Sunday, August 3, 2014
BEYOND THE DEATH OF A DOG
I read reports in the Salt Lake Tribune that an official investigative board cleared and justified the Salt Lake City police officer who killed a dog while doing a search in the dog’s back yard.
Of course the board did that – especially since it could not get testimony from the dog.
It feels like we now find ourselves in a dystopian police-state novel with a plot that has spun off its axis. This becomes apparent when we consider what should have happened in this troubling incident.
.
People and their elected leaders must insist on the Constitutional Right that police must get warrants. That should be obvious. In this case, It is bad enough that law enforcement just searched a backyard for whatever reason, aside from the issue of an officer shooting and killing a homeowner's dog.
Officers should be equipped with bear pepper spray – a non-lethal solution -- in case a home-owner's dog is [understandably] angry or charging officers who have crossed its territory.
There is a bigger issue here for us to consider. What does it say about government law enforcement, about the advertising pressure we get from weapons manufacturers, and human nature itself that it is socially acceptable to carry and use lethal weapons when we could develop, manufacture, carry and use when necessary non-lethal weaponry.
Guns are not a tool. Guns are a symbol. Symbol of power.
Friday, July 25, 2014
ASKS SOME QUESTIONS
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Office of the First Presidency published an open letter on June 28, 2014. Newrightasecension reprints the letter with some comments.
In God's plan for the happiness and eternal progression of His children, the blessings of His priesthood are equally available to men and women. [who have men available] Only men are ordained to serve in priesthood offices [currently – for revelation goes on and on].
All service in the Church has equal merit in the eyes of God.
[A nice sentiment. It reads well and sounds appreciative and inclusive . . . but really? Will either we or God put the service of J Reuben Clark and Harold B. Lee and the service of the laziest female teacher in primary in equal merit?]
We express profound gratitude for the millions of Latter-day Saint women and men who willingly and effectively serve God and His children. Because of their faith and service, they have discovered that the Church is a place of spiritual nourishment and growth.
We understand that from time to time Church members will have questions about Church doctrine, history, or practice. Members are always free to ask such questions and earnestly seek greater understanding. We feel special concern, however, for members who distance themselves from Church doctrine or practice and, by advocacy, encourage others to follow them.
[Therefore, Ordain Women does not particularly impress newrightascension. It has yet to take serious action to get what it wants.]
Simply asking questions has never constituted apostasy. [Beware: if you ask upity questions, it will not win you friends among your ward or your stake leadership either. ]
Apostasy is repeatedly acting in clear, open, and deliberate public opposition to the Church or its faithful leaders, or persisting, after receiving counsel, in teaching false doctrine.
[The placement of “faithful” in the sentence is illuminating, to say the least. If an “unfaithful” church leader has generated public opposition for his sins, the wording makes clear that it is obviously his own neck.]
The Council of
The First Presidency and
Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Official Web site of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
© 2014 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All Rights Reserved
“Simply asking questions has never constituted apostasy.” Given that opening, rightascension has some questions.
1. What percentage of the church membership is adult male? Is adult female?
2. What percentage of the active church membership is adult male? Is adult female? I admit that this question is interesting to ask but unanswerable because of ambiguous definitions.
3. If – for the sake of an example number – say, 53 percent of the active adult membership is female, should 53 percent of the ward-level, stake-level, and general membership decision-making leadership be female?
4 From a organizational function analysis point of view, if half of an organization’s membership cannot achieve the highest leadership roles from the beginning, does this make the organization more or less strong and secure?
5 What is the real difference between being consulted in a decision and in making the decision?
6. If God will discuss church leadership only with males, what does that tell us about God?
7. Should we expect an answer?
This editorial does not make recommendations.
In God's plan for the happiness and eternal progression of His children, the blessings of His priesthood are equally available to men and women. [who have men available] Only men are ordained to serve in priesthood offices [currently – for revelation goes on and on].
All service in the Church has equal merit in the eyes of God.
[A nice sentiment. It reads well and sounds appreciative and inclusive . . . but really? Will either we or God put the service of J Reuben Clark and Harold B. Lee and the service of the laziest female teacher in primary in equal merit?]
We express profound gratitude for the millions of Latter-day Saint women and men who willingly and effectively serve God and His children. Because of their faith and service, they have discovered that the Church is a place of spiritual nourishment and growth.
We understand that from time to time Church members will have questions about Church doctrine, history, or practice. Members are always free to ask such questions and earnestly seek greater understanding. We feel special concern, however, for members who distance themselves from Church doctrine or practice and, by advocacy, encourage others to follow them.
[Therefore, Ordain Women does not particularly impress newrightascension. It has yet to take serious action to get what it wants.]
Simply asking questions has never constituted apostasy. [Beware: if you ask upity questions, it will not win you friends among your ward or your stake leadership either. ]
Apostasy is repeatedly acting in clear, open, and deliberate public opposition to the Church or its faithful leaders, or persisting, after receiving counsel, in teaching false doctrine.
[The placement of “faithful” in the sentence is illuminating, to say the least. If an “unfaithful” church leader has generated public opposition for his sins, the wording makes clear that it is obviously his own neck.]
The Council of
The First Presidency and
Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Official Web site of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
© 2014 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All Rights Reserved
“Simply asking questions has never constituted apostasy.” Given that opening, rightascension has some questions.
1. What percentage of the church membership is adult male? Is adult female?
2. What percentage of the active church membership is adult male? Is adult female? I admit that this question is interesting to ask but unanswerable because of ambiguous definitions.
