Roger Kaseman: Why I'm Running For The State Legislature

I grew up on a farm in McIntosh County twelve miles north west of Venturia. Picking rocks, hauling hay, hauling manure out of the barn, a one room rural school, the country church my family attended, and my family shaped my character.

I was one of this state’s exports. I spent my working career in California where I served 22 years as a law enforcement office. Law enforcement was my calling and the law was and is my passion. The last 16 years I investigating homicides, suicides and every sort of violent death you can imagine. I moved back home to North Dakota after I retired.

I did not see myself as an elected official until the last few years. Bernie Sanders was the last straw, not as a candidate, but the cheering crowds that he draws.

[mks_pullquote align=”right” width=”300″ size=”24″ bg_color=”#ffffff” txt_color=”#000000″]The nanny state is the perfect factory for producing poor, government dependent people and keeping them poor. A society that supports liberty will not have perfect equality but will come closer to equality than any other system.[/mks_pullquote]

There is a growing movement spreading across the political specter that promotes equality over liberty. If we as a society choose equality over liberty, we will have neither equality or liberty. The free enterprise system is the best antipoverty program invented by humanity, yet a look across the political landscape shows that we seem determined to scrap the market economy for government handouts.

The nanny state is the perfect factory for producing poor, government dependent people and keeping them poor. A society that supports liberty will not have perfect equality but will come closer to equality than any other system.

If ordinary citizens don’t step forward to make difficult legislative decisions, who will? A quick look at the resumes of serving legislators shows that, except for a retired Sheriff, there is no one serving in either house of the legislative assembly that has my depth of law enforcement and criminal justice experience.

As a legislator, my first responsibility will be to state and federal constitutions, the second to constituents. The constitution trumps all, including constituents and party. I will ask three basic questions of all legislation:

1: Is it necessary?

2: Does the legislature have the constitutional authority to pass the bill?

3: What are the short term cost to this generation and long term cost to our grandchildren?