MEL’S MUSINGS
No Going Back by Kristi Noem
A book review.
Governor Kristi Noem’s book No Going Back was released on May 7th. It was tough to find a physical copy of the book in South Dakota retail establishments. I pre-ordered the book on Amazon and received it Tuesday, May 7th. I read it in one sitting.
Full disclosure, I’m a Democrat. I served in the Legislature for a dozen years, half of those as a legislative leader of my Party. I served with four different Republican Governors; George Mickelson, Walter Dale Miller, Bill Janklow and Mike Rounds. I met Governor Mickelson, but he died in that plane crash, flying to other states trying to recruit businesses to South Dakota, before we had the opportunity to work together. Governor Miller was something of a mentor to me, a tribute to his kindness and an era in politics where partisanship was largely set aside in favor of governing once the election was over. Bill Janklow and I tangled, often and for a regularly scheduled hour in his office every week, where he berated me on a variety of subjects but whatever else might be the topic of the conversation he always got around to the four lane state highways (especially the one from Mitchell to Huron) that were the product of federal funding courtesy of Senator Tom Daschle and the bond issue that built Gertie Belle Rogers elementary school in Mitchell – again nothing to do with me, but rather that was a partnership between the Mitchell School District and the City of Mitchell. Because the City was involved, the bond issue needed only 50% for approval instead of the typical 60% threshold for a school bond election. Both of those subjects sent him into an apoplectic fury. Eventually, Bill and I grew to be “frenemies” with mutual respect and liking for each other, tempered by plenty of exasperation on both sides. Mike Rounds and I served in the South Dakota Senate together prior to his election as Governor and had an excellent working relationship. Mike and I are friends, then and now.
So, as a Democrat, I’m trying to be unbiased with this book review. I’ll say this, it is a good book. It’s a quick and interesting read. Obviously, Governor Noem is a conservative Republican and that is the viewpoint of the book and equally obviously as a Democrat I don’t agree with some of her takes on current events, but her positions are valid (with two glaring exceptions, in my opinion – more on that later) and her advice for how citizens can get involved and make a difference is generally sound.
Noem talks about, but doesn’t dwell on, how it is to be a woman in politics. The comments about her hair, her “repeats” (when she would wear an outfit more than once, at different times, to various different public occasions – cue the fashionistas’ horror and outrage), her looks and what she chose to wear as accessories all clearly rankle and bemuse a bit and are specific to women in the public eye. She’s right about the double standard. When I was in the South Dakota State Senate, Kristie Fiegen was serving in the South Dakota House of Representatives. Representative Kristi Fiegen and my wife Julie were both pregnant at the same time. The difference was, I was never asked when I would resign because I had a child on the way. Kristi Fiegen got that question all of the time. She did choose not to run again until later when her children were older, and she now serves on the Public Utilities Commission. It is different for women in politics. It’s better now than it was, but there is still a double standard.
Noem doesn’t spend a lot of time talking about her farm and ranch background, that was much of the subject of her first book, but she does allude to it. She makes the point that she was raised in a gender neutral environment. Noem doesn’t use that term and probably would shudder that I am, but she makes the point that the girls and boys were treated equally. Chores and responsibilities were just that and had nothing to do with sex. Just “Git ‘er done” as Larry the Cable Guy would say.
Governor Noem tells a number of interesting, behind the scenes stories, of her time as a US Representative in Congress. She relates standing up to Eric Cantor, one of the Republican leaders in the US House of Representatives, for tanking the farm bill in Congress and her desire to do right by South Dakota’s ag producers. She suggests the “one subject” rule for bills for Congress’ consideration. Noem says that would end the “Christmas Tree” legislation where there is something for everybody, everything is in there except the kitchen sink with tremendous expense for the taxpayer as a result.