3. If – for the sake of an example number – say, 53 percent of the active adult membership is female, should 53 percent of the ward-level, stake-level, and general membership decision-making leadership be female?
4 From a organizational function analysis point of view, if half of an organization’s membership cannot achieve the highest leadership roles from the beginning, does this make the organization more or less strong and secure?
5 What is the real difference between being consulted in a decision and in making the decision?
6. If God will discuss church leadership only with males, what does that tell us about God?
7. Should we expect an answer?
This editorial does not make recommendations.
Friday, June 6, 2014
REMEMBERING HOWARD W HUNTER 20 YEARS LATER . . .
Howard W Hunter was born in 1907 in Idaho and raised in that state. As an adult, he lived in Los Angeles County, a ranch in Arcadia to be exact. He studied law at Southwestern University and plied the profession of a corporate attorney. Among his many clients, his most interesting assignment was as the legal counsel to a trust that control the minerals rights of a huge and ancient Spanish land grant that found itself above oil in 20th Century Long Beach / South Los Angeles area.
In the local Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he served as a bishop and a stake president. He chaired a regional Welfare Department Committee and also chaired a local committee that helped construct the Los Angeles Temple. In the one responsibility, he came to the attention of President J Reuben Clark. In the other he came to the attention of President Stephen L Richards. Both of them had careers in the law.
Therefore, when President Richards died unexpectedly in 1959, and President David O McKay had to select a new first counselor and a new second counselor from members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, those in the know were not completely surprised that he selected Howard W Hunter as a new apostle. McKay must have undoubtedly heard a lot of good things about him from his counselors. In this period, new apostles typically came from direct Utah backgrounds or were already in responsible church positions in the Salt Lake City. Thus Elder Hunter was something of a new apostolic entity, having roots in Idaho and in California.
Elder Hunter came to the Quorum of the Twelve just a few months after airlines started using jet liners. He and Gordon B. Hinckley, the next new apostle, became the first jet-age apostles. Hunter’s notes on airlines, airports and jets became the basis of the quorum’s knowledge and procedures in dealing with jet age airports and airlines. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, those knowledgeable about the workings of the Institutional Church and those who worked in it knew that one went to four particular apostles when one needed to get something done or changed or activated in the Church / the bureaucracy / or BYU: Elders Hinckley, McConkie, Packer – and Hunter.
When Ezra Taft Benson became president of the Church, the next senior apostle was Marion G. Romney, but age and health problems prevented him from taking up full duties as President of the Quorum of the Twelve. Therefore, Hunter became acting president of the Quorum of the Twelve in 1985 and president in 1988, but he had done some defacto leadership of the Quorum earlier when Quorum President Ezra Taft Benson had health problems in the 1980s. Starting late 1970s / early 1980s both Hunter and his first wife, Clara Jeffs Hunter, suffered major health problems. She died in 1983. As an old man with health problems, he married a second time in 1990. Her name was Inis Egan His health issues compounded in this period.
In May 1994, President Ezra Taft Benson died. His presidency covered November 1985 to May 1994, but his health and strength lasted only such that he functioned in the First Presidency to late 1988 / early 1989. Most of the Benson presidency was an extension of the Gordon B. Hinckley Administrative Years 1983-1985, 1989-1994, 1995-2008. Hunter had poor health and had a frail condition when the apostles sustained him and ordain him the new president of the LDS Church in June 1994.
It would be interesting to find out how much Howard Hunter knew in June 1994 of the facts of his frail physical condition and the advanced prostate cancer that took his life 9 months later in early March 1995. It would also be even interesting to know what he told the apostles, if anything, before the ordination.
Back in January 1970, President Joseph Fielding Smith (age 93), replaced the late David O McKay as Church president Both of them had been frail and vague for years. The apostles accepted a proposal to ordain Smith president and ordain the senior apostle and the next Church president Harold B. Lee as Smith’s first counselor. Smith then delegated his duties broadly to his counselors Lee and Nathan Eldon Tanner. I suspect they and the apostles assumed that Smith would not last long and Lee would last long, so it was an acceptable short-term arrangement. Had they know that Smith would last two and a half years and that Lee would not live to see 1974, the apostles might been of a mind to take a different course. Obviously, this sort of speculation is useless, because the apostles of 1970 did not have information that specific in their possession. They set the precedent, none the less, definitely in 1970 Still, it seems cruel to have forced a dying old man to spent his last months in an arduous job.
President Kimball experienced incapacitating health problem from late 1981 to 1985; President Benson experience incapacitation from 1989 to 1994. President Hunter, yet another Church President in poor health, posed something of a public image problem for the Church in 1994. Early in the Hunter presidency someone at the Ensign magazine found an obscure quotation from an early apostle along the lines of Orson Hyde who got quoted as saying that a prophet cannot lead the Mormon people unless he knows their problems and their sicknesses. After President Hunter died, President Hinckley – a man who was basically as strong as a horse even with his various health problems in his 90s – was ordained the new president. That particular quote never surfaced again.
A few days after Hunter assumed the presidency, he called Elder Jeffrey R Holland to serve in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. It was generally assumed . . . maybe it would be more accurate to say – your writer assumed early on Holland would someday become an apostle, but Hunter brought him to the quorum rather more early than I expected. Holland had served for 9 years as BYU president and had worked closely with Hunter, a senior apostle and an attorney, in the creation of The Jerusalem Center Building. It was, thanks in part to The Hunter Style, a major diplomatic coup amid the late 1980s Israel situation.
