Dad replies with a note on voter initiatives in Montana:

We had several initiatives on our ballot, also. There were several more but the Montana Supreme Court threw out the ones that had been foisted on us by some whacko neo-cons, because of widespread fraud in the signature-gathering process. One of the initiatives that happily passed was an increase in the Montana minimum wage–a buck higher than the current Federal minimum. That won by about 80-20. A sticking point in that one was that it calls for annual adjustments in the minimum wage based on the Consumer Price Index. The Republicans who managed to kill a minimum wage increase in the last legislative session will have lots of time to contemplate the sins of killing good legislation, because they could have gotten it pushed through without the CPI thing and bragged about how they helped working class Montanans. Now all they have is egg on their face and if the restaurant industry, who really fought the wage increase, thinks about it, they should remember who they got to this point.

Glad to hear you’re going to stay in the U.S.