Showing posts with label Bill Allemand. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bill Allemand. Show all posts
Thursday, October 22, 2026
Sunday, September 20, 2026
The 2026 Election, 22nd Edition. The Stupid on Stilts Edition.
From Greed, 1925.
We're making a fortune. So if the Republicans win, you win with us and you get $5,000. It will be called the Trump Dividend. Congratulations.
Donald Trump at the GOP Midterm Convention.
A person would have to be stupid on stilts to believe that promise, and a similar one has been extended before.
Seriously, what kind of a dumbass believes anything Trump promises at this point?
The fact that the GOP is having a "Midterm" convention is itself an example of outright desperation and hubris on the part of Trump. Trump loves Trump and you must love Trump, so he's reminding you of Trump Love so that you love him and vote for the GOP candidates to show your mindless cult like love.
The fact of the matter is that everything associated with Trump is going badly and his approval ranking is sinking like a rock. In Wyoming it's down to 54% and the impact of the tariffs on Canada haven't even hit yet, much. The war hasn't ended, inflation is about to ramp back up, and Trump's own weirdness is now too weird for anyone to ignore. The result is that Democrats, who were slated to take back the House, now appear likely to take back the Senate as well. Even in Wyoming there's some hint that the Senate may be in play and it's clear that a large number of people really aren't keen on Chuck Gray, who has been pretty quiet since the primary.
Indeed, I've seen a little lashing out at John Barrasso, who isn't running for anything. Now days we mostly see Dr. John looking at Donald Trump as if he, Barrasso, is suffering from a severe case of constipation. He may be, as he's kept his true views on everything, none of which we know, bottled up inside of himself for so long. Anyhow, if people are mad at Barrasso, who seems to have forgotten which state he's from, it doesn't bode well for Hageman and Gray, although they are both clearly the favorites.
This does bring us to some questions that should be asked in the next two months, however. Those being:
1. Do you support the undeclared war against Iran, and if yes, how do you justify no declaration of war existing?
2. On data centers, a big deal here in Wyoming, are you against them like seemingly the majority of Wyomingites are, or for them, like Donald Trump is?
3. What is your position on public lands?
4. For people who go outside, there are clearly environmental matters to be concerned about. Do you have any concerns, and if no, just don't tell us "it's a big fib", as that's just telling us that you'll lie for votes. What is your justification?
5. Epstein files. Why aren't they being released.
6. What is your real plan for balancing the budget and addressing the debt and show us that it works.
7. Do you support ending the trade war with Canada?
A note, prior endorsements on running candidates are below in a separate thread as an Appendix, which is also linked in below.. I'm doing that in this edition so as to not clog up the first part of it too much.
September 11, 2026
Two events occured yesterday which should; 1) cause a sane nation to invoke the 25th Amendment and 2) cause every Republican running for office to have to answer where they stand or never be voted on again.
The first.
Trump sworn his acolytes in so that they will be able to be called up as Long Knives to attack the upcoming Republican defeat in November.
It's not the pledge to go out and vote. Frankly, most MAGA isn't paying any attention this anyway.
It's the pledge to cheat.
Things Trump says cannot any longer be dismissed. People who think that one liner means nothing are ignoring recent history. He intends to steal the election. If he pulls that off, if he's still living and semi coherent, he intends to serve a third term.
The second was a truly bizarre video based on the Paul Harvey "God made farmers" video of years ago with a "God gave us Trump" theme.
This latches on to the extreme Evangelical leg of the MAGA stool. It would make most Christians of any branch absolutely cringe, and to claim a Divine mission like this may be very well blasphemous.
The questions that should be asked, and of any Republican candidate?
1. Will you support the results of the November election no matter what they are. If there's any hedging at all, tell the person they don't have your support for anything whatsoever.
2. Do you believe that Trump has a Divine mission? Any answer than an unqualified no should disqualify the candidate.
I can guarantee you that almost any GOP candidate, particularly if they don't know your view going into the question, will waffle and not give a straight answer.
Carrying on a bit, the religiosity of this midterm Republican convention is really something else. Protestant ministers showed up to speak at it and Tim Scott sounded like an Evangelist. At some point Protestants who are members of these communities really have to ask their pastors how they can reconcile their faith with a man who so clearly ignores Christianity.
