Author: Sandra Halvorson Reicks

Engaged couples: Seek more financial wisdom in marriage prep

God gave Solomon wisdom. For the rest of us, we have to get it the purely human way—through experiences and reflections.

We’re coming up on “wedding season.” It starts early summer and lasts until mid-fall. That means wedding preparation is in full swing for many couples. And preparing for a lifelong commitment might be a great time to bring in a little wisdom.  

It seems fewer are getting married these days.

The good news, though, is that the marriage rate has rebounded to its pre-pandemic level. According to the Institute for Family Studies, for every 1,000 unmarried adults, 34 tied the knot in 2022. The bad news is that it’s still down sharply from earlier eras. In 1970, 85 out of 1,000 made the commitment. 

There are a lot of reasons why the marriage rate has fallen, but one possibility is that couples are staring down the 50% divorce statistic and feeling cautious about taking the plunge. Couples may not be willing to roll the dice or may want to at least delay, delay, delay until feeling more confident about it.

Previous generations, perhaps many from that 1970s era, saw marriage as a leap of faith that also placed you within firm boundaries of commitment. Marriage was seen as a paradox. Unsure but sure. No guarantee of success, and yet with a solid commitment—there could only be success. 

It’s not helpful to pick apart either strategy, either delay, delay, delay or taking a leap of faith.

What is helpful for everyone is to better understand what leads to divorce. Maybe if that number went down, the marriage rate would go up.  

Christian organizations do their best to provide some type of marriage preparation. Typically, it’s about one full day of instruction and covers a variety of topics.

Not nearly enough time, though, is spent on the topic of money and how pervasively it affects a relationship.

According to a survey conducted by Ramsey Solutions, a leading company in financial education, money disagreements are the second leading cause of divorce, behind infidelity.

If money issues are causing so many problems in marriages, it would be wise to learn more about it during the engagement.

One thing that engaged couples have going for them today is easy access to information. Podcasts are one of those excellent resources. There are numerous financial podcasts. Search and find one that’s right for you.

But to give an example of how helpful a financial podcast can be for couples considering marriage, here’s a listing of a few episodes from the “The Ramsey Show Highlights.” Episodes are just 10 minutes long: “I Keep Committing Financial Infidelity,” “I Have So Much Stress from This,” “The Secret to Becoming More Disciplined,” “Pick A Side: Arguing About Buying a New Car.” “Why Do You Care What People Think?,” “There’s Your Way, Your Husband’s Way, and the Ramsey Way,” “This Is What Keeps People Middle Class,” “I Suffer from Spontaneous Emotional Spending,” “Am I Being Too Stingy?,” and “Do Not Do This Until You’re Married.”

Granted, it’s not the most romantic way to start or end date night. But if you’re in a serious relationship and any of these topics sound intriguing to you, ask your significant other to take 10 minutes with you to listen to and discuss some of these topics. It’s unlikely you’ll agree on everything, and that’s to be expected. You’re two unique individuals with your own opinions and thoughts—not a clone of the other. But having these conversations before the wedding helps. Neither one will be able to say, “I didn’t know that’s how you felt.”

Certainly, financial experts can be a great resource for helping couples understand money issues. But it’s good to remember that these individuals are also mere mortals. They can’t possibly deliver in 10 minutes the right advice, all the time, for all people, and all situations. The expert is not all-knowing. Only God has that title.  

But because we’re not Solomon and graced with wisdom, we have to find it where we can. Seek out a financial advice resource and use it. Your future marriage will thank you.   

Of course, as the statistics attest to there are no guarantees with marriages. Divorce is sometimes necessary when differences are irreconcilable. 

But the marital unit is still the bedrock of society. More and stronger marriages will help to keep this great country rolling along. You’ll be a lot happier, too.  

It does take work, but a little financial prep before walking down the aisle will pay dividends that last a lifetime.   

That’s wisdom.

We all enjoyed watching Caitlin Clark. That’s the lesson.

The best time to run on a treadmill is while watching the Summer Olympics. The 4×400 meter relay is my favorite. There’s something about the explosive speed of each fresh runner and the grit shown coming down the home stretch. No matter the event or outcome, I witness the heart of a champion at work. And it helps me to run all the faster on my treadmill. I get inspired.

