Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Lobbyists Should Walk Through the Same Door as Everyone Else

   Why give a lobbyist more stature than the average citizen? Why give him or her greater access to our congress members and our legislators. Why craft legislation for them, yet not so often or so quickly as for the common citizen?
   If we do not want money to rule, if we want persons who aren't moneyed to have equal voice with those who do, we must rein in this practice of favoritism to lobbyists. I do not fault those who lobby (except when they extend campaign money), nor, really overly much, elected officials who take in lobbyists, for that is the way the system is set up and it is normal to play by the rules that are given.
   But, this practice of listening to lobbyists first is one of the greatest drawbacks of our government as it is currently practiced. And, how simple it would be to start effecting a change: We simply start frowning on it. If we as a society start saying it is wrong, that we don't approve of it, change will come.
  Our elected officials should tell these lobbyists, I'll see you if I can, but you'll walk through the same door as everyone else. No special favors will be extended, and none from you will be allowed.

Monday, March 30, 2015

There is Good Logic for Immigration Reform being a Conservative Stance

   Who gets to decide what is the conservative stand on each issue? Well we could argue that favoring more immigration is a conservative viewpoint. Few of the founding fathers likely advocated reducing immigration, or curtailing it, or cutting it back. Those who wrote the Declaration of Independence listed as one of their grievances that the king was restricting immigration. One of the reasons we went to war, then, was to secure more open borders. Yet, today, opening up immigration is usually considered a liberal stance.
  Conservatives usually don't like it when government restricts things, or when government takes away freedoms, but on the issue of immigration, that isn't the case.
    But, it depends on who is defining what a conservative is. I see good logic that loosening rules against immigration should be a conservative stand.

Sunday, March 29, 2015

'The Greatest Miracle was yet to Come'

   I consider all the miracles our Savior performed. An Easter video just released by my church points out that, after all those miracles of his life, "the greatest miracle was yet to come." I think of all the healing he did. I think of him hanging on the cross, and the mockers saying, "He saved others; himself he cannot save." But, the greatest healing was yet to come. Though buried in a tomb, he rose to live again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZqTRSVA1YA

Saturday, March 28, 2015

The Price it Takes to Earn Each Dollar Can Measure Prosperity

   Perhaps we should measure a person's prosperity not in how many dollars he makes, but in the price he pays to earn each dollar. If the purpose of money is to make you comfortable, if you can get there without it, you have achieved the end.
  There is often an emotional cost to earning a living. We call it working condidtions. This is not to say hard work is necessarily bad. It can be good. Hard work can even be the best of work.
   But, sometimes the price we pay is too high. Like, the times we lose our values. Or, the times we give up integrity. Like the times the stress of the job is too great. That is not to say all stress can or should be avoided. Some stress understandably goes hand-in-hand with the job.
   But, it is good when the company steers clear of placing stress on the employees, when that is possible.
   Sometimes, lose of health is the price of the job. That, of course, isn't good. I think mostly of those who work around harmful chemicals and substances.
   Would be good of a society if it were to give consideration to these things, if more companies had initiatives to improve their working conditions.

The Prosperity of a Nation is in Everyone having Enough

    The prosperity of a nation is not in everyone having much, but in each having enough. It is not in how many rich you have, but in how few poor you have.
    But, I will allow for some poor people, given the right conditions. There are other things that make for prosperity, and, frankly, a nation can prosper even though there be poor amongst it, for prosperity must be measure not just in financial terms, but also in terms of the emotional toll. If the poor are content, if they are happy, then their poverty is not so oppressive. There is more to a job than a paycheck. Sometimes, the good treatment a company gives an employee is as important as the paycheck. A company can, to a degree, atone for its inability to pay a high wage by having initiatives bringing good work conditions.

Friday, March 27, 2015

Would We Take the Life of Someone in a Coma?

   Supposing we take the life of an unborn so early in the pregnancy that the being has no consciousness, and no feelings.
   Could we not ask the same question of someone in a coma? Would it be okay for us to take that life? It might be the person will come out of the coma and live a great and wonderful life, but if we catch him or her before they can get out of the coma, is it okay to take their life?