When Elder Holland described his day of ordination, went to some length to show that Hunter was vital and in command, that Hunter was up and functioning at 7:00 a.m. to lead the meeting, to do the ordination, to give Holland his charge. Holland to this day remains the most important of Hunter’s few appointments to church leadership. Elder Cecil Samuelsen, who eventually became BYU’s president, was called to the Seventy in the Hunter administration, as was Elder Andrew Wayne Peterson, who eventually suffered paralysis in a much-discussed controversial motorcycle accident; Hinckley released him a few years later. As to Holland, he may eventually wind up being more important than any of Benson’s apostles.
In his six month active administration, Hunter encouraged and emphasized Christ-like living and temple attendance. He dedicated two temples, the Orlando Florida Temple and the Bountiful Utah Temple. His appearance in Bountiful was among his last if not his last public appearance.
The LDS Church never has a minor president or minor prophet in its current terms. President Hunter’s administration lasted a record-setting 6 month active service, 9 months all totaled. It is the shortest administration in LDS history. LDS public communications became somewhat sensitive about his lasting contribution and purpose. Leaders later insisted that he was involved in if not central to the creation of the much touted The Proclamation on the Family. His name does not appear on the document; the Church officially released it the October after his death. Leaders also insisted that Hunter was crucial to the evolution of the Regional Representatives leadership group of the Church (created in 1967 – dissolved in 1995) into the Area Authorities. President Hinckley announced them officially a month after Hunter’s death. They eventually evolved into Area Seventies.
Hunter's real days of presiding influence were as a senior apostle. As Church president his health and his short tenure length limited his influence.
At Brigham Young University, Hunter’s minor status got immortalized in brick and mortar when the Law Library got expanded and named in honor of President Hunter. The library was a wing of the law building, which was named for J Reuben Clark. Clark served as first and second counselor to the First Presidency from 1933 to 1961; he became influential in the 1940s and 1950s as a de facto president of the Church during those periods when Presidents Grant and Smith were in frail condition. Thus the building named for a Church President is an adjunct to a building named for a First Presidency Counselor.
IN GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE:
There is nothing wrong, there is no shame in being a minor President of the Church. We Mormons are all the better for our association with Howard W Hunter, who served as an apostle in the LDS Church from 1959 to 1995.
In the local Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he served as a bishop and a stake president. He chaired a regional Welfare Department Committee and also chaired a local committee that helped construct the Los Angeles Temple. In the one responsibility, he came to the attention of President J Reuben Clark. In the other he came to the attention of President Stephen L Richards. Both of them had careers in the law.
Therefore, when President Richards died unexpectedly in 1959, and President David O McKay had to select a new first counselor and a new second counselor from members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, those in the know were not completely surprised that he selected Howard W Hunter as a new apostle. McKay must have undoubtedly heard a lot of good things about him from his counselors. In this period, new apostles typically came from direct Utah backgrounds or were already in responsible church positions in the Salt Lake City. Thus Elder Hunter was something of a new apostolic entity, having roots in Idaho and in California.
Elder Hunter came to the Quorum of the Twelve just a few months after airlines started using jet liners. He and Gordon B. Hinckley, the next new apostle, became the first jet-age apostles. Hunter’s notes on airlines, airports and jets became the basis of the quorum’s knowledge and procedures in dealing with jet age airports and airlines. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, those knowledgeable about the workings of the Institutional Church and those who worked in it knew that one went to four particular apostles when one needed to get something done or changed or activated in the Church / the bureaucracy / or BYU: Elders Hinckley, McConkie, Packer – and Hunter.
When Ezra Taft Benson became president of the Church, the next senior apostle was Marion G. Romney, but age and health problems prevented him from taking up full duties as President of the Quorum of the Twelve. Therefore, Hunter became acting president of the Quorum of the Twelve in 1985 and president in 1988, but he had done some defacto leadership of the Quorum earlier when Quorum President Ezra Taft Benson had health problems in the 1980s. Starting late 1970s / early 1980s both Hunter and his first wife, Clara Jeffs Hunter, suffered major health problems. She died in 1983. As an old man with health problems, he married a second time in 1990. Her name was Inis Egan His health issues compounded in this period.
In May 1994, President Ezra Taft Benson died. His presidency covered November 1985 to May 1994, but his health and strength lasted only such that he functioned in the First Presidency to late 1988 / early 1989. Most of the Benson presidency was an extension of the Gordon B. Hinckley Administrative Years 1983-1985, 1989-1994, 1995-2008. Hunter had poor health and had a frail condition when the apostles sustained him and ordain him the new president of the LDS Church in June 1994.
It would be interesting to find out how much Howard Hunter knew in June 1994 of the facts of his frail physical condition and the advanced prostate cancer that took his life 9 months later in early March 1995. It would also be even interesting to know what he told the apostles, if anything, before the ordination.
Back in January 1970, President Joseph Fielding Smith (age 93), replaced the late David O McKay as Church president Both of them had been frail and vague for years. The apostles accepted a proposal to ordain Smith president and ordain the senior apostle and the next Church president Harold B. Lee as Smith’s first counselor. Smith then delegated his duties broadly to his counselors Lee and Nathan Eldon Tanner. I suspect they and the apostles assumed that Smith would not last long and Lee would last long, so it was an acceptable short-term arrangement. Had they know that Smith would last two and a half years and that Lee would not live to see 1974, the apostles might been of a mind to take a different course. Obviously, this sort of speculation is useless, because the apostles of 1970 did not have information that specific in their possession. They set the precedent, none the less, definitely in 1970 Still, it seems cruel to have forced a dying old man to spent his last months in an arduous job.