We see somebody do something, and we realize we can do more.

Caitlin Clark, of the Iowa Hawkeyes basketball team, has taken us on a similar ride. By leading her team through the NCAA Tournament and reaching the championship round these past two years, she has inspired us in several ways—how to handle success with humility while traveling through the brackets and how to handle disappointment with grace when losing at the championship level.

She’s the “Man in the Arena.” In 1910, Theodore Roosevelt wrote, “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who shows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

Clark could have chosen the role of spectator. She could have been the one watching the game in a half-empty arena wondering why there wasn’t more interest in women’s college basketball.

But she wasn’t one to watch. She’s a doer.

She worked at the game of basketball from an early age. She honed her craft.

It’s said that it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at something. Clark began playing basketball when she was five years old. She’s 22 now. The math works out to an average of about 90 minutes each day during the last 17 years. Something tells me she probably hit that.

Through the fruits of her labor, she brought entertainment and joy to many.

She sold out arenas.

There’s a tension in life—watch and enjoy, but also work and reap.

We’re not all destined to be the next Caitlin Clark at whatever activity we enjoy most. There’s more than work ethic at play. Natural talent, attitude, intelligence, support, and in the case of a basketball player—height (Clark is six feet tall.)—all factor in.

But we can all maximize our potential. Whatever your skill set, whatever your interests, whatever your profession—participate in your life more than you watch someone else’s.

Now, more than ever, if this country is to retain its greatness it needs every citizen to reach for their potential. Get in the arena. Find your passion, and then try. Hard.

Passive existence isn’t good for the nation or the individual.

About 35 years before Roosevelt’s speech, Russian author Leo Tolstoy put the idea of “do more and watch less” a little more harshly in his novel, “Anna Karenina.” His fictional character, businessman Alexei Alexandrovich, laments the fascination of the masses with popular horse races of the times. “There are two sides—the performers and the spectators; and the love of such spectacles is the surest sign of low development in the spectators.”

Ouch.

Enjoy life. Seek entertainment. Honor a great basketball player. Or a skilled jockey. Or another athlete, actor, singer, writer, inventor or volunteer.  

But then realize that you, too, have something special to offer that can be achieved with determination and effort.

Roosevelt went on to state, “Self-restraint, self-mastery, common sense, the power of accepting individual responsibility and yet of acting in conjunction with others, courage and resolution—these are the qualities which mark a masterful people.”

He isn’t speaking about a singular superstar. “Masterful people” reflects a whole nation.

We can be those people. Clark showed the way.

But do we have the courage to be the hero or heroine of our own story?



The Word triumphs over every other word

There’s a lot going on in the country and our world: inflation, open borders, rampant crime, challenges in educating our children, the breakdown of the family unit, culture wars, increasing mental illness and suicide, addictions in the form of alcohol, drugs, food, gambling and social media, the national deficit, government corruption, the upcoming election and divisive politics, overboard obsessions with climate change, China’s relentless pursuit of overtaking the United States as a world power, Russia’s attack on Ukraine, the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel, and more. There’s much to write about, and it’s a sad list.  

But today is Easter Sunday. Nothing is bigger or better than the resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Because of Him, we can bear everything else. Especially today, it’s a time to recognize that the Word triumphs over every other word. Block out the noise and allow Him to speak to you.

Jesus is risen. Hallelujah.

A reading from the Acts of the Apostles.

Peter proceeded to speak and said: “You know what has happened all over Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power. He went about doing good and healing all those oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses of all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree. This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible, not to all the people, but to us, the witnesses chosen by God in advance, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commissioned us to preach to the people and testify that he is the one appointed by God as judge of the living and the dead. To him all the prophets bear witness, that everyone who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”

The Word of the Lord. Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

A reading from the Letter of Saint Paul to the Colossians.

Brothers and sisters: If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.

The Word of the Lord. Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

 A reading from the holy Gospel according to John.

On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb. So, she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them, “They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don’t know where they put him.” So, Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb. They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first; he bent down and saw the burial cloths there but did not go in. When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place. Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed. For they did not yet understand the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.

