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Plain talk? OK, of major importance: drop the gun control issue. It costs us big time in rural areas! Not everybody who has a gun is a 'gun nut' and it pisses them off to be so labeled! They will not hear any other message you have until this one is quiet. Dean has the right apporach on this one!
When you live in a county that covers 3,169,280 acres, 1204 miles of unpaved county roads and about 140 miles of paved highway, and law enforcement consists of a sheriff, two deputies and one highway patrolman, ensuring one's personal safety is not something one expects to have done by someone else! The rifle rack in the truck is not just the punchline of a redneck joke around here. The county population of about 1300 would be considerable smaller if we had to try and reason with a rattler, lion or bear crossing our path at an inoppurtune moment. Sometimes there are two legged vermin to deal with too. Most know how to take care peacefully, but this is still a rough county.
There is real concern about trade barriers. Canada is closer than most of the US and the ability to get hay to starving cattle fast is more important to these folks than the nuances of international trade treaties. Please keep common sense in trade policy and try to avoid using people's survival as bargining chips whenever possible.
Ah, yes, public lands are a sore spot with many. We need to find ways to make sure the locals are involved in decision making on those issues. When a BLM agent mouths off at a public meeting that ranching is gonna be gone soon so they might as well get off the land now, well, it does not play well nor make friends. There are ways to go about getting landowners to see benifit with land use policies and public lands IF you take the time to learn the problems and find Win-Win solutions. Havocdad does it all the time!
Another issue which will be big soon is Coal Bed Methane... Yep, the gas shrub has been talking about.
A little geology lesson here to make it clearer: The eastern part of the state was once a shallow ocean. There are a lot of salts in the soils and the water is not good. It is an arid land now and irrigation is a double edged sword. You need to put water on the land, but you need to do it judiciously or you salt the earth and make it sterile.
OK, now back to CBM drilling: A lot of ranchers are finding out that they do not own the mineral rights under their land. Here comes Big Oil & Gas and they wanna drill. Legally, they can do what ever they want to the surface to get to the goodies below ground!
Ranchers in Wy have already seen their pastures torn up for roads and drilling rigs. That is just the first part. There is underground water in the way of the gas drilling. The cheapest way around it is to pump it up fast and pour it on the ground. Not the most conersvative use of precious water and definately not the best way to care for what little topsoil there is! Montana ranchers are seeing the problem coming at them too.
Find a way to turn government back to the job of riding herd on Big Business instead of pimping for it and you may just make friends out of a lot of folks around here. I have been trying to show them that govenment is not the enemy, rather the interests which presently control it is. I am one woman screaming in the wilderness here... Could sure use a backup making the point with these folks.
A grassroots sort of candidate could catch on here, IF the message gets across that we are gonna return things to government for and by the people.
OK, on to the coprprate fraud issue: AG Mike McGrath (Dem) is going after suing Touch America. The power companies were deregulated under (R) Governor Racicot. This can be HUGE! Racicot left Mt and got swell jobs lobbying for companies like ENRON. He then became the RNC chairman and now is leading bush 04 campaign. Put it all together and bring it home to Montanans who lost jobs, investment $$ and are losing a way of live because the energy companies own Washington DC right now. This will play in the eastern and western part of the state! The workers and retirees in the west believed that if you worked hard and saved money, everything would be fine. They got screwed. The folks on the land in the east are facing a huge monster ready to devour a way of life they and two generations before them fought hard to eek out of a harsh land.
So, throw some help Mcgrath's way and the payoff for the Dems could be great and far reaching! Use the issue in other rural states! We know we are a tiny electorial speck, but we aren't the only ones in this boat. Montana has led the way before, help us do it again.
OK, on to the military: Farm and ranch kids serve in the military and the folks at home honor them. Pump up the volumn on AWOL and vetern benifit cuts while fat cats are getting fatter and giving thousands of dollars at a pop to break bread with AWOL!
I am already hearing grumblings about how thin the military is stretched. Folks are worried about the kids we have overseas. Overheard at the grocery store: "I guess you are glad the war is over, huh? So how is ### doing over there?" "Don't know that things are any better. He is still getting shot at and they are sitting on the border with Iran now. Doesn't seem like any war is over."
We just had our independence day. Like the founder of this thread illustrated, it is a BIG deal here. Everybody who ever wore a uniform is usually in each town's parade. When the jets do a fly by over all these small towns, it is a BIG DEAL. Folks stop what they are doing and wave at the sky (like the pilots could see us at that speed ;-) ) But they all wave. And they are proud of being Americans.
Wanna reach them? Honor that sentiment. Tap into the power of it. These are hardworking folks and they need to know they are a part of something beyond the horizon, tho they generally will bitch about it.
Show them how much they have in common with the city family trying to get by. Listen to them. Talk with them not at them. They are shy in many ways and can give the impression of being a bit slow. Don't make the mistake of thinking they are.
The spirit of what made this country great is still very close to the surface in Montana. Tap into it. Honor that energy and show us how to use it to save this nation. East or west, city folks, 'townies' or ranchers out in the country, we all love America and want her to stand for something good again!
OK, off my soapbox, but, hey, you asked. Love ya for that!
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