President Kimball experienced incapacitating health problem from late 1981 to 1985; President Benson experience incapacitation from 1989 to 1994. President Hunter, yet another Church President in poor health, posed something of a public image problem for the Church in 1994. Early in the Hunter presidency someone at the Ensign magazine found an obscure quotation from an early apostle along the lines of Orson Hyde who got quoted as saying that a prophet cannot lead the Mormon people unless he knows their problems and their sicknesses. After President Hunter died, President Hinckley – a man who was basically as strong as a horse even with his various health problems in his 90s – was ordained the new president. That particular quote never surfaced again.
A few days after Hunter assumed the presidency, he called Elder Jeffrey R Holland to serve in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. It was generally assumed . . . maybe it would be more accurate to say – your writer assumed early on Holland would someday become an apostle, but Hunter brought him to the quorum rather more early than I expected. Holland had served for 9 years as BYU president and had worked closely with Hunter, a senior apostle and an attorney, in the creation of The Jerusalem Center Building. It was, thanks in part to The Hunter Style, a major diplomatic coup amid the late 1980s Israel situation.
When Elder Holland described his day of ordination, went to some length to show that Hunter was vital and in command, that Hunter was up and functioning at 7:00 a.m. to lead the meeting, to do the ordination, to give Holland his charge. Holland to this day remains the most important of Hunter’s few appointments to church leadership. Elder Cecil Samuelsen, who eventually became BYU’s president, was called to the Seventy in the Hunter administration, as was Elder Andrew Wayne Peterson, who eventually suffered paralysis in a much-discussed controversial motorcycle accident; Hinckley released him a few years later. As to Holland, he may eventually wind up being more important than any of Benson’s apostles.
In his six month active administration, Hunter encouraged and emphasized Christ-like living and temple attendance. He dedicated two temples, the Orlando Florida Temple and the Bountiful Utah Temple. His appearance in Bountiful was among his last if not his last public appearance.
The LDS Church never has a minor president or minor prophet in its current terms. President Hunter’s administration lasted a record-setting 6 month active service, 9 months all totaled. It is the shortest administration in LDS history. LDS public communications became somewhat sensitive about his lasting contribution and purpose. Leaders later insisted that he was involved in if not central to the creation of the much touted The Proclamation on the Family. His name does not appear on the document; the Church officially released it the October after his death. Leaders also insisted that Hunter was crucial to the evolution of the Regional Representatives leadership group of the Church (created in 1967 – dissolved in 1995) into the Area Authorities. President Hinckley announced them officially a month after Hunter’s death. They eventually evolved into Area Seventies.
Hunter's real days of presiding influence were as a senior apostle. As Church president his health and his short tenure length limited his influence.
At Brigham Young University, Hunter’s minor status got immortalized in brick and mortar when the Law Library got expanded and named in honor of President Hunter. The library was a wing of the law building, which was named for J Reuben Clark. Clark served as first and second counselor to the First Presidency from 1933 to 1961; he became influential in the 1940s and 1950s as a de facto president of the Church during those periods when Presidents Grant and Smith were in frail condition. Thus the building named for a Church President is an adjunct to a building named for a First Presidency Counselor.
IN GRATEFUL REMEMBRANCE:
There is nothing wrong, there is no shame in being a minor President of the Church. We Mormons are all the better for our association with Howard W Hunter, who served as an apostle in the LDS Church from 1959 to 1995.
Friday, February 28, 2014
SAUCE FOR THE RUSSIAN GOOSE, SAUCE FOR THE AMERICAN GANDER: Comments on USA involvement in the Crimea Ukraine Crisis
As I listened to President Obama’s remarks about The Crimea Ukraine Crisis, and as I read the remarks on-line, it occurs to me that Our President is the biggest hypocrite on this particular subject.
The United States of America has for centuries “influenced”, interfered with, and meddled with small nations bordering it and surrounding it. It has military bases all over the planet, including Guantanamo on the east shore of Cuba. It has intervened in all sorts of small close-by countries for all kinds of dubious reasons. Those dubious reason rarely actually helped the natives in the long view.
The USA has recently invaded countries that were technically closer to the Russian sphere of influence than the American sphere – Iran, Afghanistan. The results of that adventure on the local natives has not yet been completely positive.
If the USA can intervene in small close-at-hand nations, then Russia obviously has the right to intervene in small bordering nations.
THE CALL TO ACTION IN EUROPE
If the European Union wants Ukraine under its positive influence instead of the negative Putin Russia influence, the European Union will have to distribute more than just its weight in words.
Monday, February 24, 2014
To Light the Fire Within – a study of the Sochi Olympics Medal Winners statistics
The government of the Russian Federation spent 51 billion dollars, a considerable chunk of it on graft, bribery, corruption, and pay backs, to build and host a Winter Olympics in a semi-tropical Black Seaside resort. Some day it would be nice if Russia hosted a Winter Olympic games in an actual wintertime mountain community in or near the Ural Mountains. Anyway, for its 51 billion dollar investment, the Russian athletes won the most medals of all the competitors.
This next list shows a comparison contrast of the top three nation winners of the last five Winter Olympic Games. Certain countries keep turning up.
Medal totals past 5 Winter Olympics
1998 Nagano
Germany 29
Norway 25
Russia 18
Japan 10
2002 Salt Lake City
Germany 36
USA 34
Norway 25
2006 Turin
Germany 29
USA 25
Austria 23 1
Italy 11
2010 Vancouver
USA 37
Germany 30 4
Canada 26 1
2014 Sochi
Russia 33 2
USA 28 4
Norway 26 3
The good news from the Sochi Olympics is that the big countries with all the money and lots of athletes did not entirely over-dominate the games, they hardly dominated at all. This has been the case at the Winter Olympics since 1998.