Thursday, March 26, 2015

Don't Snuff Out a Life Before it Even Begins

  One could argue, in the early stages, the unborn have no feelings, and no sense of being. So, they don't know know, don't care, and don't miss it if their lives are taken. It might as well be a plant being butchered.
   I thought on this logic today, and was beginning to accept it.
   Then, I remembered thoughts from long ago, of how, if not aborted, the embryo becomes a person walking upon the face of the earth. Are we to snuff that life out before it even begins?


Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Why no Such Thing as a Real Cabbage Head?

   Why are there no cabbage heads? I mean, real cabbages heads, ones with brains? Why are there no plants with brains? Or, plants with beating hearts and blood vessels? Or plants with hands or noses or lungs?
  Why are there no animals with photosynthesis? Or animals that bear fruit? Or animals that have leaves and limbs?
   All plants are so different from all animals is so many ways, that it does make you wonder, if they have common DNA, why not, then, features that are common in some species?
   One possible answer? Perhaps all DNA is not passed from progenitors, but is created by pressures in the environment, and then passed along after being created.
   I imagine one answer, as to why plants do not have brains, is found when you notice all animals move from one location to another. The very nature of moving about and maneuvering requires intelligence. So, a creature adapting to its environment would need to develop intelligence as it developed the ability to move. This does follow the principle of natural selection.
   (Rewritten 3/26/15)

Tuesday, March 24, 2015

Violence Begets Violence; When 1 has a Gun, Another Goes to Get 1

   Violence begets violence. When one has a gun, another goes to get one. That is not to say guns cannot protect us against criminals, and not to say there are not times for guns. But, it is to say, some of the violence we have comes from those who buy guns to protect themselves.
   I think of those who suggest that if only criminals have guns, we'll be in trouble, so we should all go out to buy them. Such a call to arms, is it wise? What will happen if we all go buy guns? Those who need them will be happy they did. But, what of those who live day-to-day with no need for guns? Among them are those who will end up using the gun wrongly. It goes back to the first three words I offered: Violence begets violence. If we all buy guns because we see a trend in society toward violence, there will be some amongst us who end up using the gun for violence.

Monday, March 23, 2015

Measure not the Wealth of a Nation in the Prosperity of a Few

 One man's riches, do not the prosperity of a nation make. Nor do 500 billionaires necessarily make the country bounteous.
  Rich people often control the economy, but they don't always prosper it.
  It seems it should be a corollary of a good economy that you don't need for men to become rich. To the contrary, there are times when their large incomes become a drain on the economy. Possible case in point: Among our affluent are the high rollers in the medical industry, yet the populace, as a whole, struggles to pay insurance and medical bills. And, another possible case in point: Top executives in the military industrial complex are very well off, yet the burden to the taxpayers is great, accounting for more than half of the national budget.
   I say possible case in point, because I have not seen studies on the percentage of money flowing into the pockets of industry high executives.
   But, I wonder.
   It could also be argued that any company paying its employees so meagerly they remain poor is a drain on the economy, as a whole, for they keep more people in poverty than the number of those they prosper.
   Well, I would write more, but 'tis late, and bed calls. But, I go to bed suggesting the wealth of a nation should not be measured in the prosperity of the few. I go to bed suggesting the prosperity of a few can be the burden of the many.

Sunday, March 22, 2015

Being a Prophet is More than Just Prophesying

(Index -- Great poems) 

Being a prophet is more than just prophesying. One of the ways a prophet is a prophet, is that he directs us to truths and leads us into God's ways. As I was searching for inspirational poetry tonight, I ran across a website featuring five poems quoted in General Conference by Thomas S. Monson, our current prophet.
  I had been searching through poems, looking for some I might consider the best poems of all time. Some of these quoted by President Monson, I consider as among the best. This first one, I'm not sure I'd include in the world's finest, if the whole poem were quoted, but I like this verse quoted by President Monson.

Good timber does not grow with ease:
 The stronger wind, the stronger trees;
The further sky, the greater length;
 The more the storm, the more the strength.
By sun and cold, by rain and snow,
 In trees and men good timbers grow.
   -- Douglas Malloch

This one also seems to have been quoted just in part, though I could not find more of it.

Why build these buildings glorious,
If man unbuilded goes?
In vain we build the world,
Unless the builder also grows.
We are blind,
Until we see
That in the universal plan
Nothing is worth the making if
It does not make the man.
  -- Edwin Markham

One more, I'll quote here. This one is titled, It Shows in Your Face.

