Bless this Land, and the Leader We have Just Elected

   I did not vote for this next president. I held out because of my fears on abortion. But, I believe he might be a good president. His words last night reflected a humble determination to overcome the challenges of our times. 

   "We may be opponents, but we're not enemies. We're Americans. No matter who you voted for, I'm certain of one thing: the vast majority of the 150 million Americans who voted, they want to get the vitriol out of our politics. We're certainly not going to agree on a lot of issues, but at least we can agree to be civil with one another. We have to put the anger and demonization behind us. It's time for us to come together as a nation and heal. It's not going to be easy, but we have to try. My responsibility as president, will be to represent the whole nation. And, I want you to know, I will work as hard for those who voted against me, as those who voted for me. That's the job. That's the job. It's called the duty of care for all Americans."

  

   He was both humble and confident. He was not boisterous, but sincere. I do not know where America may go from here, but my hope of the moment is with faith. There is cause in his words, and in the tone of his words, to have hope. And, there lies a hope for peace within that hope.

  

   Bless this land, and the leader we have just elected. 

(Blog rewritten slightly 11/7/2020)

Why not Pollution-Reduction Plants Sucking Pollution Right Out of the Air?

  We could suck pollution out of the air. Why not? Why would it not work? We could have what we call a pollution-control plant, its smokestack stretching high into the air not to emit pollution, but to suck it in and bring it down below where it would be cleaned out.

   The plant would be powered by clean energy, so it itself would not be causing pollution.

   Perhaps, a plant a couple miles away that blew air, directing the airwaves towards the anti-pollution plant. 

   We have plants that clean our water supply, literally taking feces and all kinds of foul things out of our water. Why would this principle of cleaning not be possible? While I don't know that it surely is possible, I certainly believe it is worth investigating to see if it is possible.

   Would all the carbon monoxide need to be converted to oxygen? Can that not be done artificially, but only by photosynthesis? Would we be able to have enough green plants down beneath to pull the trick? How would we remove the methane from the air? Good questions, all. My bet is that these questions could be answered. Our air could, at least to a degree, be cleaned by a pollution-control plant, or, if you prefer, call it a pollution-reduction plant.  

Let the Electoral College be What the Founders Intended

    Let us reorganize our presidential elections. Let's keep the Electoral College, but let's let each state determine how the electors will be selected. If each state legislature wants to appoint the electors, that is fine. And if, instead, the states want to let the people elect the electors, that is their choice, as well. 

   And, since the states have power to do it the way they want, they can have us vote directly for who we want to be president, not even knowing who the electors are. It is, after all, the states' right to fill the spots on the Electoral College however they see fit. They can water everything down till the Electoral College has little meaning at all, for it is their right

  This is, of course, the way we are doing it. This is what the states have decided they want to do.

   But, I did say, Let's reorganize our presidential elections. It is perfectly legal, the way we are doing it. But, it is also clearly not the way the founding fathers intended. Let's reorganize it. Let's do it the way they intended. Let's be more of the republic they envisioned.

   I like the idea of the legislators, themselves, appointing the electors. But, don't let them appoint themselves as electors. The Constitution says, "No Senator, or Representative, nor Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector." So, let's go with that.

   The idea is to elect wise people to be the electors. The idea is to elect electors who will consider the various people they are aware of, and find a person to be president who will be of the right character, demeanor, ability, and so forth.

   Thus, a republic. America becomes much more of a republic if we do it this way. And, since this is the way the Constitution set it up, it becomes more of the republic the founding fathers intended it to be. 

  

If You were the Russians and Wanted Chaos, this is what You Would do

   If you were the Russians, and you did control the election, and your real goal was just to sow discord, who would you want to win? You would want Biden, for if Biden wins, Trump will not accept the results, and you will reap all kinds of discord.

   You would want chaos. You would want to place the victory in front of Trump, then snatch it back from him. You would want accusations of ballot fraud. You would want the people to be outraged that the election was being taken from him. You would plant false stories in social media to egg on the outrage. 

   I'm just saying. I'm not saying for sure this is what is happening, and I'm not saying it isn't. I'm just saying that if you were the Russians and wanted to sow as much discord as you could, this is exactly what you would have happen.

   And, it is. Just saying.

 

   

The People are Entrenched in Their Parties More than Ever

    Results reflect how party is everything, perhaps more than ever. Inn countywide races here in Salt Lake County, Democrats have swept, except for our friend, Wayne Cushing, who might by a nip be re-elected treasurer. I never even heard of his opponent during the campaign. County mayor? Trent Staggs, the Republican, seemed to have way out-spent the incumbent Democrat, Jenny Wilson. (I'll have to look up the campaign spending). I thought for sure he would win. But, no, Jenny handily won re-election.

  I think our nation is more divided by party than ever before. Take Trump. Nothing has changed in four years, not as far as public opinion, that is. For a large part, those who were for Trump have never wavered. Nothing will change them. Those against him, the same. They were against him in 2016, and nothing has changed their minds. If Biden does win, it won't be by much. The results already show that state-after-state that the for Trump in 2016, went Trump, again. Mostly all the same states. Impeachment, pandemic, riots . . . all the upheaval does not change the course of the people in their politics. 

