Former Montana Senator Conrad Burns says he and Secretary of State candidate Brad Johnson are a lot alike.

Burns writes, in an endorsement letter to Republicans recently:

Brad and I have faced some challenges in our recent lives and I am pleased and proud to say we are both doing well. Anyone who has been thrown off a horse knows you got to get up, dust yourself off, and get back on.

The letter can be viewed here and here.  What is he talking about? Did Conrad Burns get a DUI and spend a stint in rehab? Did Brad Johnson have a stroke? No, the letter is an attempt to conflate the two as basically the same thing–hard times.

Problem with that is, getting DUI means you chose to make yourself a danger to others. No one decides to have a stroke. Burns was the victim of the stroke, Johnson, the perpetrator.

Recall that Brad Johnson’s blood alcohol level was three times the legal limit as he drove down the wrong side of the highway from Bozeman to Helena. The voters declined to give him a second term.

Would Burns have written the same letter if Johnson had killed or maimed someone? It’s a fair question for the self-proclaimed “party of life.”