To the editor:On behalf of It Gets Better - FD and myself, I want to thank each and every one of you personally for the purses and toiletries. Emily Hicks, Ann Machovec, Pat Scheer, Cleo Abel, Amy Pederson, Dawn Gronbach, Lisa Irving, Skeeter Fuller, Sue English, Janet Pierce, Tami Schiedegger, ...

To the editor:Most days I am proud to be a resident Palo Alto County. On Jan. 6 at 8:30 a.m., this pride was questioned after attending a Board of Supervisors meeting.Another family whose husband and father was employed as a county engineer was terminated from his job with the board citing ...

To the editor:With the Iowa Legislature commencing this week, one of its best legislators, Sen. Daryl Beall, will not be in attendance. Sen. Beall was defeated this fall by Republican Tim Kraayenbrink. Daryl was a hard-working, effective, across-the-aisle Democrat who always thought of his ...

For the third time, the cops of the NYPD have turned their backs on the mayor of New York.The first time was when Mayor Bill de Blasio arrived at Woodhull Hospital where mortally wounded officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu had been taken on Dec. 20. The second was when the mayor spoke at ...

Among President Barack Obama's budget requests last year was $5.4 billion to fight Ebola abroad and ensure this country is better prepared for an outbreak. Ebola made big headlines, after all.Indeed, Ebola is a serious health concern in Africa. This year's outbreak, the worst in history, ...

At more than $18 trillion and climbing swiftly, the U.S. national debt is a very real threat to our prosperity as a nation. The total works out to nearly $60,000 for every man, woman and child in the United States.A new attempt to get federal spending under control has been launched. Ohio Gov. ...

Cutting the size and, therefore, the cost of government is a promise politicians at all levels make. Reducing the number of people employed by government is a key to the process.But the powerful federal bureaucracy, aided and abetted by Congress and presidents of both parties, has found ways to ...

Nuclear weapons proliferation may mean that, if anything, the United States needs a strong, flexible deterrent force. Air Force officials finally are admitting there are questions whether their missile system measures up.One of the keys to the U.S. nuclear arsenal is the network of underground ...

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, Iowa's former governor, was a guest participant at the Goals in Food & Agriculture Session of the U.S. China Joint Committee on Commerce and Trade Meeting that took place in Chicago in December.Vilsack delivered an important message about the ...

Members of Congress are eager to provide military hardware to the Pentagon, whether the armed forces want it or not. The recently approved $1.1 trillion spending bill, including between $3 billion and $5 billion for warplanes, tanks, etc., the Defense Department did not request, is proof of ...

Jonathan Gruber, sage of MIT and proud champion of the Affordable Care Act, may well have had the worst year in American public life. His repeated demonstrations of arrogance, contempt for the American people and smug self-satisfaction brought mortification to his party and president. His glib ...

The fainting couch doesn't have the same cachet it did in the 19th century, which is a shame, because it should be more in demand than at any time since the age of corsets and delicate sensibilities.To put it in Victorian terms, 2014 had a case of the vapors. It was all aflutter. It needed ...

For more than half a century there was scheduled airline service at the Fort Dodge Regional Airport. That ended temporarily on Feb. 1, 2014, when Great Lakes Airlines abruptly suspended its flights to and from Fort Dodge.Air service will resume on Feb. 23 when Air Choice One adds our airport to ...

Today, we welcome in a new year. Last night, no doubt many readers stayed home, joining the ranks of those sitting on the couch, counting down the final moments of 2014 while participating vicariously in the festivities broadcast from Times Square in New York City.Others celebrated the passing ...

In a short while, 2014 will be in the record books. That makes today an especially good time to reflect on the year that is about to end.By any measure, 2014 has been a year with extraordinary events - nationally, in the Hawkeye State and in Fort Dodge. This issue of The Messenger includes a ...

Unless the Secret Service is shaken up at the very top, the agency charged with protecting the president and other top officials will not correct problems that threaten its mission, an investigation has concluded.After scandal after scandal - including lapses in which the president was put at ...

Unless the Secret Service is shaken up at the very top, the agency charged with protecting the president and other top officials will not correct problems that threaten its mission, an investigation has concluded.After scandal after scandal - including lapses in which the president was put at ...

If peace-loving people throughout the world needed any more evidence Islamic terrorists must be wiped out, it came recently.In a carefully planned attack, Taliban terrorists massacred 145 people including more than 130 children at a Pakistani school operated by that nation's military.Targeting ...

As 2014 winds down, taxpayers are often considering how they can reduce their liability by making tax-deductible contributions to charitable organizations.It's a win-win since they pay less in taxes, and the charities to which they donate get much-needed boosts.Recently, two local charities - ...

It is no wonder Israelis are so frustrated with the "international community" and, in particular, the United States. When other nations address the ongoing conflict between Israel on one side and the Palestinians and their supporters on the other, pressure is directed almost exclusively at Tel ...