I eagerly watched media reports about today's FLDS mass demonstration at Utah's Matheson Courthouse. One TV station reported that the number of attendees was "up to 1,000". Another outlet reported "over 1,000". I'm still confused.
Either way, maybe the State of Utah will start to figure out that, if you want our dirty, little state secret to go away, blatant fraud might not be the best approach. Willie Jessop alluded to a possible "extermination order". Maybe if we deprive all the polygamists of their homes and land and businesses, they'll be so destitute that they can finally be convinced to go on C.H.I.P. and welfare and unemployment and food stamps.
I've said it before - if polygamy is such a "CRIME", then why don't they arrest all of them. It's not difficult to figure out who the polygs are. There are several angry snitch people who will provide family trees to law enforcement. If you put the 10,000 adult polygs in prison, you can put all their kids in foster care, and then you can console yourself with the satisfaction of knowing that you have cleaned up our beautiful state of the ugly blight imposed on the Great Basin by our horribly misguided pioneer ancestors.
I'm still struggling with Judge Denise Lintbag's formula for proportional representation. By my last count, there are several thousand UEP beneficiaries residing in the Arizona Strip. As one observer so aptly put it, there must be at least ten or twenty disaffected ex-members who are hungering for a chunk of the loot if the trust is dismantled. Plus, Bruce (plunderer) Wisan is steadily gutting the trust of its wealth. Not to mention a couple of politically-minded attorneys general who have agendae.
By my sophisticated mathematical calculations, I have ascertained that the FLDS folk constitute about 99.997% of the total number of interested parties at the negotiation table. So, why do they get to constitute only about 0.000001% (or less) of the representation in the legal process. Perhaps their religious beliefs impose such a powerful disability upon them that they are not entitled to full citizenship in a modern, bankrupt America.
Whether the State believes it or not, well-nigh 100% of the FLDS fully support their current leaders. They likewise fully supported their leaders and the UEP trustee(s) at the time the trust was summarily reformed. The judge has publicly stated her desire to prohibit a "UEP 2". Her ostensible goal MUST be to destroy the trust and hence the welfare of its beneficiaries.
What forces are in play here? Is Lindborg a Mormon? You know that all temple-going Mormons must annually forswear ANY sympathy for "apostates" (= Fundamentalists). What that means in layman's terms is that it is (and has been) "open season" to persecute polygamists. After all, they're criminals, aren't they? Hurt a polyg, and you can be one step closer to the Celestial Kingdom or, at least, promotion in the earthly church. Are there dark LDS forces whispering insidious, ex parte promptings into Lindberg's ear, urging her to stop at nothing in her campaign of cultural genocide? A wise man once told me, "The Church eats its young."
A distinguished scholar of Mormonism opined last year that the Fundamentalist Mormons share the overwhelming majority of their theologies with the mainstream LDS Church. Why then, must there be so much antipathy?
I quote the immortal, stammering words of Rodney King, who said, "Can we, can we all get along? Can we, can we get along?"
We'll see . . . . . . . . .
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Stupid State
I have a lot of brilliant friends (notwithstanding the fact that some of them have large families). In fact, I think that listening to country music does far more damage to one's I.Q. than being a polygamist ever could.
Anyway, one brilliant friend brought to my attention today an exquisite irony that I must pass on. She pointed out that, in Utah:
If you are gay, and you try to say that you are married, the State will go to EXTRAORDINARY lengths to insist that YOU ARE NOT MARRIED.
If you have one legal wife, but you also have other adult women in your family to whom you are not legally married, the State will go to EXTRAORDINARY lengths to insist that YOU ARE MARRIED to them (so that they can call you a criminal).
Go figure !!!
Anyway, one brilliant friend brought to my attention today an exquisite irony that I must pass on. She pointed out that, in Utah:
If you are gay, and you try to say that you are married, the State will go to EXTRAORDINARY lengths to insist that YOU ARE NOT MARRIED.
