93
Let’s hear the story of Nebraska, its communities, its number one industry Agriculture, and the people who make it happen. Sponsored by Nebraska's Law Firm® - Rembolt Ludtke.
93
Bob Kerrey--Service, Sacrifice, Always a Nebraskan
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In this episode we visit with Bob Kerrey-- a decorated Navy SEAL, Medal of Honor recipient, former Governor of Nebraska, former U.S. Senator, and erstwhile presidential candidate—and above all, a proud native Nebraskan. Listen to learn why his one word to describe Nebraska is "rejuvenating."
Welcome to Nighty Three, the podcast, where we talk about Nebraska, its communities, its number one industry agriculture, and the people who make it happen. I'm Mark Falson, your host for today's episode brought to you by Nebraska's law firm, Rembolt Lute. I'm also joined by my co-host, Jane Langenmach, who is a domestic relations attorney with Rembolt Lutke. Today's guest needs no introduction, but we'll give it a try anyway. He is a decorated Navy SEAL, a Medal of Honor recipient, a former governor of Nebraska, and a former U.S. Senator. And above all, he is a proud native Nebraskan Senator Bob Carey. Welcome to 93 the podcast.
SPEAKER_00Thank you. Nice to be with you.
SPEAKER_03What's keeping you busy these days?
SPEAKER_00Well, I uh, as you know, I got injured in the Vietnam War 50 plus years ago, March 15, 1969. And uh I've been uh wearing a uh a prosthetic uh since that moment, uh not quite since that moment, a couple months afterwards. And uh uh I was invited to go down to Walter Reed to give it, I know this is a very long answer to a very short question. Um probably take up the entire podcast, just one simple question. So you you'll know that I'm I've I haven't forgotten how to be a windback. Anyway, so he I got invited down by a really remarkable uh military officer by the Mikhail Potter, who's an orthopedic surgeon, to come down to Walter Reed to address uh a group of people that he had assembled um, you know, basically since 2001 uh to repair human bodies that are shredded by that had been shredded by high explosives. It's remarkable um what what he's done. And at the time I was being treated for prostate cancer, you they use a drug called lupron to take your testosterone to zero, which is probably why I'm not causing any trouble anymore. And and it it uh but it get rid of it gets rid of prostate cancer. So um, but it takes your muscle mass down, and my residual limb is almost all muscle and and bone. So the the fit was off. And Kyle, uh Dr. Potter said, You are you having trouble with your leg? I say, well, you know, the usual, but yeah, a little bit more, and I explained why. He then went on to describe a thing called osteointegration that they're doing with legs, and um, it's essentially a if you know what a dental implant is, it's it's it's a dental implant for legs. Uh they've been and um anyway, so uh I investigated, investigated it, and I had what is required, which is two surgeries, both at Walter Reed. Unfortunately, the the pin that they put in that titanium pin broke loose. Um, they had to do a third surgery to take all that hardware out because they thought it was a bone infection, then they did a fourth and a fifth. Anyway, the short answer is I've for the last 13 months I've been in a wheelchair, and now and I know it's a it's it's it's taken on new meaning, but I'm transitioning at the moment from a wheelchair to crutches. Um that's been occupying a fair amount of my time then and uh I'm feeling pretty good about it.
SPEAKER_03Well, uh knowing how much grit and determination that you have, I'm not surprised that you're uh transitioning out of a wheelchair and on the crutches, and you're probably running the New York marathons.
SPEAKER_00No, no, no, no. I'm not gonna I'm I'm it's gonna be it's gonna be walking and swimming. That's those are gonna be my and and biking probably. But um I I'm not I'm not interested in running anymore. Other than in New York, getting across the street when traffic is heavy.
SPEAKER_03How often do you get back to Nebraska? Do you come back uh a few times a year?
