Dorgan gets an earful during Ryder-area farm meeting
Dorgan gets an earful during Ryder-area farm meeting
By MARVIN BAKER
EDITOR
Mountrail, Ward and McLean County residents lashed out at the U.S. government through Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., Thursday complaining about a wide variety of topics that included health care, grain prices and government spending.
The meeting was held on Sen. John Warner’s farm near Ryder. Warner, a District 4 Democrat, hosted about 100 including a couple of high school groups from North Shore and Lewis and Clark in Berthold.
Dorgan listened intently and most often rebutted with a cordial response, but in one situation, he drilled Underwood farmer Dan Johannes after Johannes asked the senator from Regent to prove to him that President Barack Obama was born in the United States.
According to the U.S. Constitution, the president must be born on U.S. soil, but there has been some speculation that Obama may have been born in Kenya, thus nullifying his election to this nation’s highest office.
When given the opportunity to speak, Johannes said he had six items he wanted to bring up to Dorgan. The first was to keep government out of health care, the second was to vote no on cap and trade, third was to discuss what Johannes called government waste of $6.1 million going into Lake Audubon, fourth was to ban watercraft on the Northern Plains Heritage Area, fifth was to resurrect the SEED Treaty and finally Johannes struck a nerve with his sixth comment.