Note the totals in the following lists for comparison contrast.
Medal winners from Countries with populations over 80 million
1 Russian Federation 33
2 United States of America 28
6 Germany 19
11 People's Republic of China 9
15 Japan 8
total 97
Medal winners from the small countries in population
3 Norway 26
4 Canada 25
5 Netherlands 24
7 Austria 17
8 France 15
9 Sweden 15
10 Switzerland 11
12 Republic of Korea 8
13 Czech Republic 8
14 Slovenia 8
16 Italy 8 most medals won, none gold
17 Belarus 6
18 Poland 6
19 Finland 5
20 Great Britain 4
21 Latvia 4
22 Australia 3
23 Ukraine 2
24 Slovakia 1
25 Croatia 1
26 Kazakhstan 1
grand total 198
The European Union eclipsed the Chinese empire, the Russian Empire, and the American Empire with enough and to spare. E U athletes won 141 medals.
Medal winners by continent
Europe 214
Asia 59
North America 53
Australia 3
I keep hoping that someday athletes from India, Indonesia, Africa, South America, or Caribbean or Pacific Isles will win Winter Olympic medals. That may happen someday, but it did not happen this year.
The Olympics remains a rich person’s sport and a rich country’s sport. Medal winners from the 12 wealthiest countries defined by the United Nations list in Wikipedia
1 Russian Federation 33
2 United States of America 28
4 Canada 25
6 Germany 19
8 France 15
11 People's Republic of China 9
12 Republic of Korea 8
15 Japan 8
16 Italy 8
20 Great Britain 4
22 Australia 3
garnered a total of no fewer than 160 medals.
The money angle still remains the biggest road block to getting talented athletes from all corners of the world to an Olympic games. The Olympics has the best athletes money can buy, but that does not mean it has the best athletes there are.
Stronger. Faster. Higher. Richer.
This next list shows a comparison contrast of the top three nation winners of the last five Winter Olympic Games. Certain countries keep turning up.
Medal totals past 5 Winter Olympics
1998 Nagano
Germany 29
Norway 25
Russia 18
Japan 10
2002 Salt Lake City
Germany 36
USA 34
Norway 25
2006 Turin
Germany 29
USA 25
Austria 23 1
Italy 11
2010 Vancouver
USA 37
Germany 30 4
Canada 26 1
2014 Sochi
Russia 33 2
USA 28 4
Norway 26 3
The good news from the Sochi Olympics is that the big countries with all the money and lots of athletes did not entirely over-dominate the games, they hardly dominated at all. This has been the case at the Winter Olympics since 1998.
Note the totals in the following lists for comparison contrast.
Medal winners from Countries with populations over 80 million
1 Russian Federation 33
2 United States of America 28
6 Germany 19
11 People's Republic of China 9
15 Japan 8
total 97
Medal winners from the small countries in population
3 Norway 26
4 Canada 25
5 Netherlands 24
7 Austria 17
8 France 15
9 Sweden 15
10 Switzerland 11
12 Republic of Korea 8
13 Czech Republic 8
14 Slovenia 8
16 Italy 8 most medals won, none gold
17 Belarus 6
18 Poland 6
19 Finland 5
20 Great Britain 4
21 Latvia 4
22 Australia 3
23 Ukraine 2
24 Slovakia 1
25 Croatia 1
26 Kazakhstan 1
grand total 198
The European Union eclipsed the Chinese empire, the Russian Empire, and the American Empire with enough and to spare. E U athletes won 141 medals.
Medal winners by continent
Europe 214
Asia 59
North America 53
Australia 3
I keep hoping that someday athletes from India, Indonesia, Africa, South America, or Caribbean or Pacific Isles will win Winter Olympic medals. That may happen someday, but it did not happen this year.
The Olympics remains a rich person’s sport and a rich country’s sport. Medal winners from the 12 wealthiest countries defined by the United Nations list in Wikipedia
1 Russian Federation 33
2 United States of America 28
4 Canada 25
6 Germany 19
8 France 15
11 People's Republic of China 9
12 Republic of Korea 8
15 Japan 8
16 Italy 8
20 Great Britain 4
22 Australia 3
garnered a total of no fewer than 160 medals.
The money angle still remains the biggest road block to getting talented athletes from all corners of the world to an Olympic games. The Olympics has the best athletes money can buy, but that does not mean it has the best athletes there are.
Stronger. Faster. Higher. Richer.
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
IN MEMORIAM -- SHIRLEY TEMPLE: a study of 4 of her 1940s films
Shirley Temple, born in 1928 and died in February 2014, had a life story that frankly reads like fiction – except it really did happen.
In the early 1930s she made educational movies for tikes. In the early 1930s, William Fox signed her to a contract. Fox Studio and Twentieth Century Fox Studio turned her into a child superstar. Her movies were heavy on optimism amid hard times and sometimes had musical elements. She made a huge fortune for Twentieth Century Fox.
In the 1950s, she became an early participant in television. Her second marriage lasted a long time by any standards.
In the 1960s and 1970s she had a diplomatic career, serving in two countries as an ambassador and eventually as the chief of protocol. Very few stars – John Gavin and Sidney Poitier come to mind – served as ambassadors, though at least three – Irene Dunne [who was also a Knight of Malta], Danny Kaye, and Audrey Hepburn – served either as ambassadors or delegates associated with the United Nations.
When she died, she was the senior living recipient of an Academy Award, an honorary award for the film work she did 80 years ago this year. She was 6 when AMPAS bestowed it.
