In what can only be called a shocking move, Steve Bullock virtually threw in the towel on his bid to become Montana’s next governor. By cancelling his participation in the first of a series of debates against the frontrunner, Republican Rick Hill, Bullock signaled that he had no hope of winning the election with his extremist, liberal, anti-jobs agenda. Bullock has communicated to the people of Montana that his unwavering support for the vastly unpopular ObamaCare and his vote against coal development, which is supported by over 80% of Montana’s voters, are insurmountable negatives in the contest against the pro-growth, responsible platform put forth by Hill and his running mate Jon Sonju.

Montana voters have come to expect the opportunity to take the measure of their statewide political candidates by virtue of head to head comparisons. Following the June 5 primary, both the Hill and Bullock campaign teams advocated taking their campaigns to the people.

Bullock proposed that they have eight debates — one each in the state’s largest cities of Billings, Bozeman, Butte, Great Falls, Helena, Kalispell and Missoula, plus one in Eastern Montana to focus on the needs of communities addressing energy development.

“There are strong differences between the way each of us would approach creating jobs in Montana, balancing our state’s budget and supporting our strong system of public education,” Bullock said. “And I believe voters deserve to understand our records of accomplishment, the policies we’re proposing and the values we’ll bring as Montana’s next chief executive.”

Hill said he looks forward to joining them in eight debates and added: “I anticipate that we will commit to even more.”

“It’s important that we give Montanans as many opportunities as possible to understand the difference in our accomplishments, our values, our policy proposals and our leadership opportunities,” Hill said.

The Republican nominee also suggested that each debate be set up as Lincoln-Douglas debates, where the candidates ask each other questions and answer them. That differs from the typical debate or forums in which a moderator or members of a panel ask the questions.

“This will assure an open and honest discussion of the issues, which will enable voters to better understand our differing visions for the future of our great state as well as address specific topics,” Hill said.

At some point during the ten weeks since the primary someone on his campaign staff explained the definition of “debate” to him and Stevie immediately headed for the executive washroom for a change of underwear. All this time, he was under the misguided perception that debate was synonymous with “oral interp” – a high school competitive speech event designed for those who want to become late-night infomercial spokespeople, where the most important skills are pretty hair and neatly knotted ties. Due to his receding hairline this a real challenge for Steve.

After much negotiation – consisting mostly of foot-stomping, whining, and holding his breath until his face turned blue on Steve’s part – the local sponsors and the TV station that had agreed to broadcast the event finally had enough of the temper tantrum and advised Bullock’s campaign that 90 minutes of mind-numbing prepared political pontificating would be even less entertaining than watching paint dry and they wanted no part of it. He had to agree to some kind of question/answer format with extemporaneous responses or they weren’t interested.

Although Bullock has amassed a somewhat larger war chest – largely because he didn’t have a credible opponent in the primary and didn’t have to compete for dollars or spend much during the primary season – his financial resources aren’t sufficient to give the Democrat candidate enough warm fuzzies to overcome the stark raving reality of his hugely unpopular progressive policies, extreme liberal values, comparative lack of experience, and relatively weak speaking prowess. Somewhere along the line Steve realized that his abilities were no match for his bravado and when his stalling tactics and unreasonable demands became too much for debate sponsors, he was left with two options: Put on his big-boy pants and play – or run and hide.

After careful thought and much consideration, it’s now obvious that the Democrats’ local golden boy has evaluated the situation and decided on the only logical course of action. He will be spending more quality time with his lovely family.