The Reality

According to “Home” by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, 20% of the world's population consumes 80% of the world's resources and 2% of world's owns and controls 50% of the world's assets. Is this a problem? If not why not? If so, why?

Loren M. Lambert © August 10, 2014

Home

I highly recommned:

https://archive.org/details/HOME_English

Loren M. Lambert © August 10, 2014

Common Ground May Get Uncomfortably Common

On Doug Fabrizio's Radio West, journalist Scott Carrier commented after listening to the Cliven Bundy interview. He said that the country is divided about 50-50. One half who's decisions, philosophies and political positions are based strictly upon their religious convictions. The other half who's positions are based upon scientific reasoning. He said the two sides are not talking to each other and that this could be a problem. Both view the other side as preposterous. He also commented on how the religious view the Constitution in dogmatic ways that brook no viewpoint contrary to their own.

Mr. Carrier gained his insight on this matter while producing an audio documentary that posed the question, "do you think that the world is coming to an end?" to those he interviewed. He said that both sides of this divide think that it is for different reasons and champion different remedies.

I asked my mentor, Herb Cowan-- large vegetable farmer and erstwhile rancher, and contemporary with Cliven Bundy, if he thought the world was doomed and what he thought about the self-proclaimed "Prophets" of the Constitution in their view that only the dead founding fathers, being inspired by God, knew what to do.

"It's a damn poor God that can only inspire a small handful of beer drinking, tricorn hatted colonialists and no others since then," he responded. "If things are going to hell, we'll all be to blame. And when they do, talking will break out all along great the divide when we're all forced to huddle hungry and scared on a quickly vanishing plot of common ground."

So why wait for that to happen?

I've never met anyone, including some very despicable and off the charts criminal defendants, who could not teach me something of merit and value. I promise you there are good people on every side of a conflict. Reach out to them. We can stand on common ground today or be forced to when all hell breaks out and there's nothing left but some polluted tiny speck of common ground.

Loren M. Lambert © August 9, 2014

Tie Immigration Policies to Market Forces and All Americans Personally

1. Divide the amount of private land among all US Citizens (not literally, just mathmatically). What ever that amount of land equals, is the amount of land that any US Citizen (not corporation, trust, businees, group, etc) can own without paying any taxes thereon. This will be a fluid number, called a real estate property tax waiver (REPTAX Waiver) that changes based on population decrease or growth by any means.

2. Give every US Citizen at a fixed date one share of an "American Citizenship" allotement or ACA. Freeze the number of ACAs at that point in time. The possessor of the ACA may retain, give or sell it to the highest bidder. If retained by the original possessor or pased by intestacy, the ACA gains an additional REPTAX Waiver every 75 years.

3. Determine the average value of the amount of property covered by a REPTAX Waiver. Upon the transfer of any ACA, this amount will be paid by the seller, or the buyer, as negotiated, to the US Government for the infrastructure costs on immigration.

4. To gain citizenship an alien must obtain an ACA and pass the current health, knowledge and background checks.

5. If an entity other than a US citizen acquires an ACA, it does not obtain a REPTAX Waiver but only the value of the ACA in the market. It also becomes a guarantor of the non-citizen that purchases an ACA from the entity.

6. New citizens by birth obtain a REPTAX Waiver but not an ACA. They can only obtain an ACA by inheritance, purchase or gift.

7. Our borders are sealed and the expense of doing so is paid for by taxing ACAs holders.

Think it through. What would be the consequences?

Comment 1: Paul Mize - More dang leviathan bureaucracy. Government isn't the answer.

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert - How Paul? How else to tie immigration to market forces?

Comment 3: Barbara JolleyMumm - Why private land and not public?

Comment 4: Loren M. Lambert - The same market pressures that affect public is not the same on public land. I want an the value that each person has that possesses an ACA and a REPTAX to rise and fall with the market. At the very least, citizens should understand the link between immigration and its benefits and detriments to our country;.

Comment 5: Barbara JolleyMumm - Yes but regardless if they "own" it they would feel or believe they have a right to improve, sell, neglect or tear up. Thus those who actually own it must defend it. Even though ownership may be theoretically. I understand the vested interest in citizenship, but that doesn't have to come from already owned private land. Because for example you have 5 acres 2.5 belongs on paper to someone else, yet you live and produce from this property, they decide that they are entitled to their share how do defend your investment.

Comment 6: Loren M. Lambert - It's just a method of assigning a value to citizenship--so we tie it to the amount of privately held land, just like money used to be tied to gold reserves. It's a starting point and then the market will adjust to establish its "true" value. It is not tied to a specific piece of property. Everyone just has a specific right to own a specific amount of property without taxation and that amount decreases with a greater population or increases with a drop in population--what your are defending by how you vote on immigration issues is the amount of land you can own, if you chose, free of all taxations.

Comment 7: Paul Mize - @Loren M. Lambert Perhaps we should use history as an indicator for what we should do. When the American Colonies were founded most Colonies were independent businesses (East India Company, The Virginia Company. etc) with Grants given to them from the King. The Companies had full authority (it would be like a block grant from the Feds) to do as they wished and they were required to return to the King a return (tax) on his largesse. The Virginia Colony was very successful with this model and encouraged colonization with land to the immigrants (Parcels were 50 acres per person) The person who received the parcel was the individual who paid for the colonists to get to Virginia (i.e. Father, Mother, 8 children Total 10 therefore 500 acre Patent) No intervention from King just make it work etc. (It's called capitalism) Another example would be the Transcontinental Railroad (No Potshots at Railroads) For each mile of track that was laid the Government gave the RR's a parcel of land on both sides of the track which they were allowed to sell to offset the capital necessary to fund the RR. Again a type of block grant where the government wasn't involved other than the grant of the Asset…….Go back to the drawing board and determine a method that does not create a bureaucracy, is driven by commercial and capitalist concerns and you might be able to develop an idea……..

Comment 8: Paul Mize - Think about Adam Smith, Thomas Paine, Jefferson, Henry, Washington and what they would do to solve the problem……as opposed to what the progressive idiots would put in place…..Non-socialist, non-communist….You're a smart guy ……show me something……You don't want to know what I would do……...

Comment 9: Loren M. Lambert - Yeah, what would you do? I think we're past the days when we could give away Native Americans' land. You're not talking about capitalism, you're talking about anarchism. Life's a bitch, there will always be taxes, bureaucracies and then you die. I think we'll eat death before we figure out how to eliminate all bureaucracies. I know that I would love to live in such a world so long as it was safe and without competition stifling corruption.

Comment 10: Paul Mize - Dude, I would put a Tower on the Border every mile and a half with a Barrett .50 Caliber and pull the trigger on everybody that ventured onto the North side of the Rio Grande for about one week and the problem would be over………Especially target any coyote riding a Wave Runner back and forth across the river…….You can't spend that money from beyond the grave…….I guarantee you there are plenty of Sharpshooters and enough ammunition available to quell the illegal intrusion……….and Please quit the tripe with the Native American's, I'm 1/16th Cherokee and studied the "Trail of Tears" one of the only friends I speak with from HS is full blooded Cherokee….I hate Custer and Sheridan and Kearney the 7th Cavalry …..(PS: Hey Loren, the government is where the corruption begins) I'll also note that you consider Adam Smith, Paine, Jefferson, Henry, Washington et al anarchists….King George the III, Cornwallis, and Gen. Clinton did also

Comment 11: Loren M. Lambert - Cool, I'd like to talk to him --the Cherokee

Comment 12: Loren M. Lambert - He probably wishes that the six civilized cherokee tribes had had your border control plan. in 1607. . . I don't like tripe--but if you'll stop trotting out Chamberlain, I'll cease with the Native American stufff. It's unfair that I do because I'm just a european mutt with roots back to Rome--so I guess I could . . . .

Comment 13: Paul Mize - I believe you mean the Iroquois Confederacy. 6 tribes: Seneca, Oneida, Mohawk, Onondaga, Cayuga, and later Tuscarora. If you mean the civilized tribes that would be Creek, Cherokee, Choctaw, Seminole, and Chickasaw and there are 5. Go test your DNA .., give you another hobby to immerse yourself

Comment 14: Loren M. Lambert - No not the Iroquois, I did mean the 5 (thought it was 6) mainly based in Georgia when the State Gov sent them on the trail of tears with Pres Jackson's blessing. "Go test your DNA"--is that the intellectual's equivalent of telling me to f-myself? Just ...See More

Comment 15: Paul Mize - No, I'm serious. I used to work all the Scottish Games and I met this lady who is on the board of ISOGG. She convinced me to take a DNA test and I got hooked on the learning process. Weaving together the tales and stories of Genetic Genealogy has been a blast. FTDNA out of Houston TX.

Comment 16: Loren M. Lambert - I'll have to see .

Loren M. Lambert © August 7, 2014

The Redwoods

The Redwoods--awesome and inspiring; the Rangers, professional, competent and informative, only ran into one grumpy one and he was cleaning bathrooms after people inhabit them like dumps; Oregon, friendly flies and friendly people; Denio Oregon--put a gas station there and make a million.

