Thanks. It's a word that never wearies of friendship. It accepts friendship. It gives friendship. It is friendship. 

(Index: Quotes)

The G League Develops Few NBA Stars

The G League, is it working, is it worth it? It enters its 20th year in existence, not having produced a single bonafide NBA star. Yes, 50 percent of the players in the NBA have done stints down at the developmental level, including the likes of Rudy Gobert and Fred VanVleet, to mention just two, but not a single player who was started down at the G level has ever been called up and became a star. Nope, not one. So, what do we do with this league, do we keep it around? Do we keep sending our second-round draft choices down there, hoping they will someday develop into rotational players?

Consider Georges Niang, who as a college player at Iowa State once was on a 35-man watch list for player of the year. And, as a 2016 draftee and summer league player, he drew praise from Larry Bird. The Jazz ended up picking him up, and assigning him to the Salt Lake City Stars affiliate, where he became a first-team G Leaguer. Nothing wrong with how that turned out. Niang went on win a full-time Jazz contract, and earn a starter's position.

That's about as far as a G Leaguer can be expected to go in the NBA. Is it enough? I'd say, yes and no. If the G League can produce enough stories like that of Niang, keep it. Still, though, you'd wish it to produce more, and you'd like to see a few G Leaguers becoming stars in the NBA.

Look at the list of G League MVPs through the 19 seasons. How many do you even recognize? We'll start with last year and go backwards to 2001: Frank Mason III, Chris Boucher, Lorenzo Brown, Vander Blue, Jarnell Stokes, Tim Frazier, Othyus Jeffers, Andrew Goudelock, Justin Dentmon, Curtis Stinson, Mike Harris, Courtney Sims, Kasib Powell, Randy Livingston, Marcus Fizer, Matt Carroll, Tierre Brown, Devin Brown, and Ansu Sesay.

And, therein might lie the secret to what most needs to be done. You need to give it some star power. If we can read through the list of MVPs and not recognize but a name or two, clearly the league and its players are lacking media attention.

A couple years ago, the NBA announced it would take players fresh out of high school, offering them $125,000 to come straight to the G League and play there instead of playing in college. How can you beat that? Get paid $125,000 or play in college for a year and not receive a dime, which will it be? But, the high school players were too smart. They didn't take the bait. They realized they would be playing in anonymity in the G League, whereas they would gain exposure under the bright lights and cameras of college ball.

So, if you are going to fix the league, the first thing you should do is grab it some more exposure. For one thing, you've got to get the highlights every night on Sports Center. There is talent down at the G level. Consider that Jimmer Fredette played there and only ranked as a second-team all star in 2016 (although he was MVP at the all-star game). Start with giving the league some hype, some pizzazz, and see if that helps.

Most of the players play for only $35,000 for a five-month season. That's clearly a problem. How are you going to keep your players from jumping overseas where they command much more than that? The best G Leaguers do exactly that -- They jump to the Euro League of somewhere overseas, Jimmer Fredette being an example. However, if you developed enough hype for the G League and marketed it well, it might become a money-maker and you could afford to pay the players well. Start with the marketing, and you'll turn the league around. The G League players come in having starred at their previous levels. How are you not able to market that? How are you not able to whip up enough frenzy so this league can pay its own way?

Regardless of What Kaepernick Says, Mumia Should Remain in Prison

   Colin Kaepernick would have us free Mumia Abu-Jamal. That's the latest news on Kaepernick. Mumia killed a police officer way back in 1981. The effort to free him has become a cause celebre. This week, after news broke that Kaep had joined the long list of people calling for Mamia's release, CNN's Michael Smerconish went on air, inviting Kaep to talk to him or the slain officer's widow. Smerconish suggested the topic was something he knows a little about. You might say I wrote the book, he said, and held up a book titled, Murdered by Mumia: A Life Sentence of Loss, Pain, and Injustice. Even those in the neighborhood where Mumia lived do not stand behind him, Smerconish suggested.

   A closer study will/would probably show Smerconish right. A Wikipedia entry, though, gives us some insight. "Labor unions, politicians, advocates, educators, the NCAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and human rights advocacy organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have expressed concern about the impartiality of the trial of Abu-Jamal." Therein, perhaps, we get the crux of the matter. It is not that Mumia is not guilty, but that his trial might not have been fair. 

  How important is it, that we clean up our justice system, that we run it fair, that we do not run on the principle that, You're guilty, so it doesn't matter if we treat you "fair."

  Still, would it be right to free Mumia? He is clearly guilty. The trial might have been flawed, and we should see the urgency in making sure this doesn't happen, but we should still consider that perhaps Mumia should remain in prison.

  Also of interest: All the links to videos showing Kaepernick speaking -- have been taken down. "Sorry, this video is no longer available," it says. I did find one still up, but the rest have all been scrubbed. We should be concerned about this grave incursion into free speech. Kaep should be allowed to speak. What he says should not be censored. He is standing up for someone who truly wrongfully murdered a police officer -- yes -- but that should not erase his right to his opinion. 

Do We See a Likeness in Our Day

    The Latter-day Saints have a book of scripture that speaks of secret combinations. Those combinations existed in the days of the Book of Mormon, and the book indicates they were to be a concern in our day.

   The book contains a story of how a person wanted to overthrow the kingdom, and his daughter falls in league with him in conspiring how to go about it. "Is there not an account concerning them of old, that they by their secret plans, did obtain kingdoms and great glory?" she asks.

