The Alternative Holiday Gift Guide

This list is of my own making and is intended to bring joy to both the person giving and the person receiving.  Actual results may vary.

Help with snow removal. — This gift is appreciated by pretty much everyone who receives it.  We had a rather large storm recently and many people worked to help each other in some way to clean up driveways, walk ways, and sidewalks.  This is an excellent gift for widows, the elderly, infirm, single moms, or people who work a lot of hours and may not be home to take care of it before it becomes a hard frozen pack.

Donate to the Food Bank. — Donations are up this year, but the requests for assistance are up this year as well.  There are few things that are as essential to sustaining life as food.  Some of the higher valued items are canned protein foods such as tuna fish, peanut butter, and chili.  All items should be non-perishable.  If you can give food this year to help out those in need this will make a great gift too.

Give Coats to the Homeless Shelter. — There are a few local charities that are pretty successful at receiving donations of clothing and other used items such as Deseret Industries and the Salvation Army.  The Homeless Shelter needs help as well.  In the late fall and winter months the need is especially great.  They will accept blankets as well.  If you have an adult size coat in usable condition, please consider donating it to the Homeless Shelter where it can help someone in serious need.

Forgive or Apologize to Someone and Make Peace With Them. — Everyone has been wronged in one way or another.  We can choose to hold on to the grudge and the bad feelings or we can let it go and move on.  If you have a family member or someone else you know that has wronged you please reach out to them and forgive them.  It is possible that they are not aware of the offense committed against you either.  If you have wronged someone, please apologize and ask for their forgiveness.  This gift is perfect for pretty much everyone, it goes with any outfit, is appropriate for any occasion and the cost is swallowing your pride and opening your heart.  It may in fact help you to look better too.

Visit or Call Someone. — This time of year so many people feel isolated and forgotten.  I met someone the other day who was in town for a family gathering where for the first time all of the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren were all able to visit at the same time for the holidays.  I was happy to hear of that great event but there are so many people who do not get to hear from their children and grand children enough.  When I was younger my family had adopted a couple of sisters who never married as our grandparents.  We visited them several times a year and they were always honored guests at our Christmas Eve dinners.  It was a grand tradition we enjoyed as a family.  Find someone you know who may be lonely and reach out to them.  Everyone needs a friend.

Happy Holidays!

Corportate Funding is the Enemy of Science

The Global Warming debate has been going on for years with differing legitimate opinions over the causes and prevention of the same.  Recent revelations have tarnished the work and reputations of several scientists.  This is similar to Watergate and the Nixon administration.

Watergate was a big deal and the effects of it are still being felt more than 35 years later.  In the early 1970’s people still wanted to trust their leaders and believe that even though they were political enemies, at least they would not do anything criminal in pursuit of their aims.  Nixon was forced out of office under threat of impeachment and a whole generation coming of age was forever disenchanted with elected officials.  The effect was so great that when another president 25 years later was accused of committing similar acts of political self preservation the public was so jaded that it did not care as the economy was doing well.

Now the public has a similar reason to no longer trust scientific claims related to global warming and other corporate paid for scientific research.  A computer hacker accessed and copied several computer files including emails from the East Anglia Climate Research Unit in the United Kingdom.  The emails reveal efforts to avoid freedom of information laws, the deletion or loss of original data, efforts to suppress opposing viewpoints in scientific journals, falsifying reports, and other activities unbecoming serious scientific research.  This kind of behavior seriously undermines global warming claims.

The underlying problem is the corporate funding of global warming research with the end game of finding proof of man-made global warming.  Scientists have taken their cues from attorneys who will argue either side of a case and will find support for the conclusion they are paid to support.  So much for a dispassionate review of the observed phenomena and drawing conclusions from the data.

This happens with all kinds of targeted studies.  Cigarette advertising trumpeted the backing of several medical doctors, scientists, and educators for their brand or the benefits of filters (even when some of the filters had asbestos).   Scientific studies of several medical devices and pharmaceutical drugs have been skewed or falsified to gain FDA approval and after the failings of certain drugs or devices became evident the items were pulled from the market after the damage was done (e.g. silicone implants, Vioxx, Fen-Phen, Avandia, Paxil, thalidamide, etc…).

