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The Hidden Valley In Montana We have seen some beautiful places in Montana, but the last two days introduced us to a remote canyon in the state that we have fallen in love with. The Castle Mountains are on one side and the Crazies on the other. Tucked in between are thousands of acres of farm land filled with cattle. The green hills, the trees, the streams….it’s beautiful. Our journey started at the little church in Lennep, Mt. Never heard of it? You aren’t alone. There’s an

America’s Battle with Electoral Dysfunction. It’s election day in many places, including my home state of Oregon. My email is littered with stories of multiple ballots showing up at people’s houses, and people out of state still receiving an Oregon ballot. In Maryland, tens of thousands of ballots were mixed up and messed up. We are experiencing a national outbreak of Electoral Dysfunction. Electoral dysfunction (ED), sometimes called election impotence, is the consistent ina

You Come To A Point The Reason Doesn’t Matter You come to a point in life where truth is more important than anything. As a journalist, my professional life was all about learning to smell the faint odor that follows the path of a lengthy lie. Like a doctor can sense disease, a journalist puts together bits and pieces of information to find not one conclusion but story after story, colliding into one messy narrative. There are not two sides to every issue, but many. You learn

Something About A Mom I understand moms and dads are equally important in the world we live in. In a perfect world, a child grows up with both. My mom is one of the few people who truly understood me. She told me once, “Ricky, you aren’t everyone’s cup of tea.” She wasn’t setting me up; she just knew the path I would take would not be an easy one. The last time I saw my mom alive, I had just been diagnosed with cancer. I was up in Portland near where she lived. I had told her

We Live in Prophetic Times It’s hard to believe you and I were created for such a time as this. Out of all the periods in history, God created us to be right here, right now. It’s easy to look at what’s happening around us and see chaos. But in what is meant for evil, God can and will bring out good. At a glance, to see what is happening with the war in Iran (a little excursion) is scary. This is serious stuff, and it feels like our leaders are starting something we can’t rea

Perhaps A Cleansing? On the way home from Idaho, Kathy and I were listening to a lot of podcasts. Many seem to believe America is undergoing a cleansing of sorts. It’s really not new. God allows His creation free will, and at some point, we take it too far, and He must put His loving foot down. We are so far off track from what is good, acceptable, and moral. There are many examples in history of moments when God pulled back, pushed forward, and allowed culture and civilizati

We Absolutely Can Ask Questions And Should! We had quite a few responses to a blog I wrote yesterday questioning the Trump administration’s current actions in the Middle East. The same people who write me to talk about how unfair the election system is in Oregon don’t want me questioning the president. It’s okay to throw Tina Kotek, Oregon’s governor, under the bus for her blunders, but when President Trump creates problems that impact the entire global economy, am I supposed

You’ve Got To Burn To Shine To shine, you have to burn. One doesn’t happen without the other. Most people fear the burn because it hurts. To be successful, you have to understand that, in Christ, you’re already dead. We aren’t much use to others without some cost to ourselves. Years ago, KEZI hired a consultant to analyze the on-air staff. I refer to consultants as insultants and have little use for them, but that’s another story. This one-man band determined I was the weak l

https://www.youtube.com/live/FVoWUeM7z2A?si=JIe-hrCgYrN2ImcW A first ever payrole tax in Springfield, Oregon? It's being talked about plus funding for the library may be cut. That and much more.

https://www.youtube.com/live/ASxyVVyDGmw?si=KmziNvsMvMDrMdzX I highly encourage you to click above and watch this interview with timber scientist Bob Zybach. He will tell you things about the science, the politics and the industry that are raw and filled with truth. Let me know what you think.

The Pipeline To God When we miss the mark (sin), it interferes with the pipeline of communication we have to our creator. In all my years of church-going, I was never told that. I knew sin was bad, but being good was not enough reason for me to avoid it. Lately, I’ve felt this closeness to the Father that I haven’t had in a long time. Our communication improved when I made some changes and basically cleaned up some messy closets in my life. It’s not like I was planning a t

Unlocking The Gate Someone asked me on a podcast last night if I really think new leaders are enough to change our cultural degradation. I had to pause for a minute because my lifelong answer, yes, sat there on my tongue, unwilling to come out. I wanted to say yes. I’ve always been optimistic that when people get involved, research and listen, change can happen. When I flipped my opinion about the current administration shortly after we started the war with Iran, my naivety

The Dance I’ve often looked at my life as a dance with God. Perhaps having the last name of Dancer is the reason…lol. To dance means we have to be close to our partner, really close Dancing is an intimate action. You can’t be concerned with what others think; when you dance, it ruins everything. Someone has to lead, and when we dance with God, I don’t need to tell you who comes first. If you are like me, my dance with God involves me stepping on His toes, a lot. I don’t follo

It’s Clear We Have A Problem I get a lot of mail that the public doesn’t see. A lot of mail. In my business, I’,m talking with a lot of newsmakers and people in powerful positions. The other day, I got an email from a teacher about a school district quietly reinstating a “gender type club” into the program. Secrets are usually ways of hiding things. One of my sources contacted the district, but he didn't get a response. That means no denial. Often, when I do a podcast, the re

Where’s Your Trust? I wonder if God isn’t showing us that our trust in man, a man, a party, or an ideology, is misguided. We are so easily drawn into the flame of chaos when times get rough. We forget people in power are easily misled, yet we follow them anyway. This war with Iran is a wake-up call for some of us. We allowed ourselves to be lured into the false sense of hope. Lofty words and actual change in direction made us more susceptible. We did what history warned us no

Time For Another Change We did it. This week, we put our house in Townsend, Montana, on the market. We love this house, the view, the wood floors, the location overlooking the lake, but we are nomads and also know this is not our permanent home. I honestly don’t know if permanent is in our vocabulary, unless you are talking about our marriage. We’re not in a hurry, something we’ve learned after being on this earth for 66 years. We want to stay in Montana, but don’t know where

America Should Be Our First Priority Remember, just a few short months ago, our leaders touted the idea of America First? Our President ran on that idea, and many of us voted on that basis. It’s not that we don’t care about the rest of the world; we do, but we also understand that spending billions on the needs of other countries, while neglecting those of our own people, is a recipe for disaster. The last figures I heard America is spending one billion dollars a day on this

Can’t Tell The Left From The Right This comment has shown up regularly in my private messages. “It’s hard to tell the left from the right anymore.” I must agree. I’ve never witnessed anything like it, I mean it. The switch happened overnight. The right criticized the left for not asking more questions of the previous administration; now, those same people tell those of us asking questions to shut up and trust the president. Remember when those of us on the right screamed bloo

The Generation of Hope Isaiah 5:20 speaks of a time when “They say that what is right is wrong and what is wrong is right; that black is white and white is black; bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter." We are there. Culture argues over gender, good versus evil, we whitewash the death of innocent people with excuses to soften what is clearlly cold blooded murder. And then, to round it off, we slap a “God’s Will” label on the top and make ourselves the good guys. There is a grou

The Silent Treatment/Walking On The Edge I just got ANOTHER message from a veteran who feels he can’t talk about how he truly feels about the Iran situation for fear of getting attacked. I’m seeing more private messages and emails from these folks. As attacks increase, the attackers' audience turns against them. Someone told me yesterday to just lay off the president and write about something else. Huh, we are in the middle of a war. Our country could easily be involved in a