The Gospel of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

For now, rural America and electric vehicles are not a good fit

If you want to know what people think, just ask them. And don’t be surprised when their position is the exact opposite of what gets pushed in Washington D.C.

For example, here in rural America, nobody wants an electric vehicle.

Maybe “nobody” is too strong of a word. There are a lot of people in rural America.

But nobody I’ve talked to—and I like to talk—wants one.

There are a lot of wide open spaces in the Midwest. It can easily be a 30 mile roundtrip to a grocery store or a school. Any decent-sized shopping center or major hospital could be a 100-150 mile roundtrip.

And there just aren’t sufficient charging stations in the Midwest. S & P Global Mobility, provider of automotive data and analysis, estimated that charging stations must be quadrupled between 2022 and 2025 in order to conveniently handle the needs of electric vehicles on the road, and the number must increase eight-fold by 2030.

I recently purchased a vehicle from a nearby dealership that had zero electric vehicles on the lot. While he was completing the paperwork on my new-to-me 2020 Ford Edge Titanium, we talked about EVs. He recently took his family on a wonderful road trip with a standard internal combustion engine vehicle and saw a big chunk of this beautiful country. They left Northeast Iowa and headed toward Niagara Falls. From there, they went on to Acadia National Park in Maine. They traveled through the southern part of Canada and made their way back to Iowa. They had a great trip but were glad to get home. He had a job to get back to, and the family had other obligations. He’s a numbers guy and reflected on his trip, wondering how it would have gone with an electric vehicle. He retraced his path and identified where charging stations were available. Because of the limited range of EVs, the limited availability of charging stations, and the lengthy time requirement to charge, he figured his road trip would have taken an extra eight days to complete.

Nobody I know has eight vacation days to give to an electric vehicle.

The $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act passed by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden in 2021 includes $7.5 billion in subsidies for 500,000 new EV charging stations. For starters, 500,000 aren’t enough. But we just closed out 2023, and not a single station had been built yet.  

There’s a definite trust issue from Midwesterners when it comes to the federal government accomplishing infrastructure goals—even if you give it $1.2 trillion dollars.

Additionally, cold weather is hard on batteries. It’s the norm and not unusual for winter evenings to dip below zero. And anyone from the heartland will tell you that it’s a myth that winter lasts just three months. Snow can fall on Halloween and not end until Easter. That’s a lot of frustrating days being spent on electric vehicles. 

The electric vehicle may have its place, but it doesn’t need to be every place.

The Department of Energy reports that the top three states with electric vehicles are California, Florida and Texas. These states have several, large metropolitan cities located within its borders. The city is one place where electric vehicles can work. If you’re fortunate enough to have a garage, you can charge your vehicle overnight—every night. It would be suitable to zip around a city to get to work and back and to run errands. Think of the electric vehicle as a personal urban taxi. And I’m sure it helps the air quality in these highly congested areas.

Another thing that California, Florida and Texas have going for them is their warm climate. It will be kind to their electric vehicle batteries.

The Biden Administration is pushing too hard in its attempt to increase the number of electric vehicles on the road. If all of this was such a great idea, free markets and supply and demand principles would be making it happen instead of the government subsidizing it with taxpayer dollars.

More time, greater infrastructure, and further innovation are needed before the internal combustion engine takes its last breath, especially in rural America.

Right now, electric vehicles would make life more difficult for country folks.

And nobody I know wants a harder life.

It’s tempting to ignore problems, but then we get government overreach

The “do nothing” temptation lives within all of us, and it’s why problems escalate into crises.

At first, the temptation to do nothing seems like the best and most reasonable thing to do. We’re constantly allocating our time and resources when choosing what to think about and how to live each day. For example, we may ignore government overreach if we don’t see a connection in how it directly affects our lives. Then, the overreach grows and becomes a bigger problem. In this stage, we begin to think about it but we still do nothing because—for the most part—there’s still no great upheaval in our lives. But the problem snowballs and over time becomes too big to ignore. It can morph into a real and clear danger to us personally, but by then it’s too late. Through our lack of attention, government overreach becomes stronger and its citizens weaker.   

A group of New England fishermen is in a weakened state because they thought they could work, catch fish, sell fish, feed their family, contribute to the economy, and chase the American dream.