If you have one legal wife, but you also have other adult women in your family to whom you are not legally married, the State will go to EXTRAORDINARY lengths to insist that YOU ARE MARRIED to them (so that they can call you a criminal).
Go figure !!!
Saturday, July 25, 2009
BLOOD ON THE SCREEN
I am so mad about this, I think my head is going to explode, and there will be blood and cerebral matter all over my 19 inch monitor.
Judge Denise Lindberg is holding a hearing this Wednesday to address the negotiations affecting the FLDS United Effort Plan trust. The trust was hijacked by the state of Utah, and this Mormon stake president guy, Bruce Wisan, has been acting as the trust's fiduciary for a couple of years.
Wisan is complaining that his (very lavish) fees have not been paid (waahh!!!), so, every now and then, he furtively sells off assets of the trust in order to pay himself. Last month, he sold off a herd of valuable heifers from the Harker farm (an FLDS asset). This dirty, reprehensible stunt has not yet been corrected.
This idiot judge, Denise Lindberg, is now saying that she is loath to give the trust back to the FLDS community (which had owned it for decades) because the FLDS church would use the trust in the "furtherance" of polygamy (which she says is a crime). Maybe I'm stupid, but, to the best of my knowledge, none of the states of America has a single statute criminalizing polygamy or plural marriages. If you try to write an anti-polygamy statute, you have to draw the distinction between those religiously-motivated individuals who have extra bed-partners for theological reasons and those who do it for recreation. No legislator can write such a statute without falling afoul of the Lukumi decision. Maybe Judge Lintbag is attempting to legislate from her bench. She should read Musser v. Utah, 333 U.S. 95, 1948, where she will learn that teaching or advocating polygamy is NOT a crime.
She says that the trust was created to "promulgate" polygamy. Does that mean that Chicago was settled in order to "promulgate" monogamy, and San Francisco was colonized to promulgate homogamy? Just because a fraction of the FLDS people may engage in the Principle of plural marriage, or because it is a deeply held belief, should they be deprived of the right to own things or establish charitable or religious trusts.
If I were a member of the FLDS Church, I would be on the steps of the Matheson Courthouse this Wednesday, and I would encourage everyone I know to be there with me too. I would wave signs that remind passersby that the "thread" by which our Constitution hangs has been snipped; that Lawrence overrules Reynolds; that people who believe in or practice plural marriage have as much right to own things as do other American citizens; and that targeting religious polygamists is a violation of the recent innovation we call "civil rights".
The core problem here is that, if one rogue, bigoted judge in Salt Lake City can dispossess an entire town of its hard-earned property, it won't be long before the rest of us will find ourselves starving and being herded into FEMA camps for re-education or disposal.
Be there or be square . . . .
Judge Denise Lindberg is holding a hearing this Wednesday to address the negotiations affecting the FLDS United Effort Plan trust. The trust was hijacked by the state of Utah, and this Mormon stake president guy, Bruce Wisan, has been acting as the trust's fiduciary for a couple of years.
Wisan is complaining that his (very lavish) fees have not been paid (waahh!!!), so, every now and then, he furtively sells off assets of the trust in order to pay himself. Last month, he sold off a herd of valuable heifers from the Harker farm (an FLDS asset). This dirty, reprehensible stunt has not yet been corrected.
This idiot judge, Denise Lindberg, is now saying that she is loath to give the trust back to the FLDS community (which had owned it for decades) because the FLDS church would use the trust in the "furtherance" of polygamy (which she says is a crime). Maybe I'm stupid, but, to the best of my knowledge, none of the states of America has a single statute criminalizing polygamy or plural marriages. If you try to write an anti-polygamy statute, you have to draw the distinction between those religiously-motivated individuals who have extra bed-partners for theological reasons and those who do it for recreation. No legislator can write such a statute without falling afoul of the Lukumi decision. Maybe Judge Lintbag is attempting to legislate from her bench. She should read Musser v. Utah, 333 U.S. 95, 1948, where she will learn that teaching or advocating polygamy is NOT a crime.
