Bushisms

Well, we know this president did not invent the Internet or Google, although he may have invented the word "The Internets" and "The Google".

p.s. The prez doesn't use email either. He doesn't want the liability of a written email record telling him he was supposed to know something. But the rest of this video where he states that has now been pulled from all the sites some 2 months later. Shucks!

Tabernacle Pews Are Casualty of Facelift

I'm a history buff; and this quote about recent rennovations of the Tabernacle just caught my attention.

For Robert Charles Mitchell, a retired newspaper editor from Salt Lake
City who lives in Logan, the fate of the pews and the bank tower hit the “same
vein.” "It’s an issue of values,” he said. “We glorify our pioneers. We talk about their travails and bless their devilishly hard work. We laud them on the one hand and run roughshod over them on the other. We’re dishing up ersatz history and throwing away the real thing.”

The Corpse of Habeas Corpus

"All we have to fear is fear itself." - Franklin D. Roosevelt

The ease in which habeas corpus has been compromised is alarming. As the dear reader knows, habeas corpus is a concept that precedes our system of government by centuries, thanks to the British.

Habeas Corpus looking more like a corpse.

The Geneva Convention seems convened.

And Olbermann waxes poetic on both (Video - 8:42 min).

Christians Conned by GOP

"Then Jesus said unto them, Take heed and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees." - Matt 16:6

I don't trust the government to govern religion or to work with it. I want them to be hands off because I think they will just stir up a mess.

Part of my thinking might have to do with my own LDS background in which state governments and the federal government invariably got it wrong when it came to working with their Saint minority. From my viewpoint, they just didn't understand us.

And the fruits of their misunderstandings? Well, Missouri had its Extermination Order against the Saints; Illinois, its lack of civil protection and persecution; and later when the Saints fled to the West, the expanding Federal government was finally moved not to protect but to war against the Saints, enraged by the practice of polygamy and the fear that their new federally appointed civic leaders weren't being paid enough attention to. With religious help like that, who needs friends?

It is interesting to see how manipulative such seemingly religious-minded leaders can actually be -- or so says special assistant to the president David Kuo. Things are not always what they seem at the surface. This administration's faith-based iniatitives have felt and smelt to me like an elite group of political thinkers using religious leaders, who were so willing to be used. Now comes the latest revelations from Bush's #2 man in charge of faith-based initiatives on CBS' 60 Minutes.

Observes Kuo, "He [President Bush] wanted it [faith initiatives] to look good. He cared less about it being good."

Show with no intention of substance. Hmm, where have we heard of this before in the New Testament? It sounds so familiar.

While the administration wrapped themselves up in evangelical clothes and courted their leaders, secretly they were calling evangelical leaders nut-cases. These initiatives were all for show with subtle winks to get the religious voter base out for power -- "wonder working power" -- the evangelical ear-candy equivalent to "Come, Come Ye Saints".

What was it that P.T. Barnum supposedly said? Oh yea. "There's a sucker born every minute."

Nuclear Test in North Korea

North Korea finally tests nuclear bomb Sunday night while U.S. President sleeps

• Developing story at CNN
• Shots fired on Korean border as tensions mount
  

Options?

1. U.S. continues 6 country negotiations, economic sanctions tightened but generally N. Korea continues on as a nuclear power
2. As a result, regional nuclear arms race in the Far East among Japan, China, S. Korea and N. Korea heats up big time and fast! North Korean nuclear technology eventually leak to weapons buyers
   
3. Or China steps in to end current N. Korean regime and establishes a friendlier communist government. In which case they position themselves as the military leader and power broker in Asia
   
4. Or the U.S. steps in militarily in N. Korea with some help from its alliance with other countries - Japan, S. Korea, China, Russia - in order to stop the nuclear arms race in Asia, keep the balance of power and America's leadership position in Asia. (Bogged down in a land war in Iraq, the U.S. implements a draft to meet the needs of a new war?)

Prediction: Watch for a Republican bounce in the polls with the N. Korean threat heating up. Sorry Democrats. Americans will desire stability.

What Are We Willing To Become To Feel Safe?

Here's a YouTube video of the day on the practice of water boarding. The Wall Street Journal editorial board has declared that what we are watching below isn't even "close to torture." The SS were just deploying "alternative interrogation techniques."