But a storm was brewing. Most seamen are good at spotting storms, but they were blindsided by the fury of the federal government.  

The National Marine Fisheries Service, a federal agency that is part of the U.S. Commerce Department, has determined that some fishermen must now allow government contractors aboard its vessels to monitor activity and ensure that federal rules and regulations are being followed. These at-sea services must be paid by the fishermen. Costs are estimated at $710 per day for 19 days each year, reducing a vessel’s income by as much as 20%.

Government overreach—unelected bureaucrats/the administrative state/the fourth branch of government/the deep state/the swamp—is here. And it’s powerful.

But it didn’t happen overnight. Like a fungus, the creep has been slow but determined.     

The abuse of power by the administrative state began its stranglehold about 100 years ago.

Until the early 20th century, the separation of powers implicit in Articles I through III of the Constitution prohibited Congress from delegating its legislative powers to administrative agencies. Then in 1928, the Supreme Court in J.W. Hampton, Jr. & Co. v United States said that delegation is constitutional as long as Congress provides executive agencies with an “intelligible principle” or coherent and unambiguous standard to guide rulemaking.

The case opened the door for Congress to delegate rulemaking authority to federal agencies, but only after providing well-defined guidance. Congress abdicated this responsibility. It seems that once a law is passed, it can’t hand it off fast enough to a federal agency for creative interpretation.

There are scarce intelligible principles happening in the beltway.

It gets worse.

In 1984, the Supreme Court ruled in Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v Natural Resources Defense Council that in the face of ambiguous statutory language, courts could defer to an agency’s interpretation of its statutory authority as long as it’s reasonable.

The U.S. Code contains 60,000 pages of laws. The Code of Federal Regulations contains 185,000 pages of rules and regulations. For every one page of laws that Congress passes, federal agencies create three pages of regulations to punish you. That seems unreasonable.

The case of the New England fishermen against Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo is going before the Supreme Court in Loper Bright Enterprises v Raimondo. The Court has the opportunity to rein in the administrative state.

Resist the temptation to not follow this case. Maybe you don’t own a boat. Or fish. Or have to pay a government contractor to watch you fish. But these fishermen are in rough waters, and there’s more of it to go around.

The Federal Register lists 436 federal agencies. These agencies employ over two million people who enforce all these regulations.

Today, it’s New England fishermen. Tomorrow, it will be someone else.

About 600 years ago, a Roman Catholic monk named Thomas Kempis and author of “The Imitation of Christ,” made a wise observation. “For temptation first appears to us as a simple suggestion, then it becomes a strong imagination, afterwards pleasure, evil affection, and assent. Thus, the enemy increases his foothold until he can enter altogether because he was not initially met with strong resistance. Moreover, the longer a man delays his resistance, the weaker he becomes, and the stronger his enemy grows against him.”

Citizens haven’t been attending the helm. Our “do nothing” temptation caused us to fall asleep at the wheel, trusting that someone else would handle the navigation.

Government overreach has been happy to oblige.

It’s time to correct the course.

Corruption, incompetence, and wasteful spending hinder our ability to remain a world leader

Ukraine and Israel need military aid. They need United States taxpayers’ money.

But citizens here need help too.

We have an open border and unprecedented, illegal immigration. It takes money to initially take care of all of these people—money that could be used to assist legal, tax-paying citizens or at least used to pay down our national debt. And some of these illegal crossers are not migrants. They’re individuals who desire to harm us. Our national security has been gutted under the Biden Administration.

We have high inflation and high interest rates. The gold standard of achieving the American dream through home ownership is slipping away.

We have soft on crime policies. Many do not feel safe in their own neighborhoods.

Citizens want and deserve benefits derived from their taxpayer dollars.

Outspoken foreign policy hawks try to convince us that we can do both—take care of the homeland and help allies abroad.

But it’s tougher than it used to be. Corruption, incompetence, and wasteful spending within the federal government—from both elected leaders and unelected bureaucrats—is so pervasive that it hinders our ability to remain a world leader.

We’re starting the year with a national debt of $34 trillion.

Somehow, we’ve mindlessly accepted being trillions of dollars in debt. Perhaps the average citizen believes that if we have that much debt, it must mean that we have a lot of very important needs.