She says that the trust was created to "promulgate" polygamy. Does that mean that Chicago was settled in order to "promulgate" monogamy, and San Francisco was colonized to promulgate homogamy? Just because a fraction of the FLDS people may engage in the Principle of plural marriage, or because it is a deeply held belief, should they be deprived of the right to own things or establish charitable or religious trusts.
If I were a member of the FLDS Church, I would be on the steps of the Matheson Courthouse this Wednesday, and I would encourage everyone I know to be there with me too. I would wave signs that remind passersby that the "thread" by which our Constitution hangs has been snipped; that Lawrence overrules Reynolds; that people who believe in or practice plural marriage have as much right to own things as do other American citizens; and that targeting religious polygamists is a violation of the recent innovation we call "civil rights".
The core problem here is that, if one rogue, bigoted judge in Salt Lake City can dispossess an entire town of its hard-earned property, it won't be long before the rest of us will find ourselves starving and being herded into FEMA camps for re-education or disposal.
Be there or be square . . . .
Saturday, July 11, 2009
If the shoe fits . . . .
Yes, I know you are all going to accuse me of being an inveterate cynic. A good friend pointed out an exquisite irony to me yesterday.
Harry Reid, a Mormon U.S. Senator, is pushing for a Federal Task Force to crack down on polygamist "organizations", partly because of allegations of sexual conduct with underage girls, and allegations of church interference with local law enforcement activities. Well, read this [from the Provo Daily Herald] (then read my previous post):
Harry Reid, a Mormon U.S. Senator, is pushing for a Federal Task Force to crack down on polygamist "organizations", partly because of allegations of sexual conduct with underage girls, and allegations of church interference with local law enforcement activities. Well, read this [from the Provo Daily Herald] (then read my previous post):
A Utah County LDS seminary principal was arrested Thursday [July 9, 2009] for having an alleged sexual relationship with a student.
Police say Michael Pratt, 37, engaged in a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old girl for the last several months. Until his arrest, Pratt was principal of the Lone Peak High School LDS seminary, where the girl was a student.
Sgt. Matt Higley, with the Utah County Sheriff's Office, said the alleged sexual abuse came to light after an individual contacted the state Division of Child and Family Services, who contacted the police. Officers then interviewed the girl, who Higley said was apprehensive about talking to police, but divulged significant details about the relationship.
"The sexual relationship, we know, started sometime around the beginning of May of this year," he said.
How the relationship began is still being investigated. According to a police affidavit, Pratt took the girl to various locations around Utah County to engage in sexual acts. The couple allegedly met in a ravine and an unoccupied home near the girl's house, at a boxcar in Provo Canyon, Rock Canyon, Pleasant Grove, American Fork, Goshen and in a mine near Eureka. According to the report, Pratt was brazen in his public meeting with the girl at the warm springs near Goshen.
"Also at this location, they were skinny dipping and someone was watching him from their car," the officer stated in the report. . . . . . . . . . . . . .
---------------
Maybe it's time for Harry Reid to focus his "Federal Task Force" microscope on the venerable corporate church organization he represents in his dual, political/ecclesiastical role as High Priest Senator. After all, at least as much sexual molestation and law enforcement meddling per capita likely occurs in his church as in the Fundamentalist Mormon world.
On a related note, in February of 2003, Utah AG, Mark Shurtleff, shepherded the passage of a "child-bigamy" amendment (to Utah's existing bigamy statute). The bill (HB 307) was lauded as a powerful answer to the rampant (?) "child-bride" problem in the sinister world of polygamy. Three guesses as to how many prosecutions have ensued in the last six years . . . .
1. None
2. Zero
3. All of the above
Will the Child-Bigamy law not be applied to Michael Pratt's crime because he is not a FUNDAMENTALIST Mormon, and the law was crafted to target only FUNDAMENTALIST Mormons?