SPEAKER_00Well, I haven't I haven't been able uh Mark, I haven't been able to fly commercial. Uh I I could, but it's very, very difficult. So my first trip back was was actually uh a weekend two weekends ago. Um uh really remarkable uh woman, um uh Beverly Deep Fever, uh grew up on a farm, I think out around Auburn, but I'm not sure where exactly. Anyway, she uh went to the University of Nebraska Journalism School, then she went to Columbia to get a master's, and then she spent 1962 to 69 in Vietnam, covering Vietnam, uh, which was not easy for a woman to do. I mean, she went to Quezon, she was in all of uh up to 69, a lot of the nasty places. And then she met a Marine and married him. They moved and moved and spent most of her time in Hawaii. Uh he's since passed on, and she's given a large gift to the university. And among the things she wanted to do was was encourage uh journalism. And so the foundation, University of Nebraska Foundation, had a had a uh 50-year moment to remember the fall of Saigon, and they they invited me to come back. So I was back for that. But it had been a year, been over a year since I've been back. I get back before that, I get relatively often because my I've got a daughter and a grandson, and brothers and sisters and old friends that are all out there. So so um I get as often as I can I get out there, but it's been a while until this, until this invitation.
SPEAKER_03Obviously, we want you back as much as possible. Um so I thought of you for this podcast because I on on May 1st, which is Law Day for lawyers, we were presenting at Lincoln Northeast High School, and I thought of you because you are without a doubt right. You are one of the most famous alums of Lincoln Northeast. What kind of car did you drive in high school?
SPEAKER_00Well, I saw that on your list of questions. I I had a I had an old Plymouth, uh, which wasn't much. Um my older brother had a uh had a uh 1958 uh Chevrolet truck. It was a great truck. I love that truck. And unfortunately it cost me my driver's license because I thought I'd drive it a little too fast.
SPEAKER_03That was that down Havelock Avenue?
SPEAKER_00Uh uh no, it was actually Cotton Boulevard. That's it. Well it's it's kind of crazy.
SPEAKER_03You can go pretty fast on that even today. Not not legally.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, you can. No, you can't. And uh uh you can't. Of course, the the the star of the show would be anybody who could sort of uh peel rubber in all three gears coming out of King's Food Host there on Cottonor, North Cottoner Boulevard. And I unfortunately did that once and lost several points, which is I mean, I lost my driver's license before I was 17. Uh so I went back to I went back to riding a bike.
SPEAKER_03So once a rocket, always a northeast rocket.
SPEAKER_00Well, you get you know, I mean, those are the formative years. Um, and so yeah, I've got um wonderful memories of uh my high school, not not perfect by any stretch, but but really good memories of teachers and fellow students and adventures that we had during during those during those years. And it was a different time, you know. This is pre-civil rights, so it was an all-white school. Um it was a year after I graduated, but 62 is a I don't know if you've read any of the series that uh I've got a blanket of like a kid's name who writes for the Omaha World Herald, wrote a series called 24th and Glory about sports and how it and the integration of sports in Nebraska. It's a great story that uh makes it easier to uh Dirk Dirk Chapman wrote it. Yeah, and he starts in 1962 with a game I attended between uh uh Lake and Northeast, I think it was tech. And uh, you know, we were we were losing. Um but we thought we were winning because it was a it was a state championship, and uh the ref starts calling tactical fouls on tech. I think the last seven points of the game were scored at the at the free throw line, and there was a big, big fight afterwards. Um so yeah, there's a lot of memories, um, and uh say mostly good memories of those formative years.
SPEAKER_03If I'm not mistaken, correct me if I'm wrong, when you were in the U.S. Senate, there was actually Lincoln Northeast was the only high school in America that actually at that time had two U.S. senators, and the other senator is actually from Colorado. Uh Armstrong? Was he a Lincoln Northeast grad as well?
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah. Yeah, yes, he wasn't he was a Northeast Grad. That's correct. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03So let's go a little bit further. University of Nebraska, Lincoln, you attended there. Any stories you're willing to share that perhaps the Statute of Limitations is run on and you feel comfortable now sharing with us?
