A hot stove, one of the many unpleasant places where I do not have to work

As we enter week three of remodeling at my rented house, it seems like a good time to remember that working from home on a computer—even with nail guns going off everywhere—is  awesome compared to historical models of human work. My laptop does not emit searing heat or suck my fingers into belts. Except when I instruct it accordingly via Spotify, it does not make a deafening noise. As I write this, I am working from the sofa and not a poorly-ventilated factory where I also live. I live and work in a poorly-ventilated house! My point is that being a freelance writer is really easy and pleasurable in the grand scheme of work, and I should not complain even though I had to work yesterday, too. Corollary: you should not complain even though there is no blog today, because I’ve had to work my ass off this morning and all you have to do is read. I assume you read Combat! blog from a Starbucks on the beach and not from an office or whatever. Anyway, you might read this article by Ezra Klein on the new Vox website about how our ability to think clearly actually goes down when we’re thinking about stuff related to our political beliefs. Or you can read Matthew Yglesias’s humorously enraged rant about Amtrak boarding policy. Or you can read this paragraph over again and imagine me whispering it in your ear as I gently gather your hair behind your neck. My phone buzzes, but I don’t even look at it for like, several seconds.

Montana Senate Majority Leader Jason Priest (R–Billings) in soft light

First of all, what happened to Jason Priest’s shoulders in this photograph? He looks like he was in a Delorean accident that prevented his mother from falling in love with his father. Second, what happened to the charging documents in the Billings Gazette story about Priest’s arraignment for allegedly throwing his toddler and beating his wife’s boyfriend? It looks like editor Darrel Erhlick didn’t run them because they featured a state senator saying the c-word. That can’t be it, though, because knowing Priest used British language with his wife cannot possibly damage his reputation more than knowing he (allegedly) committed a domestic assault, right? The good news is that all charging documents have vanished from crime stories on the Gazette site since Erhlick’s explanation. The bad news is that Lee papers seem more conspicuously in the pocket of the Republican Party than Montanans imagined. You can read all about it in my column for the Missoula Independent, which is what you get instead of a blog today. Maybe if you fudging coconuts stopped acting like white trash in front of the house, I’d treat you nicer.

Montana Senate Majority Leader Art Wittich (R-Bozeman) reads a non-Bible book.

The cutline under that photo will not be accurate for long. After mistakenly filing his candidacy for a Senate seat that was not up for election this year, 2013 Senate Majority Leader Art Wittich has filed for House District 68 in Belgrade, where he will conveniently not face a primary opponent. Election season is nigh upon us, and the Montana GOP is in throes. Self-described “business Republicans” have organized an insurrection against the Tea Party wing, mounting as many primary challenges as they can against the people who brought you a 2013 proposal to pay state legislators in gold coins. Meanwhile, the Montana Democratic Party can barely contain its glee, the elation in its war room threatening to disturb the other patrons at IHOP. Montana is a tough place for a Democrat, partly because of its many bright-red districts and partly because state Dems have pinned their hopes on Republican infighting. You can read all about it in this week’s column in the Missoula Independent, which is what you get today instead of a blog. We’ll be back tomorrow with Friday links.