You don't have to tell how you live each day;
You don't have to say if you work or play.
A tried true thermometer serves in the place,
However you live it shows in your face.

The false, the lies, that you bear in your heart,
Will not stay inside where if first got it's start.
Blood and muscle are a thin veil of lace;
What you wear in your heart, you wear on your face.

If your life is unselfish, if for others you live,
Not how much you get, but how much you give,
If you live close to God and his infinite grace
You won't have to tell, it shows in your face.

 -- Karlene Garner

 It is true another person could have quoted to me these poems. But, prophets are special sources for obtaining wisdom. Guiding me into truth is part of their calling, and I tend to appreciate truths that come from them.

Saturday, March 21, 2015

Industrial Military Complex Execs Needs to be Knocked off the Hill

   We cannot cry for ending the national debt unless we also demand reining in military spending. With defense costs being 57 percent of the budget, we surely should realize as much.
   I do not say we should not keep a good national defense. We must. Only do I say that we should not allow the industrial military complex to overcharge us so much.
   And, they are. There are times they sell us things we don't need, and times they overcharge for what we do need.
   We worry about soaring medical costs. Even so, military costs are out of control. Yesterday, I posted on how in order for medical costs to go up, you need little more than finding a payer rich enough to pay however much you charge. If somebody has a lot of money, someone else will be reaching in their pocket to take it out.
   Uncle Sam has the deepest of pockets. In a sense, that is, for he will borrow however much money is required. So, however much you want to raise the bill, rest assured Uncle Sam will find a way to pay you. That being true, there is going to be a tendency for contractors to take as much money from him as they can.
   Rob him blind, so to speak.
   Where does the money go? I don't believe the average person working for a military contractor makes an overly amount, at all. But, I would bet the chief executives do. Are they living high on the hill? I don't know any, personally, but don't believe it's a secret these men are very well off.
   How to get them to charge Uncle Sam less? How to get them to live on much reduced pay? Those are hard questions. It needs to be done, but how do we go about it? How to you convince the CEO of Boeing to live off $130,000 a year?
   And, I'm not so sure I wouldn't cut him that low, if I could -- him and everyone else in his board room.

Friday, March 20, 2015

A Bill Will not be Paid, Unless Their is Someone Rich Enough to Pay it

   If health costs are high, insurance is the enabler. A large bill will not be charged unless there is someone rich enough to pay it. And, it is the insurance companies -- not the patients -- who can afford to pay.
   If we didn't have an insurance system, and if patients had to pay their own bills, we would not be paying such outlandish sums for these visits to the hospital. It is the principle of supply and demand at work: However much money someone can supply, there will be someone demanding that they do.
   So, not only are insurance companies enablers, they are victims. Simply by being rich, and by being the ones paying the bills, they become the victims. It is an old principle at work: If someone has a lot, there will be someone seeking to take it from them.
   So, how do we fix our broken health care system? How do we bring down health care costs? As much as anything, the answer lies in lowering the supply of money available. Either get rid of the insurance companies, or see to it that they are not so rich.
   Those are not things you do overnight. If we just outlawed insurance companies of a sudden, the system built upon them would collapse. Reduce their incomes too rapidly, too, and that might cause our health care system to take a hard tumble.
   How do we go about either weaning ourselves from the insurance companies, or separating them from so much money? I confess I do not know. I have a thought or two, but it is late and I shall not stay up to think them out.

Thursday, March 19, 2015

Voting Festivals Could Spark Meaningful Voter Involvement

   President Obama has suggested mandatory voting, and Oregon has passed legislation making everyone a registered voter unless they opt out.
   If the idea is to connect more people to the election process, both ideas will get more people there. But, neither idea brings people to the polls more educated. Getting voters to vote doesn't mean much if they don't know what they are voting for.
   You might as well give them all a stick of bubble gum and ask them to blow a bubble when they get to the polls. That is as meaningful as having them look down a list of candidates they know nothing about. If they aren't informed, it's just an exercise.
   A better idea, one that will help educate them? I like the idea of making election day a holiday, and hosting voter festivals, where the voters meet the candidates, hear the issues, join in the festivities, and then vote. President Obama suggested mandatory voting would curb the influence of money. I'm not so sure it would. But, this would. The candidates would be right there, front and center, giving their speeches, talking to voters, and the voters would be influenced by this regardless how much money the candidates had previously spent.