She recounts her travels as a member of the House Armed Services Committee and her other work in the Congress. In that vein, we hear about Afghanistan and some of the foreign leaders she’s met. It is here that there was the dust up over whether or not she actually met Kim Jong Un or not. It is an error but not a huge one, in my opinion. I’m sure it occurred from relating a conversation that she had with a different Asian foreign leader that was conflated and confused by the ghost writer helping her to put the book together. It would be like me regaling folks with the presidents I’ve “met”. I’ve “seen” Presidents Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan up close and personal in the flesh, but I’ve only actually “met” and shaken hands with #41 George Herbert Walker Bush. It would be a factual error to say I’ve met all three presidents but more in the nature of a flub than a deception. I think the same is true for Noem and Un in her book.
Much of the book is a campaign polemic, but not unpleasantly so. She lauds Donald Trump, his style and his leadership as well as highlights her efforts to support him and get him elected, including most recently stumping for him in Iowa in the 2024 caucus. Noem is justifiably proud of South Dakotans and the South Dakota economy in her book. She touts her “Freedom Works Here” campaign in the book’s pages as well as her response to the Covid pandemic. Noem polishes her NRA credentials by crowing about South Dakota’s constitutional carry laws which rely solely on the Second Amendment’s text as justification for gun ownership.
Noem relates some other stories from her days in Congress. The one that was my favorite is “That’s just South Dakota”. Noem talks about driving a beat up Buick around Washington, D.C. in her congressional days. She says that when she went to White House events and drove her vehicle up to the gates, it was initially taken as a security threat. What deranged domestic terrorist was trying to ram the gates in this jalopy? The condition of her vehicle caused angst and consternation among the security staff at the White House. As she became better known and a more regular visitor to the White House, experienced security staff would allay the fears of the newbies by saying “Don’t worry, that’s just South Dakota” when they saw her vehicle approaching the gates.
She talks about the time she was in Kenya and visiting with women trying to be independent business people and a grandmother, who already owned one cow, was saving up to buy another one to expand her milk business. Noem, a farm gal herself, was inspired to buy a cow for the woman. Kristi asked the price of a cow in Kenya and was told $40. She tried to buy one on the spot. Oh no, that’s not protocol she was told so Noem went back to Washington, still promising the woman a cow. Noem kept her promise, but once the US government and protocol got involved the price of the cow went from $40 to $840.92 instead.
Noem sprinkles references to God and Bible verses throughout her book. My favorite line in that regard is when she says, “Christians aren’t called to delegate the cross, we’re called to carry it.” The most recent criticism of her book concerns her claim to have been a “children’s pastor”. The jackals of gotcha say her assertion that she was a children’s pastor is a load of rubbish because she isn’t an ordained minister. The critics are right that Kristi Noem isn’t ordained but that’s just semantics. There are many church leaders, some speaking from pulpits, who aren’t ordained. Everyone with even a grain of common sense knows what the Governor means. She planned religious lessons and activities for children that she led the kiddies through in church. There are things to carp about in the book and things to be shocked by (the way Washington really works for instance) and things to be upset about (Cricket for example) but this “children’s pastor” thing isn’t one of them.
She has a fun story about Two Bit, a donkey she bought at auction in order to place it in with her cattle herd to help protect the cows from coyotes. Noem says it works, but only if you have only one donkey with the cattle. Two donkeys will just spend time with each other and let the coyotes have at the cattle. She goes on to make an amusing, albeit painful to me as a Democrat, allegory about the Democratic Party in government.
Noem criticizes some Republicans and Republican policies in the book. For example, she takes after Jason Ravnsborg for killing of a pedestrian with his vehicle and his subsequent reaction to the accident when he was Attorney General. She’s critical of No Child Left Behind for creating a “teach to the test” system of schooling that denies kids a real education. As a retired teacher I can only say, “You go girl!” I absolutely agree with her assessment of that well-meaning but ultimately failed policy.
Noem talks about traveling around South Dakota on a motorcycle with her “gas stations and gun stores” meet and greet strategy. She describes her philosophy for signing or not singing bills as Governor by first asking these questions; “Is this constitutional? What will be the effects if I sign the bill? What will be the impact of not signing?’ I think those are excellent criteria for judging whether or not to sign a piece of legislation that arrives on the Governor’s desk.
