| Members of both parties said last week they had reached a compromise on requiring background checks for gun purchases. Most gun merchants said they don’t care what background you have on your checks, just that they won’t bounce. ❑ ❑ ❑ Meanwhile, a knife-wielding assailant stabbed several people last week at a college near Houston. Get ready for knife-control bills in Congress. ❑ ❑ ❑ The Ginsu lobby is already marshaling its forces. ❑ ❑ ❑ Santa Clara beat George Mason to win the College Basketball Invitational tournament, which is for those not good enough to make either the NCAA or the NIT. In equally relevant news to most Americans, President Obama unveiled his latest budget proposal. ❑ ❑ ❑ Last year, the House and Senate both unanimously rejected Obama’s budget — one of the few moments of true bipartisanship in recent years. ❑ ❑ ❑ This time, the president came up with new ideas, such as raising taxes on the rich and spending a lot more. ❑ ❑ ❑ Obama counts $167 billion the government never intended to spend as a savings due to a drawdown of war costs, then uses that to fund other projects. He forgot to include the savings from not funding a trip to Saturn and not having to pay ransom to an intergalactic overlord who might threaten our very existence. Think what that could fund. ❑ ❑ ❑ Meanwhile, Congress last week scribbled “return to sender” on a plan to end Saturday delivery and sent it back to the U.S. Postal Service. ❑ ❑ ❑ Apparently, lawmakers didn’t want to ruin their record of being utterly incapable of considering plausible solutions to any financial crisis. ❑ ❑ ❑ J.C. Penney has fired the hotshot CEO it acquired from Apple. It wasn’t his fault. Who know that doing away with sales and telling older shoppers they’re not wanted was a bad business strategy? ❑ ❑ ❑ Utah Gov. Gary Herbert left on a two-day trade mission to a Third World country last week. No wait, California is still a state. ❑ ❑ ❑ How long will it take before a group of cub scouts wants to turn the landslide at the Bingham Copper mine into the world’s coolest pinewood derby ramp? Jay Evensen is the associate editor of the Deseret News editorial page. Follow him on Twitter @jayevensen. |
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On Second Thought is a weekly feature that takes a lighthearted look at current events.
Casual observers may wonder whether Americans are being redundant by designating a specific month for madness. First it was “fiscal cliff January,” then “sequestration February” and now “March madness.” I’m just hoping we’re still around for the dog days of summer. White House staffers reportedly had to convince the president he no longer needed to pick Ohio State or a Michigan school in his bracket in order to win votes. Some people say the NCAA basketball tournament unites the nation as no other event can. This is true. Just look at how people united last week to hate the Harvard team for ruining everyone’s brackets. Tired of trying to work out a budget deal between Republicans and Democrats, President Obama decided to take on something simpler last week — peace between Israelis and Palestinians. The president urged Israelis and Palestinians to return to negotiations with few, if any, pre-conditions, other than that the standard one that the rich need to pay more. Retired basketball star Dennis Rodman told a reporter last week that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has a daughter — something previously unknown and possibly a state secret. So much for the plans to develop a nuclear missile that would kill all Americans except Rodman. Never trust a state secret to a guy who wears dresses and colors his hair before every game. Rodman visited the brutal dictator last month. "I love him," he said. "The guy's really awesome." He probably says that about all the despots. Word is the folks in Cyprus are trying to come up with a new cliché to replace, “You can bank on it.” Americans scoff at the Cypriot proposal to tax money held in bank savings accounts. In this country, as any politician knows, you grab the money before people have a chance to put it in the bank. Experts warned that Cyprus’ failed attempt to tax bank accounts might even keep Americans from depositing their hard-earned savings. Actually, microscopic interests rates have already accomplished that. Scientists say they have found evidence to support the theory that the universe was once smaller than an atom, but that it exploded and expanded in an instant. Kind of makes you wary of sitting next to an atom, or something smaller, during dinner, doesn’t it? Scientists call this sudden big bang “inflation,” because it’s so similar to what will happen one day if the government keeps pumping billions a month into Treasuries and mortgage backed securities. Gov. Gary Herbert vetoed a bill that would have made it legal to carry a concealed weapon in Utah without a permit. Easy for him to do, he has armed guards. All I can say is, if the Girl Scouts had been carrying concealed weapons last week, a thief never would have gotten away with stealing their money from a table outside a Wal-mart. "On Second Thought" is a weekly feature that takes a lighthearted look at news of the day.
By Jay Evensen
Deseret News First we were plucked from the edge of the fiscal cliff. Now we need to be saved from the looming debt ceiling. Then, automatic spending cuts will push us to the cliff again in March. Let’s face it, as superheroes go, politicians are pretty lame. ❑ ❑ ❑ Have you checked you paycheck stubs? We might not have fallen off a cliff, but we definitely lost altitude. ❑ ❑ ❑ What’s next? A “we’re tied to the tracks and the train is coming” crisis? If so, someone needs to untie Greece from the tracks, first. ❑ ❑ ❑ A newspaper back east created controversy recently by publishing the names and addresses of all concealed-weapons holders in its area. Word has it the next target will be all New Yorkers who possess soft drinks in quantities larger than 16 ounces. ❑ ❑ ❑ Meanwhile, Spring City, Utah, decided to take a different route. The City Council was mulling an ordinance to require everyone in town to posses a gun. No word on whether the mayor and city council would be required to have bigger guns than everyone else. ❑ ❑ ❑ Washington can’t seem to get around to eliminating pennies, which pile up in sock drawers, but the Treasury may soon begin minting a trillion-dollar coin. Wait until Uncle Sam tries to break one of those at a 7-Eleven. ❑ ❑ ❑ The $1 trillion coin is the Obama administration’s latest threat in its battle to get Congress to increase the nation’s debt ceiling. In laymen’s terms, it’s like getting the mother of all credit cards. ❑ ❑ ❑ The Post Office may want to consider creating a trillion-dollar stamp. All it would take is for the government to mail one letter. ❑ ❑ ❑ Then the coin could circulate to the Social Security Administration, the military and even the NHL. There could be no end to the organizations it saves. The good news is soon we’ll all have these coins in our pockets. The bad news is we’ll need them just to buy a loaf of bread. Jay Evensen is the associate editor of the Deseret News editorial page. Follow him on Twitter @jayevensen. “On Second Thought” is a weekly feature in the Deseret News that takes a lighthearted look at current events. This is the laboratory where I put them together each week. Let me know what you think, and please add some of your own through comments, Twitter, Facebook or email if you have any funny ideas.
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Ha! Ha! Ha!Everyone likes to laugh. Some of us even like to groan occasionally. Well, you've come to the right place. "On second thought" is a weekly feature I produce for the Deseret News, available on Mondays. But here you can read them as I think of them. Archives
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