Most of the interrogation techniques are top secret. Waterboarding is one of the few we know about.

Majority of Iraqis Now Approve of Killing Americans

• 6 in 10 Iraqis Approve of Killing Americans
• 7 in 10 Iraqis Want the U.S. Gone From Iraq Within a Year

Source: PIPA / University of Maryland Poll conducted by D3 Systems, Inc. Polling was conducted September 1-4 with a nationwide representative sample of 1,150 Iraqi adults.

Economist: Europeans Were Spectacularly Wrong

"A DECADE ago, Americans began a bold social experiment. In August 1996, Bill Clinton signed into law the bill that introduced “welfare to work”. From that point, poor families could no longer claim welfare indefinitely as an entitlement. Instead, parents had to find a job. The reform, controversial enough in America, was reviled in many parts of Europe. Its opponents said that welfare claimants, most of them single mothers, would be unable to find work. They and their families, it was argued, were being condemned to destitution. Ten years on, such dire warnings have been proved spectacularly wrong. America's welfare rolls have fallen by over half as existing claimants have found work and fewer people have gone on benefit in the first place."

ANALYSIS: Whatever Happens, Iran Wins

“Every obscene statement on the Holocaust, every suggestion that Israel will be eradicated, every assertion of the Natural Right to Nuclear Capability, every jab at the Great Satan, only cements his status as the megastar of restive, miserable, messianic Muslims.” -- Israel's Haaretz Newspaper

Temple Square is still top tourist draw in Utah

It looks like Temple Square is still the top tourist driver for Utah -- and it's not just Mormons coming here. People are genuinely curious about Mormonism.

That doesn't surprise me as much as this very candid comment about Temple Square from Deseret News, the church friendly newspaper owned by a corporation of the Church.

Like visitors to St. Peter's Square in Rome, people touring Temple Square should expect to find a church-sanctioned version of history. Don't come looking for a lengthy discussion of polygamy or a detailed explanation of the "Utah War" of 1857, when Mormon militia and federal troops engaged in a tense standoff.

America's Forgotten Precursor to the Civil War

I've been to various national museums in Utah and Colorado, and even managed to speak with a few curators. They've painted a picture of the 1857-58 Utah war as an attempt to squash rebellion and a pre-cursor to the Civil War. Some might even call it the first battle of the Civil War.

According to one curator I recently spoke with, the territory of Utah, pro-slavery and pro-polygamy, was perceived in open rebellion against the Federal government. One thing new that I learned from the curator was that Utah had quite a few slave owners from the Missouri saints. I had never heard of that before.

With a misreading of the Mormons and the political situation, President Buchanan sent 20% of the total federal force - a huge show of force - to squash the rebellion.

The Deseret News features a neat piece on the Utah War and how it showed how the American nation would deal with perceived rebellion and how an invaded people would react, foreshadowing events of the real Civil War that would follow just four years later.

Dog Days of Summer

I had to take a photo of my dog demonstrating to the rest of us what “the dog days of summer” means when it is heartfelt. It means finding a cool wooden floor around 9am and camping out until it’s time to take a walk around the cool of sunset.

1 Cliff 3:4. And my father dwelt in a tent. 5. And it came to pass that my dog dwelt on the floor.

Unusual Web Server Error

The things and people we take for granted that try to make our life easier. Here's a 404 error page that makes you stop and think about the everyday life of a web server.

Can't Take It With You, But This Comes Close

You might not be able to take a baseball team with you to Heaven, but this comes awfully close. Die-hard baseball fans will soon have a way to be close to their favorite teams in the afterlife. They can now buy a casket with the name of their baseball team to comfort them on their everlasting journey.

Ain't it grand to be American?

SLC is About the Wild West

Here's a deer that allowed me to get close. Salt Lake City and the Wasatch Front are in the background.

Proof enough that Salt Lake City is a metropolis in the middle of the Wild West?

This fawn allowed me to get pretty close. For those who live here, they know that we have deer here up the ying-yang.

When one thinks of Salt Lake City, one should think about the Rocky Mountains, wildlife and unbelievable scenery. I mean, you can't see temple square from this point of view, can you? And this point of view welcomes everyone who loves nature and the conveniences of a big city -- plays, art, film, shopping, etc. Salt Lake City -- the broadway, Sundance Film Festival, the New York City of the Rockies.