We logged 95% of the Redwoods and have 5% left. The paradox is that the more numerous we are the more value such national treasures have and the more open space we need. What is the optimum ratio of preservation and development? We need to resolve this now because it will not get easier as time goes by.

Loren M. Lambert © August 2, 2014

Wars Fought Against Enemies Are Never Won, They Just Temporarily Create a Momentary Cessation of Hostility

The Israelis think they are fighting the Palestinians and Hamas. Hamas thinks it is fighting the Israelis. They are not. They are fighting an idea, perceived whether true or false and given real effects by each of the combatants.

We think we fought the German, Italians and Japanese in WWI. We did not. We fought the ideologies that inspired them to arms. That is why we won. That is why we all won. While we momentarily raged into battle raining death upon our enemies, in the end, when the guns were silent, we set aside our hatred and instead of burying the living remnants of our enemies, we worked side by side with them to bury the remaining remnants of our mutual hatred.

In the "Book Thief" by Markus Zusack, the narrator, Death, poignantly informs that soldiers who run off into battle exuberantly think they are running at the enemy when in reality they are really running into the arms of Death. For killing an enemy does not destroy the idea that inspired its warriors. The idea lives on and the death it brings continues and reinforces the devotion of the survivors to pursue its same purpose. You see, wars fought against enemies are never won, they just temporarily create a momentary cessation of hostility until we get on with the business of genocide.

And an idea cannot be destroyed by killing those infected with it, for the very ideas, are endowed and infused with the power by the exponential numbers of its martyred servants. For truly we sow the seeds of our own destruction if we see the man as our enemy and not the ideas and ideology that are the engines of his actions. For these ideas corrupt all into believing them, and have forces beyond our own mortalities.

So kill the ideas and win the hearts and minds of all of your enemies. That is the way to peace. We can run towards our enemies, into the arms of death, and continue the bloody cycle and thereby become as bankrupt and naive as those we think we despise, or we can run toward the evil ideas that enslave them and find peace.

Today, we do not fight the people of Hamas, Isis, Russia or Al Quiada, we fight the evil ideas that embolden them and necessarily the leaders who use those ideas to foment fear in order to whip otherwise good people into a frenzy to unleash death and destruction.

Never forget that, so that instead of running into Death's arms we run toward the light, toward life, toward peace even though we may loose our lives to achieve it.

Comment 1: Jacob Dean - Loved the Book Thief, and while it is better to turn an enemy into a friend, there are times when war IS the answer... The terrible, awful answer. Again I quote Netanyahu (and amen his words) "If the Palestinians laid down their arms there would be no war, if Israel laid down her arms there would be no Israel."

Only the aggressor can stop a war short of victory by one side or the other.

There are people who would call Israel the aggressor in this - those people would be wrong. Were there not floods of rockets flying into Israel, Israel would stay home. It is worth noting that if any nation on earth was launching rockets at us like it is in Israel I would be advocating whomever was doing so's total obliteration.

Pray for peace, pray for calm, because short of intervention from on high or an unbelievably unlikely outbreak of sanity amongst the crazies in Hama's, Israel will likely continue to do the right thing - defend her people from the crazy, evil, terrorists who put their headquarters in a hospital basement and use houses, schools, mosques, ambulances, and hospitals as armories and civilians as shields. Many an innocent will die, because sometimes war IS the answer... The terrible, awful answer.

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert - @Jacob, yet, I often hear Netanyahu and others talk about the Palestinians as if homicidal ideation was an immutable genetic component of their status, as if they were not human beings and often Israel's actions say this. Israel is not always the hapless victim it claims to be.

Loren M. Lambert © July 25, 2014

Civil Societies' Character Scafolding

Unbroken--Laura Hlllenbrand's biography about US Olympian Louis Zamperini-- describes the horrendously violent torture and misery WW II POW Japanese Camp commander Mutsuhiro Watanabe (The Bird) inflicted upon Louis and other camp inmates, often beating them until they passed out and subjecting them to starvation, extreme cold and enslavement.

After the war Mutsuhiro escaped capture and most likely a death sentence by hiding in a small Japanese farming community. When the US commuted and dropped all pending war crime sentences and indictments, Mutsuhiro became a very wealthy and successful business man. In several interviews, with varying degrees of contrition that never quite took responsibility for his crimes, he indicated that it was the war that pushed him over the edge. He asserted that had there been no war, he would have gone through life, by all appearances, a normal caring and empathetic human being.

He was probably right. If it had been otherwise, his behavior would have possibly started before the war and most likely continued after the war.

When civil society brakes down, when those in authority are allowed to act in secrecy or with impunity, and when we send soldiers into the chaos of war, there are always those among us who devolve into ugly beasts and who succumb to their most base instincts.

Remember that before being completely unforgiving of those we have sent into war and against those who have been our enemies. Remember that before we casually decide to commit our young men into foreign conflicts. These wars do not just create casualties of the physical body but of the mind and spirit. Not that there should be no accountability for such behavior but that the pressures and absurdities of war should be taken into consideration.

Remember that also when we think that laws governing and restricting those in power and authority over us are deemed as obsolete or unnecessary--including laws governing voting rights, discrimination, wages, privacy rights, civil rights, etc. We will always need the strictures of civil society to rein in the excesses of those who find the seductive influence of power too overwhelming to resist and give in to bullying their fellow men for either their own sadistic pleasure, for their enrichment or under the delusion that they are morally superior and those they inflict harm upon deserve it.

Loren M. Lambert © July 24, 2014

Medical Care Professional's Shortage

I was listening to an interview on NPR on one of their local programs to a CEO of a medical staffing Corporation here in Utah. He indicated that on any given day there are between 20 to 30,000 job openings for medical professionals across the US. He further indicated that there is a workforce shortage of medical professionals in this country. (And no, this is not a shortage caused by the ACA, this has long been the story in our country).

I also think I mentioned a few months ago that I attended a luncheon in which I met a French physician who said that her husband, who is one of the leading experts in the world in the field of neurology and was a licensed doctor, had been going through a very complex and expensive process to obtain his license here in the United States. He is here engaged in cutting edge research on neurological diseases. She is unable to practice while here also.

This is illustrative of the Achilles heel of the American medical establishment that has prevented market forces from providing inexpensive and efficient healthcare services to the US population and has thereby catapulted the current healthcare reforms into place.

If Republicans and conservatives are sincerely serious about allowing the markets to work in our healthcare system, it needs to relax the US Medical community’s stranglehold on medical education and licensing.

Loren M. Lambert © July 23, 2014

Cesar Chavez

"Si se puede." "Yes, we can." Cesar Chavez--way more important than Nixon or Reagan.

What person, government, business has lead reforms--meaning before they were demanded--for the least powerful and the under-trodden with no expectations of a quid pro quo?

Loren M. Lambert © July 22, 2014

A Presumption of Guilt

The Russian Separatists won't allow the international community to investigate the downing of the Malaysian Passenger Jet. Simply tell them the same I tell potential opponents in litigation--If you choose not to respond, I'll assume our allegations are true. So, if you won't let us investigate, we will rightfully assume you shot it down.

Loren M. Lambert © July 22, 2014

Corporate Lawyers

Come to think of it, most corporate lawyers I have dealt with approach litigation like terrorists, dictators, etc. It is never a matter of what would be just, fair, equitable or reasonable--it's almost always a matter of what can I force as the best possible outcome for my interests by what ever means allowable and it is only power that concerns them---What power do you have to minimize my outcome, and in the face of that power should I modify my goals?

Loren M. Lambert © July 21, 2014

Chamberlain & Vietnam

The monikers of "Chamberlain" & "Vietnam"--always trotted out as arrows, anecdotes, and shortcuts to solutions and analysis. Does anyone out there have anything to offer but a cry of death and destruction or appeasement? I promise there always has been and always will be a middle ground between these to roads to disaster for those who choose to think.

Loren M. Lambert © July 20, 2014

Our Enemies’ Heart

When possible, it would be well to first determine how to reach our enemy's heart before designing how to obliterate his body.

While there may be truth in Israel’s contention that if its adversaries disarmed there would be peace yet if Israel disarmed there would be no Israel, I fear and suspect that Israelis are often too quick to play the victim with a justification to exact a harsh defense. In such a state of mind, they never pause to acknowledge that it is Palestine and other calcitrants’ middle-east leaders who are their adversaries and not the populations they allegedly lead. Rather than engaging in lopsided defense maneuvers, Israel and the West would do well to ponder the more complex and difficult question of how to win the hearts and minds of a beleaguered, and often manipulated people who are taught and even coerced into hating everyone but their own. Because, truly, there are many good, genuine, Palestinians who are prisoners of their circumstances and who want peace. Who speaks for them, who protects them and should the world community and Israel take them into consideration?

We wish, hope, and pray for and aspire that all peoples everywhere take responsibility for their own progress and throw off the yokes of oppression. Yet, unfortunately, ignorance, fear and need, and not to mention--a highly weaponized governments, are sometimes almost insurmountable obstacles to their and our aspirations. Despite this, I would still submit that a majority of the Palestinians, given the choice and the freedom to exercise it, would chose peace over war. Rather than showering them all with missiles we merely need to make more effort in discovering how to reach their hearts and empower them to reject the tyranny of leaders who espouse hatred and destruction. Instead, often Israel’s policies of settlement and acquisition are designed to alienate Palestinian hearts and repress their spirits.

