Tagged: Gary Marbut

Posted: December 19, 2012 at 9:19 pm

MT Republican Legislator Wants More Guns in Schools

Rep. David Howard (R-Park City) believes that school shootings in America are caused by too few, rather than too many, guns in school. He wants to know why the sign on the right isn’t posted in front of ever school in America.

On his Facebook page, Howard explains his views on gun free schools:

This is like zebra’s declaring a section of the Serengeti to be a Lion free zone! They would go out and mark the boundaries, lie down and relax. The lions on the other hand, would be rejoicing and putting out signs that would say “Defenseless Stupid Zebra’s Ahead”.

The godless liberals are forcing America’s kids to be sitting ducks. Sad!

Howard is backing a piece of legislation, along with other Montana Republicans, that would allow students and teachers to bring side arms to school. This is one of several measures that the GOP believes will make for a safer society. The other is a bill to allow concealed weapons in bars, banks, schools and state government buildings. These were vetoed by Schweitzer last session, and will likely be vetoed again.

What Howard and company cannot come to terms with is this basic fact: that in places like Sweden, Finland, Canada, Germany, England and many other strong democracies, there is plenty of hunting and gun ownership, but virtually no school shootings and in fact barely any gun violence at all. And no, they don’t accomplish it by arming elementary school students. They do it through common sense regulation. No assault weapons, no gun show loopholes where you can pay cash for a gun without any record of the transaction. No 100-round clips of ammo.

The fun part of the upcoming legislative session will be to observe the diminished power that Gary Marbut will wield. Marbut runs an outfit called Montana Shooting Sports Association, a group he formed to compete with the NRA which he views as too liberal an organization. He wants guns everywhere, and is the force behind bills like the ones that Howard is pushing. But it’s crazy stuff that even Montanans, who are gun purists, don’t really go in for.

Rep. Howard is the Chair of the House Human Services Committee of the Montana Legislature.

Here’s a screenshot of Rep. Howard’s post:

Posted: November 7, 2012 at 7:26 am

UPDATED: Dems Make Small Gain in Legislature

As of the time of this posting, with vote counts still coming in, it looks like the make-up of the Montana senate may be 21 Democratic senators to 29 Republicans in the next legislative session. Democrats and Republicans appear to have won an equal number of the seats up for grabs, but Rs maintained an advantage in holdover senators.

During the 2011 session, there were 28 Republicans and 22 Democrats.

In the House, it looks like Democrats may pick up seven ~~five seats,~~ making that chamber 40 38 Democratic seats to 60 62 Republicans instead of 32-68 like the 2011 session. This will help Governor-elect Steve Bullock sustain his 2013 vetoes. UPDATE: As of 8:30 pm Wed evening, Dems have gained seven MT house seats. The Billings Gazette has the story.

All of the results STILL aren’t in yet, so this could change and the Dems could pick up more seats.

Here are a couple of highlights. I’m sure there more more, please add them in the comments.

GOOD:

Democrats Brad Hamlett and Greg Jergeson were successful in winning tough Senate races.
Democrat Ed Leiser is leading Tim Baldwin.
Tom Jacobson appears to have taken out TEA Partier Cleve Loney.
Reilly Neill (D) looks to have taken out Dan Skattum in an ATP targeted race.
And in Butte, Ryan Lynch took back Max Yate’s house seat for the Dems.
Newcomer Jenny Eck was successfull in keeping her Helena house seat blue.
Gary Marbut lost in Missoula.

BAD:

Janna Taylor and Dee Brown will be back in the Senate.
Militia-linked Jennifer Fielder is in from Sanders County is now a state senator.
Nicholas Schwaderer defeated Christine Johnson for the Superior house seat that was much in the news.
Dog killer Roger Webb is leading Wanda Grinde in Billings for the Heights senate seat, but all the votes aren’t yet in.
Warburton and Hanson will be back in the house. Though given the recent Frontline expose, she might be subject to a range of penalties, including removal from office, fines, or worse. The question is whether there is a prosecutor out there who is willing to begin looking into this stuff.
Liz Bangerter from Helena and Joanne Blyton from Red Lodge will be back as well.

Posted: October 13, 2010 at 6:23 am

Montana, Led by AG Bullock, is Sole State to Fight Corporate Election Influence

As Matt Singer at Left in the West wrote about yesterday, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that after the Supreme Court OK-ed corporate influence in elections, no other state but Montana had the backbone to stand up for our own laws against it.

And Montana’s Attorney General Steve Bullock, a rising star in the political scene both within the state and nationally, is leading the fight. As the Wall Street Journal reports:

Mr. Bullock says some of the Supreme Court’s reasons for overruling the federal campaign-finance law don’t apply to his state, arguing that its Corrupt Practices Act of 1912 remains constitutional.

Montana’s opponents are some of the most pernicious influences on state, regional, and national politics we’ve seen in recent years. First, there is the militia affiliated Montana Shooting Sports Association:

Gary Marbut, president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association (MSSA), is a frequent contributor to the Militia of Montana’s e-mail list. In an April 2000 message to his e-mail list, he wrote “WTO, GATT, and NAFTA are all moves towards the New World Order and the coveted global government.”

He also contributes to the patriot Internet publication The Sierra Times. One of his columns was later carried in the Christian Identity tabloid The Jubilee. Christian Identity, based on a racist interpretation of the Bible, holds that Jews are the literal children of Satan, and people of color are subhuman “mud people.” Another Marbut column in The Sierra Times attacked the federal government for wanting its citizens to remain “Îstabable’, Îshootable’, Îbeatable’, Îrobable’, and, of course, Îrapeable.’” His dislike for the federal government also surfaced in 1994 when Marbut wanted Montana to secede from the union.

Also opposing Montana is the embattled Western Traditions Partnership, a groups with legal problems in Colorado and whose leadership appears to have acted illegally in Montana. But that’s not all. As Singer relates, the Billings Gazette is reporting that a Montana Commissioner of Political Practices investigator

has found evidence that Western Tradition Partnership intends to or has tried to solicit donations from officers of several foreign corporations or their affiliations, including some based in Canada, South Africa and the United Kingdom.

Hardly the “Western Tradition” they claim to espouse. A third opponent of Montana’s case is a TEA Party leader worried about United Nations conspiracies.

He says he wants to spend his company’s money to oust city officials who joined an international organization of local governments seeking to meet sustainability goals backed by the United Nations.

This is a battle worth watching, and whatever the outcome of this particular fight, it is also worth watching the future of Montana’s Attorney General Steve Bullock.