Mormon Bloggers

The struggle between political philosophies has been raging since our founding as a nation.  Thomas Jefferson and John Adams started tangling soon after the Constitution was signed over something so simple as how the new country would address President George Washington.  Jefferson as Secretary of State favored no titles, and Adams as Vice-President (and President of the Senate) made a fool of himself trying to come up with high-sounding titles nobody liked.  That’s how we ended up with “Mr. President” as the appropriate title.  Adams was at the head of the “Monarchists,” with Jefferson heading up the “Federalists” (convenient labels, but meaningless) in that debate, and in spite of it all they began and ended as tried and true friends.  Adams became the second, then Jefferson the third president of the United States.  The political divide has always been part of our American fabric. This... Read the rest of this entry »

My uncle likes to say, “The market always wins.” For believers in big government who may not understand this neat little phrase I will explain with an untidy big phrase: No matter how much government distorts the market with tax credits, subsidies, bailouts, etc., the market will eventually bring the financial system back to equilibrium. Or until the market collapses under a crushing bureaucratic weight. Case in point: Apparently the sham called a stress test of European banks has done nothing but stress the Euro. It looks like the market continues to win. And that is just as well. The alternative is for the market to totally collapse.  Read More →

It says something about how unpopular Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) is that his main opposition in the November election, who out-polls him by a considerable margin (54 to 39% according to recent polls) can do so while advocating the barter system to pay for healthcare.  Sue Lowden, currently the Republican frontrunner in the campaign to unseat Senator Reid first made the statement several weeks ago.  Some supposed that this meant that patients should enter into haggling over price with their physicians in order to avoid exorbitant fees.  However in a more recent news interview, Ms. Lowden further explained her position, arguing that she meant exactly what she said, hearkening back to a pre-capitalist age in which our ancestors would pay for medical care with farm goods and favors, such as house-painting.  Nor has Ms. Lowden backed down in the face of considerable (and expected) criticism from the Democratic party.  Senator Reid’s campaign has perhaps put it most succinctly... Read the rest of this entry »

I have been thinking a lot about a quote from President Ezra T. Benson, about how the Book of Mormon is a pattern for how things are to be in the last days. What really got me thinking was a part in the book of 3 Nephi, where the government was broken, and the Nephites [...]  Read More →

I’ve resisted posting on healthcare reform here for 2 reasons:1. No one wants to read a 10,000 word rant complete with charts and analogies.2. I can’t find the time to write said 10,000 word rant.So, I leave it to others with greater powers of brevity. Charles Krauthammer has two suggestions that should be tried before any radical restructuring of the current healthcare system. They will  Read More →

First Item: Not believing in the greenhouse effect, I mean global warming, I mean “climate change” is not a kook-fringe position. Even some of the authors of the UN’s climate reports don’t believe it.See this story.By the way, have you noticed how the problem has morphed over the years?I remember reading all about “The Greenhouse Effect” in elementary school and junior high. A specific,  Read More →

I ran across this story a while ago, but all the papers are running updates on it today. A woman in San Diego is trying to pay for a Master’s degree.So far, so good. It’s how she’s raising the money that’s unusual. In order to pay for a degree in Marriage and Family Therapy, she’s auctioning off her virginity. Talk about a mental disconnect somewhere. Who is going to listen to a marriage  Read More →

WARNING: this is a LONG, dry, economics rant post. Beware!”When are you moving?”I get asked this question every time I mention that we live in Ogden, but I work in Provo. The people asking the question have a point. A 156 mile round-trip commute isn’t the most pleasant part of my day, and on snow days I often can’t get either down or back.The short answer is . . . who knows!Here follows the long  Read More →

We all know inflation is bad. Rising prices devalue our money and make it harder to buy things. Apparently the opposite is also bad. Deflation – falling prices – is also bad for the economy, at least according to economists quoted by MSNBC.“A benign decline in prices amidst a sluggish but recovering economy would be unwelcome but tolerable,” Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg wrote in a  Read More →