"I don't care what others think"

I think I've heard this phrase 50,000 times in my life. Each time I hear it, it gets more absurd. It's absurd because it's a lie-if you didn't care, you wouldn't feel the need to tell anyone. It's also absurd because it shows your general disdain for others and how you grossly over value yourself. After all, if you "don't care what others think" why should they care what you think?

First off, let's get the obvious out of the way. You do care what others think. Yes, even you reading this. I'm a firm believer in individualism and I'm a very private guy-but yes, I do want others to view me with respect and admiration. For no other reason than it makes my own life easier. Life can be difficult and at one time or another you will rely on someone else for assistance. If you've alienated everyone else with your "go to Hell" attitude, you are making life much more difficult for yourself. That and if you truly, absolutely didn't care what others thought about you-you wouldn't feel the need to broadcast it. You'd just accept it and move on.

The other thing that bothers me is saying this shows how arrogant you are. If you don't care what others say-why should we care about what you have to say? Saying that you don't care what others think then expecting the rest of us to listen to you shows a seriously warped sense of self.

Poison Halloween candy?

Growing up my mother always told me to throw away home made Halloween candy that I received. Like a dutiful and obedient son, I did so. Looking back, I think that most of the homemade Halloween candy I got was harmless and it was very nice of someone to make homemade sweet things for trick or treaters. Let's think about this logically for a minute-do you know anyone at all who was actually sickened by poison Halloween candy? Not just eating too much of regular candy, but actually poisoned from Halloween candy. 

Oh, I'm sure you read about a kid in the next town over who ate an apple with a razor blade in it. How a razor blade could get into an apple without you noticing is beyond my limited intellectual abilities. I'm also certain that the apple would be thrown back at the house instead of eaten by the kid. I also read about this babysitter in the next town over getting weird phone calls from some guy. Turns out he was waiting upstairs for her. That really happened to someone. 

The much greater risk than poisoned Halloween candy is getting hit by a car because your costume in some way clouds your vision. Same with looking at your phone while you cross the street. Those risks are more common and aren't as creepy as poisoned Halloween candy, so they won't get much attention.  That's much more likely to happen to you though. 

Scripture Sunday Mormon 9:29

The sacrament is important in all religions, and LDS are no different. Several religions have rules on how you can take their version of the sacrament. For Catholics, if you are in a state of "mortal sin" it is frowned upon to take the Eucharist. I'm not sure about other religions-but in Mormonism you must be in a "worthy state" to take both the sacrament and be baptized.

I understand being in a state of purity to take the sacrament-after all, Christ does not want to dwell in an unclean vessel-but since baptism is supposed to wash away all your sins I don't fully comprehend being in a perfect state for your baptism.  I agree-if you are secretly robbing banks, sleeping with a mistress or snorting cocaine it's probably best to rethink your life before you get baptized. However if you are dealing with minor sins or minor character defects, than getting baptized might be a good way to start fresh and try over again.

Mass shootings

Mass shootings are horrific. They are without question some of the scariest things you'll ever read or hear about. It is heartbreaking beyond words to think about the people who are the victims in these tragic events. While talking about the latest mass shooting my friend mentioned that he was afraid to go to concerts. I understand that, but I'm not sure it's a rational fear. He said the same kind of thing right after that horrible movie theatre shooting in Colorado.

Again, I can't stress this enough-mass shootings are awful. My heart breaks for the victims and you can guarantee this-Hell exists and those who perpetrate such evil are turning crispy brown right now.

But they are also very rare.

You probably won't win the lottery, get bitten by a shark, or die in a plane crash, and you probably won't die in a mass shooting either. You'll die of course, all humans are mortal-but you'll die of old age, heart disease, cancer or a stroke. It's morbid but it's true. People who die of those things don't make the news. News has got to be news. Plane crashes are news because they don't happen much. Same with mass shootings.

There are lots of things to be afraid of. Some rational, some not so rational. While it's easy for me to tell my friend that fear of mass shootings is irrational-I'm not sure it'll help.

