A number of years ago, a friend advised me that one must never say these words in sequence in public: "The government should not be in the education business." 

I didn't listen.

My new year’s resolution is all about being fearless, saying a lot of other things that need to be said but aren't. The failure of our elected officials to fearlessly defend our conservative values has gotten us where we are. Every state in America, including Idaho, embraces leftist ideas and programs. Socialist public policies are directly responsible for high rates of depression, anxiety, suicide, violence, abortion, and divorce. These societal ills are the byproducts of intimidation.

To turn things around, we must be fearless about conveying the facts the leftists have made unpopular to say:

• When I earn money from my hard work, nobody is entitled to my earnings except me. Passing a law that says I have to give my wealth to someone who hasn’t earned it is still armed robbery. Lowering or eliminating taxes is less about how much it will help the economy and more about correcting the injustice of legalized theft.

• Government should not keep young people out of the workplace, nor should politicians set wages, determine work hours, steal from paychecks, or help special interests steal from paychecks.

• My property is mine to do with as I please. If I want to paint my house a different color or uproot a tree, it’s my business. If you don’t like it, make me an offer, move away, or shut up. 

• The local public school is just a government taxing district with a mascot and a ball team. There’s no reason to love a school that graduates huge swaths of young people who can’t read, write, or do math with the proficiency they need to succeed in the workforce or college. 

• Government schools are also breeding grounds for leftist indoctrination. Government schools don’t teach much, but they do have a knack for teaching obedience and devotion to government and dividing us into a fictional world of oppressors and oppressed.

• Governments push for kids to go to college because the government runs a lot of colleges. They want the revenue. Businesses push for pre-k and kindergarten because they want parents to be free to work without worrying about child care. The policies they promote are not about bettering your life or that of your kids. It’s about improving theirs.

• Government charity programs only pretend to help people while displacing successful community, church, nonprofit, and for-profit programs that actually lift people out of poverty. Politicians vote to create and fund government programs because they’re too afraid to face the criticism of voting against a program that supposedly offers “help.”

• There’s no law that mandates that states continue to support the socialist ideas and programs put in place by leftist national rulers. States do it because they get a bunch of federal money. State politicians rarely publicly complain about the impact of failed programs on society, not because they're obviously bad people (some are) but because they think it's political suicide; re-election is the most important thing to them. 

• Your government has a habit of lying to you. Government unemployment data, inflation calculations, budgetary information, healthcare stats, and program success rates are usually made up or spun, and the media will usually faithfully report these lies. 

• There's really no real good reason for conservatives to sit with legacy media reporters except to appease the special interest group that is the news media. Additionally there's no good reason why Republicans continue to allow leftist news organizations to run the party's debates.

• For decades, a majority of Republicans have gotten away with voting and governing exactly the same as leftist Democrats. Those elected officials who hold fast to the idea that government should be limited, consistent with this country's founding principles, are the ones being labeled in the media and by special interest groups as “extremists,’ as a way to give cover to the extremists who are screwing with our freedoms. 

• The Left is running a big con game when it comes to pronouns and gender. No matter how many dresses I wear and no matter how much prettier I make myself, I’ll always be a man. Rachel Levine and Caitlyn Jenner are also men. Changing a name doesn’t alter facts. There is no such thing as a trans man or trans woman. My pronouns and yours are the ones we were born with.

A free society is the work of fearless men and women. A recommitment to fearlessness — courageously speaking and acting in defense of freedom —  is what I believe can help secure the blessings of liberty for the next generation. This is the work that must be done in 2022. I wish for you a happy new year full of joy, success, and an abundance of fearlessness.