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Clearly the Unborn are Humans, and Clearly They are Living Creatures

   If they are not human, what are they? The unborn, if we were to pull out our biology charts, charting all the creatures of the world, how would the unborn offspring of humans be classed? As humans, of course, unless we create a new species in order to not classify them as humans.
   And, if you suggest they are even alive that they should be classed as any species, then how shall we class them in terms of how alive they are? Living? Is there another description for something that has blood coursing through its veins, pushed by a heart that beats? Shall we create a new word, say, "Mxlbttl," to classify them as having some of the characteristics of the living, but not enough.
   About the only two characteristics they don't have, are that they haven't been born, and they cannot emit vocal sounds. Still, if they are not to be considered living, there ought to be a word to cover what they are.
   I jest, of course. To me, clearly, they are living. Undeniably.
   So, here we have it: They are clearly humans, and they are clearly living. If we take their lives, then, yes, we are killing them.

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

They are Unwanted, So We Abort Them

  These are the unwanted. Their very mothers protest that they ever should have had to have had them. In fact, the diswant of their mother (and often their father) defines who they are, for the diswant of the parent leads to the abortion of the child.
   There are some who are wanted, yet the abortion takes place anyway. But far and away, by large, these are beings who are aborted because they simply are not wanted. Can I call them people?  These are people who would be an incumbrance, or an inconvenience, or a burden. So, we abort them.

Monday, March 16, 2015

If We Could Communicate With Them, Maybe We'd Keep Them All

    One wishes there could be a conversation between the aborted and their mothers prior to the abortion.
   "Hello? Mother? I hear you are going to cut my life short before it even has a chance to begin."
   For a while, there is no reply on the other side, as the mother is a little shook up at hearing a voice from her stomach. Then,
   "Son?"
   "Mother, yes, it's me."
   "Then, you really are alive?"
   "Yes, Mom, I'm here."
   "Oh, son, I was about to abort you!"
   "Don't, Mom. Please don't."
    The mom bursts into sobs, and again there is a pause before,
   "Oh, son, I will have you! I will have you! Please forgive me!"
   And with that, and the passage of a few months, Cameron is born, 7 pounds, 3 ounces.
   It would be easy to keep them all, if we could just find a way to communicate with them.
 


Sunday, March 15, 2015

The Unborn Children We Abort: Theirs are Deaths of Our Choosing

   These are deaths of our choosing. We are given the discretion of letting them live, or letting them die, and we choose death.
   I speak of the unborn. I speak of abortions.
   A million times each year, we choose death. We choose it not for ourselves, but for others. Sometimes we justify our decision by saying we are doing what is best for them, that it would be wrong to bring them into a cruel world where parents do not want them, or where the parents don not have the resources to care for them.
   I ask, in reply, what of those already born? What do we do with them when they are in the same situation? What do we do with those who are bullied, or who live on skid row? Do, we say, You would be better off dead? Either commit suicide or let us kill you, for your own sake.
   Would we make that choice on their behalf?
   We make other decisions on behalf of the unborn, as well. It is us who decide whether they shall be considered persons. It is us who decide whether they shall be considered real, bonafide living beings. It is us who decide if our considerations are more important than their being born. It is us who decide if what is done is considered right or wrong.
   We make the choices, and it is they who either live or die with the consequences.

if We do Nothing, the Most Silent of Deaths will Continue

   If we remain silent, the unborn will continue to go to silent graves. As Edmund Burke put it, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
   I think of the unborn, of the estimate 1.2 million of them whose lives are taken each year (just in America). I think of a meme pointing out that since they cannot speak, we must speak for them. I think of the protests across America for blacks and against police brutality, and wish America were also so resolute about  stopping the loss of lives of the unborn.
   Surely, there can be no more silent of graves than those of the unborn. They are put in medical wastebaskets, taken out with medical trash, and buried as medical trash. And, they go there without funerals, without obituaries, without headstones, without tears from their families -- and without any expression of love towards them.
   Miss them? Who misses them?
   But, it is time that we do. And, since this cause, it is just, if we do rise to our feet, pickets and signs in hand, if we do march and protest -- all across America -- if we do rise up and demand an end to this mass injustice, our voices will be heard and change will be wrought.
   No question.
   When a nation rises in protest, the powers that be will bend. It has ever been so. We need but heed Edmund Burke's suggestion to not do nothing, and change will come.
   But, if we do nothing, the most silent of deaths will continue,

