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A Time for Angels helps those who mourn

Editorial

The death of a loved one is the emotional equivalent of getting hit by a train. There’s almost nothing that can create the bewildering range of emotions that the death of a loved one can generate. The range of emotions can include anger, fear, sadness, loneliness and other feelings that defy ordinary description. And those emotions can hit hardest during the holiday season. The staff of Gunderson Funeral Home and Cremation Services is well aware of that. So for 26 years, they have organized an event called A Time for Angels to help soothe the pain of people who have experienced a ...

We must stop our rapid accumulation of debt

Local Columns

At the end of July, our national debt peaked at $35 trillion — a figure once considered unthinkable. However, just 118 days later, our country surpassed another sobering milestone — $36 trillion in debt. This rapid accumulation of debt threatens our economic security, weakens the value of the dollar, emboldens our adversaries like China and Iran, and jeopardizes our longstanding status as the world’s reserve currency. As a fiscal conservative, I believe that we must end reckless government spending and balance our federal budget to reduce our debt and get our fiscal house in ...

This holiday season, support your hometown businesses

Editorial

Tens of millions of Americans will do most, if not all, their holiday season shopping with giant online retail operations this year. They will argue that it is more convenient or safer for them to do so rather than patronize local brick-and-mortar stores. Local retailers, from mom-and-pop specialty shops to the big-box stores, rely on Christmas shoppers for significant chunks of the revenue that keeps them open year-round. If they have a bad holiday shopping season, they suffer terribly. Some may not survive long into the new year. So what? Well, put on your thinking cap for a ...

Shared Thanksgiving is fine tradition

Editorial

Thanksgiving is a uniquely American holiday that features family, food, and yes, the occasional football game. In the spirit of the holiday, thousands of people in the Fort Dodge region gathered around tables with relatives and friends for a traditional feast on Thursday. Dining room tables throughout the area were laden with turkeys, stuffing, corn, cranberries, green bean casseroles, pies and all kinds of other delicious things. But some of our neighbors couldn’t afford such a meal. Perhaps some lost a job; perhaps others had been hit with unexpected and high medical bills. The ...

Let’s talk budget cuts

Local Columns

My fellow Iowans sent me to the Senate 10 years ago to make the porkers squeal. It’s been a very lonely fight. Even in this era of political polarization, Democrats and Republicans always come together in agreement over one issue: living high off the hog. When faced with proposals to trim the fat from Washington’s budget, the turkeys in Congress from both parties act like Goldilocks. The portions are always too little or too big, always too hard, and never just right. But the real make-believe of this fairy tale is that it’s impossible to reduce Washington’s budget ...

Let us give thanks

Editorial

Sometimes in America, it seems as if we actually enjoy advertising our trials and difficulties. And, yes, we have had plenty of them this year. There were really trying times in the early days of our nation also. That is why America’s first formal Thanksgiving observance had far more significance to our people than today’s often perfunctory observance. With all our troubles, we Americans are among the very few people in the world who feel it necessary to officially observe a day of thanksgiving. The words of George Washington, our first president, recognized that need. His Oct. ...