So right-wing extremists pay $250 to attend the Michigan Republican Leadership Conference, and what does Governor Kristi Noem give them? A reheated version of her Aberdeen Prayer Breakfast speech?
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem kicked off the second day of the Mackinac Republican Leadership Conference with plenty of criticism for Democrats, but also an entreaty: don’t stop talking to them. Win them over.
“Listen, we all have people in our lives that we quit talking to. That we figured they’re so far gone, they’re so liberal, we’re just not talking to them anymore, they’ve offended us. We need to get over ourselves and start having those conversations again,” Noem told attendees of the Mackinac Republican Leadership Conference Saturday morning.
“Take the anger and the emotion out of the discussion and start visiting with them” [Emily Lawler, “South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem to Michigan Republicans: Talk to Your Liberal Friends,” MLive.com, 2021.09.25].
That sounds a lot like the advice Noem gave reverent locals back in April to “Stop being offended by each other” and “Start talking to people you’ve written off.” The subsequent steady stream of partisan Twitter-snark from her and her out-of-state entourage don’t show much sign of getting over perceived offense and seeking open conversation with people outside the Trumpist base.
But let me take the Governor at her word and practice her preaching myself. Let me assume that the words she spoke yesterday morning on Mackinac Island weren’t just the easiest script to pull from her thin file folder to jetlaggedly (oh, sorry: turboproplaggedly) recite for a crack-of-dawn crowd of out-of-staters who wouldn’t recognize her rhetorical recycling. Let me assume that when she said “We”, she really meant the first-person plural, including herself. She really meant that she, too, needs to get over herself and her hyperpartisan offense and start having conversations with people she thinks are “so liberal”.
Governor Noem, why not start by having a conversation with me? Your party, including the blog you sponsor, has called me “the most liberal man in South Dakota.” Why not sit for an interview with Dakota Free Press?
The last time we talked was over nine years ago, at a town hall you hosted in Rapid City. We interacted cordially. We haven’t interacted directly since.
So let’s interact again. Let’s spend one hour talking on the record about politics, South Dakota policy, and civil discourse. We won’t talk about you personally or me personally. I won’t scream at you for murdering hundreds of South Dakotans with your coronavirus denialism, and I trust you won’t wave the attack postcards your party carpetbombed Aberdeen with to keep its lapdog Al Novstrup in the Senate. We’ll talk about conservative and liberal principles. We’ll talk about freedom, or, more rightly, liberty in the necessary context of the social contract. We’ll talk about taxes, education, infrastructure, agriculture, the environment, and the proper role of government in keeping South Dakota healthy and growing.
As I said, we’ll have this talk on the record. How better to demonstrate “getting over yourself” than granting such a lengthy, substantive interview to a blogger from Aberdeen? How better to show conservatives and liberals alike that civil conversation between political opponents is not just possible but instructive than engaging in unfiltered, one-on-one conversation with “the most liberal man in South Dakota”?
To that end, I will bring my cameras and record the whole thing for publication on this blog. We can even do it live, if you want, in front of an audience consisting of anyone who wants to come watch. But the conversation is one on one, you and me, uninterrupted, unfiltered.
South Dakota is home turf for both of us, but I will happily grant you more home-court advantage: I’ll come do this interview in your office on the Second Floor at the Capitol, at the Mansion, at the farmhouse on Highway 81, at the Ramkota in Watertown, wherever is convenient for your schedule and my schedule.
Don’t let my stern and steady criticism of your administration fool you, Governor Noem: I can get over myself in a heartbeat and talk to anybody. I can live up to the words you said here in Aberdeen in April and in Michigan yesterday; I gladly offer you the opportunity to do the same.
Governor Kristi Noem, the most conservative woman in America, talks to Cory Heidelberger, the most liberal man in South Dakota—brand it however you want, but let’s make it happen on Dakota Free Press!
I like it.
I’m guessing Noem’s words were a weak attempt at trying to unite people. As you said Cory, she hasn’t practiced what she has preached.
But, like you, I hope she takes you up on your offer or with me as well. There are many questions I’d like to ask.
If she agrees to meet with you Cory could your loyal readers submit questions to you in advance?
I’m guessing my questions and questions from other people would be the same questions you have already.
Let’s see what happens!
Vi, I’d consider a series of interviews, or maybe even debates. The Governor and I could work out a resolution or a series of resolutions that we would debate:
I welcome other suggestions for resolutions we could debate that would highlight conservative versus liberal/Republican versus Democratic/capitalist versus socialist principles and allow us to speak passionately to our beliefs and policy priorities while demonstrating how we can do so in a civilized and informative fashion. We could take a series of debates on the road, to every county in the state, as an ongoing demonstration of how to get over ourselves and talk sincerely with people of apparently opposite political beliefs to find practical common ground.