Closer to home, Harriet Hageman is ignoring calls for a debate with James Byrd and Byrd is calling her out on it. His post from Facebook:
James Byrd for United States Senate
IF YOU WON'T FIGHT FOR WYOMING ON A DEBATE STAGE, WHO ARE YOU FIGHTING FOR?
Harriet Hageman won't stand on a stage. She won't return calls. She won't even respond. And now her silence is about to cancel the one chance Wyoming voters had to see both Senate candidates side by side.
You don't get to represent this state if you won't show up and defend what you believe in front of it. Silence isn't leadership. It's a candidate deciding Wyoming doesn't deserve a real conversation at all.
Tell Wyoming PBS: don't let her refusal to stand for what she believes in decide this for the rest of us.
Stand and fight.
That really is a chicken move by Hageman, but it seems to me she's taken that approach in the past as well.
In the past it struck me as arrogance. She stopped debating as a wave of the hand type of move, although Grey Bull pulled down 25% of the vote in 2022 and Cameron 23% in 2024. Here, it strikes me as fear. Gray Bull was a good debater and still drew 25% in a year that heavily favored Hageman. Now, with four years in, Hageman has an extremely exposed record. She poked Wyoming voters in the eye on public lands and basically called them dumb. In the category of dumb, her family's homestead burned to the ground but she still is a climate change denier. She was endorsed by Trump and has yet to explain how Wyoming farmer and ranchers should view South American beef. It's unfortunate that she lost to Mead, who was such a better candidate.
It's pretty questionable how she'd do in a debate against Byrd. Byrd would likely best her, and what's more, he knows that. So he's making her chicken move an issue.
Hageman ought to be held to account for hiding.
AN OPEN LETTER TO WYOMING PBS
August 11, 2026
To the Leadership of Wyoming PBS,
On August 10, our campaign was notified that Wyoming PBS would not be holding a primary debate for U.S. Senate, because our opponent declined the invitation to participate. A similar notice was given to Lisa Kinney, one of the Democratic candidates for Wyoming's U.S. House seat, whose opponent also declined. As a result, neither of Wyoming's federal Democratic primary races will be represented in a debate on Wyoming PBS this cycle.
I want the public to know directly: I did not refuse this invitation. I remain ready and willing to speak to Wyoming voters in this format, and if Wyoming PBS were to offer me the opportunity, I would be there.
We understand the position Wyoming PBS is in. Federal equal-time provisions limit what a broadcaster can do when only one candidate is willing to appear, so PBS can't simply offer a solo forum in place of a debate, and balancing that against the responsibility to keep voters informed is a hard job. We don't take issue with that constraint itself.
But we do take issue with the precedent this sets.
If one candidate declining is all it takes to cancel a debate outright, then any candidate who wants to dodge scrutiny now has a guaranteed way to do it. That's not a neutral policy. It rewards avoidance and punishes the candidate who actually showed up. It hands one side the power to decide, unilaterally, whether Wyoming voters get to see a debate at all. That is not how this is supposed to work.
When journalism requires the participation of good faith actors, rather than holding all individuals to account regardless of whether they participate, it will ultimately fail at its own goal of accountability. It is always easier to hide than to be held to account.
We've also noticed a related pattern: nominees who clear a primary and then simply skip general election debates too. Put these trends together, and debate participation stops being something candidates owe their constituents. It becomes optional for anyone who calculates they have more to lose than gain by showing up. That should worry Wyoming PBS as much as it worries us.
We are asking Wyoming PBS to make a public commitment that the U.S. House and Senate debates ahead of the Nov. 3, 2026 general election will occur, period. That commitment should hold true regardless of the participation of our opponents.
If a candidate refuses to show up, hold the debate anyway and leave their podium empty. Stations across the country already do this when a candidate declines. It lets voters still hear from the candidates who did show up, and it makes the absent candidate's choice visible instead of erasing the event altogether. Voters deserve to hear from all candidates in each race. Short of that, they deserve to see plainly which candidates showed up to answer for their records and which ones didn't. No candidate should get to use their own absence as a weapon to keep another candidate off the stage.
We'd also push Wyoming PBS to rethink its approach for future primary cycles. One candidate's refusal shouldn't be enough to cancel a debate outright, and that shouldn't hinge on how many candidates happen to be on a given party's ballot. A party fielding one or two contested candidates deserves the same debate access as a party fielding a dozen. Anything less penalizes voters for the size of their party's field, not for anything they did.