Of the movies she made as a child, my personal favorite happens to be Walter Lang’s The Blue Bird (20th Century Fox 1940), one of her few three-strip Technicolor films, Fox’s answer to Victor Fleming’s The Wizard of Oz (MGM 1939). It contains a vision of pre-mortal heaven that features boy spirits dressed in short blue togas and girl spirits dressed in shorter pink togas being sent to Earth in a spiritual galleon. No kidding. The Blue Bird is delightfully berserk, an eye-popping film fantasy based on Maurice Maeterlinck’s play. It was Shirley’s biggest flop of a child star vehicle: unlike Oz, it has not make grundles of money in re-release.
Little credible evidence suggests Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer really did try to borrow her for the role of “Dorothy” in Oz. Producer Mervyn LeRoy and studio head Louis B Mayer were, practically from the beginning, sold on casting Judy Garland as Dorothy.
Her father squandered the money she made at Fox, though her mother seems stable enough.
This bring me to Shirley’s career in the 1940s when she was a teenager / young adult. She was not quite as big a superstar in this period, but she made four fascinating pictures. They illustrate a number of points about film making in the 1940s and America in general.
When Shirley left 20th Century Fox, MGM signed her to a contract, but could not decide what to do with a larger more-mature Shirley Temple. David O Selznick signed her to a personal contract as well, and also found her problematic to cast. He loaned her to a number of films, made only one movie with her, and eventually told her she should move to Europe and change her name for professional purposes. Fortunately, she had the sense not to do that.
In 1943, David O Selznick cast Shirley in his production of Since You Went Away, directed by John Cromwell. The movie proposes to show the year 1943 as lived by an average American family trying to make due somewhere in Ohio during World War II while the father of house is conscripted to the United States military. This average family consisted of Claudette Colbert as the mother, Jennifer Jones and Shirley Temple as the teenage daughters, Monty Wooley as a boarder, Joseph Cotten as mother’s boyfriend, and Hattie McDaniel as the housekeeper. If there were many average families like that in Ohio or anywhere else in 1943 USA, I would be darned surprised. The oldest daughter falls in love with a soldier portrayed by Robert Walker, which only compounds the idealization – and Selznick fell in love with Jones which complicated his home life.
In 1947, Dore Shary cast Shirley in The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, one of the most berserk comedies made in that period. Try to top this as a story. Cary Grant, very fit and very charming, portrays a bachelor artist who visits a high school to lecture and winds up attracting the attention of high-school student Shirley who develops a yen for him. He somehow does something in relation to that student that winds him up before a municipal judge, who happens to be said girl student’s big sister. Myrna Loy portrayed Big Sister.
At this point the plot gets sort of farfetched. Loy was old enough to be Temple’s mother and was older than Grant. If big sister was indeed a female municipal judge [ very rare in 1947 ], how did someone supposedly that young credibly land such a position? Well, never mind. Chalk it up to willing suspension of disbelief. Maybe we can overlook that. Judge Big Sister sentences artist to community service involving little sister, which seems just too weird — even if Big Sister hopes that little sister will tire of him. Who would tire of Cary Grant? Not me – and not Big Sister who develops a yen for him, too. The plot thickened like concrete.
Sidney Sheldon, of all people, helped write this elaborate piffle. He was in his Hollywood days before he created and wrote I Dream of Jeannie for NBC-TV in 1965 and before he started churning out huge sexy romance novels that became megahits in book stores. AMPAS even awarded him an Oscar for best writing that year.
Also In 1947, Shirley starred in That Hagen Girl, which was her first film role as a young women – not a kid. Ronald Reagan portrayed her first adult boyfriend. It is a fascinating combination given their later histories. During World War II, Reagan did his military service in Hollywood making war education films and propaganda films. No actors came out of The War with as complete an understanding of Hollywood’s political power structure as he did. Only Robert Montgomery came close, and he eventually became the media consultant to President Eisenhower. In this period, Reagan became the president of the Screen Actors Guild. Reagan eventually became a governor and President of the United States. Temple eventually had a diplomatic career. Reagan was a natural choice to be Our Shirley’s first adult beau: as one critic said of him at the time, “He has a cheery way of looking at dames.”
In 1948, John Ford and Merian C. Cooper cast Shirley in Ford’s big Monument Valley western Fort Apache. Ford directed Shirley as a tike in the 1930s; but in the 1940s, given his eccentric personality, he seems an iffy choice to direct her. Actually she did well by him; she turns out one of the memorable performances in that memorable film. She never worked with Ford again – though and she could have if either he or Shirley had wanted.
John Wayne co-stars in this film with Henry Fonda, who portrays just about the most disreputable, unlikable villain of a United States army officer Ford ever created in a movie. He comes Out West to a fort with injun troubles and starts running it into the ground. Shirley portrays his almost-grown daughter who accompanies him. He is a widower, or something. One way or another, he has no wife. He named this daughter “Philadelphia” which congers up all sorts of images of what type of person this man is. Meanwhile, daughter gets herself in trouble with an enlisted soldier whose enlisted father and civilian-mother happen to live and work in this fort. The Colonel is incensed that she would start a relationship with an enlisted man instead of a commissioned officer or someone associated with a commissioned officer. The boy’s father is unhappy with the situation too; being a good Army sergeant, he knows his place.
Philadelphia soon disappears from the film. Her father leads troops on a mission that turns into something along the lines of Custer’s Last Stand. It is his fault, and he dies with everyone else. The movie ends with John Wayne spinning a yarn about him for the benefit of an Eastern newspaper reporter. Ford’s view is factual evidence is not history; the story, not the facts, counts in recounting America’s greatness. It is one of the most unsettling ends to a Ford movie, but it says a lot about the sort of history we get in school. It remains one of the most Fordian of Ford’s films.