Loren M. Lambert © July 17, 2014

Utah AG’s Disgrace

Current events here in Utah remind us that whether here in Utah, or in Iraq or in Russia, the populace should always be suspicious of a office holder who wants to "ordain" his or her successor. (Shirtluff to Swallow--"I’ll get you ass in, if you'll protect mine when I’m out."

Loren M. Lambert © July 16, 2014

Unbroken

According to Laura Hillenbrand, in Unbroken, in Nazi and Italian POW camps, 1 to 2% of US GI's perished, while in Japanese POW camps, 25% of US GI's perished. I find it curious that while neither Germany nor Japan should forever be chastised for their World War II past, why are the Nazi's so frequently trotted out as the example of all things evil. We should share the infamy and let a few other past bad examples get some play.

Comment 1: Mark Gammell - One word.....Jewish-Genocide.

Comment 2: John Hinckley - Yeah, what Mark said, the Germans had the Jews, Gypsies and gays to do their medical experiments on. Could have been racial too; or maybe revenge for the internment camps. No Geneva Convention until after the war so...

Comment 3: Loren M. Lambert - @Mark, yes, that is a glaring truth--I'm just saying--maybe we spread a little reflection elsewhere. Perhaps the homogenous Japanese population (at least in Japan, not in occupied Manchuria, Korea and Vietnam), prevented that imperialistic drive from being focused internally and only outwardly.

Comment 4: Mark Gammell - Maybe I am partial, but I believe the behavior of the Japanese Government post-WWII has displayed admirable and adequate evidence of self-reflection and repenting of its ways. Perhaps the Germans as well. I am less familiar with German government and politics post-WWII.

Comment 5: John Hinckley - My first landlady in Korea spent the war years in her parents attic to prevent her from "volunteering" to give "comfort" to Japanese soldiers during the second world war. Our Branch President in Chung Ju volunteered for and was in Kamikaze training when the war ended. He'd been told life would be better for his family.

Comment 6: Loren M. Lambert - Yes, it was an amazing transformation. It makes me wonder why other countries are so incapable of embracing reform and democracy.

Comment 7: John Hinckley - Consider the fact that in Japan and Germany we imposed our will on them and ran the whole show until 1949 in Germany and 1952 in Japan. For better or worse we didn't run to the U.N. or anyone else and ask mother may I. Food for thought...

Comment 8: Mark Gammell - I have no use for the U.N.

Comment 9: John Hinckley - Why not Mark? Doesn't everyone want to give bundles of money to and give up power to a group that hates them and everything they stand for?

Comment 10: Mark Gammell - It could be argued that the Japanese have executed democracy or a U.S.-style constitutional government better than the U.S., and that they hold truer to that constitution than we do, and retain more of their freedom than we do.

Comment 11: Loren M. Lambert - @John, yes but we had a very compliant population and a plan that was not based on revenge or reparations (for the most part).

Comment 12: John Hinckley - Very true Loren; do you think a relatively homogeneous population also played a role? I do.

Comment 13: John Hinckley For example in Iraq we have Shia, Sunni and Kurds.

Comment 14: Mark Gammell - Education plays a big role as well. On the whole, they are much better educated than we are....at least in terms of achieving very high and consistent results across the whole population. There are no illiterate people in Japan. They know how to educate children much better than we do. And, the parents are much more involved in the children's education. Their standards are much higher than ours.

Loren M. Lambert © July 15, 2014

History & Native Americans

I’m often disconsolate about the gaps in my knowledge. One area that’s dogged me is my knowledge of Native American history. It’s a raged wisp of what it should be.

When I attended elementary school, I was taught that we bought Manhattan from Native Americans for a few buttons and thereby eventually everything, the Pilgrims and Lewis and Clark were rescued by Native Americans, that they were "noble savages" who lived in harmony with the land and we broke a lot of treaties with them, but they shot a lot of arrows, so it all kind of muddled along and worked out sort of in the end. It was all very general, shallow and imprecise, leaving me with a caricature.

While, I’ve done better since then in learning their traditions and history, I still know so very little. But I’m going to tackle it.

Why should I or you care? History, like the roots of trees, nourish and shape our present. We cannot be free from it. It’s not just a matter of learning from history so as not to repeat it. It’s of great and indispensable importance for understanding who we are as a people and how the currents of our yesterdays reverberate in the oceans of our present and will fill the seas of our tomorrows.

It’s also important that we know our history with all of its disappointments, that we understand the wrongs as well as the triumphs of our fathers. Not necessarily so we can atone for our sins, wallow in our mistakes or bring in a brighter future, but because to be ignorant of the wrongs of slavery, the errors of our adventurism, and the depredation of our Native Americans, is to again demean their existence, to pass them off as unimportant, and to continue to be smug about our assumed importance.

To honor our friends and loved ones, we would think ourselves uncaring and insensitive to shirk taking the time to learn about their lives, and their histories. If we truly believe in honoring and loving all men and extending good will to all cultures, we should strive to learn their histories with as much zeal as pursuing a lover.

As for me, I’ve finally started down the Native American path to gain a greater understanding of their culture and history. I challenge you pick just one area of knowledge the universe has been urging you to discover until the day when we truly do extend peace on earth and good will to all. Yes, it will be a life long journey of learning.

Comment 1: Garrett Hanson - I've always wanted to learn more about their culture, deities, and way of life. It's fun to see someone who's actually delving. Human history can be so fascinating. I love learning about the different things Genghis Khan did and his rise to power.
I love Greek mythology and it's lessons. It's how they interpreted the world, and to read about the native Americans and how they interpreted it in detail. I think it would fulfill something in me. I think you may have jump started my knowledge seeking.

Comment 2: Jen Ottens - AWESOME! I began to study and try to learn the truth about what happened and what we have left of the culture when I learned that my grandmother concealed the fact that her mother was full blooded Lakota Sioux until after her death. I ended up with very mixed results but an overall view that government corruption has been a part of our history from the very beginning. Record keeping was worse than abysmal as allotments to crooked officials in and out of the tribes were based on unverified numbers so they cooked the books. Hoping I could fill in my family tree, I ran into unacceptance from Native Americans who expressed their anger at many people claiming kinship as a fad, or to get tribal scholarships ect. So I ended up with a name, from South Dakota, and a marriage certificate but no other info. and sadness that my skin color blocked any further progress down that road. I understand why all these people did what they did, and felt the way they feel. So I have had to try and learn from books what I had hoped to learn from newly reunited family. Some stuff is just so screwed up that God will have to straighten it out Himself. Maybe my hopes and expectations were too high. Black Elk Speaks is a book I read with interesting information I have been told is legitimate. I hope your study brings you more joy than pain. I'm certain that your heart will be changed by the knowledge in any case. All the best!

Loren M. Lambert © July 14, 2014

The Butler

"The Butler." I give it 5 Gusto Canoe paddles up. A must see.

Comment 1: Loren M. Lambert - Presidents may come and go but it is the enduring character and strength of people like Cecil Gaines and his son Louis Gaines that make a nation great. (It is not lost on me that there is some poetic license in this story, yet it is true to history and the real events of real people).

Loren M. Lambert © July 12, 2014

Greatest Despair

Our greatest despair comes when those we love do not live up to the lies we created for them. And our greatest loss is forsaking them when they do. Loren M. Lambert

Loren M. Lambert © July 12, 2014

Smart Pipes

I want smart pipes. Pipes that tell you when they are going to burst. Pipes that tell you if they are going to get plugged. Pipes that don't smoke a doobie over the week end just because they can, and you show up to work and they're all stoned and leaking all over your building. I want smart pipes.

Loren M. Lambert © July 11, 2014

Native Americans & US History

Neither the history of the United States nor that of Native Americans can be understood in isolation from the other. Ned Blackhawk

Loren M. Lambert © July 10, 2014

The War On Rationality & The HLD

There are many people who think corporations are not people, there are many people who think they are. There are many people who agree with the Supreme Court's 5 to 4 decision on Hobby Lobby-there are others who do not--as with many other decisions. Yet, none of the parties on either side, that I am aware of, have taken up arms and started shooting each other. Maybe you or people you know have. I don't know of any.

To hype and sell products and keep up ratings, pundits, especially those at Fox News, like to characterize any political, social or scientific disagreement as a "War."

There is a war in the Ukraine. There is a war in the Congo. There is a war in Iraq and Syria where people are dying horrible deaths as we speak. There is no war on Hobby Lobby and to call it such cheapens and trivializes the lives of those who are dying and strains and stifles reasonable discourse.

So you know. I'm okay with part of the Hobby Lobby decision--the part that will allow some departure from the one size fits all policies. Our country can live and prosper with it. I understand the sentiments on both sides. And each have valid points and no, I'm not interested in debating them. I am interested in understanding peoples concerns. However I’m not okay with the legal precedent that corporations are people.