We appreciate the work Wyoming PBS does for this state, and we expect a response.
Sincerely,
James Byrd
Byrd for Wyoming See less
September 12, 2026
It turns out that neither Gray nor Hageman are willing to debate.
I'd have much less faith in Kinney being able to really do well in a debate against Gray, although she was a practicing lawyer and has been a legislator. Additionally, Gray's default setting when he gets stressed is asshole.
Both Hageman and Gray's campaigns are defending their position to be chickens. So are their diehard supporters. But it isn't a good look.
September 16, 2026
Rod Miller: Proposition 1 And Rolling The Dice For Lives
Rod Miller voices his opinion about Proposition 1.
What the text of Prop 1 states is:
(xliii) A portion of property used as a primary residence as a homeowner’s exemption. The following shall apply to the homeowner's exemption:(A) For property used as a primary residence, fifty percent (50%) of the assessed value of the primary property is exempt from property taxation as a homeowner's exemption. Not more than one (1) homeowner’s exemption shall apply to the same property in any year and no owner shall claim more than one (1) homeowner’s exemption in any year including property that is improved by a residence that houses more than one (1) family. To claim a homeowner’s exemption the person shall have been a resident of this state for not less than one (1) year prior to claiming an exemption under this paragraph and shall have resided in the applicable primary residence for at least six (6) months of the immediately preceding tax year. To claim a homeowner’s exemption, the owner of the property shall submit a sworn claim to the county assessor not later than the fourth Monday in May on forms provided by the department of revenue demonstrating that the person is the owner of the property, and that the property is the person's primary residence. False claims are punishable as provided by W.S. 6-5-303.
Basically this proposition was a Wyoming Freedom Caucus "I just moved here with lots of money from California, bought a McMansion or a 40 acre dirt farm, drove up everyone's property taxes, and I don't like it". The proposition would gut local communities income like a fish, which most of these people don't care about as they truly hate the government and don't care about educating children, for instance, as they prefer ignorance.
We're voting no on Prop 1.
Indeed, this is the one thing we've actually answered a poll on. The poll was clearly supposed to be in favor prop 1 and the pollster, pretty clearly calling from some place in the South, didn't really know how to react to my answers to the questions.
Speaking of speaking, where's Harriet and Chuck on doing a debate?
Speaking of those two, there are questions as we proceed along that they should be made to answer.
Harriet, now that her home county is on fire again, should be forced to answer if she's willing to basically burn everything down to support the lie that climate warming isn't real. We all know it's real. She no doubt knows it's real. Why the fib?
Both should be made to answer if they support the illegal war against Iran and why?
And what about those diesel prices, eh?
On other matters, there's some rumors going around that Bill Allemand, the far right wing Freedom Caucus candidate who barely survived a primary challenge, may bail out of office. Apparently he may run through the election, according to one version of it, and then bail out some time after that. Without the Freedom Caucus crew in Cheyenne there's nobody to tell him what to do, and it would appear, generally, he needs somebody to tell him what to do and he knows that. He's not going to have any friends any longer in Cheyenne either.
If he bails out now, he probably throws that race to the Libertarian running in the district, although there is a Democrat running as well. He likely won't do that now and I'm not exactly sure what happens if he does. The logical thing would be that the other GOP candidate from the primary would replace him through a party process. If he drops out after the fall election, and if he wins it, the party would pick three names and send them to the County Commissioners who would pick the new legislator.
That, in fact, is how Chuck Gray first took office.
September 17, 2026
The propeller hat Dixiecrats in the GOP are at war with their own party. Unfortunately for that party, they are also in control of a lot of county, and the state, committees.
Hence some of those organizations basically backing the losing campaign of carpetbagger Rebecca Bextel.
The party is really hypocritical. This past year it endorsed candidates in the primary for the first time and basically told GOP voters who they had to vote for. It endorsed Hageman, Gray, and Bien. Bien came in third in the Governor's race and they've been pouting ever since.
Barlow, who won the Governor's race, swamped his opponents, taking 45% of the vote, but sad Dixiecrats note that 45% is not 50%, and therefore, they argue, he's not the legitimate candidate. That logic is pretty flawed as he certainly is under Wyoming's law, and his only real rival in the campaign was Trump endorsed Degenfelder, who took 30%. Dixiecrat darling Bien took 24% and sad Confederates note that if you add Degenfelder and Bien together, that's more than 50%.
