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