Loren M. Lambert © July 9, 2014

Native American Policies

According to Ned Blackhawk, historically we in Utah are viewed by many Native Americans to have had some of the most onerous and repressive policies of assimilation and termination. Why I wonder are we taught that we were so much better in our Native America policies than others? Curious what others may know on this subject.

Loren M. Lambert © July 8, 2014

To My Muslim Friends--Where Is the Outrage or the Support of Free Will?

Mariam Yehya Ibrahim was sentenced to death in the Sudan for allegedly converting from Islam to Christianity and because she would not renounce her faith. The Sudan appellate courts dismissed the conviction and sentence on a technicality. Ms. Ibrahim then tried to leave for the United States with her American husband. She was again detained by Sudanese officials.

The focus on her death sentence by the media centers on whether or not she was raised Muslim or Christian and not on whether or not any government or religion should have the right to compel and force adherence to a religion. It should be irrelevant what she was, it should only be relevant what she wants to be and that every human be allowed to follow the dictates of their own conscious.

It seems so astounding to me that as usual, there seems to be no Muslim Clerics, Imans, Caliphs condemning the law and government under which she was convicted.

Here's the message they send:

“Islam is a peaceful, beautiful religion and if you do not think so we will kill you. Islam is an accommodating religion inviting all to its joyous sublime protection, but if you, once within our fold, then leave, we will kill you. Islam is so unquestionably true that it can stand up to any criticism, scrutiny or debate, but if you criticize, scrutinize or debate its verity we will kill you. And all the countries in which Islamic rules, they are beacons of enlightenment, and if you cannot agree to this we will kill you.”

Now I have friends and acquaintances that are Muslim who I know do not think this way and who understand that all people should have the agency and free will to choose what religion, if any, they will decide to follow during any period of their lives--but I ask, where are your voices? Are you only devout because of the fear of retribution or are you sincerely in your hearts and minds convinced of the correctness of your path? Also, are confident that your religion can stand on its own because of its merits regardless of the criticism it is subject to and not because of its adherents' willingness to inflict pain and death on others?

If you are so convinced, I urge you, before the bonds of oppression have clamped down upon us all, that you speak out against those who would use religion as a tool of terror and control.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/24/world/africa/sudan-christian-woman-arrest/

Loren M. Lambert © June 26, 2014

Salt Lake City Poised to Make Millions In a Few Months–Do Your Part–Here’s How:

Yesterday, on a green arrow, I was making a left hand turn on 800 South onto West Temple to take the southbound on-ramp onto I-15. If you’re familiar with this area you have to move to the center and the far right southbound lanes or instead of going onto the freeway you wind back onto West Temple.

My practice has always been, so long as I can do so safely, during my left turn to immediately move into the center lane. Well a Salt Lake City Police Officer standing on the side of the road by his motorcycle waived me over. I thought maybe it was a routine check of everyone to see if we had our rabies shot or something.

I politely asked what was wanted and he politely told me that I was being ticketed because while making the left hand turn into the center lane I did not use my right hand signal. In fact while he was writing me a ticket, he waived over the next victim. I had no idea that that was the law. If it is the law, the law is an ass with an superfluous public servant riding it. (Superfluous, because in this case, he really could be doing something better with his time). This is true since, 1) you’re still turning left while traveling to the center lane, 2) your signal has not shut off from the left turn and it would break it to signal right, 3) if you signaled right the required 3 seconds before moving right you will be stuck in the inside lane to West Temple and, 4) since there is no intersecting traffic when making a left on a green arrow there is no one that would benefit from your signaling. Signaling in these circumstances is an exercise in futility. Or, maybe, just maybe, it’s a benevolent act of charity that can make our city wealthy.

Go to any downtown busy intersection with four lanes or more and watch how many vehicles when making a left turn cross through the inside lane to any of the outside lanes without using their right hand signal–its virtually everyone. What a great revenue producing idea!!! I did this very same thing today. In 10 minutes literally 40 vehicles violated that law. At $100 a pop, that’s $4,000 in ten minutes. Think of the possibilities. This is probably happening in every busy intersection in the entire valley. Our men in blue, black and brown could literally have the city raking in millions. Or even better they could out source the job to me for free and I’ll only charge 35% of the incoming revenue. Deal? Then the cops could be out there doing what cops do best, exercising at Gold’s Gym and maybe even stopping or solving a crime.

Comment 1: Russell Josephson - Actually it is illegal to 'make a left turn into the center lane'.
The universal traffic code indicates that you must turn in to the closest lane. That means the leftmost lane on a left turn or the rightmost lane on a right turn.

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert - Legal/illegal/smeagol if I could howl like a beagle I'd be better than Jonathon Livingston Seagull--a mere technicality Russull, a mere technicality.

Comment 3: Elizabeth Ormond Jolley - Better yet, hire the attorney at $400 an hour to represent you during your ridiculous case for the ridiculous ticket. That will now cost you ridiculous thousands and thousands. (Sorry for the rant. I've had a rough couple years with the dreaded DMV. )

Comment 4: Loren M. Lambert - No, I want rants, I specialize in rants, I encourage rants except from 2 year olds. 3 and above is allowed.

Comment 5: Chris Adler - It drives me nuts when drivers like you, Loren, are behind me in an intersection and drive straight into the lane I'm moving towards legally.

Comment 6: Loren M. Lambert - Yes, Chris, but so you know, I make sure I can do so safely and without violating any other drivers right to never brake, slow down or adjust to my driving.

Comment 7: Lee Shawn Gardner - You don't have to move all the way to the right. There are four lanes, so you only need to move one lane to make it on the freeway since three of the four go right and you have a city block to get one more lane over.

Comment 8: Loren M. Lambert - @Lee, yes, you are correct. 10 points for Slytherin.

Comment 9: Loren M. Lambert - @Russell. Made the left hand turn at 900 south onto the freeway entrance. There you cannot turn into the nearest inside lane and still enter the freeway, yet the segway invites all to do so. The law if therefore still an ass.


Loren M. Lambert © June 25, 2014

State’s Rights

What did State's Rights and anti-federalist sentiment mean in Georgia and the South in the early eighteen hundreds? That Georgia could murder its Native American population and strengthen the institution of slavery with impunity.

What will it mean in Utah? We'll that is yet to be seen but do not blindly think that all things local are the bees knees to land use policies and health care expansion.

Loren M. Lambert © June 24, 2014

You Get What You Pay For

If you want to determine the best place to place an aging loved one, look at the pay of the people responsible for their care.

Loren M. Lambert © June 19, 2014

Still A Jury of the Estranged In a More Enlightened World

In jury selection this week, when each member of the jury pool was answering voir dire (questions to probe suitability for jury duty), out of the 28 jurors, 2,when asked to indicate their spouse’s occupation, without pause or diffidence, acknowledged their gay partners. There was also, of course, a large contingent of WILDS (white impressive Later Day Saints), including a well spoken, slightly heavy set, attractive single-female Temple-Grounds Gardner.

This openness by the LGBT community rarely happened just a few years ago. In my opinion, this is a welcome societal shift because it shows progress in bringing these members of our community within the circle of our humanity, culture, and communion. It also engenders honesty and thereby conveys important information.

Yet this openness has adverse consequences in jury selections. This is because we do not select a jury of our peers, we winnow the pool by the process of elimination. First by challenges for cause and then by each attorney, for any unspoken reasons, eliminating 3 persons. The remaining first, 6, 8, or 12 as the case may tie, are seated. When a party or an important witness to the litigation is a minority, this most invariably eliminates any member of his or her class and saturates the sometimes collective bias of the majority.

In my particular case we had a gay man who was a key witness. The opposing side knew this. We needed a juror who could relate to the peculiar challenges that such a person sometimes faces in our society. Who do you think was peremptorily eliminated from the jury pool by the opposing counsel? If you guessed the Temple Grounds Gardner, you are wrong. It was the lesbian. (The other gay man was too far down the lineup to be selected.)

So you know, this is not a diatribe against WILDS or WASPS. Nor is it a claim that one member of a minority is invariably lenient or apt to give his or her minority a pass or an unfair advantage. They don’t. They sometimes are more harsh. What I do believe is that we in the majority sometimes are insensitive, ignorant and even at times unfairly biased against minorities. When you are in the minority and know this to be true, you would take great comfort in having a peer or two on your jury sitting in judgment.

Unfortunately, the consequence of jury winnowing is that we don’t get a jury of our peers, we get a jury that is estranged from the issues, experiences and needs of minority litigants. For instance, imagine being a WILDS in the early 1800s and having a jury trial in the Missouri capitol and having your jury selected from a pool of mainly non-mormons: Would you want to at least have one member of your faith on the jury?

We should fix our jury system to be sensitive to this issue by retaining challenges for cause and then allowing each attorney to select, rather then eliminate, persons to serve on the jury. Half the jury selected by each side. This would truly be a jury of our peers.

Comment 1: Russell Josephson - Perhaps the biggest problem is the categorization of people into stereotypical groups, instead of seeing them as individuals. I never even heard the WILDS (white impressive Later Day Saints) label before you posted this. Perhaps you can define what it means to you?