There are other interesting things in the book like when Noem asked then President Trump for a decommissioned Minuteman Missile to place at the national historic site where those missiles were once housed in bunkers under the prairies of South Dakota. Trump indicated a willingness to let her have one, but she didn’t get it. I suspect that the Defense Department and our security services weren’t too excited for even a decommissioned missile to be on public display.
Noem takes after China, its dictatorship, closed society, TikTok and the penchant of the Chinese to buy up US agricultural land and assets in the book. All are areas of interconnection between foreign and domestic policy where she was prescient, in my view. She brags about the July 3, 2020 fireworks display at Mount Rushmore. I must say, I’ve always found it odd that at the “Shrine of Democracy” there aren’t fireworks on July 4th. It’s a combination of a potential fire hazard and federal employees who don’t want to work on a federal holiday, but still – come on!
She defends not signing a bill banning transgender people from participating in sports outside of their biological sex because it was poorly written and then touts her efforts to do the same thing in a better way via executive orders and later legislation. Again, I think Governor Noem is ahead of the curve on this one. When Caitlin (formerly Bruce) Jenner and Martina Navratilova concur that women’s sports are for biological women only, Noem’s agreement with this position can only be seen as being within the current mainstream.
The two points where I vehemently disagree with Noem are first with her assertion that diversity, equity and inclusion are actually “racism”. I also think she has her facts wrong when she says the Biden Administration is sending aid to Ukraine so that country can pay government pensions for government employees. US aid to Ukraine has been in the form of weapons systems, cash to buy weapons from other countries as well as investment in US military personnel to train Ukrainian troops to use the more sophisticated weapons systems we’re now sending them in their fight against Russian invaders. I don’t know where she got the idea military aid was being used to fund Ukrainian pensions. The assertion is neither documented within the text nor footnoted with a reference as to the source of that allegation.
Noem ends her book with a list of things that she would do as president, if she ever attained that office. Most are common sense, and all are within the accepted dogma of today’s Republican Party. She has a couple of humorous “priorities” in there as well. The one that made me laugh out loud was her hypothetical invitation to the Obamas and Bidens to come to the White House during her presidency to watch one of her favorite movies, The Grey. The part of that invitation that tickled my funny bone was her comment, “We’ll make it a matinee for Joe.”
In that “what if I were president” section, is a reference to Commander, President Biden’s dog, with a nod to all of Commander’s biting incidents. She says, “Commander, say hello to Cricket”. The now infamous Cricket makes his first appearance on page 101. I understand the “farm mentality” when it comes to animals. Often when we came to visit my grandparents on the farm when I was a child, Grandma would often catch a chicken, cut its head off, pluck it and cook it for supper. When my Mom was a little girl, her Dad – my kind and beloved grandfather, shot the family German Shepard when the dog was old and sick. It was the Depression; money was tight and used to buy necessities for the family and not to be spent on a veterinarian to put down the dog. There are reasons why euphemisms exist like “Fido went to live on a farm”, when a dog mysteriously disappears from a child’s life, or making reference to someone who has died as having “bought the farm”. So, I understand Noem’s mindset when dealing with Cricket, but it was still an appallingly callous action as well as a terrible political mistake to include it in an otherwise exceptionally well done book clearly designed as a prelude to a national campaign.
When one puts down a dog, it should be done with tears in one’s eyes like in Old Yeller or with deep regret and gratitude for all the dog has meant to you as Will Smith did in, I Am Legend. In both those movies the dogs were afflicted with incurable diseases that rendered them violent, rabies in the case of the dog in Old Yeller and a virulent zombie virus in I Am Legend. Someone should have taken Kristi Noem to see the movie John Wick, where the death of a puppy is the impetus for a thrilling and vicariously satisfying revenge tale against those ultimately responsible for killing the dog. The Cricket story is the only real misstep in the book, and it’s turned out to be a doozy.
The book is No Going Back. You won’t agree with all of it, but it is an entertaining, informative, interesting read and worth your time. I recommend it.