Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
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Until recently, to even mention you had seen a U.F.O. got you public and private ridicule and branded as some tinfoil-hat-wearing lunatic who read too many comic books and watched too many science fiction movies. But now, suddenly, not only are such reports being taken seriously, but agencies of the federal government are preparing to release (at the direction of congress) what they know about Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon (UAP-with plural Phenomena interchangeable). Yes, the subject is so...
My priority bill for this year has made its way out of committee and onto General File. LR 11CA is my resolution for a constitutional amendment to repeal the State income tax, the property tax, the State sales tax and the inheritance tax and to replace these taxes with a consumption tax. Last week Speaker Hilgers announced that he would begin floor debates on taxation bills beginning the week of April 26. LR 11CA will likely be put on the agenda sometime that week. We have been making great...
“When I was fifteen years old, I traveled the country giving speeches about the Constitution at American Legion halls for prize money. This was a scheme invented by my mom, a debate coach, to help pay for college. I would travel to big cities like Denver and Fresno, and win a bunch of money.” Those are the words of Heidi Schreck, a fast-talking, loud actress, at the beginning of her 2019 smash Broadway play, “What the Constitution Means to Me,” that she wrote and stars in. She re-enacts that te...
What does the federal government’s 30X30 plan actually do? Today I would like to clarify what the 30X30 plan actually does and tell you why it is a very bad idea. On January 27, 2021 President Biden signed Executive Order #14008 entitled, “Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad”. In Section 216 of that Executive Order, President Biden directed the Secretary of the Interior along with the Secretary of Agriculture, and other senior officials, to develop a plan to conserve at least 30 percent of the lands and waterways in the United State...
I am writing as a point of needed clarification. Over the preceding months, there have been repeated stories and letters to editors with incorrect understanding. Nebraska did not join the Texas election lawsuit last December. Nebraska joined an amicus brief highlighting important separation-of-powers issues under Article II of the U.S. Constitution for the Court to consider. The Supreme Court voted 7-2 in choosing not to hear the matter, and the issue is closed. Douglas J. Peterson Nebraska Attorney General...
The local community, and Western Nebraska Community College’s Sidney aviation program specifically, was struck hard recently. Make no mistake. This will be a difficult journey. The aviation program is a tight-knit crew of students fascinated with the many skills associated with flight. Visiting one of their fly-in breakfasts for pilots, I felt like I was invited to a community gathering, something almost family-like. Even those who bordered on “dysfunctional” put fun in the word. They were...
In 1976, I graduated from high school and was getting ready to go to a Christian college in Oklahoma. I grew up believing in God, church and the Bible and wanted to be a preacher and teacher of the Word. I had a few months to go before I left for college and so I got a job working at McDonalds. One day I was standing at the counter taking and handing out orders and the lobby was full of customers. As I was waiting on one customer, I noticed an elderly lady enter and began working her way up to t...
President Biden last week unveiled a number of executive orders he says will begin his effort to institute “common sense” gun regulations. In reality, his orders will do nothing to stop criminals from getting guns, and are just a first step in disarming law-abiding American citizens. Mr. Biden echoed a mantra ceaselessly bloviated by leftists that he will “close the gun show loophole.” Fact check: there is no such thing as a gun show loophole. Every gun show I’ve been to, and there have been...
On January 27 of this year, President Joe Biden signed an executive order called “Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad.” You can read it online, but direct your attention to Section 216 in which the Secretaries of Interior, Commerce and Agriculture are directed to submit a plan by the end of April to “conserve” 30 percent of America’s land and territorial waters by 2030. This is just part of a global initiative related to U.N. Agendas 2030 and 2050, which are not conspiracy theories...
I remember the time when the Easter season meant the television media would overload viewers with visions of artificial green grass, the sound of clucking, colorful eggs and the camera panning to the sight of a rabbit sitting contently, appearing to be chewing on grass. It is such a disjointed scene few could forget it. There’s the sound of a hen, the view of an egg — artistically overdone — and the rabbit laying in field of green plastic. I’m thinking of the awkward collision of concepts. I kno...
I never thought I would see the day when America would follow in the steps of Nazi Germany when they burned “banned books” by the thousands. We haven’t quite reached that level of fanaticism – yet. But it sure looks like our current national leadership is trending in that direction. I hope and pray the following never becomes a reality. The scene: We stand in front of a blazing pyramid of books outside of an empty library building. A man stands in front, with tears in his eyes as he recites...
Last week my priority bill for this year was voted out of committee. The Revenue Committee voted 6-2 to advance LR11CA to General File. LR11CA is my resolution for a constitutional amendment to repeal the State income tax, the State sales tax, the property tax, and the inheritance tax, and to replace all of these taxes with a consumption tax. The consumption tax would tax all services and new goods. Used goods would never be taxed. The consumption tax only taxes an item once, then it is yours to...
President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. took office a little over two months ago. In his inaugural address, President Biden dedicated himself to “bringing America together.” In the weeks since then, he has charted a very different course. Instead of governing by building consensus, he has aggressively pushed a far-left agenda. He refused to compromise with Republicans on stimulus legislation. Instead, he signed a coronavirus spending package that bailed out Blue states at the expense of states like Nebra...