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert - WILDS is merely a clever way to refer to the outstanding members of the LDS faith who rendered public and patriotic service as jury members. As Rush and Shaun know if you don't have something clever to say--regardless of its factual validity and connection to reality--don't say or write it at all.
Comment 3: Loren M. Lambert - WILDS (white impressive Later Day Saints) HILDS(Hispanic Impressive Later Day Saints), etc.

Loren M. Lambert © June 12, 2014

The Young and the Seasoned

Day one of trial. Litigation is a blood sport for the young, that requires the experience of the seasoned. Consequently only vampires are great litigators.

Loren M Lambert © June 10, 2014

Command

"To command river ways, is to command the land around them." Professor Ned Blackhawk.

Loren M Lambert © June 10, 2014

There is Enough

There is enough if things are done with order. There is enough for all if all things are done with order. Right here, right now, right as things are at this time.

Comment 1: Mark Gammell And all it will take is a totalitarian global government that can control every aspect of everyone's lives.

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert Dear @Mark, no, of course not--where is your faith? A man looking for the worst in everyone will always find it even when he looks at his own reflection--don't linger too long before the mirror--or better yet, maybe you should and then be the change in the world that you expect from everyone else--D&C 104:17 For the earth is full, and there is enough and to spare; yea, I prepared all things, and have given unto the children of men to be agents unto themselves. (God did not say there will be enough if, he said there is enough and to spare. Do you believe that?) Mosiah 4:27 And see that all these things are done in wisdom and order; for it is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength. And again, it is expedient that he should be diligent, that thereby he might win the prize; therefore, all things must be done in order. (God did not say to race forward with no thought, with no plan, with no consideration of the wisdom of your actions, he said to not run faster than our strength, than our foresight. Yet we must be diligent and all things must be done in order. Do you believe that? No totalitarian government--whether local, regional, national, global or whether sectarian or secular would ever be the right answer.

Loren M. Lambert © May 21, 2014

Male Genitalia, Female Mamary Glands and Leftie Conspiracies Abound or Can You Sail Under the Suggestion of a Pirate or Can You Not?

So you know, many would accuse me of being exploitive and unnecessarily sensational for what I’m about to say and they would be dead to rights yet I couldn’t think of a better analogy.

My psychologist friends would be familiar with this malady that I came to witness when a potential client, years ago, wanted to sue his/her employer for sexual harassment and for creating a sexually hostile work environment.

His/her complaint was that his/her supervisors and co-workers were almost constantly and without remorse or any sense of circumspection literally flooding the work place with graphic and visual depictions of the male genitalia and female mammary glands. To impress upon my mind the vast extent of this prurient depravity, he proceeded to extract from the tripple - layered plastic Wal-mart grocery sacks he substituted for a suitcase and multipurpose filing cabinet, numerous photographs of the offending materials.

While a few photographs seemed, if viewed at a great distance through cataracts, to resemble these less frequently viewed and most cherished and at the same time reviled body parts, it soon became evident that if this poor soul’s coworker had vomited up a pile of glass shards or had accidentally crushed an arm in a metal press, he/she would have, therein envisioned depicted, all the sensual carnalities ever imagined by men (and a few women), and enough breasts and penises for use by all the world's cosmetic plastic surgeons for time and all eternity to emulate as worthy models in their artisian surgeries.

This person’s chronic mental health condition was not unlike the same condition that beset the early explorers, who, mostly male, the further along on their journeys in time and geography they got, started naming all mountain formations after females and their body parts. One notable example are the Grand Tetons, a frence name, which in English would be the Grand Tits or Grand Breasts or Grand Mammary Glands. (We need to reciprocate and see if one of the French Alps could be named the Grand Tits and see if that sounds as neat to them as the Grand Tetons do to us).

In the same vein, just as this past potential client of mine tended to see male genitalia and female mamary glands in all he/she saw, some of my conservative friends, for some reason, somehow see every idea, comment or breath from someone who does not bear the Fox News or Glen Beck conservative stamp of approval as a leftie conspiracy to bring upon them the totalitarian apocalypse.

Case in point, I made a recent post below that was about littering and it was deemed proof of a leftie conpiracy. Polluting and littering are not liftie, liberal, or progressive issues. It’s littering. It's polluting. Both are forms of theft that steal our money not in an in-your-face robbery but an after-the-fact embezzlement. This post concerned three post-prubescent girls littering up Big Cottonwood Canyon. So you know, I hate it just a much when I see slobs at Gold’s leave their water bottles, packaging and used Q-tips on the floor, or those who go to games with their fat spouses (or skinny) and pack of loud (or quiet) brats and leave all their trash behind in the stadium. I go out of my way to pick up trash at Golds and other places because they too are sacred to me, just like the canyons are, even though they are privately owned.

I don’t want to spend my money on higher taxes, higher gym fees or higher game ticket fees (or higher private park entrance fees) because other slobs and their progeny want other people to pick up their garbage. I don’t want to spend money on cleaning up a world that is suffocating under our filth because we can’t get our scat together to begin with. Why isn’t that every bodies issue? Why is it a liftie issue?

Maybe it is just because I am the messenger. After all I am a Pirate and not a card carrying conservative. But don’t let me get in the way of my message. Yes, and regarding my post below, the simultaneous thought and comment that I and my fellow Pirate (Mansour Aryazand) had was that the littering Bimbos may have hucked their garbage (while they thought they were out of sight) possibly to spite us because I had earlier suggested they had accidentally dropped their garbage and got them to pick it up. And I, in fact, have met lots of stupid, ignorant people who when called on their crap–whether it’s slobbish, repulsive, rude, ignorant or criminal behavior, will simply engage in additional stupid behavior just to spite the world. But should that stop us from pointing out the wrongs we see and trying to change it? Let’s face it, it’s hard to figure out a way to get through to such people but get through we must.

So, borrowing and paraphrasing the words of my fellow favorite and famous Pirate, Jack Sparrow, from Pirates of the Caribbean:

“The only rules that really matter are these: what a people can do and what a people can't do. For instance, you can accept that your fellow sojourners here are pirates and yet still capable of much good or you can't. But pirate is in your blood and that of your fellow men, boy/girl, so you'll have to square with that some day. And me, for example, I can let you all be stupid and soil your bed, but I can't bring this earth into the next century all by me onesies, savvy? So, can you and those you associate with stop polluting and throwing all your junk around and sail under the suggestion of a pirate, or can you not?"

Loren M. Lambert © May 27, 2014

You Get What You Pay For-Or, Why Revenge In Some Circumstances Would Be Sweet

I must confess revenge is on my mind. It would be just, and would send the right message.

After a rejuvenating, epic and completely exhausting hike up Mount Raymond with my friend Mansour, we arrived at our car at 7 pm, parked in the S-Curve parking lot up Big Cottonwood Canyon. I had run out of water coming down and retrieved the extra water from my car that I had brought. The hike was up a trail, Mill B North Fork, that few travel which wound its way past jagged cliffs, verdant forest and crystal clear water falls. It seemed a rare part of our mountains that was unspoiled and unmarred by trash and over use.

Standing at the side of my car as I gulped down the water, 3 attractive, barely post-pubescent females--two blonde Caucasians and an African American--soon to reveal themselves as stupid bimbos--drove into the lot in a sleek, shiny, new red Volvo Convertible. They strategically parked so they could enjoy the stunningly beautiful canyon as the sun was descending deep into the western sky. They were having a meal of pizza, bread sticks and soda. One of them casually threw some garbage out onto the ground next to them.

Every now and then I just can’t refrain from calling out peoples’ irresponsibility. So, I yelled, “Hey, you dropped something.” They tried to ignore me, but after several more suggestions that they pick it up, one of them eventually, without opening the door, jumped out and picked it up. Mission accomplished?

I’ve lived in Spain a year while enrolled in the University of Seville. I loved my experience there and the Spanish people and culture. One thing though really bugged me. Although everyone’s houses seemed to be spotless, it seemed that when out and about, most everyone always threw all their garbage on the ground. In fact their roadsides and open country were veritable junkyards.

Whenever, out, or in the county you had to watch your step and often hold your nose. When I’d be walking with my Spanish friends, they would often unwrap candy, popsicles or store items and throw their trash on the street, even if a garbage can was in throwing reach. I got fed up. So, in a very theatrical manner, emphatically telegraphing visually and orally my intentions and actions, I would litter. I would announce, “Gee, I have some garbage. What should I do? Hmmmm? I think I’ll throw it on the ground even though there is a garbage receptacle I am dangling this garbage over this very second.” Then I throw it on the ground. I did this several times with a few of my friends.

They scolded me. I asked them why they scolded me when I watched them do the same many times. There response was: “We can litter but since you’re an American from the U.S., you can’t. Besides, it gives work for the poor.” I asked, “wouldn’t you rather spend money on other things than having poor people pick up your garbage?” “What else would they do?” they asked. I explained that people will adjust to do whatever they need to and if your only aspiration for the poor was that they picked up your street garbage then that is what you would end up with–a country full of those that unnecessarily created garbage and those that cleaned it up. My friends in Spain did not thereafter litter, at least not that I knew about.