The truth is that we have a lot of government blunders.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky, recently released the annual Festivus Report. It details $900 billion in wasteful government spending.

Interest, alone, on our debt was $659 billion. We’re spending more than a half a trillion dollars a year on debt that should not even be there. Every person and every business must balance a budget to survive. The one place where sound financial prudence doesn’t happen is with the federal government.

The National Institutes of Health (taxpayer-funded agency) signed a $33.2 million contract with a business to house, feed, and care for 3,000 monkeys before they’re shipped to various research labs around the country. That’s $11,000 per monkey. Contrast that with what a foster parent receives in subsidies in order to provide a home for a child who—for many different reasons—cannot remain with his or her birth family. Some foster families receive as little as $5,000 annually. We spend more to take care of monkeys than caring for children.

The United States Agency for International Development (taxpayer-funded agency) shelled out $6 million to the country of Egypt in order to boost tourism there. Stupefying.  

A full $38 million in COVID payments went to dead people. Apparently it’s perfectly acceptable to admit this data failure, but mainstream media and party liberals are outraged when any effort is made to ensure that vote counts are accurate and elections are fair.

The Department of Defense (taxpayer-funded agency) blew $169 million by letting military equipment—such as engine, transmission, and tank parts—sit outside in the elements until they were ruined. This is no big surprise when we left $7 billion of exceptional military equipment with our enemy when we hastily withdrew from Afghanistan.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (taxpayer-funded agency) spent $477,000 on giving female hormones to male monkeys. There is no limit to the government’s obsession with transgenderism.

And the Biden Administration doled out $236 billion in improper payments—money sent to the wrong person, in the wrong amount, or for the wrong reason. There are only 330 million living in this country. That means every man, woman and child had to come up with $700 just to take care of government nothingness.

There’s more on the Festivus Report. Unfortunately, there’s more.

And it’s this incompetent, wasteful, corrupt activity that will hinder our ability to help our international friends when they’re in need.

We used to be able to keep the homeland burning brightly while firmly situated as a world leader.

Ah. Those were the good old days.

We can no longer do both.

Make winter your favorite season by breaking a bad habit and spreading kindness while doing it

Shortly after a large Thanksgiving dinner, many start to think about a New Year’s resolution. Thoughts of diet and exercise occupy space in our head after dressing and pumpkin pie occupies space in our stomachs. 

Statistically, though, resolutions don’t work. As few as 9% keep their New Year’s resolutions throughout the entire year.

If you have resolution fatigue, there’s a better approach. Develop a goal and then:

  • Admit that committing to that goal for four seasons and 365 days, followed by a desired lifelong change, is a bit intimidating and overwhelming.
  • Jumpstart your goal in an intense way for a shorter time period: the 98 days between Christmas and Easter—all winter months and only about a fourth of a full year.
  • Acknowledge that the winter season can be tough on us without some kind of positive intervention on our end.
  • Understand that helping others takes attention off of us and our many excuses for not accomplishing something.
  • Achieve a primary goal by implementing a secondary goal of a specific number of acts of kindness to be performed daily and feel your heart grow lighter during dreary, winter months.   

Most experts say it takes 21 – 66 days to break a bad habit. And it often takes a minimum of 90 days to turn the corner on a true addiction. The 98 days between Christmas and Easter, this year, is time enough to break a bad habit or begin the courageous journey of recovery from addiction.  

And by turning the season of winter into a season of kindness, the cold, harsh weather will seem warmer and more bearable.   

Acts of kindness are powerful, especially for the giver. It can even be therapeutic.

A therapist once instructed a recovering addict to perform 100 acts of kindness.

In a day. And the next day after that. And the next.

That sounds almost impossible. To both accomplish and track.

And that’s the point. It refocuses thoughts, energy and actions. It keeps the addict extremely busy with something other than drugs or alcohol. 

Mentalhealth.net frames the benefit of performing acts of kindness this way, “Your mind cannot dwell on two things at once. If you keep your mind occupied, cravings have less power.”

It also recommends counting and recording these acts of kindness—as many as possible—for at least 90 days. Another seemingly insurmountable task.