I think that’s a perfect example of ‘practice what you preach’. If she can tell everyone else to have those conversations then she should be willing to have one of those herself. I, for one, would love to see that!
Get flea, tick, mange and rabies vaccines if you pull this off, Master.
One of the symptoms of Noem Derangement Syndrome is a slow and steady stream of partisan snark. This morning, starting very shortly, at the Conservatives with Common Sense breakfast, the Opening Rant will lambast partisan snark and mock out-of-state name-callers self-inflicted with NDS.
Resolved: Name, specifically, what schools in South Dakota are teaching about history, in your opinion, that is wrong.
Resolved: Name, specifically, what should schools in South Dakota teach about history that is, in your opinion, right.
Mike Sanborn began The Decorum Forum in 2009 which enjoyed a significant following for several years. Other local notables, Bill Fleming, a Democrat and Bob Newland, a Libertarian have been authors there. Sanborn is a member of the South Dakota Nazi Party and is responsible for some of the most sexist and misogynistic Deadwood and Sturgis Rally billboards littering I-90. A perennial loser, Sanborn was destroyed in Rapid City’s 2015 Ward 3 runoff election that kept incumbent Jerry Wright on the City Council.
Yes, longtime blog troll grudznick is Mike Sanborn.
Hmmmm.
Jezz grudz I’ll ask my doctor, Steele is his name, he’s Canadian in origin about NDS. I’m sure he’ll give me Ivermectin for it. No covid, no worms, sh– up a storm, its great for the masses to pass whatever is in you. I’m sure it would work for your CCS too.
Readers can go to Faceberg and find grudborn’s page called: what else? Common Sense.
CAH, she’s the top political opportunist in politics, she’s no conservative.
Mercury goes retrograde, tomorrow, for twenty one days.
Mercury affects humans interacting with other humans and retrograde is said to inhibit and diminish effectiveness.
It’s time for grudz to face the piercing light of exposure.
There’s no “derangement” in the criticism of Kristi Noem.
She’s a cold hearted woman with a Nazi German personality.
She lies; she cheats; and she steals.
Your Governor is a female bully and labeling her a victim is the only justification MAGA’s like grudz can muster.
Kristi Noem is in no way, shape, or form any part of a victim.
Noem Derangement Syndrome is just fakery, invented by Don The Con and embraced by those who don’t know how to respond to overt bullying.
You know, I like this idea. I might do it differently. Not make it just the Kristi/Noem show, but broaden it out to include others as well, and focused on resolving or trying to lessen the distances on issues, and if not that, at least understanding where people are coming from.
One “bipartisan” thing Noem/Ravnesborg might do is join Texas’ lawsuit against the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s approval of a “temporary” storage disposal site in that state. Since they like to join Texas lawsuits, this lawsuit seems very popular with everyone. The oil industry and environmentalists, Democrats and Republicans are united against this “temporary” storage site for high-level nuclear waste. Noem came out early and strongly when South Dakota was threatened by the the borehole “test,” and doing so would strengthen South Dakota’s case against whatever Biden might do to finger South Dakota in the future. States need to flex their muscles or “consent” will look more like rape. Biden has not been particularly quick to make good on his promise for “consent” in nuclear waste disposal matters.
Cory and Vi, I love your “Resolved” debate topics.
Meanwhile, we’re all aware that Mr. G has a crush on our Governor, much as (for those of us old enough to remember it) the way Sonny Crawford mooned after Jacey Farrow in The Last Picture Show. Heartbreaking, really.
Lar, you know my good friend Bill, and yours, sold out to The Man for big bucks, taking advertising dollars to pay him off for his liberal ranting tendencies. I never heard anybody say Bill was a stupid man, and to this day he reaps the profits.
My good friend Bob, of course, is mostly just angry he wasn’t able to cash in by selling out to The Man, like Bill did. That is really the only difference.
My good friend grudznutz is angry because no one will ever call it a man.
You are righter than right, Bob. Of course, since you work for The Man as a corporate narc, you know better than poor grudznick, unbeholden to The Man.
Grusnutz is beholden to one man. Cory Heidelberger is the only man on earth who would allow the slimy coward gridznatz to continually pollute his publication with its feeble attempts at satire.
If Governor Noem accepts my invitation, I invite Bob and Grudz to sit in the front row.
Nice way to try to trick me into blowing my cover.
Perhaps we’d be in the same chair, Bob….me to the right of the middle, and you on both fringe ends.
Or perhaps you’d be performing a lewd act on me, as you are wont.
Keep that thing in your pants, Bob
You got nothing for me, no
Your sister knows how to dance
She might be more my speed, yeah
I try, but whenever yer around yer always fishin’ for it. My sister tells me you were…, uh, less than adept.