I also touted to them my home town’s cleanliness, that I had been taught to leave things better than I found them, and that we had pristine garbage-free forests and mountains. Sadly, today we too are becoming like my Spanish friends and leaving our canyons and roadsides a mess.

So, back to the three post pubescent females. At the end of their meal, the three started up their convertible, gunned it out of the parking lot and when they thought they were out of view, heaved all of their garbage onto the road. Such conduct outrages me because there is no excuse. I don’t want to pay people to pick up garbage. I want to pay for improvements in our infrastructure and other more important things, I don’t want a Utah that looks like the Spanish country side, full of rotting trash. Please, if this is what you, your friends, your family or your acquaintances do, don’t, and encourage those you know not to.

Furthermore, there couldn’t be too many new, red volvo convertibles in the Salt Lake Valley that these littering bimbos have access to. So, if you know these three, please introduce me, because I’d like bring my trash and throw it into their homes, because that is what Utah’s public lands are to me, they are my home, they are precious and I cherish them. Or, since I suspect if I had been some young male they wanted to impress, they would not have littered. If you are such a person, kindly tell them this behavior is inappropriate.

Otherwise the revenge of trashing their home would be just and sweet because they need to understand that our public lands are our legacy and heritage. There is simply no excuse for those who drive into our canyons to enjoy their beauty and who then trash them on their way out.

Loren M. Lambert © May 26, 2014

The VA's Most Recent Scandal

I'm currently litigating against the VA. Like the current scandal rocking the VA, the suit concerns a lack of leadership. The scandal and my case are admittedly partially due one of the failings in government services.

But at its core I think is this issue: many who fill leadership roles at the VA are retired military personnel, who should certainly have a calling and affinity for the veterans they serve, but who are collecting a government pension along with their salaries. I anecdotally wonder if they view the VA as a cushy retirement club to make a little pocket change and are complacent about their work. This appears to have been the attitude of some I have encountered in my research of my case.

When I was in the military, it often appeared that the twenty year retirement, all or nothing plan, created a lot of perversity in the ranks when getting to twenty became, more important than what was the best for the country. One of the bad examples in this litigation instructed his charges on the benefits and virtues of "triple dipping," that is, collecting both a military and VA retirement and then receiving consulting fees by working for a government contractor.

Maybe that system should change. Just a thought.

Loren M. Lambert © May 24, 2014

Syrian's Medical Professionals--A Light To the World And An Embarrassment To US Doctors

Recent news reports regarding Syrian Medical Professionals reveal that many have been tortured and murdered by Bashar al-Assad's regime and by the rebels for no other reason than providing care to any one injured by the war. Yet still many vow to continue saving lives as long as possible.

Recent news reports regarding the United States Medical Professionals suggest the some American Health care providers (mostly doctors) fear their revenues will drop if they provide care to medicare and medicaid patients and if the Health Care Act continues as the law of the land. As a result a few threaten to retire early. It's such a hard existence living in a democracy under the rule of law.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/09/13/us-syria-crisis-health-idUSBRE98C0NG20130913

Loren M. Lambert © May 15, 2014

The Smell of Babies (A New Perfume by Burberry)

Study found that the smell of newborn babies lights up the female brain in same area that is lit up by chocolate. As a result, many procreation minded religions are banning chocolate from their congregation's diet.

In a related study, it was found that the smell of newborn babies lights up the male brain in same area that is lit up while mowing the lawn or heading off to hunt rabbits. As a result, many procreation minded religions are banning men from doing anything--which they then realized they were already doing.

Loren M. Lambert © May 14, 2014

The Sage Brush Repellent Rebellion

One person's act of civil disobedience is another person's opportunity for a good lower bowl cleanse.

Loren M. Lambert © May 13, 2014

Wild Horses, The Avatar and Xanadu.

Of all cultures, we here in the US anthropomorphize the most.

My son was up today from BYU. We discussed Utah's wild horse population that is devastating the desert because it has no natural predators.

We also discussed how science is showing that the connections of life are not far off from the animist beliefs depicted in "The Avatar."

Science is discovering amazing intelligences and connections in many animals and even plants. Plants actually sense, see, plan and have relationships.

But everything has to live in balance. Without balance every living thing within the sphere of that dissonance suffers.

The Potawatomi or Ojibwe language does not refer to the flora and fauna as "it" but embraces life in a language that elevates it as our kin. The native american woman that explained this said it causes you to be more connected to our world.

However, this connection to life does not mean one of naivety or holding a simplistic or unrealistic view of the circle of life.

What does that have to horses? They were not native. They have no natural predators here and at their and other animals expense, are over populating the land. They are not playing a part in xanadu but are creating the opposite and are losing their connection to life because they are out of balance.

Yes, I think they are majestic beings. I felt this magical connection the first time I encountered a wild horse. But all life is precious. Don't elevate one species of life over others just because we have found a way to domesticate it for our own purposes. Antelope, desert sheep, deer etc are as intelligent and as valuable as horses.

It's time to have a rational discussions about how balance must be established in our deserts. Perhaps we need to anthropomorphize less, view all life as our brothers and sisters and realize xanadu comes at the price of balance.

Loren M. Lambert © May 12, 2014

Pow Wow Rally To Take Back San Juan County

This coming week end I invite you to camp out on San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman's yard for a Pow Wow to help the Native Americans take back the land that his ancestors took from the native populations and then to bar him and all his gun touting, carbon pollution belching ATV riding friends from Recapture Canyon.

As you may have heard, he fomented a rally to encourage criminals to come to our state and his county to pollute, ruin our public lands and desecrate Recapture Canyon. Please send him a email and let him know if you would like to reserve a camp sight in his yard or at the county commissioner's building.

Are his actions and possible violations of the law any different than Tim DeChristopher (sent to prison for protesting oil and gas exploration leases) and the occupy wallstreeters who were arrested in Pioneer Park. No. He should be investigated and prosecuted if he is found to have violated any state or federal laws.

At the very least he should be forced to resign.

Please send him an email, fax or give him a call and tell him you’d like to reserve your campsite:

Phil Lyman
Office Address: P.O. Box 9
Monticello, Utah 84535
Phone:(435)587-3225
Cell Phone:(435)459-1079
Fax: (435)587-2447
phil1@lymancpa.com

Loren M. Lambert © May 10, 2014

The Power To Overcome All

“My parents gave me love and I knew that what ever happened to me, they couldn’t take that away. I would always know my parents loved me. That’s what got me through all this,” said Elizabeth Smart at a silent auction and benefit dinner at the La Caille for Holding Out Help.

Empower your children to overcome all obstacles. Love them. Everything else is secondary.

Loren M. Lambert © May 9, 2014

Still Living in an Astounding World

Its astounding to me that we still live in a world where a small band of thugs can claim that God told them to kidnap over 200 young girls and sell them into slavery and can do so with impunity.

Loren M. Lambert © May 7, 2014

Freedom of Speech

The twins of freedom of speech are the freedom to speak your mind and the maturity to allow others room to speak theirs--even when it discomfits or offends.

Loren M. Lambert © May 6, 2014

If Pain Or Death Is God’s Punishment, Let Him Who Is Without Sin or Fault Inflict It.

For most of human history and currently in many populous countries, our species has used death, pain and the fear of them, to punish and subjugate others. Criminals, corrupt government officials, dictators and authoritarian countries inflict pain through torture and murder to eliminate their enemies, subjugate their populace and extract incriminating statements from detainees. This infliction of pain can be as innocuous as short deprivations to tortures that culminate in death. Currently around 112 countries use mayhem, mutilation, corporal punishment, and capital punishment including whipping, cainning, dismemberment, castration, stoning, hanging, shooting and lethal injection as punishment for blasphemy, homosexual acts, theft, drug use, apostasy, and promiscuity.

After September 11, 2001, our own country, in what was one of our darkest hours, justified and rationalized the use of torture, either inflicted at the hands of our own security forces or by proxy through rendition to surrogate countries. With the election of President Obama hopefully such practices have been eliminated. This history, nonetheless, indicates that, as a species, we have taken what in nature was a positive phenomena meant to preserve our existence and corrupted it into a negative, sinister force of oppression through which we manipulate others.

The US and Utahs’ Constitutions, similar to all states, prohibit cruel and unusual punishment. The Utah Supreme Court indicated that, “[A] punishment is "excessive" and unconstitutional if it (1) makes no measurable contribution to acceptable goals of punishment and hence is nothing more than the purposeless and needless imposition of pain and suffering; or (2) is grossly out of proportion to the severity of the crime. A punishment might fail the test on either ground.” The court further indicated that: “when the State causes suffering that is "wanton, insensate, or vindictive," when it inflicts punishment in a spirit of bitterness or sadism, it can no longer be called necessary. . . A punishment thus becomes unconstitutionally cruel when the suffering inflicted by the State exceeds what is necessary to serve the legitimate "objectives of the criminal law."

