Simple Utah Mormon Politics

Beginning in late 2008, the RAND corporation began lobbying for war in an effort to jump-start the moribund American economy. In an apparent effort to provide more fodder for that cannon, globalist extraordinaire Newt Gingrich warned recently that our next ticking time bomb scenario is likely to happen very soon. If we don't attack Iran and North Korea soon, Gingrich warns, the American economy will be utterly destroyed by the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) of enemy nuclear weapons. "War is good for the economy." Some of my co-workers agreed with that statement on a recent walk to the local Chevron for a Unfortunately, the likelihood of Americans being suckered into a frenzy by Newt's latest ticking time bomb scenario is immensely greater than the probability that Newt's apocalypse would ever happen anywhere in the universe. soda pop. Rubbish, I said. At best, it only appears to be good for the economy. War, even of a defensive nature, is never good for the econo...

Should judges make law? Do judges make law? Barack Obama's first appointment to the Supreme Court says yes to both. Does that make for an activist judge? It depends on who you ask. It is good that we illustrate the diversity of America by diversely representing ourselves. I am not against having a Hispanic Supreme Court justice, but if Barack Obama wanted a truly deserving first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, he could have done much better than Sonia Sotomayor. If you ask a classical liberal (what we call these days a "conservative"), they will tell you that judicial activism I'm all for creating "a historic day for the Hispanic community". I just think it would be much more historic if a truly deserving Hispanic became a member of the Supreme Court of the United States. involves a judge making or changing the law instead of just interpreting and applying it. If you ask a "new" liberal (what we call a "liberal" these days) the same que...

In just over 100 days, President Barack Obama, once thought by many to be the man to right the wrongs of the Bush Administration, has now out-bushed Bush and out-cheneyed Cheney. In a speech given last Thursday, President Obama unveiled a brand new approach to the war on terrorism, one that the New York Times says "is at the very boundary of American law". It's referred to as "prolonged detention", and it means that you can be kept prisoner without trial for an indefinite period of time, simply because of the crimes that you might have committed if you had been released from prison. Is this where the neocons join hands with Barack Obama? I expected that the Obama Administration would be similar to the Bush Administration, but I am astonished that our new President would go so soon beyond what he regularly and roundly castigated in the 2008 presidential campaign. In a moment of great and much-appreciated clarity, MSNBC talk-show host Rachel Maddow called it some...

Both the U.S. and Japan have gigantic social welfare programs. Japan's program is just about as costly as ours, but it works much better, and Japan's crime rate is much lower than that of the United States. Why has Japan's welfare program has worked so much better than ours? In Japan, the family is considered to be the first line of welfare support. The crass individualism Rather than place welfare requirements upon extended families, the United States government chose to attempt to solve the entire problem--and now we have a mountain of debt and cesspools of social filth to show for it. spawned by gigantic corporations caused a great deal of grief to a lot of American workers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal social legislation, in trying to solve that admitted problem, created one that was far worse. The New Deal, in trying to rein in the corporation, and the Great Society, in trying to plug the increasingly leaky dike of...

The California Supreme court is scheduled to decide on Tuesday whether the recently approved Proposition 8 was done legally or not. In the run-up to the decision, Prop 8 taunting is in high gear--most of it vilely and hatefully against the new law. In March the California justices intimated that the case against Proposition 8 doesn't have much merit. I hope they don't bow to the pressure of the well-organized taunters from the homosexual lobby. Update 5/26/2009 - Court Upholds Proposition 8 In the Book of Mormon, the prophet Nephi speaks of a "great and spacious" building that would be filled with people who revel in mocking those who disagree with them. 26 And I also cast my eyes round about, and beheld, on the other side of the river of water, a great and spacious building; and it stood as it were in the air, high above the earth. 27 And it was filled with people, both old and young, both male and female; and their manner of dress was exceedingly fine; and they w...

Socialism doesn't work, no matter by whom it is tried. Life would be so much simpler if the rest of the architects of social doom would get this into their thick heads. California is the latest unfortunate example of social experimentation gone awry. It looks, perhaps though, that a majority of Californians are waking up from the social nightmare, and the bellwether state might just be turning a corner. If we can learn from the smaller failure of Californian socialism, then there is still time to turn the American ship of state away from crashing hard upon the rocky shoals of its much larger social venture. Arnold Schwarzenegger is royally ticked off at the citizens of California, because they aren't going to put up with his Republican socialist crap anymore. They should go It would be nice if government could solve all of our problems, but it simply can't. In most cases it merely pushes the problems into the future, where instead of dealing with mosquitoes now, we b...

There is at least one worldwide organization which, although many of its members are also members of the mass media, prohibits discussion in public of anything that goes on inside its closed-door meetings. It meets annually. You've probably never heard of it, but it's important that you know about it. It's called the Bilderberg Group, and its members met last weekend in Greece ostensibly to determine what additional economic and political mayhem they can wreak on the world. The Book of Mormon speaks of a world-wide conspiracy in our day whose plan it is to destroy liberty when ye shall see these things come among you that ye shall awake to a sense of your awful situation, because of this asecret combination which shall be among you; or wo be unto it, because of the blood of them who have been slain; for they cry from the dust for vengeance upon it, and also upon those who built it up. For it cometh to pass that whoso buildeth it up seeketh to overthrow the afreedom of al...