Jay Evensen
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On Second Thought for Nov. 25, 2019

11/22/2019

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A lighthearted look at the news of the day:

Welcome to Thanksgiving week, that wonderful time when children who have been watching too much cable TV will try to impeach Uncle Ted for hogging all the drumsticks.
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Remember when Black Friday meant doing more than lying in bed telling Alexa what you want?
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Things are getting nasty in Washington. Rumor has it the Thanksgiving turkey may not get pardoned this week. It all depends on whether it squeals like a bird at the impeachment hearings and wants to “gobble” all the publicity.
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Actually, the turkey might not get pardoned anyway. There are far too many turkeys running around Washington as it is.
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The impeachment hearings mean Americans today have something in common with Americans in 1869, when the House held hearings against President Andrew Johnson, the first such hearings in the nation’s history. The only difference is cable TV ratings were much lower back then.
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However, social media was robust in those days, but you had to dress in dinner jackets and hoop skirts, and it could be accessed only at formal parties. Only rarely were people atwitter.
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Utah lawmakers say they’re getting close on tax reform. By that, they mean they just found out that portrait photography, photofinishing and dog grooming — three things they had eagerly taken off the list of services to tax — actually have been taxed for years. 
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The Census Bureau reported last week that Americans are moving less than ever before. That’s bad for moving-van companies. But it’s good for your fitbit, which doesn’t have to count as many steps.
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But if we’re not moving, that means we’re staying put and accumulating more stuff, which means an eventual boon for eBay, which would be good for the economy, which would give everyone  more useless stuff to accumulate, which means there is such a thing as a perpetual motion machine.

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On Second Thought for Nov. 18, 2019

11/15/2019

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​A lighthearted look at the news of the day:

Michael Bloomberg wants to join the list of Democrats running for president. Why? Because when you’re 77, where else can you go to feel young?
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Worst case scenario, Bloomberg ends up as the younger running mate to either Joe Biden or Bernie Sanders.
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Hey, it beats hanging out with the other 77-year-olds down at the corner cafe, where all they do is complain about politics.
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One interesting note: Most of the serious presidential contenders this year are immune from the “OK, boomer” jokes making the rounds among young people these days. That’s because they’re all older than baby boomers.
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Speaking of politics, the race to become the Republican candidate for governor of Utah is easy to confuse with the race for the Democratic nomination for president. Either one could qualify for its own group insurance policy.
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Some lists include 14 possible Republicans candidates for governor. The primary may come down to which candidate can get not only his or her family, but the family next door, to vote.
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Maybe the impeachment hearings are a giant ruse to distract us all from how the government is set to shut down this week unless there is a budget agreement.
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Americans would like to worry about these things, but too many of them are trying to book their summer vacations to Fitzgerald, Georgia, which soon will be home to a 62-foot rooster that uses 16 tons of steel and plant materials and has an apartment for rent inside. This promises to be the biggest thing since Cawker City, Kansas, scored the world’s largest ball of twine, which weighs 5,000 pounds and stands 8 feet tall. If your timing is right, you could hit the annual twine-a-thon on your way to a night in the chicken, but then what would you do the next summer?
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The mayor is using tax money dedicated to tourism to build the chicken. The whole thing will cost $150,000, which isn’t chicken fee … well, you get the idea.
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On Second Thought for Nov. 3, 2019

11/1/2019

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A lighthearted look at the news of the day:
 
In a recent speech, President Trump said he’s building a wall in Colorado. It won’t work. Utah freedom fighters will still find ways to smuggle fry sauce across the border. 
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Colorado has a lot of neighbors to protect itself from. The question is who will pay for this wall — Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arizona, or New Mexico?
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Actually, a wall on Arizona’s section of the four corners probably wouldn’t cost much.
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Now that November is here, we can start focusing on turkeys other than those being interviewed on cable news channels every day.
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That is, if you’ve figured out what time it is, yet. Health officials say changing our clocks twice a year causes people to experience “microsleeps” throughout the days immediately following. Apparently, this is different from zoning out while waiting for Utah lawmakers to make up their minds on tax reform.
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As of Monday, only 50 days remain until Christmas. Or, to put it another way — you have just 49 days left to pay extra for next-day shipping and hope to get lucky.
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Now that the holidays are here, we can stop complaining about the federal government spending more money than it has and start cheering for consumers to begin spending more money than they have.
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A survey found that two-thirds of parents admit to taking Halloween candy from their children, and those that do so eat about one-third of the available candy, on average. Think of it as preparing the little dears to become taxpayers some day.
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Of course, if that were true, the children with the most candy would find loopholes or begin storing their candy in overseas accounts.
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The ones with the least would wait until April and receive candy credits or refunds in the form of snacks the government has been chewing on for months.
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But either way, if you eat too much all at once you’re on your own to find health insurance.
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