It is, but it assumes that Degenfelder voters would have voted for Bien if she hadn't been running. The opposite is probably true. The 1/3 bottom of the bell curve probably would have voted for Trump knighted Degenfelder if Bien hadn't been running, but Degenfelder voters in large part would likely have gone for Barlow if Bien hadn't thrown his gray kepi into the ring. If anyone had an argument here, therefore, it would be Degenfelder.
Neither Bien or Degenfelder, who hope to dig out of their holes rather than convert them into political graves have said anything about the results being illegitimate but upset WFC members have a bit, for Bien. They tried to get a write in campaign going for him and at least locally one badly defeated WFC member still is. Others, including some committee members, are backing Bextel, who will lose massively in November.
The Constitution Party itself, which support a strict reading of a double secret constitution only they know about, is open enough itself to admit that it's hoping that Bextel can pull down 10% of the vote so that it can be a "major" party. Under Wyoming's law on primaries, which I believe to be unconstitutional, that would make the party the very model of a modern major party.
That result might occur and it might actually be a good thing, although anyone voting for Bextel, as noted, fits into the bottom end of the bell curve. What it would do, however, is give propeller hat wearing Dixiecrats a place to actually go, and they should go there. They are not Republicans.
Lubnau notes that upset Dixiecrats in GOP committees positions oddly don't make the same argument about Freedom Caucus darling Chuck Gray, who only pulled down 25% of the vote. While Barlow isn't threatened by Bextel, Gray actually may be by Libertarian Johnson and Democrat Kinney. I wouldn't have given Kinney any chance at all, but Gray's refusing to debate her is actually elevating her status.
On Sheridan County, while some on its GOP committee may be crying in their Bomber Mountain Amber Ale, the results were the same as they were statewide. Barlow swamped his competition and while Bien did come in second there, he only barely beat out Degenfelder. Again, those Degenfelder votes would have most likely gone to Barlow. And Gray only barely beat out Biteman and Christensen there.
One final thing to note. Teton County, where Bextel has hung her kepi, and Sheridan County, are the homes to a lot of rich carpetbaggers. These people tend to vote their own economic interests, and not paying taxes and telling the peasants to go **** *** are in that category. Like the rank and file in Confederate Gray in the 1860s, a lot of that rank and file (which here includes a lot of carpetbaggers) tend to be dim enough to follow the dictates of their oligarchic masters. We're seeing that, and frankly just a lot of real bottom of the bell curve ignorance, at work on these topics.
On other topics, Postmaster General David Steiner wants to quit his job, according to insiders.
He should as he's serving a madman.
The Post Office has been in the news recently as Trump keeps ordering it to impose impossible regulations on mail in voting, which Trump himself uses, as part of Trump's effort to interfere with and steal the November election. The Supreme Court won't let him so he's having a major tantrum.
cont:
Holy smokes. . Rebecca Bextel has released a campaign video. Buckhorn Bar t-shirt aside (after a certain age, no matter how doe eyed you may be, you can't pull that off), she sounds like the biggest Alabama hick ever. Her accent is so thick it's really impressive. Trying to use the tag line "you don't have to be smart to be governor", she unintentionally sounds to native Westerners as Southern hick, which is admittedly a stereotype, given that's how Westerners tend to view Southerners. Southerners probably are unaware of that.
Bextel has lived in Wyoming for 20 years, which means that she's hardly lived here any time at all. And she lives in Teton County, which Deep Wyoming regards as California.
Anyhow, in terms of actual intelligence, Barlow is a veterinarian, one of the most difficult degrees to obtain. Bextel has a degree from the University of Alabama, although I don't know in what.
Becky also tried to sound tough in a recent Chamber of Commerce appearance by claiming she had "bigger balls" than her opponent.
Pretty insightful, really. She had to demean her status as a woman in order to have merit in her own eyes.
The Dixiecrats. Just go home.
September 18, 2026
Harriet Hageman wrote a guest column in the Cowboy State Daily regarding birth right citizenship.
