Will the mutant elephants hijack another legislative session?

If you happen to be at the state Capitol during the coming session, you are likely to encounter mutant elephants in the hallways, restrooms and chambers. Although their footprint on the legislative process is immense, their presence goes mostly unnoticed by the voting public. They appear mild-mannered but are actually quite dangerous. 

Mutant elephants have the bodies of elephants but the heads of donkeys. They are Republicans who have grown Democrat heads. A political evolutionary marvel, perhaps caused by ingesting toxic amounts of socialist junk food, combined with diets deficient in the ideas of liberty. Or maybe it’s just cultural conformity and establishment political ambition that leads to this bizarre cross-breeding with genetic opposites?   

Exactly where to draw the biological line is debatable, but approximately 30% of legislative Republicans appear to have mutated. With some, the ears are longer and the hee-haw is louder, making them more easily recognized. But beware of them all. They move as a herd and trample our freedoms just as effectively as the pure strain donkeys they run with. After Jan. 6, they will be at it again. 

Meanwhile, mutant donkeys with elephant heads are an extinct species, that haven’t been spotted for 40 or 50 years. 

Fundamentally, there are two philosophies of government, historically represented by the two major parties.  One concept – often called “The American Idea” established by our founders, insists that freedom is the birthright of all people, that our natural rights are bestowed by God and that the primary purpose of government is to protect and secure those rights – as stated in the Declaration of Independence. This is the philosophy of small government and big people – of humanity left free to achieve incredible and miraculous things. It is the philosophy that trusts freedom, thereby limiting the scope and powers of government within its constitutional bounds.   

Such are the core conservative beliefs of the traditional Republican Party, resulting in a legislative advocacy that empowers the individual through free markets, open competition, consumer choice, private property rights, lower taxes, educational liberty and uncensored, unintimidated free speech.  

By contrast, the government model of the Democrat Party stands consistently in opposition to these concepts and envisions an aggressive and growing government that provides a solution for most everything.  Talk to any well-meaning Democrat politician and you’ll pick up on this immediately. It is the ideology of liberalism -- of prideful politics, that ultimately leads to human degradation and economic ruin. 

However, you would be wrong to assume that the Montana Legislature is a forum for these competing ideas of the two parties. You would also be mistaken to assume that the heavily Republican numerical majority in recent sessions has translated into many conservative victories.   

For the 47-plus years I’ve lived in Montana, there has never been an actual conservative majority in the legislature. Why? Because the donkeys all vote as donkeys, while at least one-fourth of the elephants – elected as Republicans -- consistently join the Democrats to sabotage strong conservative legislation, working instead to pass Democrat-inspired big government bills. Yes, it is a travesty of which few GOP voters are aware. We keep thinking we are electing Republicans. 

It's no surprise that the mutant elephants have organized themselves into something called The Solutions Caucus.  A more accurate name would be The Government Solutions Caucus, patterned after the Democrat approach to public policy, believing that all issues require government solutions.  Hereafter, they should be referred to that way. 

Until the next election cycle, we will be confronting even more big government Republicans than in 2023, thanks to the active role of Gov. Greg Gianforte, targeting the conservative Republicans for defeat with his public endorsements. This in turn encouraged hundreds of thousands in out-of-state PAC donations to flow to the mutants. That’s what we are dealing with. 

The one hope is that organizations like MCA (which is planning a new website to regularly track the votes of GOP legislators) will hold the mutant elephants’ big feet to the fire and motivate their constituents to fiercely communicate their disapproval. Come primary time, the true elephants who mistakenly elected these people will not forget.

Roger Koopman is president of Montana Conservative Alliance. He served four years in the Montana House and eight years as a Montana Public Service commissioner.