Therefore, just as cruel and unusual punishments are constitutionally proscribed as a sentence following criminal proceedings that allow proper procedural and substantive due process, our laws prohibit torture for any purposes. Yet even here, many states still impose against those who are arrested, detained or imprisoned some water, food, sleep and toileting deprivation and some level of exposure to the elements. Furthermore, 32 states, the U.S. military and the federal government still allow capital punishment. In a society that has matured considerably from the days when public torture, executions and hangings were part deterrent, part entertainment, and part civic duty, this is puzzling.

Certainly, if punishments should, by some metaphysical means, reflect the depravity of the crimes committed, many human beings deserve both torture and death. Despite this, our morality, as reflected in our constitutional pronouncements and case law, has sufficiently advanced so that we have foresworn torture as a punishment. Why? Because it is messy, violent, painful, gory, wanton, appeals to our basest natures, is often misused, cannot be retracted when erroneously inflicted and corrupts the societies and individuals who impose it. So why do we still cling to capital punishment--torture’s last vestige?

Has it somehow been civilized because our ability to inflict it has progressed so that we allegedly kill without causing pain? Is it because it has been taken from the town square to the prison enclosure and hidden from view that it is now benign? Yet, it is not civilized. Despite the white cloaked physicians who have replaced the black hooded executioners, it is still nonetheless, violent. It strips life from the body, and according to some, rips out the soul, beyond all reformation, from the same.

Between the sentence of death and its execution, capital punishment, like torture, inflicts the pain, suffering and mental anguish of fear upon the condemned and their loved ones. It, like torture, corrodes and debilitates the psyches and continuances of those who carry it out, from the jury or judge who are fed by its corrupting power over life, to the prison officials who prepare and strap the condemned into the executioner’s table. Its finality, its irretrievability, condemns us all when we err. Finally, who really knows if the executed feel no pain? Can that be shown by applying the scientific method?

The problem is that just as pain is a subjective experience, whether or not capital punishment is “wanton, insensate, or vindictive,” really has no anchor to any objective standard. It is wholly subjective. For whether or not a particular punishment is wanton, insensate and vindictive, is an evolving concept depending upon culture and often competing religious beliefs that are incapable of validation or empirical proof. Furthermore, is not the infliction of death an infliction of pain? It is pain that propels us to avoid any and all harmful stimuli, not just because of the pain that such stimuli cause, but also because of the final demise it might occasion. Moreover, under our Judeo-Christian culture, is not pain and death, God’s punishment? Therefore, is not the death penalty a usurpation of God’s authority and simply another means of torture and is therefore wanton, insensate, and vindictive?

In short, we cheapen the sanctity of life by being so presumptuous and so lacking in humility as to believe our system of criminal justice is perfect enough to inflict this type of ultimate pain on other human beings. No Judge, no jury, nor legal system should be deemed so perfect, so infallible, so beyond the corrosive influence of welding such power as to have the right to inflict torture as a means of punishment or interrogation, nor to impose the ultimate pain of death.

In conclusion, capital punishment and its infliction of pain and suffering serves no legitimate objectives of the criminal law and simply has no place in a modern penal system and should be eliminated as a choice on all the face of the earth.

Comment 1: Russell Josephson - God disagrees with you on capital punishment -- in fact, if society fails to execute the murderer, it becomes an complicit accessory to his crime: "at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man." (Old Testament | Genesis 9:5 - 6)

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert - Hard to argue against God, nonetheless, the mosaic law is no longer followed by most. Christ repealed it. Besides, why just pick that one, plenty other laws in the Old Testament that we don't follow. You should read: The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible Audio CD – Abridged, Audiobook by A. J. Jacobs

Comment 3: Russell Josephson - The citation is not from the law of Moses, but a revelation given much earlier to Noah. It looks like you are starting to base your morality on your politics -- instead of the other way around.

Comment 4: Loren M. Lambert No I think the death penalty is morally repugnant, especially given men's imperfections and use of it as a tool to oppress and I know Christ agrees. There is no a human being alive that I would trust with such a power, especially those on the wacky rabid right and those to the lunatic fringe of the left. Is blood atonement really still a doctrine of "the church?" I don't think so. I think your morality is driven by what you think is a doctrine of god that is really not. The world will be an exponentially better place when no governments use torture and death as a tool. The only time it is justified is in immediate self-defense--individually and collectively.

Comment 5: Russell Josephson I fully agree with you that torture is immoral. It can never be justified because it violates the inalienable rights of man. Even when you invoke the evil philosophy of utilitarianism -- it fails to be just--see:
http://russj.livejournal.com/20537.html

The death penalty is not 'blood atonement' -- it represents the principle of justice. Paul said that the state acts on behalf of God in this respect:
"For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil."
(New Testament | Romans 13:4)

While we as individuals may wish to be merciful, only Jesus has paid the price required to extend mercy. The state does not have that authority.
"And now, the plan of mercy could not be brought about except an atonement should be made; therefore God himself atoneth for the sins of the world, to bring about the plan of mercy, to appease the demands of justice, that God might be a perfect, just God, and a merciful God also." (Book of Mormon | Alma 42:15)

Loren M. Lambert © May 5, 2014

Tyrants

How many times will tyrants of all forms learn that that which is gained by thuggery will end in thuggery. Ukranian soviet separatists will create one hell only to be embraced by another that will rob their children of their dreams, their liberty and bring upon their heads a mountain of pain and shame.

Loren M. Lambert © May 3, 2014

Baptism

The great states-person Sarah Palin has again confirmed what most of us learned about her when she said that "water boarding is how we baptize terrorists," that she is very off kilter and better out of political leadership. How could she think that that is what Christ taught us about baptism? "Come unto me and I will increase your burdens and give you a baptism of hate and horror.

Please get this woman off the national stage. Such an embarrassment.

Comment 1: Laura Wanlass Gudmundson -  I am sitting here with my mouth hanging open. Embarrassment indeed


Comment 2: Cynthia Mazza Rutherford - I agree. What comes out of her mouth is disgraceful,


Comment 3: Ellen Donahue Lambert - she's just another tawdry fish in that big ol political barrel... 'START SHOOTIN'!!! YEEEHAW!!!'

Loren M. Lambert © May 1, 2014

Democrats Blow a Great Opportunity--Peter Carroon v. BYU Professor Richard Davis

I voted for Richard Davis for Democratic Party Chair. He did not win. Peter Carroon won. Both were good choices, but Peter is a better choice as a candidate for political office and Richard would have been a shrewd and smart strategic choice as Party chair.

Utah Democrats were foolish for not embracing Mr. Davis' candidacy, even though many party stalwarts may not agree with some of his positions--as I don't.

In listening to comments in the caucases, instead of realizing that Democrats are the minority party in Utah, it appears that the rank and file want Peter Carroon, not because he's good for the party's progress but because, "he's put in his dues," "we need to act like, talk like and be Democrats (whatever that means)," and because he's a BYU Professor and therefore his candacy is "interjecting religion into politics." I also had the feeling that many would not vote for Mr. Davis solely because he is LDS.

So the same wrongheaded thinking that many staunch LDS Republicans have that does not permit them to be Democrats or vote for none-LDS candidates or those who are Democrats--applies to many Democrats. Yet when you are in the minority, you especially need to reach out and attract more participation from a broader electorate. You do not do that by party purges, creating orthodoxy and electing those who have "put in their dues."

Those involved in politics at the grass roots level in both parties tend to include many who are at the polar extremes of the populace. This leaves a lot of people in the middle. And lets face it, in Utah, that middle is filled with many who are LDS who do not feel welcome in the Democratic party and are often made to feel unwelcome.

As a consequence, the Republicans have the luxury in this State of ignoring the independent and potential swing voters. Democrats can accept that for what it is and as the minority party, work with it and court those moderate voices or it can swim against the current.

Therefore, Democrats can decide if they want to continue to have little influence outside of Salt Lake County by sticking to their orthodoxy or they can appeal to a broader base by making bold choices. Such choices would include embracing fellow Democrats who, while clearly fitting within party philosophical parameters, may not share the same positions on a few issues that Democrats consider the litmus test to the parties' supposed orthodoxy.

Richard Davis, as party chair, could have helped exponentially in extending the party's influence beyond Salt Lake County without having had any political power to have threatened the orthodoxy of the party.

Yet, because Democrats have rejected Professor Richard Davis, Republicans can relax and Democrats can now continue to be the party of the Wasatch front.

Loren M. Lambert © April 26, 2014

Not When, but If

"It is not a matter of when but if."

Comment 1: Steve Sims - if the when is never the if is moot

Comment 2: Loren M. Lambert - This isn't my slogan, it's the slogan of the republican party.

Comment 3: Bob Shorten - Ninth grade geography teacher at Wasatch always said that about earthquakes

Loren M. Lambert © April 23, 2014

Taste for Dirt

When you get a taste for dirt, it's hard to keep it from going to your head.

Loren M. Lambert © April 22, 2014

Look Good or Be Good?

I only have time to look good, not to be good.

Comment 1: Rosalinda Burton - Oh come on now! Being good helps you look good!!!

Comment 2: Jeff Johnson - How ironic and I'm just the opposite.

