I received a phone call this week from a young man who was exploring a run for the McCook City Council. Yes it is time to be focusing on the upcoming primary election. Never mind that whomever we, in Nebraska, might choose, our vote will be moot for the nomination for the Republican candidate is already a "done deal." Nebraska's Democrats are toying with the caucus system of determining a nominee which is a flawed way to go about it in my opinion. Anyway it is fun to watch.

Someone once said "All politics is local" and he had a point. It is important that we select good people to the council and to the county board. After all they levy taxes and spend "our" hard earned money. The young man that inquired would, I think, make an excellent council member and I encouraged him to run.

Last Monday night, the Council held the annual hearing of the One- and Six- Year Plan for street maintenance and improvement. The 1 & 6 is a good exercise that forces long-range planning. The plan that the council adopted appears to be a good one though I am not sure it has enough outlook. The solution is obvious to me. You take the total miles of paved street, divide that number by the projected life of the pavement and then replace, fix, or maintain the resulting number of miles each year. The problem is that fixing streets is also a money decision. The council must prioritize, make sure the street repair budget come first and then spend what is left on the competing other needs. Of course the water and sewer departments have the same urgency to maintain their systems so there is competition for available funds.

McCook unfortunately has a somewhat checkered past on maintaining vital infrastructure. Past councils have found it too easy to delay maintenance and spent the money on whatever pressing need came before them. The mindset seemed to be "make it up next year."

Well, unfortunately, experience has shown that delayed maintenance costs even more and catching up never happened. I applaud the present council for putting adequate money into infrastructure maintenance. It is vital though that we elect persons who have future needs of the city in mind.

On "Super Tuesday" a local store clerk asked my prediction of the, in- progress, election outcome. "Would it be better for Hillary to win or should Obama be the Democrat nominee?" was the question.

Well, I'm not as brave as fellow columnist Mike Hendricks who predicted Sen. John McCain to be our next president.

I did offer my opinion that perhaps it would be better for the country if Sen. Hillary Clinton were the nominee because she would be easier to defeat in the general election than would Sen. Barack Hussein Obama.

In matters of politics, experience has taught me to be humble. My rule and guide has always been to vote for the person with only a sideways glance at the party. Unfortunately I thought that Jimmy Carter would make a good president and that turned out to be a bad mistake.

I knew that Carter was one of Admiral Hyman Rickover's (Rickover was "father to the nuclear sub program") chosen few and I thought that training would have helped his understanding of the importance of a strong military.

Then, too, he was a graduate of the Naval Academy so I knew he had a broadbased education in liberal arts and science. Unfortunately Carter was elected and then came back to haunt me after my transition from jet pilot to farmer. Double-digit inflation is bad for most business and especially destroying for a farmer, and Jimmy Carter embraced inflation in a big way. History already has shown Jimmy Carter to be one of our worst presidents, a weak military advocate and he definitely flunked economics. To think I voted for him!

Then along came Bill Clinton, a man of absolutely no moral character. I definitely did not vote for him and was more than amazed that the country granted him a second term.

Electing him the first time was a bad mistake, but twice? Now to bring Hillary, along with Bill, back to the White House! Just thinking of what that decision would imply; well, that makes the reign of Jimmy Carter look good.

And that brings us to Sen. John McCain who it looks like has sewn up the Republican nomination. For my taste, Sen. McCain is not nearly conservative enough as he tends to run a little more to the left than I like.

I do have faith in the long-term wisdom of the American electorate, Bill Clinton excepted. Perhaps this country has been tending a bit more to the right than is good and a little left leaning President McCain will again unite us. Time will tell.

That's the way I see it.