Two Cents – The Other 98 Cents

The upcoming South Dakota gubernatorial election may be one of the most important state elections of our time.

In January 2025, when Governor Kristi Noem resigned to become the Homeland Security Secretary, then-Lieutenant Governor Larry Rhoden ascended into the Governor’s office.

When the dust settled, Governor Rhoden had quite a mess to deal with.

Governor Noem left a wake of controversy ranging from the use of state resources to promote herself to the Trump administration, nepotism, severed relationships with the press, and the relationship with the nine tribes in South Dakota were in shambles.

Now comes Larry Rhoden stepping up to the plate. Much of the Noem mess was cleared up quickly and quietly. In his usual humble manner, Governor Rhoden simply said, “It’s time to reset our relationships with the tribes, the legislature, and the press,” then he acted on it. Just like you would expect a rancher—and a governor—to do. He kept his word. This is who Larry Rhoden is.

Toby Doeden is a different story. He comes barging in the door, vocal cords blazing.

Doeden has made a number of fanciful promises: to end property taxes, to rid the state of fraud and waste, to support Trump’s agenda, to shake up Pierre as the outsider and, according to his campaign signs, “Save South Dakota.”

From whom? From what?

Maybe he missed government class, but the executive branch does not have the authority to unilaterally eliminate property taxes. But he has said publicly many times, “I guarantee it.”

There is no plan, no math, just a promise that tourists will pay the $1.8 billion in lost revenue on top of what they already pay. Just a promise that he’ll be the first governor in U.S. history to eliminate property taxes. No details, just trust him.

That promise assumes he’ll be able to convince a supermajority of 105 legislators to adopt his plan as well. Did I say plan? I meant fantasy.

It’s a noble cause though, after all, South Dakota is the 5^th lowest overall tax burden in the U.S. I mean, there ARE four other states that are tied or are lower than SD.

What’s worse, Toby Doeden doesn’t even want to use his own personality as Governor. He wants to emulate Donald Trump. In practical terms, Doeden adopts Trump’s style in lieu of his own, and thinks Trump’s plan for America will seamlessly translate into Doeden’s plan for South Dakota. Doeden has already called people losers and spoken angrily about policy he surely doesn’t understand.

Meanwhile, who is Toby Doeden? I’m not sure anyone really knows. The guy who talks like someone else at political events and on social media?

On one hand, we have Larry Rhoden, who is a hard-working hometown veteran, rancher, volunteer firefighter, a man with outstanding character, a sincere handshake, and a stellar reputation.

On the other hand, we have a millionaire who thinks South Dakota needs saving and he’s the savior. All so he can sit in the Governor’s office and ponder WWDD?

My advice—choose character over chaos. Pick proven leadership vs. unproven promises. Vote for Larry Rhoden on July 28th.

Here’s a small example of someone who’s apparently angry about something they know little about. All too common in this world overloaded with too much information:

He’s concerned that Rapid City’s “7% Vision Fund tax” needs to be done away with – and of course the roads fixed to perfection.

Well, if the Vision Fund tax was 7%, I would agree it needs to be eliminated. But it’s not – it is 1/2 of one percent. That’s .5% not 7%. It’s 1/2 of .01 cent, not 7 cents on the dollar. So how did this person get it so wrong? How did they inflate the tax by 1300%? The answer seems obvious.

This person is either uninformed or misinformed. If they are uninformed, they used their ignorance of the issue to lash out publicly… to vent unintelligibly. The anonymous Two Cents forum attracts such comments, as do other anonymous social media forums. But this person is in good company:

Recently President Trump announced that prescription drug prices were going to be reduced by “1000%, 1100%, 1200%, 1300%, 1400%” and ” not 30 or 40 or 50%, but numbers the likes of which you’ve never even dreamed of before.”

Well, he’s right about one thing, I have never dreamt of the pharmacy paying me to get a prescription filled. If you think about it:

A prescription that costs $50, if offered at 50% off would cost $25.00. If offered at 100% off would be free. If offered at 1400% off …… the cost would be -$650. Thats negative $650. In other words, the pharmacy would owe you $650! So where did the President come up with these figures? Who knows, but what is truly shocking is that people defended him on social media. One commenter posted “Nobody have calculators on their phone? …. 100-1000% = 10.”

I asked ChatGPT to explain how something could be reduced by 1000%. The response was: “1000% off is mathematical absurdity” and further “any claim of 1000% off is either a joke, a mistake or marketing nonsense.”

So why would people believe things like this? Why does the person believe the Vision tax is 7%? This is the problem without a solution, but the internet obviously has undue influence or is taking the place of people using their own brains to form opinions.

It is estimated that 20% of all social media interactions are the doing of Bots (software that performs automated tasks). So when internet ramblings occur, and people blindly believe what they read or hear, then people are misinformed. It is also estimated that in 10 years, as much as 70% of social media interactions will be bots. The question need to ask yourself is: why are the bots posting on social media?

A 2023 paper from the University of Southern California projected that if current bot development trends continue, bot posts will outnumber human posts by 2030.

Will the internet ever lose credibility? I doubt it. Because the chronically uninformed are always seeking to be informed and misinformation satisfies that – especially if they can blab on about it, in an anonymous platform.

The internet is an excellent place to acquire knowledge and find soluti0ns to problems, but great care must be used, in other words one must still use their brain to vet that information.

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