The difficulty is when these studies go forward on the basis of a proven idea that has not yet been proven.  There are millions of dollars spent, jobs created, and livelihoods at risk if the results show something different than the corporate funded expectations.  This becomes a vested interest by the scientists to skew and bend the data that does not conform to the pre-conceived conclusions already bought and paid for.

Science needs to reassert itself if it wants to regain credibility and public trust.  This can only be done by the individual scientists willing to stand up and quit working for companies and institutions that refuse to follow the data to wherever it leads.  Science has recently acquired a credibility gap and needs to regain what was lost.

Comments Welcome

A Return to Honesty

We live in a country with a highly regulated but still mostly free economic system.  We have many laws, rules, regulations, licenses, and taxes to comply with in order to run even a moderately sized business with 10 or more employees.  It can seem very overwhelming but millions of people manage to make it through the regulatory maze each and every year and help to provide the jobs people need to work and take care of their families.  Each and every one of these businesses will engage in hundreds of transactions each year and will be better for it.

With this chaotic arrangement the United States has the most dynamic and successful economy in the history of the earth.  Why does this system work so well?  Because of three basic things: 1- Creativity for bringing things to the marketplace, 2- Freedom to start a new business, and 3- Honest self interest.

The United States is the world leader in creativity for scientific innovations.  We have more useful new inventions here than in any other country in the world.  Many of our best inventions are manufactured in other countries but they were first invented here.

Freedom to work and begin a business.  For many people this is the American dream in the land of opportunity.  We have a very stable country from decade to decade with peace and tranquility in our borders that allows businesses to start, grow, and flourish.  You can start a restaurant, clothes merchandising, a tire store, a used car lot, computer store, or any other business where your combination of skill and interest lies.  The market is still allowing for new entrants and new ideas to flourish in the United States.

Honest self interest is an indispensible part of how our free market system works and is of the last several years causing serious problems because of a lack of honesty.  We have had some scandals because of greed outweighing honesty.  Here are a few examples.

In real estate for several years appraisers were under tremendous pressure to inflate appraisal numbers to qualify for bigger and bigger loans.  Only when people began to default on the loans and the mortgage companies were unable to recover market value equal to the loan value did the problem become evident.  Mortgage loan officers have been using stated income loans as a tool to get approvals for several years for people with difficult to show income which is an acceptable practice when they are honestly stating the income of the borrower.  Too many loans were pushed through with inflated income figures on the word of dishonest loan officers.  There were even some loan officers who “helped” people with 0% interest loans through Habitat for Humanity where it was clearly against the home owner’s interest to change the loan.

The dishonesty has to stop.  The free market system is in part based on the general goodness of people acting in their self interest.  Honest dealings with creditors, debtors, business owners, shopkeepers, as customers, and in any other part of the economic system will do more to promote business and grow the economy than almost anything else.  We need a return to honesty in all areas of the free market.

Comments Welcome

The Abortion Conundrum

(Author’s Note: Abortion in most cases is a uniquely modern day evil.  This column sarcastically addresses a common but not-well known issue regarding the practice of abortion.)

The Senate is considering a health reform bill right now.  Part of the ongoing debate is how to handle abortion funding.  Some Senators want federal funding for abortions while others oppose it.  Regardless of how you feel about the morality/advisability of abortions, there is a free market solution to the problem of how to fund abortions.  Here is one example of a comparable free market solution to the problem of wrecked and old cars.

Auto salvage yards pay for wrecked cars.  If you are in a car accident and the car is totaled, the insurance company pays for the value of the car and then the car is sold to an auto salvage yard.  The salvage yard then sells the wrecked car in parts to people who are looking for used auto parts.  It is a profitable enough business that the yellow pages have many listing for auto salvage yards.

