State legislators in the Flathead Valley are — like the former governor himself — unsurprised by the Montana Republican Party’s public break up with Marc Racicot. The two-term Republican governor, who served from 1993 to 2001, earned a formal rebuke from the state party organization’s executive committee on Feb. 15. The decision comes after Racicot endorsed a series of Democrats in recent state and national elections, party leadership said. “It was a difference between party platforms and principles and I decided I would choose principles,” Racicot said last week. The former governor said he was unfazed by a text from...