Album of the Weekend

Veruca Salt-American Thighs

You've heard the song "Seether" before, it's one of the most popular songs of the 90's with good reason. Veruca Salt was one of the first all girl grunge groups that broke though into the mainstream. That might seem odd to you, but remember it was 1994 and all girl groups didn't have the power or influence they should have had in the mainstream. Yes, there are exceptions but Bikini Kill and the Riot grrrl movement sadly never became as popular as they deserved to be nationwide.

Oh, what an album. Listening to this you have to ask why Veruca Salt is not even more popular. Sometimes they are forgotten about in the conversation about classic grunge bands of the 1990's. Sure the best songs are the most popular and most well known-but pretty much every song on this album is worth a download. Another classic from the era. 

Women who like sports vs men who like crafts

Thirty years ago, it used to be considered odd if a woman liked sports or a man liked to knit/crochet or make soap. Now, more and more women are into sports and you'll often see women give amazing commentary and insight while watching sporting events. I love seeing it-and I feel sorry for women who thirty years ago and back might have loved sports as well but whose opinions were not taken seriously. It's a shame that happened at all, but luckily I do think it's changing. Now if you are a man and you make stupid of sexist comments about women who enjoy sports you'll be called out for it by many people, other men included.  

I wonder if it's the same way for men who like traditionally feminine interests. Sadly, I don't think so. I am a guy who loves to make soap. I tease myself and my friends by acknowledging that it's a rare breed of heterosexual guy who has this hobby, and I can take some good natured ribbing about it. I wonder if men who crochet or knit get the same treatment as women who like sports, car repair, or other traditionally masculine activities? 

Trump releasing the JFK files

My thoughts on the JFK conspiracy can be read here.

Trump is releasing some more classified information on the assassination of President Kennedy, set to be released on October 26, according to this article by the New York Times. I agree totally with the researchers that the New York Times has mentioned-nothing major will be released, and no, you will not find information that the CIA/FBI/Mafia/Jackie Onassis killed President Kennedy.

The really cool thing about a conspiracy theory is that you don't need evidence to support it. You can just make things up and believe them because there is always some deep organization that wants the rest of us to be ignorant and not know the truth. So basically, you can create whatever you want too and call the people who disagree with you sheep and blind believers. That's a big reason why people believe in conspiracies-they like to look down on others who don't think the same way. It makes them feel smart.

This release of "classified files" is a long time coming and I'm eager to see what light it will shed on the assassination. No matter what is released though, nothing will ever be good enough to satisfy the conspiracy theorists.

LDS Church becoming more open

It's been awhile, but I'm still excited that the LDS church has released pictures of the seer stone that Smith Jr used to translate the Book of Mormon. The LDS church is notoriously tight lipped about what goes on inside and it's history. Some of that is good, but some of it isn't.

There is, of course, a difference between "sacred" and "secret". Active LDS (and I'm inactive, I don't claim to be a Peter Priesthood. I haven't been to church since Easter) are told not to talk about what goes on in the temple. This can lead to non members and conspiracy theorists getting bored and creating their own ideas about what happens in the temple. They are almost always wrong of course-and I don't see why they do it. Ten minutes of internet research basically tells you everything and why do you care about a religion that you aren't a part of? 

The internet is many things, but one thing it does perfectly is provide information. Like it or not, investigators, the curious, young missionaries, kids, adults (basically anyone) can find out information about the church just by a Google search. Members and the church can't really stop information from being found.  I think the church has smartened up by releasing more pictures and more information. With the church becoming more open about it's past, now there will be an official source if inquisitive minds want information. 

George W Bush and Donald Trump

The former president George W Bush recently gave a speech and it's been taken by some people to be anti Trump in nature. I agree, I think it's also very anti-Trump but it's also anti-the left as well. I did not read the entire speech but the clips I've read are pretty clear. I wonder why Bush is choosing to speak out against Trump right now while he kept his mouth shut during the eight years of the Obama presidency.

W has always been much smarter and a much better man than his adversaries on the left and right give him credit for. He's also a master politician who knows which way the wind is blowing. Obama stuck his head in the sand when the GOP made massive electoral gains during the later years of his presidency, while Bush admitted defeat in 2006 when the democrats made the same gains. W knows that Trump is a weak president who the establishment hates. So if he critiques him, then W will be back in the good graces of the elite-for a time. They'll turn on him the moment they can.

