Reminiscent of when Montana’s only member of Congress Denny Rehberg (the guy suing the firefighters after his scrub brush burned) famously told an eastern Montana county to go hire a lobbyist if it wanted to get federal money to pave a local road(even suggesting the name of a lobbyist that they ought to hire), Montana Senator Max Baucus could be seen in the newspaper recently saying something similar.
For the first time in 35 years, there is agreement between Montana and Canada to permanently forbid mining and exploration in a beautiful and wild area next to Glacier and Waterton Parks. All that is needed is $17 million dollars from Congress to seal the deal. Yet last week Baucus stated publicly, and incredibly, that the request for the appropriation "came in the wrong form".
This claim merits serious examination. As far as I can tell, there is no such thing as a "form" for requesting federal money. When a state needs something from the federal government, the Congressman/Senator is supposed to bring it home. Plus, Baucus could be heard saying recently that he has been working very hard on this environmental issue for 35 years.
It is a very peculiar state of affairs that no doubt traces to the ego-bumping between Schweitzer and Baucus. Some activists on this issue hope perhaps Tester can do better. Nobody expects Rehberg to do anything, of course. The best part is that Max Baucus's staff continues to send out press releases describing Max as "America's most powerful senator."
The fish in the North Fork of the Flathead River, which will be killed off by coal sludge if this deal falls apart, clearly do not understand that they need either a high-powered corporate fish lobbyist, or must write fish checks to the Baucus campaign, in order to see that their home is protected. The Flathead River runs into Glacier National Park, which provides desperately needed tourism revenue for the small towns and reservations which surround it.
What's also weird is the timing of this thing. Has Max Baucus even been watching the news? We Montanans don't want Glacier National Park to end up like the southern gulf coast, whose small town economies were decimated by the BP oil spill.
Montana state officials are doing everything they can to protect the small rural and reservation towns whose economies depend on tourists visiting Glacier National Park to survive. In an article entitled Schweitzer rips Congress again on Flathead protections it was reported that
Schweitzer used the podium at the Western Governors Association to prod the Montana congressional delegation — led by fellow Democrats U.S. Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester — to sign onto federal legislation that could pay for the project.
“Don’t be running after the bus,” Schweitzer said in comments directed at the delegation. “Get on the bus and sit beside the driver.”
We're still waiting to see if anything happens.