Hageman won't debate her opponents and probably for good reason. She's arrogantly supported a bill that would have set public lands up to be privatized and essentially called Wyomingites' opposing it stupid. She claimed to be a "Constitutional Conservative" but has done nothing about Trump running roughshod over the Constitution, including waging an illegal war that's driving up prices for everyone in the state. She has nothing to campaign on and American's short attention span doesn't allow for a "I'm not Liz Cheney" as a platform. With Trump down to a 54% approval rating in Wyoming, "I love Trump" is starting not to sell so well either. So she's taking a page out of the Desperate GOP Playbook, that being hordes of foreigners are coming here to have babies, or in this particular case, hordes of Chinese are coming to have babies.
Well, in reality, for the first time in fifty years the US had negative migration last year. That is, more people are leaving the US than entering it. The US has been teetering on the edge of rapid decline for years, but Trump has floored the accelerator on that, with the help of Republicans in Congress, and the country looks like a joke. China, the nation which Harriet maintains is trying to plant vast hordes of babies into our country, is the clearly up and coming nation.
The truth of the matter is that this problem, if there was one, has pretty much jumped the shark. While I'm really skeptical of it being a crisis, right wing demographers right now are arguing the opposite problem, that being that the US population is actually starting to decline, that decline accelerated by the country having become unwelcoming to foreigners. The solution is supposed to be for (white) Americans to get busy, so to speak.
That interestingly cuts in an opposite direction for a person like Hageman, and it really stands in contrast to Cheney. Cheney, now 60 years of age, is a Gen Xer and the mother of five children. Hageman (age 63) is technically a Baby Boomer (perhaps more accurately a Gen. Jonser) with no children whatsoever. Both are lawyers, but Hageman looks a lot more like a feminist in every fashion. Indeed, as I slightly knew here, and knew her friends better, I was quite surprised early on when she emerged as a Conservative.
I'm well aware, of course, that these sorts of questions aren't even supposed to be raised in polite society, but we no longer live in a polite society and people like Hageman are part of the reason why we do not. So the questions are fair game.
Anyhow, Hageman may have some accomplishments but I don't know what they are, and whatever they are, they to not appear to be large enough to justify voting for her. Mostly she's been a Trump loyalist right up until recently, and an opponent of public lands. She's complicit in the failures of the Trump Administration by doing nothing, or actively supporting them, and she's detrimental to the interest of Wyoming.
Time, therefore, to drag out the Hordes Of Chinese Babies Have Landed on Our Shores line.
September 19, 2026
Why does this not surprise me?
September 21, 2026
Outrageous.
Harriet Hageman goes after Conservation Easements.
Wyoming sportsmen, and frankly everybody, cannot support the candidacy of Harriet Hageman. She's in the public lands hater category.
She just introduced this bill.
1st Session
To provide that the Secretary of the Interior may not enter into certain conservation easements with a term of more than 30 years, and for other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVESApril 9, 2025Ms. Hageman (for herself and Ms. Fedorchak) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Natural Resources
A BILLTo provide that the Secretary of the Interior may not enter into certain conservation easements with a term of more than 30 years, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
This Act may be cited as the “Landowner Easement Rights Act”.
SEC. 2. Limitation on conservation easement terms.
After the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary may not enter into a conservation easement with a term of more than 30 years.
SEC. 3. Renegotiation of conservation easements.
At the request of an owner of land that is subject to an eligible conservation easement, the Secretary shall—
(1) not later the 6 months after the Secretary receives the request from the landowner, provide to the landowner—
(A) a detailed map of the easement; and
(B) notice of the current fair market value of the easement as determined by the Secretary; and
(2) renegotiate the terms of the eligible conservation easement, including—
(A) a term not longer than 30 years; and
(B) payment by the Secretary to the landowner in an amount equal to the fair market value of the easement, as determined by the Secretary under paragraph (1)(B), minus the amount paid by the Secretary for the eligible conservation easement being renegotiated (adjusted for inflation); or
(3) allow the landowner to buy back the eligible conservation easement or a portion of the eligible conservation easement at fair market value, as determined by the Secretary.
The Secretary shall notify the owner of the land subject to that conservation easement of the owner’s right to submit a request under section 3—
(1) not later than 3 months before the conservation easement becomes an eligible conservation easement described in section 5(2)(A); and
(2) not later than 1 year before the conservation easement becomes an eligible conservation easement described in section 5(2)(B).
In this Act:
(1) CONSERVATION EASEMENT.—The term “conservation easement”—
(A) means a voluntary, legal agreement between a landowner and the Secretary that limits use of the land in order to protect its conservation values; and
(ii) related to utilities.