Let Utah Look at Taiwan, and Follow

    Shocking. Taiwan has had but 563 cases of COVID-19 and only 7 deaths. In all this time since Covid burst upon us, that's all.  Compare that to Florida, which is of about the same population, but which has had but about 16,000 deaths.

   Seven against 16,000.  Scramble, America. Scramble to learn what they have done differently.

  To begin with, they are mask-oriented. Their culture is not against wearing them. They don't have rave parties where thousands of youth show up in defiance of the authorities who are saying, please wear masks. 

  But, that is only part of it. They are technologically savvy. They are record-keepers. When someone goes to a doctor, their medical records pop up, with a complete history that includes their respiratory problems. They proactively seek out patients with severe respiratory symptoms and test them and treat them. 

  Yes, they are record-keepers. And, they integrate the records of those who have traveled abroad with the medical records. And, they test those who have traveled. In America, no such luck. In America, they would scream at you for sharing your travel records with the medical community. Americans share their every move on Facebook, but they will not share all the information vital to stopping Covid-19. Bless them, it is their freedom. Bless them. But, it would surely help if they realized it would do no harm to share such information. It would only help. It would not lead to the end of our freedom nor to the demise of our nation.

   Taiwan can isolate itself from the world. No one can enter who will not be tested. I think back on the early days of Covid in Utah, and of how there was an effort to monitor the borders. Seven highways into the state were identified. It was voluntary, and no one was going to toss you into jail if you didn't, but you were to register. Same with airline passengers who were not just passing through on airport layovers. If they were staying, they were to voluntarily register. 

   One wonders if it would have been so bad to make it a mandate. And, not just register them, but test them. A major inconvenience, that. But think of the inconveniences we have had, and consider that we have lived though them. Sometimes, safety is an inconvenience. Tests don't come back in a day. Testing everyone at the state line would have perhaps meant a few tent cities, and, in the border cities where hotels exist, it would have meant the overflow of those hotels.

   In retrospect, and looking at Taiwan, I say we should have done it. It does not go unnoticed on me that if we had, then students would have accounted for a large share of those entering the state. 

   Nor does it go unnoticed that the same people who decry the loss of freedom over masks and social distancing were also opposed to the registration at the borders. I wonder if it would have been an incursion on their freedom. My judgement, at this point, is that it would not. My thought is that the government does have the right to secure its borders from the disease.

   Measures work. Covid can be stopped. Taiwan shows us as much. Utah could have given itself a better chance to sidestep the virus. It could, perhaps, have been the one state to escape the pandemic. 

   So, let us take it from here. Up the record-keeping -- keeping and sharing all information necessary -- though letting people opt out if they choose (as the Constitution does guarantee them the right to be secure in their personal effects). Be quicker to test the risk groups. Take greater measures to isolate and quarantine those who contact the disease. Encourage more isolating, period. When family members step away from their homes, they run the risk of contacting the virus and spreading it to others in the family. So, let them isolate and mask as much as they can.  Step up the calls for mask-wearing and social distancing. Let every student be called in by their school, sat down, and given a cordial plea to help by masking. Should church leaders wish, let them continue their efforts to encourage people to follow the counsel. Let everyone from government leaders to neighbors calmly encourage compliance, making their pleas not with anger, but with love. 

   And, consider a mandate. If it is not an infringement of Constitutional rights -- and my thought at the moment is that it is not -- then perhaps do it. You wear a mask, or you pay a fine or go to jail

   Testing at the border? I even consider that -- yet. Yes, the damage is done once you have so many cases within your state. We still are fighting to stop the virus. Stopping more Covid from entering our state would lessen the flow of the virus. It would have some effect.    

   These are dire times, and dire measures are not wrong.

   In closing, what of the argument that Covid is no more a problem than the common cold? What of the argument that deaths are counted as Covid when they really belong to other things? What of the argument that this is all hysteria? 

   Look back to Florida, with its 16,000 deaths compared to only seven in Taiwan. How many of those 16,000 might be up for debate is one matter, but it seems surely that thousands and thousands of those deaths were from Covid. And, if they are testing so much in Taiwan, do we suppose that they are not counting the deaths as from Covid? Do we suppose they are classing them differently than we are? Seven deaths, is all. Are we suggesting there really have been thousands more, but they've counted them as deaths from the common flu, and from things we call underlying conditions?

   If you can save lives, do it. Utah can do better, and should. 

If Prisoners don't Belong There, COVID is Good Time to Release Them

  The families of prisoners are demanding their loved ones be released because of the COVID outbreak. It is unsafe, they are telling us. 

   How much safer would they be on the outside? The pandemic is at a crest. People are perhaps not any safer out of prison than in it. 

   Still, I believe there is worthiness in releasing prisoners. It is worthy to consider what each one is in there for. How many are there simply because they did not report their new addresses to probation officers? How many are there for technical issues? Yes, we have criminals who belong in prison. Yes, many belong there. But, I believe there might (I say might, for I must yet study more) also be some who are there for technical issues for which we should not be imprisoning them in the first place. 

   Leave the ones who belong there, there. But, if there are those who don't really deserve to be there, this is as good a time as any to release them. 

   Another consideration should be whether we can isolate them. If we can isolate them while they are in prison, they are surely as safe as they will be outside the prison.