

Another good article on white supremacy in Montana is out this week. The independent media outlet In These Times, chronicles the politics of the hate movement in Montana.

Hate-monger Chuck Baldwin says the movement is God’s work:

“I really believe God is doing something in the Flathead Valley!”

It is true that in 2010, Montana saw a temporary increase in extreme right politician political activity, and Baldwin’s crew is clearly hoping that trend will continue:

Last year, local racist groups began reserving a room at the Kalispell library to show Holocaust denial films. In November, Flathead voters elected a Tea Partier to a state House seat who wore a Confederate flag jacket to a Memorial Day parade, and who maintains that the Civil War was fought over states’ rights, not slavery.

This year saw an apparent attempt by a right-wing cabal to wrest control of the Flathead Valley Community College Board of Trustees. One of the candidates was Tim Baldwin, a son of Chuck Baldwin. Another was an engineer and atmospheric physicist who doesn’t believe climate change is caused by humans. Another backed legislation that would give county sheriffs authority usurping that of the federal government—a concept derived from the Posse Comitatus.

But this year, “all four of the far-right challengers in the community college board election were trounced in May” — perhaps because the deity has been really busy lately recruiting GOP presidential candidates to run against each other.

Posted: August 15, 2011 at 6:51 am

Holding the Door Open for Fanatics

A must-read article in this weekend’s Great Fall’s Tribune profiles a new rise of the white supremacy movement in Montana. The movement’s backers aren’t just organizing, they’re seeking their way into mainstream politics.

The TEA Party appears to be holding the door open for them.

TEA Partiers are helping to amplify the voices of extremists like Chuck Baldwin, inviting him to appear at their events and on their radio shows. The Tribune writes of Baldwin:

The Florida transplant to the Flathead has been a Constitution Party presidential candidate, an advocate of militia movements and involved with the Council of Conservative Citizens, which the Southern Poverty Law Center characterizes as a hate group.

“There are some individual activists pretty interested in politics and how you use politics as a way to mainstream your message and line up behind candidates to gain credibility,” McAdam said. “Most are much more interested in trying to create communities that look the way they want, all white all the time.”

To start the process, Baldwin encouraged his entire family and congregation to move to Montana. His son Timothy Baldwin brought his own family too, and immediately sought to launch his political career as part of a slate of TEA Party candidates running for the board of the Flathead Valley Community College.

Baldwin is assisting other hate groups as well, such as the Oath Keepers. The movement has already gotten TEA Party Republicans to put forward their legislative ideas, such as the gold standard, a key goal of the Oath Keepers group in Montana.

It isn’t just TEA Partiers at the legislative level that are carrying water for the fanatics. It’s happening at the Congressional level too. The same opposition to Pell Grants held by extremists groups pops up in the statements of people who used to try to pass themselves off as mainstream politicians, like TEA Party Congressman Denny Rehberg.

Since the TEA and Republican parties appear unwilling or unable to clean these elements out of their own houses, it is left to us to vote them out of office.