Category: Washington - Jay Evensen

Put birthright citizenship issue into historic perspective

8/26/2015

The race for the Republican presidential nomination has, if nothing else, demonstrated that some issues are destined to forever roll round the American political landscape like a steel ball in a bottomless funnel.

The question is whether we will learn from history.

Donald Trump has strengthened his fragile early lead on a large pack of candidates by attacking the part of the Constitution that says babies born on U.S. soil are given automatic citizenship, regardless of their parentage.

The man in second place, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, said such so-called “anchor babies” are a growing concern among Asians, rather than Hispanics.

If you’re getting dizzy, it is because we have now come full circle from 1866, when Congress debated passage of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution.

U.S. needs to stem its troubling slide on freedom index

8/19/2015

Seattle’s gum wall is an example of how the marketplace of ideas can go in directions no single person could predict.

About 20 years ago, people began sticking chewed gum to the walls of an alleyway below Pike Place Market. Wikipedia says workers at a nearby theater tried to scrape it off, but more just kept coming. Today it is a must-see tourist attraction. A few days ago, while on a family vacation, I joined a steady stream of visitors in examining the colorful blobs of mastication, trying not to think of the germs or what my clothes might look like if I stumbled into the stuff.

I also tried to imagine what the reaction might be at a typical city council meeting if someone proposed creating such a thing as a way to attract visitors, or as an idyllic backdrop for wedding photos. Someone from the health department surely would testify before the unanimous “no” vote.

Sales taxes on the Internet is still a tough sell

7/1/2015

Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz says he wants to move beyond the “bumper sticker” slogans that are lobbed against his bill allowing states to collect sales taxes off everything their residents buy online.

But along the way he throws out an argument of his own that, while perhaps a bit large for a bumper sticker, is nevertheless far more complicated than he makes it seem. It goes like this: People today walk into a retail establishment, test a product, then whip out their smart phones and order it online so they won’t have to pay sales tax, which is unfair to the retailer.

Chaffetz, who visited the combined editorial boards of the Deseret News and KSL recently, is carrying on a fight that has raged for at least two decades. At its heart, it concerns how you have learned to shop online and how much you’re going to pay.

It is a fight in which Utah long has been at the forefront.

A summer free of health scares is no reason to relax

6/30/2015

So far, it seems to be an apocalypse-free summer. We’ve had a few shark-bite stories to chew on. Some mosquitos in New York City and far-flung Nebraska apparently have West Nile virus. Birds have been dropping dead all over the Midwest from avian flu, leading to sharp increases in egg prices.

But none of these has yet to become a full-blown media sensation. There are no measles outbreaks at Disneyland. No one has been forced to bring reason to the debate by comparing the 57,000 people who

It's time to declare a war on cyber hackers

6/10/2015

You don’t have to peruse news sites too long to wonder why the White House isn’t declaring a war on hackers and calling for the best and brightest minds to heed the call and help the good guys gain an upper hand. As it is, the bad guys are winning, with seemingly little resistance.

The past few weeks has seen acknowledgments from the IRS that someone, probably criminals based in Russia, accessed and stole tax and personal data from more than 100,000 taxpayers. Then a few days later the government revealed that other hackers, probably based in China, stole the personal information of at least 4 million federal employees.

This comes on the heels of several private-sector breaches, in which thieves stole credit card information belonging to tens of millions of shoppers at Target, Neiman-Marcus, Michaels and others.

What should we do with Ed Snowden?

6/3/2015

So now what do we do with Ed Snowden?

The irony of the USA Freedom Act, strongly supported by Utah Sen. Mike Lee and signed into law Tuesday by President Barack Obama, is that it vindicates virtually everything Snowden did when, as a contract worker for the National Security Agency, he revealed secrets about how the government went about collecting information on Americans.

For this, Snowden remains exiled in Russia,

Drones likely to fill the skies with promise and terror

2/18/2015

The day may come when the feisty folks of Deer Trail, Colo., look like the most far-sighted people of their generation.

I’m talking about the ones who wanted to issue hunting licenses to shoot drones out of the sky. The idea was defeated in a referendum last year — the final gasp of resistance to a technology that surely soon will wash over us.

Let's fix what really is holding the economy back

2/4/2015

North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis might want to hire handlers with a better sense of timing.

While answering questions recently, he decided to illustrate government’s unwarranted list of business regulations by focusing on an FDA requirement that food-service workers wash their hands after visiting the bathroom. Government shouldn’t have to require this, he said, because any restaurant that didn’t require such a thing would go out of business.

Obama administration should emphasize religious liberty

1/21/2015

President Obama gave an obligatory sentence or two to religious freedom during his State of the Union address Tuesday. It wasn’t nearly enough.

He deplored the “anti-Semitism that has resurfaced in certain parts of the world.” He criticized the “offensive stereotypes of Muslims — the vast majority of whom share our commitment to peace.” And he quoted the Pope, although in a context that had less to do with religious freedom than with diplomacy.

Altogether, these took two paragraphs in a long speech, and they were capped by the first-ever condemnation of transgender discrimination in a State of the Union, which grabbed all the media attention.

Also, it was all wrapped in the unconvincing message that things are going well in foreign arenas.

In truth, religious intolerance and persecution is an

Why states, not Washington, should look at free tuition

1/20/2015

Deadlines force me to write this before the State of the Union address, but the expectation is that much of what President Obama says will have all the practical effect of a promise from a department store Santa Claus. Nothing actually will happen unless somebody else acts.

It may be a ridiculous stretch to equate Congress with levelheaded and wise parents, but thanks to the sheer force of political opposition, elected representatives, in this case, will be good enough to bar the door to more expensive programs.

But in the case of the president’s hope of providing “free” tuition for earnestly striving students at community colleges, it’s important to note that such initiatives are best left to states. Otherwise, all sorts of complications can arise.

Utah provides a couple of examples.

During a combined KSL-Deseret News editorial board meeting last week, I asked Utah Valley

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