Monthly Archives: September 2016

When I was growing up, I knew very little about races and racism. I was born and spent the first nine years of my life in the Bay Area, the east Bay Area, the Oakland side – the real Bay Area. Dad owned several delicatessens at the time and they all served very working class people of all races. While we lived in a very white neighborhood our churches and schools were a racial mix of Asians, especially Japanese, blacks, Hispanics and us.

I suppose racial sensitivity was high living so close to Oakland in the 1950s and 60’s. Maybe that’s why everyone seemed to get along where I lived. But I have to think as well that we got along because we didn’t have class distinctions, even if racial tensions were high inside the big cities. read more

As if it matters at all, the Clinton campaign has created a new support group in Utah: Mormons for Hillary. The initial group is comprised of over 100 Latter-day Saints who say they are voting for Hillary – 120 founding members to be exact.

At the forefront of this new group are self-identified Republicans, such as attorney David Irvine. I say “self-identified” because typically Republicans, such as Irvine, are rarely viewed by others as Republican – mostly they are called RINOs, Republican in name only. But even that doesn’t matter. read more

For a good five or six years over the past decade I have encouraged the state Legislature to reign in the power of the Utah High School Activities Association (UHSAA). Recently, and surprisingly, the State Board of Education had the same thought. The State Board proposed to end the control UHSAA has over school athletics by controlling the transfer process.

UHSAA has purview over all extracurricular activities in Utah schools – music, science, vocational programs and, of course, high school sports. For every other extracurricular activity a student is free to transfer to any other school to pursue those activities. But not if the student is an athlete. In fact, state law rules that any student can transfer to any school for no reason if the transfer school has space. But not if the student is an athlete. read more