SPEAKER_00Well, so I mean you both are familiar with the phrase uh to the best of my recollection, uh, grand jury language. I'll use that language as I'm describing my adventures. Uh no, the university was important for me as well. I mean, one of the things that I that that uh I I experienced during those years was I and they said the docs diagnosed the the symptoms as asthma. It's probably looking back on it, probably more just really, really severe allergies that came on Labor Day through the first freeze. Um and when I during the speech that I gave, I was trying to, you know, trying to remember something that happened 50 years ago is not so easy. So um, you know, I it uh what I'm trying to do is sort of frame it in the in the five years after I left the University of Nebraska. I I say left only because I finished a five-year program in pharmacy and poor, uh, because I wanted to get out and start working, and uh finished up with a correspondence program and uh for me an important class at Morningside College up in Sioux City. So 65, and so that's when I left, June of uh 65 and 66, 67, 68, 69, those were the years when my draft status changed, when I took a physical, qualified for the for the going to be selected by the Army soon. I had just read the Cain Mutiny, uh, which a book that I loved, and um I volunteered for the Navy. Um I did want to be Captain Queen, but I didn't want to go command a destroyer. And so the next year I'm at Naval at the Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island, and I volunteered for underwater demolition because I thought that the Pacific Ocean was warm in San Diego. It's not, it's cold. For those of you who are thinking about going out on vacation. So it's uh, you know, and then uh I ended up uh being selected for SEAL team, was administrative officer for the SEAL team the next year, and then the next year I'm after getting injured in Vietnam, I'm in Philadelphia. So there's a there's a five-year window there. And yeah, the the uh the reason I'm digressing a little bit on that is that uh timing matters in life. So 65 to 69, where I was born in 1953. If I'd have been born in 48 or if I'd have been born in 38, uh, my life is different. Those those events would had uh would have presented different choices to me, uh either five years earlier or five years later. But the grounding is is the state, is the place. And uh my mom is uh you know from Iowa. She was grew up on a farm in Iowa where I go over and work. I would the first Mark, you might appreciate this. The first time I got a standing ovation was speaking to a flock of turkeys that my uncle raised over in Iowa. They are that that is a responsive audience. I mean, that they will they will applaud anything that you say to them. So um, and then my dad was orphaned and grew up in Chicago and went to Iowa State and they met there and stayed in Lincoln during the war. And um, you know, we're part of Bethany Community Church, which was my church for years. And um, you know, he gave a thousand dollars to a friend in that church. He said, I'm going to Japan. It turns out, not as a part of the invasion, but as a part of the occupation force. And he returned to Lincoln after the war and bought all lumber, lumbered coal business there in Bethany. Um, so that's uh that's a story though of how I ended up in Nebraska, but that it is the Nebraska imprint, more important than you know, Lincoln Northeast is obviously in Nebraska, and the University of Nebraska is obviously in Nebraska, but it's Nebraska that has the impact. It's the place and the story of the state.
SPEAKER_03Do you still follow Nebraska athletics at all?
SPEAKER_00Uh through Adam Carricker. Um I I'm uh I use Adam regularly uh to find out what's going on with Nebraska recruiting, and he's pretty frank in his evaluation of what's going on with uh football. But he's also very inclusive. He talks a lot about women's volleyball and baseball and so and softball and all the other sports that are there. So yeah, he I I do I do I wouldn't say I'm a uh follower of it, but I but I like to like to find out what's going on.
SPEAKER_03So when you were governor of Nebraska and are U.S. Senator, you traveled the state quite extensively. Do you have any favorite or memorable moments in small towns in Nebraska outside of Lincoln, Omaha that you can recall?