Shirley had an incredible career as a kid, but she found a way to improve with age. Not every kid star can say that. Will Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton ever become ambassadors? Shirley Temple's 1940s films illustrate many points still useful to know even today.
In the early 1930s she made educational movies for tikes. In the early 1930s, William Fox signed her to a contract. Fox Studio and Twentieth Century Fox Studio turned her into a child superstar. Her movies were heavy on optimism amid hard times and sometimes had musical elements. She made a huge fortune for Twentieth Century Fox.
In the 1950s, she became an early participant in television. Her second marriage lasted a long time by any standards.
In the 1960s and 1970s she had a diplomatic career, serving in two countries as an ambassador and eventually as the chief of protocol. Very few stars – John Gavin and Sidney Poitier come to mind – served as ambassadors, though at least three – Irene Dunne [who was also a Knight of Malta], Danny Kaye, and Audrey Hepburn – served either as ambassadors or delegates associated with the United Nations.
When she died, she was the senior living recipient of an Academy Award, an honorary award for the film work she did 80 years ago this year. She was 6 when AMPAS bestowed it.
Of the movies she made as a child, my personal favorite happens to be Walter Lang’s The Blue Bird (20th Century Fox 1940), one of her few three-strip Technicolor films, Fox’s answer to Victor Fleming’s The Wizard of Oz (MGM 1939). It contains a vision of pre-mortal heaven that features boy spirits dressed in short blue togas and girl spirits dressed in shorter pink togas being sent to Earth in a spiritual galleon. No kidding. The Blue Bird is delightfully berserk, an eye-popping film fantasy based on Maurice Maeterlinck’s play. It was Shirley’s biggest flop of a child star vehicle: unlike Oz, it has not make grundles of money in re-release.
Little credible evidence suggests Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer really did try to borrow her for the role of “Dorothy” in Oz. Producer Mervyn LeRoy and studio head Louis B Mayer were, practically from the beginning, sold on casting Judy Garland as Dorothy.
Her father squandered the money she made at Fox, though her mother seems stable enough.
This bring me to Shirley’s career in the 1940s when she was a teenager / young adult. She was not quite as big a superstar in this period, but she made four fascinating pictures. They illustrate a number of points about film making in the 1940s and America in general.
When Shirley left 20th Century Fox, MGM signed her to a contract, but could not decide what to do with a larger more-mature Shirley Temple. David O Selznick signed her to a personal contract as well, and also found her problematic to cast. He loaned her to a number of films, made only one movie with her, and eventually told her she should move to Europe and change her name for professional purposes. Fortunately, she had the sense not to do that.
In 1943, David O Selznick cast Shirley in his production of Since You Went Away, directed by John Cromwell. The movie proposes to show the year 1943 as lived by an average American family trying to make due somewhere in Ohio during World War II while the father of house is conscripted to the United States military. This average family consisted of Claudette Colbert as the mother, Jennifer Jones and Shirley Temple as the teenage daughters, Monty Wooley as a boarder, Joseph Cotten as mother’s boyfriend, and Hattie McDaniel as the housekeeper. If there were many average families like that in Ohio or anywhere else in 1943 USA, I would be darned surprised. The oldest daughter falls in love with a soldier portrayed by Robert Walker, which only compounds the idealization – and Selznick fell in love with Jones which complicated his home life.
In 1947, Dore Shary cast Shirley in The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, one of the most berserk comedies made in that period. Try to top this as a story. Cary Grant, very fit and very charming, portrays a bachelor artist who visits a high school to lecture and winds up attracting the attention of high-school student Shirley who develops a yen for him. He somehow does something in relation to that student that winds him up before a municipal judge, who happens to be said girl student’s big sister. Myrna Loy portrayed Big Sister.
At this point the plot gets sort of farfetched. Loy was old enough to be Temple’s mother and was older than Grant. If big sister was indeed a female municipal judge [ very rare in 1947 ], how did someone supposedly that young credibly land such a position? Well, never mind. Chalk it up to willing suspension of disbelief. Maybe we can overlook that. Judge Big Sister sentences artist to community service involving little sister, which seems just too weird — even if Big Sister hopes that little sister will tire of him. Who would tire of Cary Grant? Not me – and not Big Sister who develops a yen for him, too. The plot thickened like concrete.
Sidney Sheldon, of all people, helped write this elaborate piffle. He was in his Hollywood days before he created and wrote I Dream of Jeannie for NBC-TV in 1965 and before he started churning out huge sexy romance novels that became megahits in book stores. AMPAS even awarded him an Oscar for best writing that year.
Also In 1947, Shirley starred in That Hagen Girl, which was her first film role as a young women – not a kid. Ronald Reagan portrayed her first adult boyfriend. It is a fascinating combination given their later histories. During World War II, Reagan did his military service in Hollywood making war education films and propaganda films. No actors came out of The War with as complete an understanding of Hollywood’s political power structure as he did. Only Robert Montgomery came close, and he eventually became the media consultant to President Eisenhower. In this period, Reagan became the president of the Screen Actors Guild. Reagan eventually became a governor and President of the United States. Temple eventually had a diplomatic career. Reagan was a natural choice to be Our Shirley’s first adult beau: as one critic said of him at the time, “He has a cheery way of looking at dames.”