   Many among the LDS have long wondered what the secret combinations in that book are all about. They refer to them -- as does much of the book  -- as Gadianton's Robbers. It is a mystery. They also wonder at our day, wondering where and how the secret combinations -- the "Gadianton Robbers" -- might exist among us today in the United States.

   So, if the daughter of Jacob speaks of a formula that tells how to go about overthrowing the kingdom by using these secrets of old, what follows would surely be the playbook.

   And what follows is that she dances before the person who they want to get to murder the king. The person watches her dance and desires her for his wife. They tell him to bring the head of the king, and then he can have her to wife. When power is gained, those involved are sworn to secrecy, and sworn to be loyal to the new rulers. If someone opposes the new regime, they are to be killed. 

   There, then, perhaps is the formula for these secret combinations. Perhaps if we break it down, we might see relations to what could be happening in our day. Jared and his daughter got Akish by appealing to his passions, appetites and desires. He lusted to have the daughter as his wife when he saw her dance. Perhaps it was even an appeal to pride, for to have a beautiful woman can be a matter of pride. Then, they swore people to loyalty, to be faithful to the new regime. And, they covered up the truth. Even so, you establish and maintain your power through falsehood and by preventing the truth. Those who opposed them were to be killed.

Four steps: 1.) Appeal to vanity; 2.) Require loyalty; 3.) Suppress the truth; 4.) Punish those who oppose you.

Do we see a likeness in our day? 

So, Jared and his daughter got Akish by appealing to his passions, appetites, and desires. I consider on whether it equates to appealing to his pride, for to have a beautiful woman is somewhat a thing of pride. Then, you maintain your power through falsehood, even as Akish kept the truth from being known. And, you punish those who oppose you, even as Akish had them killed. Whether that is what the Gadianton robber formula is all about, we can wonder. We do see those three elements in what took place here in Ether. And, it tells us right at the beginning of that little story that they are going to use the formula of old. There is good reason to

We Must Return a Focus to the National Debt

The nation should not lose track of its national debt. It should not quit the watch. More than $27 trillion, does it stand at now. It was just under $20 trillion when Donald Trump took office. So, the growth has been close to double how fast it was increasing before Trump took office. 

   Regardless who is to blame -- or whether it is even the president who is to blame -- we need  to return to a concern for the national debt. Other things might have stolen our attention, the pandemic and social unrest, but we must get a focus back on the national debt. 

Consider on These Women Who are Pro-Choice.

   Consider on those who are pro-choice, and be not quick to cast distain upon them. Among them are those who cannot afford a child, those who humbly acknowledge they cannot provide proper care for the child. Yes, and among them are they who -- though the act might not have reached rape -- went into the night against their will, and they who were enticed by men seeking only to draw pleasure from their beds.

   What have I done? these women said in the morning, some without even knowing a child would come.

   I do not say abortion is right, even in such a fix. Nor do I say they were right in what they did. Still, consider on them. Have compassion. Consider the tears that flow from their eyes, and the heartache they go  through. Consider the host of them who are not wicked people, but rather who often are quite honorable.

   Consider that many of them -- who knows what proportion -- do not believe life begins at conception. They seek not to take a life. Consider that they are told by those they trust -- both by authority figures and loving friends -- that life does not begin at conception. However quick they are to believe, many of them are persuaded to their beliefs by others. Mistakes can draw their decisions from the friendship of others.

   Consider on these women, a wonderful bunch they are. Would we view them as our enemy? Would we distain them and cast stones at them? I think it not necessary. I think it not worthy of us. We are called to love all mankind, and told not to judge.    

The Story of Esau and Jacob is the Story of Our Day

    It's a biblical story. Esau loses his birthright, and therefore hates his brother who won it from him, and vows to kill that brother. Sounds exactly like what is happening today between the descendants of that story. The Muslims hate Christians, as well as the nation of Israel, and they are vowing to wipe the nation of Israel off the face of the earth.  

  The story of Esau's losing his birthright to Jacob laid out, prefigured, what would happen in our world. Just as Jacob gained the birthright, even so the Christian nations have ruled the world. Esau was told, though, that there would be times "when thou shalt have dominion, that thou shalt break his (Jacob's) yoke from off thy neck." Even so, we have seen the Crusades, and all the wars between the Muslims and the Christians and the Jews in Israel ever since. And, there have been times the Muslims have broken the yoke, even as the story foretold. Esau was told that, "By thy sword shalt thou live," and it has been war for his posterity ever since.

   "And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his father blessed him." Even so, there are those of Islam who hate Christians. There perhaps is even a rage of jealousy within them, thinking they should be the ones ruling the world. "And Esau said in his heart . . .I will slay my brother Jacob." Even so, the Muslims sometimes speak of sweeping the Jews into the sea. 

  "Bless me, even me also," Esau had cried. And, his father had replied that he would. "Thy dwelling shalt be the fatness of the land, and of the dew of heaven from above," his father promised. Even so, look at the Muslim nations today. They have the "fatness of the land." They are rich, in many ways, with oil. Dubai is one of the richest cities on earth, its becoming so only in recent decades. Dubai is a fulfillment of the story-prophecy we have seen just within the span of the last few decades, in our own day. Nor have the riches of the oil fields blessed them all along, but that too has been a fulfillment just in the last century or so.