RUST COMMENTARY: SOMETIMES LITTLE DEALS ARE BIG DEALS

Towards the end of an 18-hour day this week, I found myself enjoying two seemingly unimportant events in the way too many judge unimportant.

One was joining in the celebration of "EASY" ELROD'S 90th birthday celebration (she's the widow of Dr. DENNIS ELROD who passed away 16 years ago after an illustrious career delivering babies at St. Francis Hospital initially and then Southeast Hospital).

Sons Dr. BURK ELROD, formerly of Cape and now of Alaska (one of my kindergarten-12th grade buddies while growing up) and his brother Judge DON ELROD of Fredericktown, were the hosts for some of Mrs. Elrod's many friends.

Mrs. Elrod reminded me of the Cub Scout and Boy Scout days of my youth.

The second IMPORTANT even -- by heavenly treasures definition -- was attending the formation of DAISY TROOP 272 at Trinity Lutheran School later that evening. (Daisys, which I didn't know, are pre-Brownie and Girl Scout age ... about 5-6 years old).

The pride, smiles, commitment and beginning experiences of sharing, service, and fellowship while learning about integrity, honor and truth were quite refreshing to one such as me who sees too little of these traits in the so-called successful-world people.

According to Matthew ... the truth about heavenly treasure moments (as these two events were) is that they 1) appreciate, 2) last forever and 3) enlarge the heart.

Earthly (material) treasures 1) depreciate 2) don't last and 3) shrink the heart. (Part of the outline of the Rev. RON WATTS' sermon Sunday.)

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The importance of family, by Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas: I was recently pulled aside by a father who thanked me for our efforts to promote fishing in Arkansas. The man said his son would talk to him while fishing about things he wouldn't mention anywhere else.

His comments didn't come as a surprise to me.

Fishing trips allow parents and their children to get away from the hustle and bustle of modern life and communicate in new and profound ways.

Years from now, when the boy has forgotten every lecture his father ever delivered and every toy his father worked so hard to buy, he'll remember the fishing trips they took together.

Those few hours a father spends with his child are more important to society than anything a governor will ever do. I can sign a bill into law, but people won't obey it if they never learned discipline at home. We can fund new buildings, but students won't learn if their parents aren't concerned about their education. I can talk until I'm blue in the face about character, but no one will listen if they've never been taught the difference between right and wrong.

Arkansas has the second worst divorce rate in the nation. It has the fifth highest rate of live births to girls ages 15-19. Only about 50 percent of children spend their entire childhood in an intact family in this country.

Think those statistics don't matter? Think again. Seventy-two percent of adolescent murderers grew up without fathers. Almost half of children in disrupted families have not seen their father in the past year. Studies show children from single-parent homes are more likely to have poor health, drop out of school and live in poverty.

It's time we realize the future of our state depends on the state of our families. -- Star-Progress, Berryville, Ark.

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Child Care Returns: Liberals are forever fond of recycling. Nothing illustrates this better than their fondness for bringing back their favorite policy ideas, however flawed. Medicare is currently involved in a controversy over patients' right to choose their own doctors. The whole federal health care debate promises to heat up once again. And now, Hillary Rodham Clinton is making a bid to reopen the child care debate. She organized a White House conference. She brought together the usual list of "child advocates" who stroked their chins, put their heads together and, predictably, called for more federally funded day care centers. This likely outcome is the natural result of a philosophy which says "it takes a village to raise a child." What children need most is parents. A new federal child care initiative will only force more parents into the paid labor force to make ends meet. The best child care plan is family tax relief. -- Washington Update

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For one of the few times in Missouri Press Association history, the No. 1 daily in the state, as judged by other editors publishers (from out of state) was NOT the St. Louis Post Dispatch, Kansas City Star or the Springfield News-Leader. Last Friday ... that general excellence award (based on the total newspaper) was presented to the Cape Girardeau SOUTHEAST MISSOURIAN.

But ... we'll keep trying to make it better as the product is built new daily.

My congratulations and thanks to the entire staff at the Southeast Missourian.

~Gary Rust is the president of Rust Communications, which owns the Southeast Missourian and other newspapers.