Friday, July 10, 2009
Church Opens Mouth, Inserts Foot (More Hypocrisy)
You know how O.J. Simpson goes to such extraordinary lengths to feign innocence and act like he didn't really kill Nicole and Ron . . ?? I mean - I crack up every time I think about the stupid, bloody, size 12, Bruno Magli shoes. You can pretend all you want but, if you're a murderer, you're a murderer (right ??).
By the same token, the State Church of Utah wants to masquerade as a wise, judicious organization that makes ever-careful P.R. decisions. OH PLEASE !!!!!
Last night, Church security guards accosted two gay men who were walking home from a concert by way of the Church's "Main Street Plaza". The men were holding hands, and one kissed the other on the cheek. The guards accused the men of "inappropriate behavior" and instructed them to leave the private property. The men protested, so the guards forced one of them to the ground and handcuffed him. Salt Lake P.D. soon arrived and cited them for misdemeanor trespassing. In its report on the event, a TV news team showed video of heterosexual couples holding hands and kissing on that same property.
Okay, so let's do the arithmetic on this one. If I were one of those two gay men, I would be calling a civil rights attorney before I had my next meal. What part of S-T-U-P-I-D does the Church not understand? Maybe the whole private property thing prevails here, and the men's case would be weak, but why would the Church even dare to risk the fallout?
It just seems to me that the Church's attitude on certain things is so blinded with hubris, that it regularly forgets to "look" before it "leaps". The word "bonehead" comes to mind.
If I were Utah's gay community, I would get a posse of gay couples to go to the Main Street Plaza on the morrow and have them all hold hands in plain sight. Actually, I'm half tempted to go there with a couple of my wives, and hold hands with both of them (maybe even steal a kiss or two) and see if I can provoke another excessive response from the ecclesiastical plaza police.
Church spokespeople gurgitated the obligatory rationalizations, but I think all they've done is awaken a not-so-sleeping giant!
The question is - did these bruiser guards and their LDS counterparts in the Salt Lake Police Department act on their own righteous initiative, or were they carrying out a tightly-crafted directive from on high? Either way, I predict a storm of reactions which will all bring the Church precisely the opposite outcome from what it wanted.
Here is the double standard - LDS Mormons can be police officers and do the bidding of a Church in their law-enforcement work, while FLDS members have been stripped of their right to serve, because Mark Shurtleff fears that they MAY follow the wishes of their church.
By the same token, the State Church of Utah wants to masquerade as a wise, judicious organization that makes ever-careful P.R. decisions. OH PLEASE !!!!!
Last night, Church security guards accosted two gay men who were walking home from a concert by way of the Church's "Main Street Plaza". The men were holding hands, and one kissed the other on the cheek. The guards accused the men of "inappropriate behavior" and instructed them to leave the private property. The men protested, so the guards forced one of them to the ground and handcuffed him. Salt Lake P.D. soon arrived and cited them for misdemeanor trespassing. In its report on the event, a TV news team showed video of heterosexual couples holding hands and kissing on that same property.
Okay, so let's do the arithmetic on this one. If I were one of those two gay men, I would be calling a civil rights attorney before I had my next meal. What part of S-T-U-P-I-D does the Church not understand? Maybe the whole private property thing prevails here, and the men's case would be weak, but why would the Church even dare to risk the fallout?
It just seems to me that the Church's attitude on certain things is so blinded with hubris, that it regularly forgets to "look" before it "leaps". The word "bonehead" comes to mind.
If I were Utah's gay community, I would get a posse of gay couples to go to the Main Street Plaza on the morrow and have them all hold hands in plain sight. Actually, I'm half tempted to go there with a couple of my wives, and hold hands with both of them (maybe even steal a kiss or two) and see if I can provoke another excessive response from the ecclesiastical plaza police.
Church spokespeople gurgitated the obligatory rationalizations, but I think all they've done is awaken a not-so-sleeping giant!