(2) ELIGIBLE CONSERVATION EASEMENT.—The term “eligible conservation easement” means a conservation easement that—
(A) has been in effect for longer than 30 years; or
(B) was put into effect before 1977 without the creation of an official corresponding map.
(3) SECRETARY.—The term “Secretary” means the Secretary of the Interior.
This just guts conservation easements that the Federal Government participates in. It make the easement no easement at all.
Why on earth did people vote for Hageman in the primary?
With this outrage, we will close out this edition.
Prior related recent threads:
Labels: 2020s, 2026, Adam Kinzinger, Canada, Donald Trump, Evangelical, Food, Immigration, inflation, Taxes, The Second Trump Administration, The Trump Trade War with Canada, Trump Trade Wars, United States
Appendices:
Last edition:
Labels: Bill Allemand, Constitution Party, Democratic Party, Economics, Industry, Joe Porambo, Karlee Provenza, Keenan Morgan, Libertarian, Ogden Driskill, Republican Party, Rod Miller, Tamara Trujillo, Wyoming (Natrona County)2026 Election, Ana Cordova, Brent Bien, Bryan McCarty, Chuck Gray, Eric Barlow, Harriet Hageman, James Byrd, Kenneth Casner, Kevin Christensen, Rebecca Bextel, Robert Short, Shaun Johnson, Steve Harshman, Wyoming
Additional Labels
Wednesday, September 2, 2026
Saturday, July 18, 2026
The 2026 Election, 16th Edition. The skeptical eye edition.
July 11, 2026
As we head into the final days of the primary election, which for most offices is, unfortunately, the election, we here in Wyoming are being subjected to a daily bombardment of election propaganda crap, most of which assumes that if Donald Trump bent over and pulled his oversize trousers down, you'd gleefully kiss his big white ass.
And that's exactly what most of the candidates for Congress are doing.
Having said that, either election fatigue or the rise of local issues is baffling a few.
For the House, Chuck Gray is flopping around like a carp thrown out on the beach looking for something he thinks can outrage you into voting for the little rich carpetbagger whose never had to really work. Gadfly Reid Rasner, who doesn't stand a chance (and whose been mysteriously absent recently) actually seems to have hurt Chuck by calling him China Chuck. Chuck's most recently effort is to pretend to be horrified by birthright citizenship. Given as Trump sort of excused Graham Platner from rape accusations the other day, we can assume lil' Chuck is searching for a girlfriend to make accusations against him so that he can get a Trump accolade.
Foster Friess, another rich carpetbagger, has been running for the same position, Congressman, and has hit on the "I've never had to work a real job but you dumb fucks have to so I'm going to pretend that you want a job on the floor of an oil rig where you will get killed".
As noted, Rasner has just dropped off the screen.
And of course we have Florida cracker Frank Chapman on screen looking like his new cowboy boots hurt his feet and pretending to be one of us.
We can hope that Jillian Balow is getting some traction, as she seems by far the least objectionable Republican candidate for Congress. She also must be the least well funded of the good candidates as we don't see her campaign material nearly as often, unfortunately.
This isn't everyone running on the GOP ticket. Bo Biteman, of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus, Kevin Christensen, a vet who'd like to kiss Trump's big white ass, Richard Dodson, David Giralt and Keith Goodenough all are as well. Goodenough is the most interesting candidate in the race, having been a well know Natrona County candidate whose served in various offices, and who has served both as a Republican and Democrat.
If the primary election were today we would vote for, for Congress, Balow.
Democrats running for this office are Elena Del Real and Boomer Lisa Kinney. Kinney will win and then go down so badly in the general it'll leave a crater visible from space in her native Albany County.
If we were registered as Democrats and the primary was elected today, we'd just not vote either of these two obvious losers.
If the general election was held today, and we had our choice of candidates, we'd vote for Balow.
For the Senate seat, a propaganda flyer for Harriet Hageman came this week for the first time. That fact would suggest she doesn't figure she actually has to spend much money. Other candidates in that race are Jill Edwards, John Holtz, the gadfly Baby Boomer who just won't go away, Sam Mead and Jimmy Skovgard. Mead is by far the best candidate in this race but he faces an uphill battle against Hageman simply because she's in Congress.