All day long, there are many opportunities for random acts of kindness: holding a door open for someone, being a generous tipper, smiling at someone who looks sad, giving a compliment, saying please and thank you, picking up a piece of litter, being on time for an appointment and respectful of others’ time, forgiving someone who wronged you, cooking a special meal for someone, reaching out to a friend or family member, donating your time, talent or treasure to a charity, giving someone the benefit of the doubt, and being fully present when asking, “How are you?”

That’s a lot of kindnesses to track.

Fortunately, there’s an app for that. There are a number of free “click counter” apps that can be downloaded to your smart phone. If you prefer the old-fashioned way, there are lots of five-dollar mechanical click counters that can easily slip into a pocket.

It seems a little drastic to do all this counting, but again, it keeps the addict’s attention focused. 

Addiction is a difficult thing, and kindness-clicking your way to recovery will likely not be so simple. But it’s one tool that can be used along with different therapies and treatments.

Performing acts of kindness are good for others, too.

If it takes an intense 100 acts of kindness on a daily basis to help a recovering addict, others can strive for 50 or even 25 acts daily to help overcome a bad habit or just help to make the winter season less dark and our hearts lighter and uplifted.

Keep saying yes to resolutions, even if they’re not for an entire year. And bring both intensity to your goal and kindness to others during the winter months.

It might even become your favorite season.   

Chaos in the House is messy, but fruitful

At President Donald Trump’s 2019 State of the Union address, Democratic female lawmakers wore white. Together. And sat together. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, also in white and from her dais, beamed at the group with great satisfaction.

It was intended to be a Democratic sign of solidarity for women’s rights. As if the nearly 40% of women who voted for Trump in 2016 weren’t also individuals who championed equal rights. 

It was an orchestrated message using fashion. One can just imagine cell phones ringing and vibrating with the very important message to be sure to wear white.

That’s what high school kids do when they want to have “white-out” night at the gym for a basketball game.

Except this was a State of the Union address being given by the President of the United States, and lawmakers were there to represent their constituents—not follow silly party leadership requests.    

Is it too much to ask our elected officials to take the job of ensuring the well-being of our country seriously?

That requires independent thinking—not a phone calling tree instructing you to do as you’re told.

There are 300 million living in this country. Only 435 are elected to the House. Stand tall and lead, all on your own. There’s no need to become a minion to party leadership. Had one of those female Democratic representatives gone rogue and wore all red in defiance to the calling tree command—it would have delivered a more important message to voters, especially those with daughters. Think for yourself. Always.   

The 2022 mid-term elections brought a return of Republican majority to the House of Representatives.

Republicans have had a heck of a time filling the speaker of the House position. It took Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) 15 votes before ascending to the speakership, and one perceived betrayal to lose it. Steve Scalise (R., La.) briefly considered the role before withdrawing. Jim Jordan (R., Ohio) tried three times, without securing enough votes and withdrew from consideration. Nine others competed before Tom Emmer (R., Minn.) emerged as a nominee. But a nomination is still a long way from a confirmation. Then came along Mike Johnson (R., La.). He was someone these eclectic Republicans—the conservatives, moderates, RINOs, MAGAs, Tea Partiers, and the Freedom Caucus—could get behind, and he became the 56th speaker of the House of Representative.    

The process was messy, and it’s a human tendency to avoid messiness.

But there is also pride in catching a glimmer of individuals who fight for what they believe in—not mindlessly nodding their heads at whatever leadership told them to do. The shame isn’t that there is chaos. It’s that not enough honor their unique role in our representative government. Instead, dictatorship by party leadership has become the norm.  

The continued success of our country absolutely requires independent thinking, but we’re seeing less of it.

In The Federalist, Stella Morabito bemoans this “aversion to speaking openly” in her column, “Students’ Support for Terrorism Isn’t Ideology, It’s Conditioning.” Morabito refers mainly to college students, but one could easily make substitutions when she writes, “The conditioner calls the shots, and the masses conform. That’s where most college students (members of Congress) are today. They enter a university (the House of Representatives) striving to get credentialed but are threatened at every turn with ridicule or expulsion if they don’t agree to the assigned narrative.”