If you have an old car that you just want to get rid of and is not able to be sold, you can still sell the car to the auto salvage yard and they will come and tow it away for you free of charge.  You are not liable for the costs of transporting it at all.  It works out pretty well for all the parties involved.  When the cars are completely stripped of usable parts the rest is sold for scrap metal and recycled.

There is a thriving auto recycling industry.  There are suppliers and buyers of all the used, wrecked, and recycled vehicles.  You may be wondering how this applies to the abortion question.  The answer is that there is a similar and thriving market for unborn babies.  There is a literal flesh market for unborn baby parts.

Medical research facilities purchase and traffic in bodies and body parts.  Abortion facilities and hospitals are a regular source for these parts.  When a woman goes in for an abortion, she is not informed that the life that is removed will be cut up, packaged, and re-sold to medical research facilities (not unlike how the neighborhood butcher takes care of cattle).  The worst of these procedures is partial birth abortion which I will not describe here.

Because of the market for bodies a doctor performing the abortion will alter the procedure to produce better specimens for the laboratories.  Babies have been removed alive and left to die or be killed, then processed for these labs because they make better specimens.   Sometimes the dissection is performed on a baby with a still beating heart meaning that it was a vivisection.  If you have a miscarriage and go to a hospital for follow up treatment the tissue samples will be processed and re-sold.  Unusable tissue for laboratory analysis is gathered and incinerated much like the scrap metal left over from auto wrecking yards.

So here is the free market solution to abortion funding.  Just like a woman does not pay to go to a fertility clinic to have her eggs harvested, abortions should be free and the costs covered by the re-sale of baby parts.  There is no reason that abortion clinics should not be self funding with the market for baby parts.  The problem of funding abortions is solved.  After all, it is her body and she should have control over it.

Comments Welcome

The Imperial House of Representatives

220 members of the U.S. House of Representatives have decided that we are subjects and not fellow citizens.  The House voted to pass a nearly 2000 page bill to reform health care late on a Saturday night probably hoping that it would not be noticed.  The good news is that the bill is not expected to see the light of day in the Senate.

The federal government proposals to reform health care have not enjoyed a majority of public support for the last several months.  There were summer protests, the tea party movement, a march on Washington, and several protesters at town hall meetings in August of this year.  In a poll from August, support for reform was only at 42% with strong opposition at 44%.  There has been no significant improvement in these numbers for supporting health care reform.

What is shamefully absent in these discussions is any notion of the concepts of freedom, liberty, or the limits of permissible Congressional action under the U.S. Constitution.   There is simply no basis in the Constitution for the government take over and complete regulation of health insurance.  If any level of government has the power to regulate health insurance it is at the State level.  Instead of letting a free people find the answers, the House of Representatives passed this monstrosity.

In the bill you would be required to file with you tax return proof of your enrollment in a qualified (federal government approved) health plan or face an additional tax.  Failure to pay this tax if found to be willful could result in five years in prison.  If your benefits are through your employer your employer will have to enroll everyone in a qualified plan and if you are paying for your own health insurance you will have to switch over as well.

These qualified plans are expected to cost approximately 17% or more of your yearly income.  The federal government will determine what the qualified plans will cover and how much they will cost.  It is not a public option it is a public mandated expenditure.

This kind of lawmaking is outrageous.  The public voice has been squarely against this kind of reform, the cost is much too high for any reasonable organization to bear, and the authority to take this kind of action is entirely absent from our Constitution.  A bare majority of the U.S. House of Representatives chose to act like our rulers instead of our representatives with a clearly defined grant of authority in Article I of the Constitution.

Utah’s delegation did the right thing by voting against this bill.  Kudos to Rep. Jim Matheson in particular for breaking ranks with his Democrat fellow travelers and voting against the bill.

This Congress is not interested in helping the people or following any of the Constitutional restrictions placed on them.  Health Care reform would place a full 18% of the economy under federal government control.  It is a naked power grab by elected officials who do not want to represent us, they want to rule over us.