Comment 3: Loren M. Lambert - (Frankly, truth be told, I was thinking about my workouts--the reality is I can't push myself like I use to because I can't hold up and my time is limited so its like I'm athletic enough to stand at the starting line in the sun and look like I could actually run the race but as soon as the gunshot sounded, I'd just have to stand in the sun and look like . . . )

Comment 4: Rosalinda Burton - ....you just finished it?

Loren M. Lambert © April 22, 2014

Embracing The Eternal Mystery of Mediocrity, Moderation and Modesty

I’m re-thinking this, be all you can be, find your highest potential, explore your limits, hogwash. The wisdom of Joe Rowling, fellow river rat and Wisconsin wonderkund-kid keeps coming back to taunt me. Joe, zinc oxide always plastered across his city-boy-white nose, a goofy Gillagan’s Island straw hat on his head, said you should never get into shape so you don’t ever have to worry about getting out of shape. So you know, this wasn't coming from some loser--Joe was the best most improbable yet adequately able river guide there ever sometimes was.

He would slightly less than whole heartedly agree with me that it’s best to stay a bit pudgy, somewhat pale, slightly greasy and settle for just enough of everything to live moderately above the poverty level. And, he would nod unenthusiastically that on a good day we should shoot for just a bit less than the sure thing, expect the worse yet plan for something slightly better, and to always look on the side that faces you and steer clear of any bright sides.

I mean isn't it much more engaging and romantic to be able to just look at what others are doing and say–“Hell, I could do that.” “You call that art?” “Piece of cake.” “I’ve seen bigger balls on a pygmy possum.” “Why don’t I?–Why bother?--Hey, I’m fine where I am,” and last but not exactly, the least, “I could a if I wanted ta, I just don’t wanna.”

In fact, if he wanted to, Joe would’ve probably made millions of dollars going into business with me almost printing up t-shirts with slogans like: Slow Guts No Gory; Less is Never More & We Want it That Way; No Need for Speed; Never Gain If It Requires Pain; When the Going Get’s Tough The Smart Go To Bed.

Finally, Joe would possibly give me an ovation if I’d do the standing and half-hearted clapping myself, and if he had the interest in listening to me exhort: don’t ever go the extra mile; definitely do not take the road less traveled; and never ever, except on the pain of death, follow your dreams.

And why? Because 90% of all fatalities, catastrophic property losses and relationship blowouts occur during the extra mile, 97% of the time the road is less traveled because it leads to a dumpy little place next to a toxic waste dump where for entertainment its five residents watch tar drip; and don’t follow your dreams because they were never really that cool since you were either asleep, drunk or sick when you had them you never had the capacity to follow them any way, and if you did manage to follow them to their very end you had to ask: Is that all there is? Is that all I’ve got? And then you had to answer: Yes, that is all there is, and that is all I have got, and it’s all I ever had and ever will have.

Where’s the mystery and glory in that? There isn't any. So leave something in reserve. Besides, if you would just ignore them, dreams should be like butterflies that just come and land on your shoulder. Why should you chase them? Better--make them chase you. So, if you hear about the best restaurant with the best food ever, avoid it like the plague. If you hear about some technique for the most exquisite sex, the most intimate relationship–burn it. Don’t put that kind of pressure on yourself. Who wants the burden of knowing it will never get any better.

This will allow you to live in a state of continuous anticipation with a sure knowledge that your best is yet to come, that Santa will always be on his way, and that America is a place where we are exceptional and never do anything wrong.

Then you’ll never have to confront the pain of knowing you gave it your very best but your best wasn't good enough, and you’ll never wonder if what you have could be any better.

So when I die, my epitaph should read:

Here Lies a Man Whose Best Was Yet to Come, Who Was More Than Likely A Famous Genius and A Great Leader but Who Chose to Live a Modest, Humble Life of Mysterious Mediocrity.

Loren M. Lambert © April 22, 2014

The Daddy Daughter Connection

Today I got a call that no parent/Dad wants to hear. It turned out that it wasn’t too serious, still, not good. “Mr. Lambert there’s been an emergency, you need to come immediately to pick up your daughter and take her in for medical care . . .” Instantly, at the back of my stomach this heavy sick feeling took hold. I fired off a few orders to my office staff, gathered up my brief case and headed to Cottonwood High.

Earlier this week I had one of my best meetings, aka, auditions. Generally, they have all been pretty solid lately due to lots of hard work. So you know, a great audition for an actor is not that they get the part, we don’t have any control over that and there are a lot of variables and lots of stiff competition. A great audition is when you forget you’re auditioning, you forget your day, forget your standing at a mark like a wax museum statue, forget there’s a camera stuck in your face and you connect to a momentarily real experience and react like you really would were that moment a real event in your life with your scene partner. I was reading for the part of a father who had recently lost a daughter and was consoling his surviving daughter due to her survivor’s guilt. In that moment for all intents and purposes I was that girl’s father and the emotion was raw, real and visceral.

The same as it was as I was driving to get my daughter.

My sons, all older than her have had their medical emergencies. Those experiences also provoked the same sense of concern, but there was something different about this, something much more profound and substantial knowing my daughter was in pain. It was like there was this neural connection draining her anxiety into me so I could feel it like it was mine.

I arrived at Cottonwood, called the number I had been given and Noelle’s high school attendance coordinator brought her out in a wheel chair. She couldn’t walk because while at dance practice she had impaled her foot on a sharp hanger wire that must have been used to hang some prop. It was dangling from the ball of her foot and looked to be about an inch or more in. She was in pain and every whimper and ouch made my gut turn more. I wanted to take the pain for her.

We went to the Holliday Instacare. While waiting for treatment, which required a numbing shot because the wire was hooked, she asked me to sing to her. My jaw dropped, my heart surged and I felt so inadequate. For the past many years she had always asked me not to sing. On the spot, all I could think of was the Killer’s Human that I had been singing in the morning. Not exactly a calming song. Yet, she wanted distraction, so I obliged. Holding her hand, as the doctor gave her a shot, I sang a weak Human and then threw in Ed Shehan’s Lego House.

"Are we human, or are we dancer, my sign is vital my hands are cold, and I'm on my knees looking for the answers, are we human or are we Dancer." "And if you're broken I will mend you, and I'll keep you sheltered from the storm that's raging on now." Still the neural connection raged on, the pit in my stomach, and the helplessness in the face of her pain remained. It didn’t wane until an hour after I took her home.

Then I realized why it had been a great audition--the apparent tapped into connection. That Daddy Daughter connection. So what is it? Instinctual? I can’t think of anything I’ve done different with my sons, wife or others I love in my life. Yet this was so immediate, so tangible. Though now I know she'll revert back to asking me not to sing when I do, I am just thankful she’s now downstairs, safe, sharing the calm after the storm with good friends. I can only hope that further such connections will only be in auditions when I can find that neural link in my imagination and be at my best artistic self, instead of receiving a call that there has been an emergency.

Loren M. Lambert © April 18, 2014

Sugar is Poison--Literally

Sugar is poison, sugar causes addiction, sugar causes diabetes (type II), any diet that works will be high fiber and low sugar. Low sugar and high fiber diets are what god gave us and processed food is taking real food and turning it into unhealthy garbage. We used to consume about a 100 grams a day of fiber—now we consume 12 grams a day. Extracting fiber and adding sugar is good for your wallet and bad for your health. This is said here: http://radiowest.kuer.org/post/sugar-bitter-truth-0

Loren M. Lambert © April 16, 2014

The Desire That Cannot Be Acknowledged In Public.

Do we really have a sense of balance in our approach to this most complex of drives?

We know that many that share 90% of our genetics will starve, cross continents, navigate miles of rivers against the crushing currents, and fight sometimes to the death to get it. Does this reality have any lessons for us to learn?

We know that similar necessary compulsions can be voiced with complete acceptance. Like I am hungry or I am cold. Yet why is it so unacceptable to utter its reality as if to do so will conjure up the death eaters and the snake-faced one who leads them?

I am just going to say it, I love crunchy Frito lay corn puffs.

Loren M. Lambert © April 14, 2014

Passion

Some of my friends, like family, sometimes say things in the moment that are driven by passion without a lot of wisdom, so I don't take it personally and let it go. I sometimes do the same--too much passion, too little restraint. I'm getting better at being wise and disagreeing but not being disagreeable. I really do love and like most people and feel no ill will towards them even when they in-artfully disagree with me.

Loren M. Lambert © April 14, 2014

Donkey Politics at Its Best

Within the shadow of the everlasting mountains, the Democrats held their convention behind the "What Jesus Most Sanctifies" podium. Not as snappy as I remember the Republican Convention I attended years ago but significantly more colorful.

There were only two contested races for the Demos nominees. All four seemed highly qualified. How could I chose? One lost my vote due to a petty stereotype mentioned by the guy introducing him and the other merely due to a slightly greater affinity I had for the other candidate.

And the person who shines the brightest as a great leader at the convention--the gentleman who took the time to pick up all the paper towels that missed their mark in the men's restroom. Bravo. A true hero.

I suspect many of the candidates would see this as beneath their dignity but if I could run them through a similar test, then I'd know the true public servants.

If all of us had the attitude of this gentleman in all of our doings, there would be need for only a very lean government.

Loren M. Lambert © April 12, 2014