He's a Bush, and the one thing you can count on them for is decent behavior. There is no way Bush would have attacked his rivals the same way Trump did in the 2016 primary race. That was also his fatal flaw-he allowed the left to attack and define him and tried his best to rise above it instead of fighting back.

Trump is the opposite. He lacks the manners, class, and grace that Bush has. That's a good thing in some ways-in the real world you need to learn how to punch back-but it's a bad thing as well. You need to learn to pick your battles.

Scripture Sunday 3 Nephi 12:44

In the Lords Prayer, Christians are told to "forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us." This passage in the Book of Mormon makes me think of that. We are told to "bless them that curse you, love your enemies, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them who despitefully use and persecute you." That's difficult huh? For some of us, it's damn near impossible.

This passage doesn't mean "I am a doormat and if someone punches me in the face, I'm supposed to lie down and do nothing." Sorry, doesn't work that way. No major Christian denomination (Mormonism included) teaches that. I'm afraid sometimes that anti-Christians use passages like this if Christians behave in certain ways that they don't agree with.

Is the musical "Jesus Christ Superstar" blasphemous?

I think I'm going to start a Facebook group called "Heterosexual men who like musicals". We seem to be a rare breed, not many of us out there. It's a dangerous world as well-aside from assaults on our sexual preference we also get accused of all sorts of things. I posted on my Facebook wall a few days ago that I was listening to Jesus Christ Superstar, a favorite musical of mine, and someone said doing so was blasphemy.

This is lazy thinking by Christians. The musical Jesus Christ Superstar is no more blasphemous than the movie "The Passion of the Christ." For some reason, people like accusing everything religious of being offensive. Don't get me wrong, some religious artworks are offensive. The Virgin Mary covered in cow dung comes to mind but I'm sure there are others. Jesus Christ Superstar is strictly the life of Christ presented in musical format. It's only blasphemous to people who are looking for a reason to be offended.

Album of the weekend

L7-Bricks are Heavy

This was the first album I heard from the legendary L7, and I don't remember listening to their other albums. I've heard that "Bricks" is totally different from their first two, in sound and lyrical style. I'm not sure how that makes me feel about their first two albums because "Bricks" is outstanding. Like "Live through this" by Hole and yes, "Nevermind" by Nirvana, "Bricks are Heavy' Is a grunge classic and should be much more popular.

"Pretend We're Dead" is, of course, the most popular song off the album and in this case, the most popular song isn't the best song. "Everglade" and "Monster" are my two favorites. The album has a dark and gloomy feel, with songs about oppression, anger and social frustration. Essentially it's the perfect grunge album that represented the era that had so many wonderful albums.

European countries declaring their independence

A quick look at overseas news will show you that a lot of countries in Europe are declaring independence lately. From the Scotland vote to Brexit to the Catalonia region in Spain-you can feel revolution in the air.

It's wonderful to see. Anytime a state can declare local control and not give it's political power to a separate, unaccountable entity, I'm all for it. Succession might be scary at times-after all it's a big step for a population to make, but it's often proper and even necessary. Of course no one wants violence to break out-that's horrible but I'm not naive. With such a passionate issue that raises emotion civil unrest is bound to break out somewhere. That's not me approving it, but I can see why it happens.

Inmates in a Texas prison donating money to Hurricane Harvey relief....

This is an amazing story. Some inmates in Texas prisons have donated $50,000 to Hurricane Harvey relief.

I'm not naive, some people who are in prison belong there for a very long time. It would of course be a mistake to think that all of them are evil and have no redeeming qualities or can contribute nothing to society. To me, this story sort of shows that not all prisoners are psychopaths who are unable to be redeemed and belong in jail until their death.

I read somewhere that there are two types of prisoners: The stone cold maniacs who are born evil (and yes, evil does exist) and the people who had just made terrible mistakes who, if released, would never do anything wrong again. I've never been to prison and I've never worked in one, so I'm not qualified to say if that's true. This story however, is incredibly inspiring and can remind us that even people who have been forgotten by society are capable of wonderful things.