The question is - did these bruiser guards and their LDS counterparts in the Salt Lake Police Department act on their own righteous initiative, or were they carrying out a tightly-crafted directive from on high? Either way, I predict a storm of reactions which will all bring the Church precisely the opposite outcome from what it wanted.
Here is the double standard - LDS Mormons can be police officers and do the bidding of a Church in their law-enforcement work, while FLDS members have been stripped of their right to serve, because Mark Shurtleff fears that they MAY follow the wishes of their church.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
HUMAN NATURE
Sorry I haven't posted for a couple of moons. Life has been wacky at best.
I am careful not to bash human nature. People are driven by many motives. However, I can't accept the "Devil made me do it" excuse either. I know some people just hate other groups of people. After all, I hate smokers. I hate hypocrites, too.
When I lived in Utah in 1998, I hated the Lakers. I hated Shaq and Kobe. I went to NBA playoff games and I hated Laker fans. I probably wouldn't have killed one of them, though. I would have checked my hatred just short of stabbing. Like all humans, I have passions - strong ones. I just try to govern them with common sense, and I realize that killing Laker fans would have no reasonable defense in a courtroom.
In Utah it is fashionable to hate polygamists. It is the state sport. Some people know exactly why they hate polygamists; others have no clue why - they just hate them. It might be hereditary, because people have been hating polygamists for hundreds of years. It's also a doctrinal thing. Church leaders make public statements that polygamists are adulterers and criminals, and everyone can scurry behind the excuse that hating plyg's is ecclesiastically endorsed. What could make you feel more clean and sanitized than falling asleep at night knowing that there are polygamists in Utah, and you aren't one?
Problem is - it's all based on a big lie - the lie of monogamy. Now, it's none of my business to tell people not to get into monogamous marriages; it's just important for most women to realize that, just because their husband does not have another wife, he still usually spends his entire life wishing he could have one (or a cute mistress). Monogamous men are forced to lie to keep the peace.
Last night (in Chihuahua, Mexico), some Mexican drug thugs shot two young American fathers in the head and threw them in a cemetery. I don't think they were murdered because they live somewhere near a Fundamentalist Mormon community. The perpetrators had more venal motives - like reprisals for the imprisonment of some fellow gang-members. I did, however, notice some blog commenters saying that it "served them right" for committing crimes (polygamy) and having to leave the safety of the U.S. as outlaws (?!). Sadly, these cartels are "equal-opportunity" terrorists, having recently also kidnapped a former LDS temple president.
Human nature can get us to say and do a lot of low-down, dirty-rotten things.
I like the bumper sticker that reads "Jesus is coming, and boy, is He p!$$@d !!" I have a pamphlet authored by the august former LDS Church president, Ezra Taft Benson. It is titled "This Nation Shall Endure". I get a kick out of this every time I think of it. I mean, he was the Church prophet, right? It just seems so silly that he forgot to read the words in the 87th section of the Doctrine and Covenants - especially verse 6, which promises:
6. And thus, with the sword and by bloodshed the inhabitants of the earth shall mourn; and with famine, and plague, and earthquake, and the thunder of heaven, and the fierce and vivid lightning also, shall the inhabitants of the earth be made to feel the wrath, and indignation, and chastening hand of an Almighty God, until the consumption decreed hath made a full end of all nations;
You can't have it both ways. Truth is - this land, America, is Jesus's footstool. When the pilgrims arrived, they dedicated it to the 13 tribes of Israel as stewards till Christ came back. Sadly, we tribes have abdicated our destiny and contaminated the land. The currency/interest manipulators have a gameplan - to enslave us all - and soon. Jesus has a gameplan for them, and for any who cater to them ( " . . because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication" [Revelation 14:8]).
I think we just need to be careful when we point the finger of condemnation at other folks. Clearly, God has had a gutful of our waywardness, and it won't be long before He sends someone to clean things up and settle the score. Sectarian divisions and religious elitism only make matters worse.