It explains the many unanimous, partisan votes coming out of Congress. Fall in line, or else.

The Democrats get this. They receive their marching orders, not from constituents but from House leadership. And they obey.

On the Republican side, there are too many who refuse to be tethered. The struggle was real, and admirable, in the quest to make the very best decision about who to elect to the important role of speaker of the House.  

“White-Out Night” at the high school gym is fun for the kids. For a couple of hours and all in white, students cheer for their home basketball team. 

But it’s just a game. The final score will not have lasting national or worldly ramifications. Students aren’t responsible for the national deficit, high inflation, open borders or global unrest.

Voters must now consider whether candidates—especially incumbents—are capable of thinking independently. Because there’s something worse than chaos in the House.

It’s an orderly authority that is never questioned or challenged. While that may not be messy, it’s far from being American.

The signs of a nation in decline are all around us

In the mountains of Bogota, Colombia, there’s an understanding among drivers. There’s the left lane, the right lane, and then the newly created space in the middle of those two lanes to allow an impatient driver to pass without creating a head-on collision. Everyone knows what to do. The left lane driver and right lane driver squeeze to the outside boundaries of their lanes. The impatient driver fully believes the other two will do that and drives through the middle.

Colombia has an emerging economy but falls short of being highly regulated like more developed nations. If you’re going to drive through the mountains, do so defensively. Or die.

A hallmark of an industrialized nation, like the United States, is that a strong rule of law will protect you. But sometimes there can be a whole bunch of laws, and its citizens are still not protected.

Let’s start with our roads. Rural Americans drive many two-lane roads. Traveling 55 miles per hour and meeting another car doing the same thing always had its risks. But it’s different now. More and more vehicles are crowding and crossing the center line before jerking back to its own lane. Many times when meeting these vehicles, the driver’s head is down—most likely looking at a cell phone.

There are laws against that. Lots of them. The Governors Highway Safety Association reports that 34 states ban handheld cellphone use to make and receive calls and 49 states ban texting while driving.

Many pay very little attention to these laws. Anyone who regularly drives on two-lane roads sees an increase in distracted driving and is frequently making the judgement call to take the shoulder to avoid a head-on collision.

We’re not so different from Bogota.

The law of the land is also failing to protect Americans from the societal costs of illegal immigration. There are nearly 1,200 pages of immigration regulations in Title 8 of the U.S. Code.

It doesn’t stop 10,000 individuals from illegally crossing the U.S. border in a single day. Millions can cross annually.

It seems as though there are no consequences for entering the country unlawfully. We have 435 elected officials who write reams and reams of rules that get ignored.    

Many still developing and emerging nations have stronger border enforcement than this country.

The U.S. is not the highly developed nation it thinks it is.

At least we still have the Second Amendment. The right for Americans to possess weapons for the protection of themselves, their rights, and their property was ratified in 1791. Since then, 20,000 gun laws have been adopted at the local, state and federal level.

Tens of thousands of regulations should accomplish at least one thing—the ability to make the average American feel safe.

But it doesn’t. The Pew Research Center reports that 72% of gun owners cite protection as the major reason for owning a gun.

It’s not that difficult to connect the dots. Our general population is increasing. There are more of us to deal with. Arrests have fallen from 14.1 million in the 1990s to 4.53 million in 2021. Bad people aren’t decreasing. They’re just not being arrested. And the number of full-time law enforcement officers has dropped from 697,000 in 2019 to 660,000 in 2021. There are fewer protectors on the streets.

More people capable of mayhem plus fewer cops making fewer arrests.

It’s understandable why citizens desire to keep a gun in the home for protection, despite 20,000 laws designed to keep them safe.

We really cannot count on others to help us. We must protect ourselves.

The people of less developed and lawless nations know this all too well. They must depend upon themselves for their own security. We’re not so different from those other countries.

It’s election season. There’s a lot of rhetoric about whether or not we’re a nation in decline. It’s a good question to ask because a nation’s strength is a fluid matter. It can increase or decrease.  

A strong rule of law, or lack of one, is a primary indicator of a nation’s rise or fall.  

We do a great job of writing legal code—of putting laws on the books. Every politician’s favorite word is, “comprehensive.” It’s a signal that massive new regulations will be written.