Friday, March 13, 2015

All Lives Matter, Including the Lives of the Unborn


   I think of the riots in Ferguson, and across the nation, and see the power of protest. I think of the people chanting, "Raise your hands -- Don't shoot." And, I think of the slogan, "All lives matter."
   Look what Ferguson hath wrought: With it, we have become wary of death at the hands of police. Before Ferguson, we were a nation accepting the notion that if a policeman shot a person, it was because the person had it coming. Since Ferguson, we wonder if all the deaths are warranted, if all are justified. We are indignant, angry and defiant.
   We demand justice.
   The other day, a Facebook friend posted on police violence against blacks, and I commented, "All lives matter," on the thread. I scrolled down to read a meme of an unborn child, with the caption, "Raise Your Hands -- Don't Abort." I lost that meme, but made my own version, above. I added the line, "When the mother is the law." It is ironic that even as police are the ones who should protect us, even so it is that mothers should protect their unborn.
    I find myself, tonight, wishing the nation would rise in outrage against taking the lives of unborn children, that there were outrage equal to what there has been in Ferguson. I look at Ferguson, and think of the slogan, "All lives matter," and consider that certainly that should include the unborn. Their lives should matter.
   A life taken amiss is a life that should be missed. What? an estimate 1.2 million lives lost to abortion each year, and yet we go on about our affairs without considering saving them? If we were to rise in protest, mny or most of those lives could be spared.


When Society has Warts, the Soothing Balm is Public Protest

   Anger can bring healing. When there is hurting, when there is wrong, when the ills of society get us so worked up we pour into the streets in anger, then is when change will come. The warts of society fester until we find them so offensive, we treat them with a balm called public protest.
   When a nation rises in protest, the powers that be will bend.
   Has it ever been so? From the first revolution, outrage has healed America. We shed the injustices of tyranny first with such protests as the Boston Tea Party and then with war. We cast off slavery only with war, and dispersed much of the discrimination against blacks only with marches and banners and outcry in the public square. We gave women the right to vote only after they stood up with pickets and shouted.
   Protest has helped make America great. If there are wrongs that remain, we must not think they will be healed in our silence.

Thursday, March 12, 2015

Does Constitution Whisper for the Senate and President to Get Along?

    I sit down to write about how, if we are to do things the way the Constitution outlines, the Senate should vote on the Iran deal.
   I'm barely started, when I realize the funner story is that, if we are to follow the way the Constitution paints that things should happen, then just maybe the Senate and President Obama need to get along and work together. Yes, to me, that venerable document seems to be suggesting as much.
   It's only a little more than one line, but listen to what the Constitution says. It starts by talking about the president, and it says, "He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur."
   I don't know, picturing the the president taking advice from the Senate seems to suggest they sit down and work together as a team. Now, in the days when the Constitution was written, that might have seemed possible. But . . .
   Then, enter the parties.
   And, I wonder if partisan division has ever been so divisive as it is at present. Sit down and cordially come up with an international agreement? Not likely in today's world. I would love to see that happening, though. I would love to see the Constitution being loved so much that the participants would say, "If a little love between us is what is being suggested -- if the Constitution so much as insinuates that -- we will make it happen."

Wednesday, March 11, 2015

Iran Deal Appears to be Binding -- So, Constitution Says, Let Senate Vote

   An example of President Obama's executive actions I do not agree with comes in the form of the proposed deal with Iran. Treaties must be approved by the Senate, but Secretary of State John Kerry suggests this is not a treaty, but rather an executive agreement.
   Are we sidestepping the way the Constitution would have us do this by choosing our own language? Kerry says the agreement would not be binding. I wonder what that means. Does it mean we can go ahead and impose sanctions even though Iran is keeping its part of the deal? Because, if we are obligated to keep our part of the deal, it seems it is binding, and it is a treaty, and the Senate should be allowed to vote on whether to approve it.