SPEAKER_00Well, uh, you know, this it's a unique place. Uh so all the rivers, we have more rivers than any other state in the country. And we drain every square inch of the of our territory into the Missouri River. So we're a Missouri River basin state. So all those rivers, uh, whether it's the Niagara, the Dismal, the Platte, I mean, I've had lots of adventures. Um, and all of them good, uh, because it really does, it's a place where you can go and get away from people and feel connected to something larger. It's a it's a you know, I I I enjoy Nebraska Rivers a lot, uh, uh both for political reasons, because we've spent a lot of time trying to do things like the Niabara scenic designation. And politically, it may have been one of my favorite moments because you know the Niobara, the the dam uh uh was defeated, and it was uh Doug B. Rider took the lead on that. But we I supported the uh opposed the creation of the dam, and then we wanted to create a wild and scenic designation. You can imagine um uh you know what people in Cherry County thought about having a park service coming. And so I said to Jim X, I said, we've got to go up there. Oh Jesus, he said, Bob, it's they're opposed to it. Well, you gotta give them a chance to vent their spleen. So we had a job meeting in at the high school in uh Valentine. And right outside the the door where we were coming in, there was two guys on horseback with a horses face uh uh facing towards the building with signs on the rear of the horse. One said X and one said Cherry with arrow pointing down at the horse's ass. So you know, maybe my favorite, favorite political moment.
SPEAKER_03So maybe not Nebraska nice that particular day.
SPEAKER_00Oh, it actually it is nice. You know, and then the other one that's comparable to that is I I didn't make it back for the the opening of the of the of the bridge, the pedestrian bridge, which by the way came about. Um Brad Ashford and I were trampsing about uh the river uh uh on the Iowa side. And afterwards we stopped in a cafe and had had, I don't know, coffee or something, and uh started talking to a guy, and he was telling me why Iowa and Nebraska are different in terms of buck trails, that when the Missouri River moves by constitution in Iowa, it becomes public land, and Nebraska is private land. And so all we needed to do was build a pedestrian bridge across the river, and we get access to all the Iowa trails. That's kind of where it began. So I didn't make it back to the opening, and the city Omaha City Council was quite nice and and and and Mike Fahy uh really shepherded the thing through uh and putting my name on the thing that I'm quite actually quite proud of. Anyway, so I walk, I'm walking from Nebraska to Iowa across the bridge, and the guy comes screaming at me on a on a bicycle, went by, and I could hear him hit the brake and screeched on the and he came back and he said, you know, I never like you. I didn't vote for you anytime you ran for election. I didn't like anything you did. I didn't, I was opposed to this bridge, but I was wrong. This thing is great. Thanks. And he turned around and off he went. This is I'm home. I've arrived home. Yes.
SPEAKER_01Senator, I want to ask you about your presidential bid. I was in college at the University of Nebraska, I think probably in the journalism school, uh, when you were running. And so I remember that. You're one of just a handful of Nebraskans who've ever run for president, and you fared better than most. Uh our law firm was actually your campaign legal counsel.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, don't worry, those those files are still secret.
SPEAKER_01So can you tell our audience what about your Nebraska upbringing would have made you a good president?