If the primary election was held today we'd vote for Mead.
On the Democratic side Billy Benavidez is running against James Byrd. Byrd is a very good candidate and may be the best candidate in the entire race from either party. A Byrd v. Mead race would really serve the state.
If the primary election was held today and we were registered as Democrats, we'd vote for Byrd.
If the general election was held today and we had our choice of candidates, we're not sure what we'd do.
For Governor the race seems to have Eric Barlow, out in front. He's a very good candidate. Megan Degenfelder is running on having been Superintendent of Public Education and that Donald "Grab 'em by the Pussy" Trump has endorsed her. Brent Bien is running on the "I worked my entire life for the government (USMC) and hate the government ticket". A lot of WFC people like him as they're gullible and ignorant. The WFC has a flyer with Bien, Chuck and Hageman circling. A Curt Blake is also running.
If the primary election was held today we'd vote for Barlow.
On the Democratic side Ken Casner is running as the symbol of the dead Democratic Party in the state, as he's so old he may in fact have already passed on.
If the primary election was held today and we were registered as Democrats we'd scream in anger and refuse to fill out the ballot on this one.
If the general election was held today and we had our choice of candidates, we'd vote for Balow.
For Wyoming Secretary of State the GOP candidates are Jason Fearneyhough, Qwenton Eagle Oviatt, Rachel Rodriguez-Williams, Robert Short and Charles Young. Of these candidates, right now, the only ones I know anything about are carpetbagger Rodriguez-Williams, an odd man off Hispanic in the Wyoming Fascist Caucus, and Robert Short, long time Converse County Commissioner.
If the primary was held today, we'd vote for Short, but we need to look into these candidates more.
For the Democrats, there's Bryan McCarty, whom we know nothing about.
If the general election was held today and we had our choice of candidates, right now it'd be Short, but we're not wedded to that position. We'd never vote for Rodriguez-Williams.
For Superintendent of Public Instruction the GOP race features Chad Auer, Steve Harshman and Thomas Kelly. Harsham is a long time teacher and educator and is by far the best choice on the GOP side. On the Democratic side Ana Cordova and Sergio Maldonado are running, both of whom are educators.
If the primary election was held today we'd vote for Harshman.
If the general election was held today we're not sure what we would do.
The primary will decide the Treasurer's race as only Republicans Curt Meier and Scott Smith are running. Meier will win.
In other races, we'd like to see Bear, Allemand, and Ide retired to private life. I.e, lose and lose badly.
In news from elsewhere, Graham Platner officially pulled out of the race, but with the least apologetic message ever.
Platner was, of course, lately accused of rape and had some troubling aspects to him early on. The rape accusations, however, were a bridge too far for Democrats, thankfully.
One of the main aspects of the Platner saga has been the degree to which it really exposed the hypocrisy of the GOP, which started off by attempting to mount the high horse of morality which was bucking wildly. A party that has "Grab em by the Pussy" "I went to Epstein Island but didn't notice it was rapey" Trump and a host of other moral creeps can't really be complaining about morality When the Democrats in fact demanded that Platner drop out that left them in a bit of a pickle as they got what they were urging but, by extension, that means they have to clear out the bordello in order to have any moral credibility, which they aren't going to do.
Indeed, Donald Trump came to Platner's defense, noting that sometimes the accusatrixes are fibbers, which sometimes they indeed are. His point is, of course, that he's maintained all along he's not a moral creep and his female accusers are lying. It's pretty clear not all of them are lying about what they accuse Trump of, but at any rate he came to Platner's defense. It'd have been amusing if Trump had endorsed Platner, which I could actually see sort of happening. In a weird sort of way, Platner is what J. D. Vance once was, but with a side order of massively problematic personal issues.
July 12, 2026
U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham passed away yesterday at the age of 71. Once a staunch opponent of Donald Trump, during Trump's first administration he became a strong supporter. In recent years, almost pathetically so.
Gov. Henry McMaster will appoint a temporary replacement. He has absolute discretion, but he's a Republican and will choose a Republican. He's also a strong Trump supporter.
Graham was facting Dr. Annie Andrews who stood a strong chance of defeating him. His death makes it likely that his successor will prevail in the fall.
It seems quite likely that Graham died of a heart attack. He was two years older than his father was when his father died the same way. That event left him raising his 13 year old sister, as his mother had already passed away.