Tuesday, March 10, 2015

I and the Cabbage Patch have the Same Distant Grandparent?

  Now, did man, cabbage and insects all evolved from the same organism? Am I related to cabbage through an eons ago common ancestor? Then, again, was there just a single organism that we all evolved from?
   Or did man evolve from one organism, cabbage from another, and insects from a third? For, it does seem if there was one time that amino acids spawned a living creature, then there was a second and a third.
   Doesn't such a thought leaves open the possibility that different sets of species evolved from different starter organisms?
 

Monday, March 9, 2015

From the Earliest DNA, Did a Map Exist for Far-Flung Generations?

   I once read how in the embryo that becomes a baby, the mapping exists for all the features of what the person will eventually look like, the hair color, facial look -- everything. And, this makes sense -- doesn't it? -- since if a person inherits features, then everything must be passed through the smallest of portals, the very smallest of organisms that is to grow into a person.
   For those who oppose abortion who face the criticism that early on, the embryo is not a human because it bears no human features, the argument is clear: All the features of a human being, even before they are visible, are present in the embryo, indeed, in the zygote.
   But, there is also an argument for the design of man hidden in this. If human features are mapped out before the person becomes what he or she eventually becomes, and they are passed from generation to generation, then at least portions of the map existed as far back as the first -- shall we say -- zygote.
   I'm would guess everyone agrees on that. After all, evolutionists have long spoken of the percentage of DNA in a current person that is the same as that of a person living eons ago.
   Here's what I wonder: Did that earliest of all ancestors include coding within it allowing descendants to differ? The question is very significant, for if the original genetics contain mapping for one descendant to look one way, and another to look another, then there existed from the earliest inception, design. Whether you want to tack the word "intelligent" on it front of it, design, itself, is a fact.
   This runs counter to what current evolution teaches, if I understand correctly. For, my understanding is that evolutionists will tell you there is no design, there is no plan. The creature is molded and changed by its environment, becoming one thing if the environment molds it that way, and another if the environment molds it another.
   If there is advanced life on other planets, the creatures do not look like our humans.
   I look at all the different creatures, and wonder. I look at just the animal kingdom, and wonder. Did a bear become a bear and a horse a horse based solely on differences in environment?
   This is all supposing we believe evolution does mean one creature evolves into another. And, I may share tomorrow a reason for wondering whether that is as true as what current evolutionary thought suggests.

Saturday, March 7, 2015

Laws can Serve as Good Influences

   What of the argument that laws against drugs, and smoking, and gambling and prostitution all take away our agency?
   To me, they do not. I suggest that while the law does impose consequences, there are consequences to most any choice. If a person chooses to take cocaine, long before the law comes along, there will be consequences. The threat of those consequences can be a good thing, for if a person can see drugs are going to ruin his life, he will be less inclined to take them.
   Good influences are good, so laws that influence us for good are a benefit to us.
   So, if we are so worried about laws taking away our agency, why do we not worry that these natural consequences also are robbing us of agency? Why do we not protest that God has set up a system that cuts against our ability to choose without being forced to choose? He has not. And, in the same vein, laws do not take away our agency. They add to the consequences, yes, but our agency remains. They influence what we do, yes, but they are good influences, even as many natural consequences serve as good influences.

Friday, March 6, 2015

Story of Joseph is story of Government Assistance

   I sometimes consider the story of Joseph, who was sold into Egypt, and how he gathered food during the seven good years, and how the government provided during the seven lean years. Government assistance? It surely was, and the whole of the land and all of the people were on it.
   I think sometimes, we get too caught up in whether the government is providing a service or doing something, when what is important, is not who is doing it, but that it is getting done.

Thursday, March 5, 2015

Whether Health Care is a Right, is it Right to Provide it to Everyone?

