Isn’t it just swell that John Driscoll, the no-show Democratic candidate in Montana’s Second Congressional District election, took the time to inform voters that if elected he would work to ensure U.S. nuclear weapons would not be used in a first-strike manner unless approved by Congress.

What’s puzzling is that the Sept. 11 Billings Gazette opted to print his nothing-burger musings when every inch of newsprint is increasingly valuable as we near the Nov. 5 election.

You see, it is not an issue Driscoll will face anytime for the rest of his life because he essentially folded his congressional-campaign tent the day he filed to run, planning not to spend more than $5,000 to promote his candidacy.

In a very real sense, veteran politician Driscoll robbed Eastern Montana.

His vanity won over common sense in choosing a low-budget campaign in the apparent belief that he is well-enough known and admired that he would win. But as the song by Taj Mahal goes, Republican Troy Downing has secured “A Cake Walk into Town.” 

Holly Michels, chief of the Lee State Bureau in Helena, correctly wrote on Sept. 1 that the election is effectively over.

Voters in Eastern Montana were robbed of the opportunity to witness a vigorous contest with a focus on issues affecting our part of the state. We got only crickets.

True, any Democrat faced a huge obstacle in opposing the Trump-endorsed, well-financed (including his own money), Afghanistan veteran and incumbent state government officer Troy Downing. 

Driscoll gained 13,317 votes in the Democrat primary election, closely followed by Broadus rancher Steve Held with 10,583 and Billings resident Ming Cabrera with 8,341 – Cabrera with perhaps the most-germane qualifications and experience for the position.

Downing, replicating Matt Rosendale’s opportunistic moves to state Insurance Commissioner and then the U.S. House, trounced his eight competitors in the Republican primary. Several factors favored Downing– an endorsement from Donald Trump whom he once opposed and support from Republicans Gov. Greg Gianforte, First District Rep. Ryan Zinke and junior U.S. Sen. Steve Daines.

Downing’s dominant campaign ad recited his credentials as an Air Force veteran who enlisted after 9/11 and served in Afghanistan. But his role wasn’t exactly clear: The ad projected an image of an Air Force pilot in a flight suit wearing Tom Cruise sunglasses with a jet in the background. 

A closer look reveals private-pilot Downing wearing his civilian Nomex flight suit sporting a patch advertising YAHOO, which in 1998 purchased his technology company. Behind him is his personal Czech L39 jet trainer. Just slightly deceptive — he was never an Air Force pilot.

Instead, Downing enlisted as an airman basic in the California Air National Guard’s 129th Air Rescue Squadron, not the Air Force per se. Nonetheless, he is an Air Force veteran since the ANG is a component of the active Air Force and deserves commendation for his patriotism and honorable service. He went on two combat deployments to Afghanistan with his Air Guard unit as a helicopter flight engineer. Back in the States as a “traditional Guardsman,” Downing had time to build a commercial real estate company and a securities company, he recently told the Explore the Big Sky publication. 

Facts also were a little blurry in 2018 when he was fined $2,110 and lost hunting privileges for illegally securing a resident hunting license as a non-resident. Downing argued that the case was based on mistakes made by accountants who prepared his income tax returns. 

Downing, a native Californian, likely would have faced direct questioning about his biography as he would have fairly inquired of Driscoll who has been politically active since 1972.

However, it looks like Downing will get a pass on tougher questions from a would-be feisty opponent. To date, he has been successfully vague: National abortion ban? Raising tariffs? An immigration policy beyond building a wall? Aid to Ukraine? Concern with Russian aggression? Eliminate the federal departments of Education and Homeland Security? Repeal of the Affordable Care Act? Investment in alternative energy? And the list goes on.

Downing is to become one of only four people in Washington working for and representing Montanans. He should have to work for that responsibility and honor beyond simple self-promotion.

Instead, Driscoll gave him a cake walk into Congress.

Peter D. Fox of Big Timber spent 25 years as daily newspaper editor and journalist in Wisconsin and Montana including the Billings Gazette. He later served as a Wisconsin cabinet secretary, an officer with the University of Wisconsin System, and as a non-profit executive. After four years active duty in the U.S. Army Security Agency 1967-1971, and went on to serve 25 years in the Army National Guard. He retired as a colonel in 2004.

It’s not very often in MMA both fighters win, but that was the rare case in a recent bout in Great Falls, Mont.

Justin Jaynes wasn’t the announced winner on Sept. 21, though he walked away one.

That night at a Fusion Fight League event, Jaynes faced off with longtime MMA super fan Bryan Chapel, who “finished” the UFC veteran midway through Round 2.

Chapel is a 46-year-old man with an intellectual disability who has become a pillar of his local Montana community. He works as a bagger at an Albertsons grocery store. A chance encounter between Jaynes and Chapel couldn’t have come at a more coincidental time.