Late night comedians

Jimmy Kimmel has recently stated that he's not the moral compass of America, and thank God for it. Oddly though, he can lecture us about gun control and  socialized health care and get away with it just fine. I'm sure that if a "conservative" late night comedian (now that Red Eye is off the air, there are no conservative late night comedians) started preaching the opposite of what Kimmel believes, he'd be praised in the press and given a lot more attention.

Seth Meyers (who?) also told Trump voters that they aren't welcome to watch his show. I'm sure it breaks the heart of every Trump voter who, like me, barely knew who this guy even was.  I get it, in order to make it in Hollywood you have to have an ego, but Meyers seems like the guy who is laughing at the party at all his own jokes while the rest of us just want him to shut the hell up and go away. I don't watch late night shows (I'd in bed reading or watching sports/news) so I can't judge their quality. I am glad that the ratings for all of them seem to be down-after all, no matter how hip and cool you are if you alienate a large portion of your audience it's not good for business.

To Kill a Mockingbird pulled from schools....

And here is another sign that political correctness has gone off the deep end. The landmark novel, "To Kill a Mockingbird" is being removed from a school reading list in Mississippi because it makes some people "uncomfortable".

This borders on madness.

It used to be right wing preachers organizing book burnings but now, fascism comes mostly from people who are trying to protect thin skinned babies from reality and from getting "offended". If I have to tell you why To Kill a Mockingbird is one of the best American novels ever written, then move on and don't read this blog post. It doesn't matter if someone might be "offended" or "upset" by it. I was upset reading it. Many of us where.

Spoiler alert. Read no further if you don't want to know the ending. When the accused man who is clearly innocent is killed by a group of racists, it's among the more heartbreaking scenes I've ever read in a novel. When Boo Radley saves Scout from the horrible Bob Ewell, it's among the most touching scenes I've ever read in a novel. In other words, the novel is fantastic and clearly deserves to be read by everyone.

Good art can be a little offensive. The art set loves offensive paintings, but when it comes to one of the greatest novels ever written, they are oddly silent and won't defend it. It's very depressing.

Scripture Sunday Mormon 4:5

Justice delayed is not justice denied. In society today, it can often seem like evil people get away with what they do. We read about Casey Anthony or another case like that and we ask ourselves what happened to right and wrong? It's not just the Casey Anthony case. I'm sure we could spend hours talking about evil going unpunished in the world of today.

Take heed-I'm not a lyrical poet in case you didn't know it (ten 1990's points if you get that reference) but the Book of Mormon reminds us that God will one day make everything just. The wicked stir up the hearts of the children of men, and in the end, they too will get what is coming to them. Evil will never go unpunished.

Historical perspective

Yes, I know it's not one hundred percent accurate, but that's not the point. The point is that life today is vastly, vastly superior to what it was even seventy years ago, much less one hundred years ago. This meme is perfect in that way-it shows how life was in 1942 for a large part of the worlds population. I'm no expert in World War Two, but I'm sure there was a time when the defeat of Hitler wasn't assured. Europe had to deal with the very real fact that the entire continent might be conquered by a genocidal madman. Say what you want about Trump, but no, he's not a genocidal madman by any stretch of the imagination.

It's deeper than a shot at those idiots who compare Trump to Hitler. We sit in our air conditioned houses in the summer and heated houses in the winter usually on our butts while we play Xbox, watch TV and partake in our hobbies. There is nothing wrong with that, I support you doing what you want of course-but we're not anything like the greatest generation who was being shipped out to die on the beaches of Normandy or in the battle of the bulge. We're not like the Lost Generation or World War One who was fighting in the trenches and choking on mustard gas. We're nothing like the Civil War generation who was....get my drift?

No matter how old you are, you are incredibly lucky to be alive today and have the freedoms we do. Complaining about how bad things are shows how ignorant of basic history you are.

Album of the weekend

The Donnas-Spend the Night

The Donnas are fantastic. They combine a classic rock feel with pure and simple fun. It's nothing deep or edgy here-they lack the political edge of the Dead Kennnedys and existential dread of Green Day. I'm not comparing the Donnas to the Ramones-but they have things in common. Simple music, not terribly deep or concerned with the outside world  (this would change with some later Ramones songs, but for the most part they weren't terribly political) and just here for the party. The more I think about it, the more The Donnas are like Kiss.