He attended university while raising his sister on an ROTC scholarship and served after law school in the USAF. After his active duty career he continued to serve in the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve. He was always a JAG officer. He was a government attorney for local municipalities briefly before entering Congress in 1994. In his first race, he was supported by Strom Thurmond.
Graham never married.
July 14, 2026
The Governor of South Carolina appointed Darline Graham Nordone, the sister of the late Senator, as his replacement for the balance of his term. She is unlikely to run for the seat, which is up this term.
Quite a few contenders are lining up to compete for it, with some Nancy Mace practically begging for the seat while pretending that she's being begged to take it.
Closer to home, Chuck Gray (who's never been married and for whom there's no known current or former known former love interest) is complaining about a something gadfly Reid Rasner (who has been married, and divorced, to a man) said in Rasner's doomed campaign.
According to the Cowboy State Daily:
That upset Chuck who likes to run around calling people names but doesn't like to be picked on. The Daily reached out to Chuck's father who replied, “Clearly I support my son, Chuck Gray, 100% - and he’s going to win, Reid Rasner is a very troubled individual. Chuck Gray for Congress.”
What seems to be the case is that the elder Gray liked some of Rasner's Facebook posts, which is a pretty good reason to question his political leanings, although they frankly are pretty similar to his son's.
The Gray v. Rasner fight is one that Gray, frankly, deserves. Rasner is a gadfly, with a campaign so wacky that some have questioned if its a comedy act, but his views aren't really very far from Gray's, which ought to be regarded as comedic.
cont:
Donald Trump is schedule for a television appearance this Thursday which appears to be part of his pathetic fable that he won the 2020 election he lost, and as part of his push for the Stop Americans from Voting Act.
The gullible will no doubt listen to whatever stream of lies he spouts.
July 15, 2026
Early and absentee voting for the primaries starts on July 21 and ends on Aug. 17.
Primary election day is Tuesday, Aug. 18.
I usually try to vote early since the county decided to consolidate a bunch of voting locations into one, at the Fairgrounds. I frankly don't appreciate that much.
It was for paranoid security concerns.
A Miller article:
Horses, hats and political propaganda as Wyoming prepares to vote
Miller is spot on. We are in the hats, boots and horses season, with politicians who don't normally wear Western togs, and probably fear horses, get photographed like they're appearing in Lonesome Dove.
July 16, 2026
Right up until now he was proclaiming his innocence and claiming policy abuse:
I don't hold the DUI against him. Lots of people end up having a one off conviction for this, although you surely should not drink and drive.
No, I do hold the diehard claim of innocence and police misconduct against him, and his lawyer.
And frankly his WFC views.
Don't vote for this guy, there's no reason to.
Nor should you vote for his diehard defender Rozmaring Czaban. Czaban has an Allemand apologist role the same way that Trump cabinet members have to Trump. I don't know what the deal is, but Czaban, a candidate for Natrona County Commissioner was defending Alleman as late as earlier this week.
There are a lot of good candidates for Natrona County Commissioner. She isn't one.
Tonight, unfortunately at the same time as the demented fascist seeks to justify stealing elections:
And also:
July 7, 2026
In an effort to steal the 2026 election and undermine democracy, Donald Trump, a demented narcissist whose occupancy of the White House is itself illegal and illegitimate, delivered a broadcast which attempted to show that, basically, China had tried to influence the news, but which instead showed that Russia had, and in his favor.
Trump is a traitor to the country and the 25th Amendment or an impeachment, or just a declaratory judgment action demonstrating that he's legally unqualified for the office, should be undertaken immediately.
Anyone claiming to be endorsed by him, or seeking office to support his efforts, is supporting a traitor and should not be voted for.
Republican Party Campaign Poster.
And while Der Fibber was seeking to create a fable, this was included in his release:
Oh my.
An example of somebody who should not be voted for:
Republicans with lots of self bucks:
Republicans who aren't Dixiecrats or Fascists:
July 18, 2026
This edition is only a week old, and it's already uncomfortably large, so we'll close it out and move on to the next one.
Related threads:
Last edition:
The 2026 Election, 15th Edition. Trump will attempt to steal the election.
Labels: 2020s, 2026, 2026 Election, 2027, Chuck Gray, Conspiracy Theories, Donald Trump, Harriet Hageman, John Barrasso, The Second Trump Administration
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