I pray for the families in Colonia LeBaron who lost their loved ones in such a horrifying way. Their lives are not worth less because they might have embraced the fullness of the Restored Gospel. It is time for the saints to unite - not divide. We should set aside our biases and stand up for correct principle.
I am careful not to bash human nature. People are driven by many motives. However, I can't accept the "Devil made me do it" excuse either. I know some people just hate other groups of people. After all, I hate smokers. I hate hypocrites, too.
When I lived in Utah in 1998, I hated the Lakers. I hated Shaq and Kobe. I went to NBA playoff games and I hated Laker fans. I probably wouldn't have killed one of them, though. I would have checked my hatred just short of stabbing. Like all humans, I have passions - strong ones. I just try to govern them with common sense, and I realize that killing Laker fans would have no reasonable defense in a courtroom.
In Utah it is fashionable to hate polygamists. It is the state sport. Some people know exactly why they hate polygamists; others have no clue why - they just hate them. It might be hereditary, because people have been hating polygamists for hundreds of years. It's also a doctrinal thing. Church leaders make public statements that polygamists are adulterers and criminals, and everyone can scurry behind the excuse that hating plyg's is ecclesiastically endorsed. What could make you feel more clean and sanitized than falling asleep at night knowing that there are polygamists in Utah, and you aren't one?
Problem is - it's all based on a big lie - the lie of monogamy. Now, it's none of my business to tell people not to get into monogamous marriages; it's just important for most women to realize that, just because their husband does not have another wife, he still usually spends his entire life wishing he could have one (or a cute mistress). Monogamous men are forced to lie to keep the peace.
Last night (in Chihuahua, Mexico), some Mexican drug thugs shot two young American fathers in the head and threw them in a cemetery. I don't think they were murdered because they live somewhere near a Fundamentalist Mormon community. The perpetrators had more venal motives - like reprisals for the imprisonment of some fellow gang-members. I did, however, notice some blog commenters saying that it "served them right" for committing crimes (polygamy) and having to leave the safety of the U.S. as outlaws (?!). Sadly, these cartels are "equal-opportunity" terrorists, having recently also kidnapped a former LDS temple president.
Human nature can get us to say and do a lot of low-down, dirty-rotten things.
I like the bumper sticker that reads "Jesus is coming, and boy, is He p!$$@d !!" I have a pamphlet authored by the august former LDS Church president, Ezra Taft Benson. It is titled "This Nation Shall Endure". I get a kick out of this every time I think of it. I mean, he was the Church prophet, right? It just seems so silly that he forgot to read the words in the 87th section of the Doctrine and Covenants - especially verse 6, which promises:
6. And thus, with the sword and by bloodshed the inhabitants of the earth shall mourn; and with famine, and plague, and earthquake, and the thunder of heaven, and the fierce and vivid lightning also, shall the inhabitants of the earth be made to feel the wrath, and indignation, and chastening hand of an Almighty God, until the consumption decreed hath made a full end of all nations;
You can't have it both ways. Truth is - this land, America, is Jesus's footstool. When the pilgrims arrived, they dedicated it to the 13 tribes of Israel as stewards till Christ came back. Sadly, we tribes have abdicated our destiny and contaminated the land. The currency/interest manipulators have a gameplan - to enslave us all - and soon. Jesus has a gameplan for them, and for any who cater to them ( " . . because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication" [Revelation 14:8]).
I think we just need to be careful when we point the finger of condemnation at other folks. Clearly, God has had a gutful of our waywardness, and it won't be long before He sends someone to clean things up and settle the score. Sectarian divisions and religious elitism only make matters worse.
I pray for the families in Colonia LeBaron who lost their loved ones in such a horrifying way. Their lives are not worth less because they might have embraced the fullness of the Restored Gospel. It is time for the saints to unite - not divide. We should set aside our biases and stand up for correct principle.
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