Comments Welcome

 

We Should Be Thankful, Even If. . . . .

We are living in tough times right now.  Economic indicators are not looking promising no matter what the powers that be want us to believe.  There is no surge of confidence that our governmental policies will rise up and save the day with the current problems we are facing.  Official unemployment numbers are around 10% but the real unemployment numbers including the people who have given up on looking for work is closer to 20%.  Taxes and government spending is higher than ever.  Foreclosures are up, bankruptcies are up, and times are tough for a lot of people.  Even with all of these problems we still have a lot to be thankful for.

Thanksgiving is a great time of year to be reminded of the need to be thankful.  Of the 110 Pilgrims that Thanksgiving is connected with less than 50 survived that first winter.  With help from the local Indians the Pilgrims were able to learn how to grow food in the difficult New England climate.  That first year’s harvest was plentiful and sufficient for the second winter and a celebration was held.  The Pilgrims were able to make their situation better in spite of the tremendous losses they suffered in the first few months in the New World.  We can do the same in these very trying times.

The most basic thing we have to be thankful for is life.  We have been given a wonderful body and mind that can work together to solve any problems we face.  Our mind is a powerful instrument empowered to solve many problems and our bodies can be used in productive labor to these ends.  At any point in your life you can work toward improving your situation.  You can work to change your life for the better.

We live in the United States.  Living in the United States has so many advantages over living in other countries.  Here we can complain about not getting enough whip cream on a banana split while people in many other countries don’t even know where their next meal is going to come from.  We have so much abundant and cheap food that obesity is epidemic in the United States while starvation and bare subsistence living is the rule in many other parts of the world.

We have so many varied and plentiful resources at hand that we can take advantage of.  There is more money, information, and opportunity flowing through this country than ever before.  The United States has problems with millions of people sneaking over the border to work and live here precisely because of the opportunities available in this country.  To compare: the only border China has issues with is the North Korean border.

Now is a great opportunity for rebuilding and creating new things.  With each of the difficulties we face there is an equal opportunity for growth, improvement, and something better.  The millions of people who are unemployed will have new opportunities forced on them that they never considered before.  The inventiveness and creativity of the American People is unparalleled and unequalled.  New businesses, new solutions, and new technologies will have their origins in these tough times.

The American People as a whole will begin to rediscover that what lasts is what matters most.  When times are tough people rediscover their families, their faith, and their true strength.  The American People are fighters.  We are not content to sit by and wait for someone else to make things better but will take charge and work to make things better.  We are a very resilient people who will see these challenges through to the very bright future on the other side.

We have so many things to be thankful for, even if times are tough for now.

Comments Welcome

Don’t Talk to Cops

Here’s why.  It is one of the best hours about the subject I have ever seen.

The Nature of Rights

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” — The Declaration of Independence.  This is one of the most quoted sentences from the Declaration of Independence.  It is a correct and masterful statement about the nature and source of our rights.

Many people talk about our rights without considering what the source of rights are or what the impact of a right may be on others.  We need to re-think the meaning of a right and what it entails.

A right is a claim to a thing, action, belief, or course of conduct.  You have property rights, religious rights, human rights, freedom of belief, freedom of conscience, rights of self protection, rights of self determination and self government, judicial rights, freedom of the press, parental and familial rights, and many other rights.  The source of these rights is our Creator.  Because our rights are a grant from our Creator, it places the risk of divine punishment for trampling those rights.

The God given rights we enjoy are liberating to us.  We have the freedom to do many things as long as we do not infringe on the rights of others.  Property rights protect the fruits of our labor.  Religious rights allow us to explore belief systems about the nature of the universe and the mystery of life, or to ignore these questions completely.  Our freedoms allow us to take responsibility for ourselves and make mistakes.

A competing and mistaken idea is that rights come from the government.  This is the idea that the government “allows” freedom of speech, freedom of worship, the right to bear arms, or ownership of private property.  Government does not GRANT rights but is supposed to PROTECT rights.  The Declaration of Independence puts it this way: “That to secure these [God given] rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed”.

