Opinion

It won’t come as a surprise to our readers to learnthat, growing up, I was a bit of a bookish kid. I loved reading—not many high school students take a book from the Oprah Winfrey Book Club to football camp— and I loved learning, so much so that I often tell people that school was really one of the only things I was good at growing up.

In 2014, President Obama famously said, “I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone,” telling the American people he didn’t care whether Congress had provided legislative authority for his favored policies. He would go it alone whenever he felt like it. Ten years later, Obama’s then-Vice President, now-President Joe Biden has been ruling in the same fashion daily. President Biden’s executive actions don’t just ignore congressional intent; they are expensive, unwise, and unworkable. A recent report by the House Budget Committee showed President Biden’s executive actions have totaled over two trillion dollars in added cost to taxpayers, all without congressional approval.

The historic tornadoes that pummeled the eastern and central portions of our state last week were devastating, and supporting the ongoing recovery efforts for Nebraskans remains top of mind. The Nebraska Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has reported damage to homes, farm equipment and buildings, power lines, other infrastructure, vehicles, and trees across many counties in the Third District. Fortunately, despite the destruction of hundreds of homes, no Nebraskans lost their lives. We owe such great thanks to the hard work of meteorologists, broadcasters, emergency responders, and countless volunteers who have donated time and resources to those affected.

One summer back in the day, when I was more of a stud and less of a dud—or at least I wasn’t mortified to be out in public without my shirt on—my brothers, some other guys, and I packed up the boat one Saturday afternoon and headed up Highway 92 to soak up the sunshine at Sherman Reservoir.

Term limits claim thirteen Nebraska state senators while two are leaving for other reasons. That’ll mean fifteen new faces in the nation’s only one-house nonpartisan legislature come January.

What a week! As a rule of thumb, I cringe when I see a writer use an exclamation point or when a stray one gets published in one of my newspapers, but I think after the week that the people of Nebraska, particularly those in places like Howard, Douglas, Lancaster, and Washington counties, have had, an exclamation point is a fitting piece of punctuation. In the wake of some grizzly tornadic storms, there was a lot of loss last week, both locally and around the state.

No matter who you are, I think everyone, at one time or another, has had the type of day where nothing seems to go your way. Let’s just hope that, when that day occurs, it doesn’t align with a major life milestone.

In 2021, the last special session of the Nebraska Legislature lasted thirteen days and cost the state $105,436. Do the math, that’s $8,076.92 per day.

“I believe I have the votes.” Those six words have become the curse of the Nebraska Legislature. The buzzkill.

Next week, I am going to be taking some time away from work to spend the weekend sharpening my skills, but even before I dust off my pen, notepad, and portfolio, I have been assigned some homework. And, like in middle school, I am already stumped by the assignment.