SPEAKER_00Oh, that's a good question. Um, I'm not the sure the answer is going to stack up next to it very well, but I I think uh I think it matters that you're from a state that that uh produces food. I think the the both the value, the economic impact, because it's a basic industry, agriculture. It's not just a fringe industry, it's a basic industry. And many, many other industries, including the ones that I started, the healthcare and and restaurants, they're derivative, you know, of uh the the basic industries, which are largely manufacturing. And ag is a different one because you manufacture your product outside. So you get these values, they're religious values. Even if you don't believe in God, they're religious. You plant in the spring, you take care of your soil and the and and and get the get rid of weeds, and and you know, and you harvest in the fall. And it's a celebration in the fall when that harvest comes in. And sometimes uh mother, you know, our our uh farmer told me his favorite farm program was playing praying for bad weather in Iowa. So it's you you just you bring the crop in and you don't know what you're gonna get. So I think it matters. Both both the economic value of agriculture, it's not fringe, it's high tech. Um, you know, as Jim Pillin will tell you. I mean, Jim Pellin uh applied technology to become very, very successful at growing and selling hogs. Um so and you see it all the time in the extension work that the university does. It's a land grant college, it's got a history. Uh, it was passed during the Civil War, for God's sake. Um, you know, well, a period that was worse when people say, oh gosh, things have never been as bad as they are today. They say, really? We had 700,000 people die because we couldn't resolve the issue of slavery without going to war. So I think having that grounding mattered. Um, and I think there's a tendency as a consequence. Uh I think there's a tendency and a consequence to want to solve a problem. One of my best friends in Nebraska was a guy that Bill Chapman, who was a commodities dealer, and he heard me give a speech once where I said, we need to have a level playing field. He came up afterwards and he said, Bob, we don't need a level playing field. You just tell me what the playing field is and I'll level it. Well, that's kind of a Nebraska attitude. Yeah. So I I I think all that would have helped. It would have helped if I was married as well, because I think it matters to have a to have a have a spouse that you can come home and complain to without having to worry about anybody else uh leaking it out to the press. But um it was a I learned a lot about the country uh during that campaign. And I would have preferred that that I defeated Bill Clinton, but I didn't. And uh uh but I I I would do it again. If you told me I was gonna lose, would I do it again? Yeah, I'd do it again. I'd probably do it differently, I hope, but I'd do it again. Because it it I got more out of it than than I expected.
SPEAKER_01If you had been elected, what would you have wanted your Secret Service name to be?
SPEAKER_00Oh, I don't know. Gimpy.
SPEAKER_03Usually it's something more bold, uh, you know, the let's go f with the positive.
SPEAKER_01I started watching the show Paradise recently. I don't know if you've seen any of that, but the the president in that show his Secret Service name is Wildcat. So maybe you could have been Husker.
SPEAKER_03I like that.
SPEAKER_01Wildcat?
SPEAKER_03We're giving you Husker. You get the you're Husker.
SPEAKER_00That'd be good. I'm sure the Secret Service would come up with a name that wouldn't offend me.
SPEAKER_03So how do you describe Nebraska to your friends in New York who've never perhaps never been here, have no concept other than it's somewhere in the central part of the United States? How do you describe it?
SPEAKER_00Well, a lot of what I do is what I just did. We grow and sell them billion bushels of corn every year. And we've got, I don't know what it is now, a million and a half cattle and hogs, and um we we we grow food. And it's a basic foundational high-tech industry. It's, you know, it's it's as high tech as NVIDIA. So it's it's uh because we're using AI to analyze all the conditions that are available to us to decide what to put in the ground, what our seeds should be. So it's a it's a it's a basic foundational industry uh and creates a tra has a tremendously positive impact on the entire U.S. economy. Uh I mean when when when I was elected governor, we were in a recession, and a lot of that recession was driven by uh problems in agriculture, declining land values, higher interest rates, low commodity prices. And and the economy turned around, but it turned around in part because of a farm bill. Um so it's uh I would say that that's number one. Number two is I I just I would describe the values.
SPEAKER_01If you went to high school here, you went to college here, what advice would you give to young Nebraskans?
