Opinion

There was a time early in our marriage where we traveled with a Bible teacher and provided music for his meetings. Actually he was the vice president of our Bible college and beloved by the entire student body.

One year ago this week, I attended the inauguration of President Biden and Vice President Harris. While I was deeply disappointed in the election process and its outcome, President Biden campaigned as a centrist who wanted to unite our country, defeat COVID, and improve America’s standing in the world. When he took office, I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Instead, President Biden and his administration immediately began implementing a left-wing agenda out of touch with suffering Americans. In my subsequent weekly column, I criticized President Biden for signing a series of executive orders which undermined the rule of law, made life more difficult for American families, and trivialized China’s malfeasance. Unfortunately, the decisions began a pattern which continues today.

Like many Nebraskans, I’ve been to Lake Okoboji in Iowa, which is why I must smile about a special legislative committee’s proposal to build a lake in Eastern Nebraska to rival that lake. The Legislature’s Statewide Tourism and Recreational Water Access and Resource Sustainability (STAR WARS) special committee says the Nebraska version would span 4,000 acres, reach 30 feet or so deep, and stretch seven miles.

The most heinous crimes often target vulnerable members of our society. To protect our innocent, Nebraska is hard at work to expose human trafficking and root it out of the Good Life.

In August 2020, our nation marked the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment’s ratification, which gave women the right to vote. This was the final victory in a decades-long struggle by these visionary reformers.

When I was sworn in as a Nebraska state senator in January 2017, I said that “I will support the Constitution of the United States, and the Constitution of the State of Nebraska, and will faithfully discharge the duties of senator according to the best of my ability.”

With 1.4 billion consumers, China is a place with abundant potential. China also is ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, a longtime belligerent which enslaves its own people, steals intellectual and tangible property, and flouts fundamental values like national sovereignty, free enterprise, democracy, and the rule of law around the world. While Congress has taken several small steps to restrain China this year, including passing the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act which bans products made with slave labor in China’s Xinjiang region, the Biden Administration is failing to more directly confront China’s aggression.

Remember local control? It seems some state Senators have forgotten, and they’re all Republicans. State Sen.

Major Stephen Long described the Plains as the “Great American Desert” when his expedition studied our region in 1820. “It is almost wholly unfit for cultivation, and of course, uninhabitable by a people depending upon agriculture for their subsistence,” wrote his group’s geographer. Fast forward 200 years, and Nebraska has developed into a global powerhouse of agricultural production. We rank #1 in the nation in agricultural cash receipts per capita.

Students who want to serve their country as officers in the military can apply to the U.S. Military Academy, the Naval Academy, the Air Force Academy, the Coast Guard Academy, or the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. Applicants need excellent grades, solid test scores, and with the exception of the Coast Guard Academy, a nomination from their senator or representative.