Category Archives: Editorial Commentaries

Today’s strident populism, personified by Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, is fed by voter frustration, anger, fear and despair. But, I would argue, at the heart of today’s strident populism is our moral abandonment of the poor. Americans give time, money and other resources to the poor but fail to provide the most important assistance: human dignity. We fail to see them as ourselves and, because we fail in this respect, the poor are effectively cast out, separated from the dignity we afford ourselves. read more

I am out of the Republican Party. With the rise of Donald Trump, the Republican Party has dumped the last vestiges of conservatism. Though party faithful scramble, spit and stutter to make the best of this intellectual disaster, it pains me to see so many otherwise reasonable people defending the indefensible.

There is no lesser of two evils in the choice before conservatives. Both candidates are politically evil. I will not vote for one evil because I think the other is more evil. Bill Buckley famously held that he would vote for the most electable conservative. Neither Hillary Clinton nor Trump is conservative. I think building some gargantuan wall on our southern border is un-American. I think rounding up millions of people and isolating an entire religion are un-American ideas. Trump is not America first; he’s cynicism first. He’s fear and anger first. read more

Addressing intergenerational poverty is tricky business. If we are trying to break the cycle of poverty, innovative and nontraditional measures must be employed. We just cannot keep using the same failed approaches. To stop intergenerational poverty, we must focus on rising generations — the children of these families trapped in poverty. With situational poverty, parents need and receive direct help with their temporary circumstances. With intergenerational poverty, the adults in the room are either very often the problem or live with circumstances that don’t allow them to be the solution. The only way to effectively break these cycles of dependency is to focus on the children and, frankly, until now, many conservative policymakers have been reluctant in principle to bypass parents. read more

Utah has the opportunity to lead the nation once again. In the face of candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, Utah could choose an alternative that could possibly change the course of politics for a generation. Utah could achieve consensus on an alternative to Trump and Clinton, set the example, announce it to the nation and invite every other state to do the same. At most, we could regain our national identity and sanity. At least, the true spirit of freedom can rest on this exceptional state. read more

When Gov. Gary Herbert announced his Healthy Utah plan in 2014 to address Obamacare issues related to Medicaid, Utah’s right wing combined in knee-jerk fashion against it. The plan was labeled “Medicaid expansion” and demonized as a policy betrayal to the fundamental principles of conservatism.

Nearly a year and a half later of productive dialogue and negotiations between the governor and House and Senate leaders, the Legislature just passed a bill increasing Medicaid coverage. And surprisingly, nary a word from Utah’s right wing. Certainly the “principles” remained the same. Yet silence from the right side of the peanut gallery. Even the left side of that gallery proclaimed that the new bill was definitely not Medicaid expansion. After all of the political weeping and gnashing of teeth against Medicaid expansion from Utah’s right wing, one might have expected some expressed concerns. Au contraire. read more

Donald Trump’s race to the White House already has made political history inside the Republican Party. The hand-wringing by GOP insiders could start a fire were it not for their sweating palms. Many conservative activists inside the party see Trump otherwise — a refreshing voice of no-nonsense, Everyman practicality. Often seen as the fulcrum on which the GOP teeters between establishment and grass-roots camps, the real tension inside the party from Trump’s candidacy is not about the man. The tension is about the vision of America he represents. read more

A little less than a year from now the next president will be sworn in. The first 100 days of a new presidency sets the tone for every other day. They send a message to Congress and the world about the kind of leader we have elected — not just in terms of policy, but also in tone, style and temperament.

Based on Trump’s comments and claims so far on the campaign trail, as well as extensive research into his activities, we have a reasonably certain idea of what Trump would do bursting out of the gate as our new president. read more

As many Republican financiers and strategists sit on the sidelines waiting for Donald Trump’s campaign to collapse, a persistent question remains unanswered: Why hasn’t it already collapsed?

Any reasonable answer comes across like trying to explain why an object defies gravity – no matter how many ways you try to explain it, the fact of the matter is the mystery object isn’t hitting the ground. Its existence momentarily suspends all reason. Everyone is left to simply wait for it to fall. read more

Billionaire T. Boone Pickens is weighing in on the presidential race in a profound way, calling for a “bipartisan screening committee that vets presidential candidates like we do anyone else applying for a job and recommends the best candidates possible.” Mr. Pickens has never flirted with running for president himself, but he has been known to influence the outcome in previous elections.

Perhaps he sees the success of his fellow billionaire Donald Trump as a threat to the process. When Mr. Trump was asked how he proposed to register Muslims in the United States, citizen and non-citizen alike, in a national database to track their every move, his response was “effective management.” We can surmise this also is his answer for how he foresees rounding up and herding millions of people across the Mexican border. read more

Constant introspection is healthy and politics seem to find ways to systemically avoid it or, worse, always project the bright side (usually the obligatorily optimistic side) of things. So, I ask, for all of the time and money spent to protect the cause of freedom in Utah, what do we have to show for it?

My educated guess is that freedom in Utah would be about where it is today even if groups like Strata Policy, Libertas Institute, Utah Taxpayers, Americans for Prosperity, Eagle Forum, Parents for Choice in Education and Sutherland Institute never existed. That guess is not (completely) a knock on the people involved. It’s a knock on their lack of collective vision and effective strategies. read more