But these laws are meaningless congressional paperwork if they’re not enforced.

Ask a defensive driver, a defiant texter behind the wheel, a border patrol officer, an illegal immigrant, a police officer, a criminal, a gun owner. Ask anyone.

Yes, our nation—once a shining city on a hill—is in decline because of increased lawlessness. Politicians must deal with this reality.

Citizens already are. 

Hire bouncers, not security guards

At a Wisconsin river town, just large enough for the Census Bureau to label as a big city, a group of us 60-something women hit the bar scene. Between jobs, families, and moves, it’s sometimes hard to get together and catch up. Tonight was our night.

We found an open table close to the front door inside of a popular establishment. We were there early. That’s what our age group does.

But as the night wore on, an employee who looked the part of a bouncer grabbed a bar stool and planted himself just inside the front door. My first thought was that he was taking cover for a band that night. Except there wasn’t a band scheduled to play. Or maybe he was going to check IDs to make sure patrons were of legal age to purchase alcohol. But that was the bartender’s job. Nobody was stopped at the doorway to produce identification.

Regulars who knew the man shook his hand, fist bumped or high-fived him as they walked through the door. He gave those he didn’t know a curt nod.

He was a “Walmart greeter,” without the smile.  

Then someone darkened his doorway that shouldn’t have. The bouncer sprang from his perch and, with his chest, pushed the other man into the door frame. With his face inches from the other, he growled, “Get out.” And he did.

Ah. I was blind, but now I see. The guy’s only job was to identify past troublemakers and keep them out of the bar. I guess at this establishment if you start a fight or destroy property, you forever lose your right to enter the bar again.

Seems fair.

There are “reserve the right to refuse service” laws on the books. Obviously, it doesn’t include discriminating based on sex, race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, medical condition, genetic information, marital status, sexual orientation, citizenship, primary language or immigration status.

But you can still throw out jerks. Being a jerk is not a protected status.

Retail stores could use bouncers, too, to keep out repeat offending shoplifters. Being a thief is not a protected status either.

Some stores will hire a security guard, but it’s not quite the same. Security guards and bouncers both follow the law, but bouncers have an edge to them and are a little more unpredictable. Jerks and thieves don’t like that.  

Cities everywhere are dealing with repeat retail theft, but New York City made a name for itself when Mayor Eric Adams announced that about 300 individuals, in a city of 8 million, were responsible for a third of shoplifting crimes. And just 25 stores accounted for 20% of all shoplifting complaints by businesses.

The same people are hitting the same stores, over and over again.

These businesses need Wisconsin river town bouncers at the door. Or just hire the best bouncers from area night clubs to do day gigs at these stores.

Retail theft affects everyone—the businesses being ripped off and losing income, employees who lose their jobs when businesses must close due to rampant theft, the federal government’s decreased withholding tax revenue from those lost jobs, senior citizens whose social security payments depend upon withholding tax revenue, shoppers who pay higher prices to offset theft losses, insurance companies that must pay out losses on a claim, other customers of insurance companies who will see their premiums rise to cover those claims, law enforcement that is already stretched too thin, state and local governments that see a drop in sales tax revenue due to stolen and not purchased items, and citizens who benefit from services provided by sales tax revenue.

The Chamber of Commerce reports sobering statistics: 100 billion in annual retail shrink, 39 billion in lost wages, 14.9 billion in lost federal, state and local tax revenue, and 46% of businesses increase retail prices to offset theft. Organized crime plus serial shoplifting equals huge economic consequences.

Maybe one good bouncer at every door of every retail establishment could change the world.

He wouldn’t be able to stop large-scale assaults—a flash mob of smash-and-grabbers. But while those incidents garner a lot of media attention, it’s more often the criminal activity of individuals who have no fear and brazenly walk off with merchandise that continuously and relentlessly chips away at a store’s profitability.

Know who’s coming into your store. Refuse to serve the troublemakers.

Even California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act states, “The law clearly distinguishes between the right of a business to refuse service based on conduct as opposed to personal characteristics. The misconduct or disruptive behavior of particular individuals may be grounds for refusing to do business with them.”

Let a bouncer tell those particular individuals to get out. Forever.