“It was kind of a weird thing,” Jaynes told MMA Junkie on Friday. “I was at home, just like any normal night. I’m watching Netflix just like anybody else would be. I came across the movie called ‘Peanut Butter Falcon.’ It has Shia Labeouf in it. It’s a really good. This kid who has Down syndrome runs away from a hospital that he’s staying at, and he comes across Shia Labeouf, who is kind of like a vigilante. They end up becoming buddies. The guy is like, ‘It’s my dream to become a professional wrestler.’ Shia Labeouf essentially trains him. In the movie, he has his first wrestling match and it’s the greatest thing ever. Now, mind you five days later, I meet Bryan.”

Chapel’s dream has long been to compete against a UFC athlete, so when the two met at an afterparty for an event Jaynes was commentating, the wheels were put in motion.

“I go to get paid, and I meet Bryan,” Jaynes said. “Bryan and I are talking about how he wants to fight and he trains and this and that. It’s his dream to fight a UFC fighter and someone who’s been in the UFC, not just a fighter. He said specifically a UFC fight.

“The promoter, Terrill (Bracken), he’s like, ‘Well, you know he fights in the UFC?’ He’s like, ‘We should fight sometime.’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, we should do it.’ Terrill’s got this crooked look on his face. Bryan walks away, and I’m like, ‘Terrill, this is something we can really put together.’”

Incase u missed my fight last weekend ❤️ pic.twitter.com/poYn2w7lHM

— Justin Jaynes (@JustinJaynesMMA) September 25, 2024

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For as long as he can remember, Jaynes has aspired to be a WWE wrestler, though his biggest athletic successes came during his five-fight stretch in the UFC. The opportunity to take bumps and sell judo throws (which he did emphatically during one sequence in the fight) while making someone’s life better was too much to turn down.

Chapel defeated Jaynes early in the second round with strikes and jumped with joy, both hands pumping to the sky, after the stoppage came. Jaynes had a flash back, as the elation-filled celebration played out, to an event with much different circumstances – but all the same feelings.

“I experienced the greatest moment of my life when I knocked Frank Camacho out,” Jaynes said. “When Bryan gets up and the referee jumps in and waves his hands and Bryan starts jumping up in the air and throwing his hands up in the air, I can relate to that moment. If anybody ever has the chance to give somebody that moment, help them do that.

“… My UFC career didn’t go how I thought it was going to go. It didn’t go how I wanted it to go. I felt like I was put in unfortunate circumstances. But I did have the opportunity. If there’s anything positive I can do to help people feel how I felt on June 20, 2020. That’s what my main goal is now.”

Image via Fusion Fight League

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That night, the goal was certainly achieved by Jaynes, who said he was approached in the back by a tearful Chapel after the match.

“I went back in the dressing room, he’s crying in the back,” Jaynes said. “He comes up to me and he puts his arms around me. He’s like, ‘I’m so sorry I had to beat you up so bad, but this was the best day of my life.’”

That’s how Jaynes knew while Chapel was declared the winner – the true result was a double victory.

“That’s worth his weight in gold to me, man.”

The man charged with intentionally killing a 70-year-old motorcyclist Tuesday in a road rage incident near Belfry appeared in court in Cody, Wyoming, on Friday in two different hearings for two different crimes.

Michael Gambale, 47, lived in a Cody up until the time of an incident last year when he was arrested. He asked in court to waive extradition and return to Montana.

He now lists a Billings address for mailing. 

Neighbors say he kept to himself and he was fairly quiet.

Carbon County Attorney Alex Nixon alleges that Gambale crashed his car into a motorcycle intentionally, killing a man on Highway 72 just south of Belfry on Tuesday.

Gambale faces charges of one count of deliberate homicide and three counts of attempted deliberate homicide for attempting to run other motorcyclists off the road.

A Park County, Wyoming, district judge agreed with the prosecution’s recommendation of a $1 million bond for the Montana case.

Gambale faced another complaint from the county attorney that he wasn’t following the orders of his probation stemming from a different case.

Revis White, Gambale’s attorney, said the prosecution Gambale was not reporting to the Veterans Administration in Sheridan, about his medication.

“That’s what they believed, but nobody followed up with anything since February,” White said.

White argued that it’s possible for Gambale to have not reported to the VA, but he also took his medications.

Gambale was and will continue serving a probation sentence for an incident that happened in November of 2023.

He pleaded no contest to shooting arrows up to 350 yards onto the runway of the Cody Airport.

Court documents state that the bolts were short thick arrows used with crossbows and air bolt guns and potentially could cause damage to aircraft tires.

Gambale was arrested on a probation violation on Sept. 17 and released on bond just days prior to the road rage events.

His neighbors say they saw him pacing along the fence the day of the airport incident.

They say he served in the military, was quiet and needed help.

Soon he will be in Montana.

“He will be incarcerated at least short term in Carbon County and so for intents and purposes, the Wyoming case is effectively done,” Revis said. “It’s certainly the small piece of the puzzle at this point.”