SPEAKER_00Oh, I would say don't be don't be shy about, don't be, don't be self-conscious about who you are. Um you know, don't don't let anybody tell you that you're inferior because you're you're Nebraska. So be confident, uh, be generous, um, pursue beauty, um, you know, develop good friends and you know, take care of those friendships. Um you know, it's just the usual stuff that you give advice to somebody who's immigrating here from some other country. It's uh it's people are pretty much the same no matter where you go. Um you know, be grateful. Um using Warren Buffett's language, you won the Ovarian lottery, you're living, you're born in the United States of America, you're you know, you start a race ahead on points. So um, I I just I think I think there's there's nothing there's nothing magical about about uh about life. It's just that um the expression freedom isn't free is usually referenced as military service, but uh it's it's much more difficult than that because you're free, but you get to decide. And you're gonna make mistakes. You know, you you just are. You're gonna make mistakes and oh my god, now what do I do? I gotta hire Lumbo, you know, but I gotta hire a law firm to get me out of this mess, or whatever. I mean, you're gonna you're gonna make mistakes, and they aren't they don't don't let them get you down. That's part of you know, that's that's part of life. When you get up in the morning, I this is where I put it. I set a world record this morning. It's the longest I've ever lived. And I hope I set a world record tomorrow. Um and obviously the odds favorite. And when I get up, I choose to be grateful. I don't, you know, it's not like it's not I'm infected with it or it's it's genetic. I it's a choice. And you can you can make a choice to be grateful, you can make a choice to be happy, as miserable as you might be for for awesome reasons, but it's uh it's nonetheless it's a choice.
SPEAKER_03Let's segue to just uh some three or so quick questions. So, other than grandmother's restaurants, uh what's your all-time favorite Nebraska restaurant or food item that you uh uh liked having or maybe still have when you come back?
SPEAKER_00Well, when I can't I go to Don and Millie's too. That's that's right.
SPEAKER_03I forgot about Donna Millie's, yes.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Uh because my brother-in-law, uh I've uh I've never had a better hamburger than the one that Dean Rasmussen made, either at Grandmother's or at uh at Donna Millie's. So I I am a I'm a I'm a fan of consuming beef. I consume beef, I consume pork, I consume, I consume those two primary uh four-legged animals. Um and any place that knows how to do it well, I I I like them. Um so I don't know that I've got a favorite food other than it's it's back to what I was saying earlier. It's the people I'm having the food with more important than the food.
SPEAKER_03So, other than the Bob Carey Pedestrian Bridge, do you have a favorite Nebraska landmark, whether natural or man-made?
SPEAKER_00Well, I no, every single river. Um, you know, every single I used to pull off the road going down to Lincoln on the interstate just to uh hang out at the uh tiny little park in between the two cities, right on the river where people went and fished all the time. It's just it's refreshing. You think, oh my God, that water's coming down and it's going away, and it's coming down, it's just never ending. And there's all kinds of life along the rivers. And we created a couple of uh wetland uh parks on the Missouri River, and they're spectacular. You don't have to do anything, just let the water do the work. Um, so I I love the rivers. Um, genuinely love the rivers.
SPEAKER_03Senator Carey, uh something we ask all of our guests, and you get just one word. What's one word that to you best describes this place where you were born and raised, where you attended Lincoln Northeast High School and the University of Nebraska, where you served as governor and as our U.S. senator? What's your one word for Nebraska?
SPEAKER_00I'd say rejuvenating. And it it's it's it is connected to my description of the rivers. The rivers are rejuvenating. You go in feeling one thing, you come out feeling another, and and almost always feeling good. I mean, uh on the other hand, I've some of my worst dreams are dreams of floods. Um the river, the river, the river uh uh is beautiful, but at times it doesn't care if you live or die. So you have to be you do have to be careful with it. So yeah, the river for me is rejuvenating.
SPEAKER_03Senator, thank you so much for your time. Very grateful. I hope you come back more often. Uh, and I know Nebraskans are proud of you. Very nice. Thank you very much. Senator Carey, thank you so much for your time. I know our listeners appreciate it as well. Folks, if you enjoyed this episode, consider subscribing on Apple, Spotify, or whatever your favorite podcast app is. Give us five stars while you're at it. Keep on listening as we release additional episodes on Nebraska. It's great communities, Nebraska's number one industry, agriculture, and the folks who make it happen. Thanks.
SPEAKER_02This has been 93, the podcast, sponsored by Nebraska's law firm, Rembolt Ludkey.