    A picture of someone holding up a sign, saying, "Health Care is a Human Right," rolls across my Facebook page, and Connor Boyack, the poster says, "No, it's not."
   I reply:
  Maybe we should view the question not from a standpoint of whether it is a right, but whether it is right. If you can help someone, should you? If someone will suffer without medical attention, should you leave them to suffer?
   Never has society beheld such medical advances as what we have today. So, such medical care could not be offered in past societies. Today, we know how to treat many diseases and conditions, and the question is whether we should ensure that as many people as possible are reached with these benefits.
   Have them pay for what they get, then? I have no problem with that. I do not know what work provisions Utah Cares has, but I understand Healthy Utah does have some. My thought is, it would be wonderful if every person placed in Healthy Utah (or Utah Cares) were also placed in a job, even if it were a second job as their first doesn't earn enough money.
   Don't know if that could be done, but I think it would be ideal. And, I know it won't get done unless we try. So, I say, make the effort to place them all in jobs.

Wednesday, March 4, 2015

Respect Those of Same-Sex Attraction & Those Who Don't Believe in it

  I believe you have the right to believe as you do, the right to practice same-sex unions, without being discriminated against in the work place and without being denied housing.
  But, I also believe I have the right to believe that same-sex marriage is wrong, that marriage should be between man and woman. And, I don't feel I should be discriminated against by being fired for expressing my belief.
   Perhaps that is a fair summation of the sentiment that has brought about legislation drafted in the Utah Legislature and announced today. The state is hailing the bill, SB296. And it is indeed an achievement, that a bill should favor defending the same-sex marriage, and, at the same time, defend those who do not believe in such marriages.
  The bill has attracted supporters from those in the LGBT community. That is of note. We will wait to see if it also draws opposition from others in Utah's same-sex community. I hope not. It would be neat if the bill pleases both sides.

Tuesday, March 3, 2015

Would be Nice to have a Study of Ways Body Sometimes Defends Itself

   So, the body adapts to its environment. If it takes in a lot of food, it gets fat, etc.
   What if we were to only consider the times the body rejected the environment, the times it resisted it?
   Like the 100-year-old person who smokes or drinks. Or the person who doesn't get fat, albeit he eats as much as an obese person. Or the person who swallows poison and it doesn't harm them. Such a study would be interesting.
   I do wonder about the body's ability to build up immunities, and I wonder if there are ways the body rejects harmful environments beyond what we discuss as building up immunities. I wish someone would study of this, analyzing incidents and what has caused them.
   (Blog altered 3/4/15.)

Monday, March 2, 2015

I Fear the Very Thought that a Constitutional Convention is Being Considered

   The very Constitution is being questioned. There have arisen those who would assemble a new constitutional convention to change the document.
   Me? I say, forbid. I love our Constitution. Oh, this is not to say there are not changes we might make. But if amendments are to be made, make them amendments, only, not a rework of the document. I fear those who would staff a constitutional convention. We would not be assembling a body of men and women equal to those who founded our nation. I fear what changes they might bring.
    And, I fear the very thought that a constitutional convention is even being considered. I haven't overviewed all the movements. Perhaps most call only for amendments, not reworking the venerable document entirely. Still, I fear that a group would get together where massive changes would be possible.
(Post added to and changed 3/3/15)


Sunday, March 1, 2015

Little Steps Lead to Big Ones

   I wrote the first two lines long, long ago. Had it on a piece of scratch paper among so much junk needing to be thrown away. Ran across it yesterday and decided I better finish it so I could throw the scratch paper away.

  Little steps are big ones,
Small steps lead to great,
  The first step may seem tiny,
But it is it that decides your fate.





City Planning Suggests Land Near Airport a Natural Fit for Other Uses

   The land near the airport is on the list of suggested sites for the prison relocation, as you may know. I do wonder about that. No, I am not so worried about what those flying in will think, to find the prison at our gateway. On that, I wonder if perhaps it will not bother them.
   But, use of the land? The reason for giving up the Draper property is that a higher use of the land is foreseen. Why would we, then, not be concerned about the proper use of land near the airport? It, too, is a valuable resource. Some companies value being near an airport, as they fly their people in and out quite often. Once that land is taken to build a prison, it will no longer be available to lure those businesses to Utah.
   Convention space? True, we already have situated a lot of our convention space downtown, but not all of it. Placing a convention center in the vicinity of the airport would, surely, be attractive to those considering where they hold their conventions. If we do think we might should add to our convention space anytime in the next 50 years, let's leave that land available.
   The proper use of land in a city, as we  all know, is called city planning. I suggest, if we are planning our city, we should see that the land near the airport has uses that fit in with it quite naturally. We should perhaps leave the land open for those uses.