One Utah

Re-Posted from July 2006
Asking the opinion of the executive director of Evergreen International if there is scientific basis for homosexuality is akin to asking a chicken farmer for proof eggs are bad for you.The beguiling nature of the entire article is betrayed in the first sentence “the simple ‘born gay’ theory has faded from the [...]

Dan Savage Takes On Tony Perkins Over Prop 8

You don’t get to march in the public square, slime people, malign people and demagogue against people and then jump behind a bush and say, no God we’re a church.

Right on!

The Mormon Church has politicized itself with this movement and — in California to ban same-sex marriage. [...]

Seemingly endlessly litigated and legislated around, the First Amendment reads simply:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
For [...]

The Salt Lake Tribune’s Robert Gehrke holds himself to the highest standard of objective journalism so rare in the Utah media. He should be commended for his objectivity.
in An ‘odious reminder’, Chaffetz’s plan for tent cities is lambasted: Candidate’s immigration plan likened to WWII internment camps (archive link)
“Jason Chaffetz’s comments are more than just [...]

Interesting article from the City Journal of the Manhatten Institute (oh yeah…”right wing crazies” at the MI).
Quote:
“Obama’s nomination will be celebrated as a first for African-Americans. But the racial symbolism may obscure the importance of his presidential run to the tens of thousands of government-funded community groups that stand to benefit from an Obama agenda [...]

According to Paul “Sorry-ma’am-this-is-my-job-someone’s-got-to-do-it” Mero, chief of Utah’s conservative Sutherland Institute, the state has a vested interest in your sex organs. Your children, you see, are the state’s means of production, and your sex organs, being the means of producing the means, are therefore a national asset subject to oversight. Lots of oversight. The more [...]

The first line of The Nation article linked below reads, “…even the most rabidly right-wing media hosts had to prove their populist cred…”
That gave me pause to reflect on Paul Mero’s comment this morning, “…and if congressional lefties (and spineless Republicans) would allow the domestic production of oil and gas…”
If career right-wingers are now looking [...]

We Utahns of the more mainstream political persuasion (nationally at least) have a certain affection for Utah’s Sutherland Institute Director Paul Mero. He is after all, exceptionally lovable, friendly and affectionately earnest in his radically conservative positions. Most endearing is his forgiving nature and patience in the face of our, at times, rough edges.

In [...]

I think we are reaching a nadir in the American consciousness. There are so many indicators both large and small. The surprising populist movement lead by Barack Obama is an obvious one. The changing language and focal points of the Right-Wing are another. Almost no one is left in the media nor in politics [...]

No. This has been another edition of easy answers to simple questions.

Sunday, the Tribune ran this article about declining support in Utah for the Iraq war.  Highlights:
Jeffrey Jones wasn’t surprised to see that a two-year compilation of Gallup polls showed American Mormons, more than any other religious group over that period, believed the United States was right to invade Iraq.
A January poll by The Salt Lake [...]

This is a re-post from last year in honor of the repeat of last year.
Utah got her first openly gay State Senator several years ago in a mid-term procedure in which delegates-only voted for a young lawyer named Scott McCoy. On that day, something changed in Utah.
But it has not unfortunately dissuaded our state legislature [...]