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A decade ago, hating the rich was all the rage. In cities across America, members of the “occupy” movement marched against the wealth concentration of the top 1%.
Usually somewhere across town, members of the Tea Party held similar demonstrations, generally aimed at politicians they felt were spending money too freely.
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Now that an 11-member board is ready to begin remaking the large section of land in Draper where a state prison soon will be destroyed, it’s time to say this again: Make sure a large regional park is part of the plan.
I’m not just talking about green space. The plans we’ve seen so far include green swaths meandering between what designers hope are employee-filled business buildings. These are nice and important. Open spaces help a community breathe. Do you believe actress Felicity Huffman got off with a light sentence — two weeks in prison, a $30,000 fine and community service — for paying someone to rig SAT answers so her daughter could be admitted to the acting school of her choice?
Or maybe you believe the sentence fit the crime, or perhaps that prison is too harsh. I’m not going to shed much light on these questions, other than to pose another one. If Huffman, or the 51 other people charged in the college admissions scandal uncovered by an FBI probe known as “operation varsity blues,” had instead donated richly, and legally, to the school of their choice, and their children had been given preference on that basis, would it have been much different? Remember all that snow last winter? Remember how rainy it seemed to be in the spring, right on through June?
Well, that was before bone-dry August. The Escalante River may be as good an illustration as any of how fickle the weather can be in the interior West. According to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, the river still stands at 124 percent of normal precipitation for the entire water year, but only 19 percent so far in September. Sometimes, you can learn a lot about today by leafing through the yellowed pages of old newspapers (or the not-so-yellowed pages of newspapers.com’s electronic archives).
In April of 1937, economist Roger Babson wrote an opinion piece that warned about the misuse of credit. It may be good to buy something you can’t afford if that that thing is a machine that will pay for itself over time by saving money, he said. You don’t like the idea of toll roads in Utah. I mean, you really don’t like it, according to a newly released opinion poll commissioned by Utahpolicy.com.
The poll, conducted by Y2K Analytics, found a resounding 68 percent of Utahns either somewhat or strongly opposed to the idea. Well, you’re going to get them anyway. Maybe not now, and maybe not in the next couple of years, but eventually. That’s my prediction. Write it down. If you’re a candidate for public office and you notice a social media campaign, coming from who knows where, that spreads falsehoods about your opponent, what do you do?
Do you take the John McCain high road? Remember how McCain, during the 2008 presidential election, confronted a supporter who said she couldn’t trust Barack Obama because “he’s an Arab”? “No ma'am,” he said. “He’s a decent family man and citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues …” |
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The author
Jay Evensen is the Senior Editorial Columnist of the Deseret News. He has 32 years experience as a reporter, editor and editorial writer in Oklahoma, New York City, Las Vegas and Salt Lake City. He also has been an adjunct journalism professor at Brigham Young and Weber State universities. Archives
April 2020
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