Last week we had yet another indication the Biden administration is woefully ignorant about life in rural America. Pete Buttigieg, the new U.S. Transportation Secretary, expressed support for a new tax to make vehicle owners pay for each mile they drive. In an interview on CNBC Buttigieg said, “If we believe in that so-called user pays principle, the idea that part of how we pay for roads is you pay based on how much you drive, the gas tax used to be the obvious way to do it, it’s not any...
The shooting at a Colorado grocery store is tragic. That we should all agree on. It is tragic to start with because any violent loss of life has more than one victim, for a time at least. It is socially tragic because assaults in public places continue to strip away the sense of safety in society. We can dissect the situation by gender, political ideology, race, anger issues, religion, or even gun availability. Any one of these issues leaves many questions unanswered. Maybe incidents like this...
In an earlier article I used George Orwell’s novel “1984” as the basis of my thought process. Two years before George Orwell wrote “1984” (in 1945) he wrote a novella entitled “Animal Farm.” “Animal Farm” was an allegory of the Russian Revolution of 1917. At that time, a power- hungry Tsar ruled over the Bolshevik people of Russia, making their lives miserable. The Bolsheviks revolted against his tyranny. Some have claimed that the moral of this novella was: “power corrupts, absolute power corr...
The Nebraska Legislature is halfway through its 2021 session. Senators are working on passing a budget that controls spending and delivers on Nebraskans’ top priority — property tax relief. The Unicameral is also working to achieve other important objectives like providing veterans tax relief, replacing the crumbling Nebraska State Penitentiary, and expanding our state’s broadband infrastructure. At this halfway point in the legislative session, Senators are sorting the worthwhile bills from the...
The most important principle of communism is the abolition of private property. When Karl Marx and Fredrick Engels wrote the Communist Manifesto back in 1847 they declared the first principle of communism to be the “abolition of land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.” Today we are seeing this principle being implemented in a very large way. On January 27, 2021 President Joe Biden issued Executive Order 14008, which is known as the Tackling the Climate Change Crisis at Hom...
For those who do not recognize the reference in the title, it is taken from a song by Napoleon XIV, the pseudonym of Jerry Samuels, who had a one-hit wonder in 1966 with his novelty song, “They’re Coming to Take Me Away Ha-Haaa!” His nom de plume, for his series of mental illness songs was a play on the names of Napoleon I and King Louis XIV. Samuels used these songs to make some humorous, yet astute observations about life in the 1960s and beyond. The second stanza of the song should be a fam...
I know I am not the first person to say that the pandemic has changed many things about our daily lives. In some cases, such as mask-wearing and social distancing, these changes are temporary and would never have happened if COVID-19 had not come to the United States last year. But in other cases, the past year has simply accelerated permanent changes that were already taking place. One of the most striking examples of this second type of change can be seen in medicine. Even before the pandemic...
Two weeks ago, there appeared in “The New York Times Book Review” a review of Derk DelGaudio’s just-published memoir, Amoralman: A True Story, and Other Lies, even though he says, “It is not a memoir.” Rather, he says, “I had a story to tell about my days as a bust-out dealer, hired to cheat card players at a series of high-stakes poker games at a house in Beverly Hills. I told the story through a memoir.” In the the first half of the book, Derek tells of his early years growing up in Colorad...
I was recently asked to fill out a law enforcement survey on hate crimes from a television broadcaster. I filled out their survey a short time after having gone through Nebraska’s mandated anti-bias and racism training that all law enforcement officers are required to take every year. During these trainings, I was basically told that as a white law enforcement officer, I am automatically racist and in all cases biased. I hate to break it to everyone, but we are all biased and I have even been t...
In 1947, a man named Eric Blair, better known by his pen name George Orwell, started a novel entitled “1984.” He described the novel in his own words as “a most dreadful mess.” This novel was published in 1949, the year I was born. Happy birthday to me! This novel was also made into a movie that I watched on television this past year. Eric Blair had a vision of things to come and at the same time a reminder of things that already had come. He saw not only the possibility but the reality of the...
Several years ago I read The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, the first in The Chronicles of Narnia series. Actually, that is probably when I reread the classic tale. Later I watched the movie. It is the kind of story that is overwhelmed with imagination and fantasy, and a handful of life lessons. I was struck by the imagination of the story line and of the children. A whole world of fantasy and adventure lie within the grey world of the rainy London estate where they were residing. All they...
ACE, the Public Alliance for Community Energy, will again be a competing natural gas supplier in the upcoming Nebraska Choice Gas selection period, which has been extended this year and runs from March 18 through April 22. Formed by Nebraska communities to ensure Nebraskans have a choice in their natural gas supplier, ACE remains true to its mission as the only community-owned and not-for-profit supplier in the program. Local control is the cornerstone of ACE. Each of the 75 ACE member communities, including Sidney, has a representative on...