In 1948, John Ford and Merian C. Cooper cast Shirley in Ford’s big Monument Valley western Fort Apache. Ford directed Shirley as a tike in the 1930s; but in the 1940s, given his eccentric personality, he seems an iffy choice to direct her. Actually she did well by him; she turns out one of the memorable performances in that memorable film. She never worked with Ford again – though and she could have if either he or Shirley had wanted.
John Wayne co-stars in this film with Henry Fonda, who portrays just about the most disreputable, unlikable villain of a United States army officer Ford ever created in a movie. He comes Out West to a fort with injun troubles and starts running it into the ground. Shirley portrays his almost-grown daughter who accompanies him. He is a widower, or something. One way or another, he has no wife. He named this daughter “Philadelphia” which congers up all sorts of images of what type of person this man is. Meanwhile, daughter gets herself in trouble with an enlisted soldier whose enlisted father and civilian-mother happen to live and work in this fort. The Colonel is incensed that she would start a relationship with an enlisted man instead of a commissioned officer or someone associated with a commissioned officer. The boy’s father is unhappy with the situation too; being a good Army sergeant, he knows his place.
Philadelphia soon disappears from the film. Her father leads troops on a mission that turns into something along the lines of Custer’s Last Stand. It is his fault, and he dies with everyone else. The movie ends with John Wayne spinning a yarn about him for the benefit of an Eastern newspaper reporter. Ford’s view is factual evidence is not history; the story, not the facts, counts in recounting America’s greatness. It is one of the most unsettling ends to a Ford movie, but it says a lot about the sort of history we get in school. It remains one of the most Fordian of Ford’s films.
Shirley had an incredible career as a kid, but she found a way to improve with age. Not every kid star can say that. Will Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton ever become ambassadors? Shirley Temple's 1940s films illustrate many points still useful to know even today.
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui: what we should learn from a known felon disaster waiting to happen.
Reading this morning in the news:
Suspect in Utah County officer shooting has died
Thursday attacks » Police say they may never know the motive.
By Nate Carlisle, BROOKE Adams and Jessica Miller | The Salt Lake Tribune
First Published Jan 31 2014 11:12 am
Spanish Fork • The suspect in the shooting death of one Utah County Sheriff’s officer and the wounding of another died Friday as law enforcement provided more detail on four shootings that stretched through two counties.
Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui, 27, succumbed to his injuries at 2:20 p.m. Friday at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center. He was shot in Juab County on Thursday after police say he shot and killed Sgt. Cory Wride, 44, and wounded Deputy Greg Sherwood, 38.
Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui.
What to say? He illustrates four things that we do not want to talk about in culture, but we need to discuss.
1. He had a long criminal record. He had bolted from his parole officer and was a wanted felon. Why do Utah parole officers have so many cases? More parole officers needed.
2. Garcia-Jauregui had killed a person by stabbing said person multiple times with a screw driver and then running the person over with a car. In jail he earned contraband citations and got into a violent confrontation. The parole board released him in less than 5 years. Five years. The legislature needs to hold hearings and do some rules adjusting. The legislature needs to understand that funding prison programs will not come cheap.
3. His is yet another story of the Second Amendment in action. Someone was perfectly willing to either give or sell this man a weapon. Or he stole a weapon from somebody whom did not keep a weapon secure. I am tired of hearing Second Amendment Supporters talk about these sorts of incidents as if they cannot be helped and that the victims are unfortunate but collateral damage.
4. His sort of anger and violence management problems also illustrate that mental health always needs more funding for research and treatment.
THE CALL TO ACTION
Incidents like Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui do not happen by accident. The particular indicate the legislature needs to hold hearings and adjust certain regulations with weapons and prisoners.
The U S Constitution needs an amendment guaranteeing self defense. The Second Amendment is not it.
Suspect in Utah County officer shooting has died
Thursday attacks » Police say they may never know the motive.
By Nate Carlisle, BROOKE Adams and Jessica Miller | The Salt Lake Tribune
First Published Jan 31 2014 11:12 am
Spanish Fork • The suspect in the shooting death of one Utah County Sheriff’s officer and the wounding of another died Friday as law enforcement provided more detail on four shootings that stretched through two counties.
Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui, 27, succumbed to his injuries at 2:20 p.m. Friday at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center. He was shot in Juab County on Thursday after police say he shot and killed Sgt. Cory Wride, 44, and wounded Deputy Greg Sherwood, 38.
Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui.
What to say? He illustrates four things that we do not want to talk about in culture, but we need to discuss.
1. He had a long criminal record. He had bolted from his parole officer and was a wanted felon. Why do Utah parole officers have so many cases? More parole officers needed.
2. Garcia-Jauregui had killed a person by stabbing said person multiple times with a screw driver and then running the person over with a car. In jail he earned contraband citations and got into a violent confrontation. The parole board released him in less than 5 years. Five years. The legislature needs to hold hearings and do some rules adjusting. The legislature needs to understand that funding prison programs will not come cheap.
3. His is yet another story of the Second Amendment in action. Someone was perfectly willing to either give or sell this man a weapon. Or he stole a weapon from somebody whom did not keep a weapon secure. I am tired of hearing Second Amendment Supporters talk about these sorts of incidents as if they cannot be helped and that the victims are unfortunate but collateral damage.
4. His sort of anger and violence management problems also illustrate that mental health always needs more funding for research and treatment.
THE CALL TO ACTION
Incidents like Jose Angel Garcia-Jauregui do not happen by accident. The particular indicate the legislature needs to hold hearings and adjust certain regulations with weapons and prisoners.
The U S Constitution needs an amendment guaranteeing self defense. The Second Amendment is not it.
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