Because of this mistaken idea that the government gives us our rights we are in the middle of a debate about the “right” to healthcare.  How can this possibly be considered a right?

All of the rights that are recognized as coming from God do not place a financial obligation on any other person for that right to be honored.  The ‘right’ to healthcare would require someone to pay for the healthcare and the problem that is fueling the current debate is that healthcare is so expensive these days that people are unable to pay for it.  If a person is not able to pay for something now, it will not be magically better when the government is involved.  The money to pay for things will have to come from someone.  This is a right that would cause servitude rather than liberty.  There are no God given rights that require someone to pay for your care.  It should be handled through compassionate giving in a truly free market.

Comments Welcome

Misplaced Priorities

We live in very interesting times.

Perhaps the greatest entertainer ever died last summer.  You probably know the name.  The funeral was all over TV and cable television has not been able to find anything else worth talking about for several days.  While this entertainer made a big impact on the world and our global culture this person had very little to do with our daily lives.

People know more about movie stars, tabloids, sports teams, what movies are coming out this summer and what TV shows to watch this week than they do about things that have a more serious impact on our lives.  We need to begin finding strength in our unity instead of focusing on our differences.

Media outlets control the narrative we are spoon fed every hour, every day, every week, month after month and year after year.  We are told what to think, who to like, what shoes are cool, what cars show success, how often we should be having sex, what drugs to take to make us feel better, how we should feel about things and who to vote for.  We are entertained, shocked, and tricked into using many hours each week to keep up with what our media magnates are telling us.  When analog TV was going away there was such great concern that some people would not be able to get their TV instructions that the deadline was extended a few months and government coupons were distributed to make the converter boxes less expensive for the less fortunate.  It is as if our own government is afraid of what people might do if they stop watching TV and start reading and thinking more.

Entertainment and TV is alright in the right place and time but the problem is that it dominates our time and attention.  What difference does it make ten years later who won the Super Bowl?  Will it really matter in ten years the movies you watched, what celebrities got divorced or married this week, or how the exciting action packed conclusion was resolved on your favorite TV show?

We need to spend more time with family and friends doing real things.  Spending time fishing with family, going for a walk, or playing games will create memories that will have a better lasting value to your life because it is developing relationships that matter.

We also need to start paying attention to what our government is doing.  We feel impotent and unable to do anything about the growing power and influence of government in our lives.  That is where the power of entertainment and distraction comes in because when we are distracted we are not thinking about how to take control of our lives back from the government.

We need to focus on the things that matter and will make a difference for the future.  We need to pay attention to what the government and jealously guard our liberties and freedoms.

There are several municipal elections next month, people who will have the ability to tell you how to take care of your property, raise your taxes, plow the streets, and so many things that make a difference in your daily experience.  Have you figured out who you are going to vote for?

Comments Welcome

Things as They Really Are

“Wo unto them that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!”  – 2 Nephi 15:20

Today we are beset with messages that are confusing and wrong.  In our integrated society ideas cross political, moral, social, and entertainment boundaries.  So many things have become politicized because our government has taken to control and regulate everything.  It seems that you are not allowed to express your point of view on a moral issue without it being politicized.

Here are some things that would seem to fit the definition of calling “evil good, and good evil”.  Same Gender attraction issues are huge right now.  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has a long public statement on the issue.  Our society is facing pressure to accept gay partnerships and sex acts as on par with marriage and fidelity.

Calling these contrary views “enlightened” is also calling light darkness and darkness light.  Same thing as calling these relationships as fulfilling and as wonderful as traditional relationships.  They are not the same and they never will be.

All kinds of things are promoted as good ideas when they are not appropriate for Latter Day Saints, like drinking, carousing, and other activities that have been verboten for those who choose to follow our faith.

The reality is that following God’s commands and exercising appropriate self discipline will go a long way toward creating a happy and fulfilled life.  Lasting joy comes from living righteous laws.

Comments Welcome