Spend the Night is their best album and it's the first album released on a major label. You've probably heard "Take it off", it achieved some mainstream success. My favorite song on the album is "Too Bad About Your Girl." You don't have to worry about bad songs on this album-there certainly are some, but the songs are so short that you don't have to wait long until you get to a better song. This album is worth a full download, for sure.

Girls being allowed to join the Boy Scouts

First off-this blog post is not "anti" Boy Scouts. If you like the Scouts, great. If you were a Scout, great. If your grandkid/kid/uncle/brother/husband or whatever was a scout-great. Don't take this personal.

The Boy Scouts were never my thing. I was never a Scout and I have no regrets at all about that. I'm not the outdoorsy type and even as a child I wasn't a joiner. I have no interest in joining a club that would have people like me as a member. Groucho was exactly right with that one.

So...girls are now being allowed to join the Boy Scouts. My personal opinion is that this is fine and all parities are advised to chill and let it be. However, no one agrees with me. I'm seeing people say this will be the end of the Boy Scouts. The Girl Scouts. Society. Religion. The world. I'm highly doubtful that any of that will happen, although the Scouts have been losing members for a long time now.

Change of any type is difficult to accept. In fairness the people complaining about this should have seen it coming. I remember it being talked about since the early 90's.  I'm looking forward to seeing what will happen in six months after the initial change. 

Harvey Weinstein

No matter what you do in life, good or bad-it'll probably be discovered. After years of sexually harassing anything with two XX chromosomes the behavior of the powerful Hollywood executive Harvey Weinstein has been brought to the light. Before I go any further I want to remind everyone that I am not perfect, we are all sinners, and all of us have done things in our lives that we are not proud of.

However, thirty years of sexual harassing women is very serious and no, it can't be swept under the rug. People are comparing Trump to Weinstein, and that's a big mistake. You can't justify a wrong by pointing to another wrong. I can't burn my neighbors house to the ground, get arrested and tell the cops "But Susan down the road is also an arsonist. Arrest her and leave me out of this." Sorry, doesn't work that way. That's a childs way of justifying their own actions. Both Trump and Weinstein are chronic sexual deviants and there is no way getting around that.

Men who use their power to get sex are not uncommon in the world, especially in Hollywood. From the dawn of movies the famous casting couch has been a well known symbol for Hollywood excess and immoral behavior.  Now with the overly intrusive media it's harder to get away with it, but it's clearly possible and still happens all the time. Weinstein is finished professionally, though it's obvious he'll never have to busk in town for quarters to feed himself.

Vice President Michael Pence leaving a football game due to protests....

The Vice President walked out of a football game due to the ongoing NFL protests.  Even though my sympathy is with Pence, it's nothing more than a publicity stunt.

You may not agree with him on much, but he's obviously a bright guy. You can't be in politics and be stupid or obtuse-yes, even those you disagree with are not stupid. If Pence was an idiot, his staff would be smarter and more perceptive than him. They'd tell him what is going on and they'd keep him updated on current events. He surely knew about the NFL protests that were going on. He claims to be a football fan, so there is no way he didn't know.

He clearly went with the knowledge that he'd leave if they protested. Surprise! That's exactly what happened. Now, he's energizing the base because they support what he did. Obviously, to those who dislike him or his politics, he's a shameless opportunist who is taking advantage of the latest battle in the cultural wars. To those who like him or agree with him-he's standing up for patriotism, truth, justice, and the American way.

Those praising Pence and critiquing him need to ask themselves something. If a politician I liked did this, how would I feel? If a politician I didn't like did this, would I feel differently? For example, if Joe Biden left an NFL game because the players were kneeling to support the pro-life or pro gun cause, I'm 100% certain that the reactions of the left and right would be the opposite, but they wouldn't be able to see it.

Bipartisanship

Politics is largely smoke and mirrors. It's 90% garbage, spin, and twisting morals to suit your own political needs. Every side is guilty of this. In the book, "The Politician:An Insiders View of the John Edwards Scandal" political operative Andrew Young says it best "Everyone thinks politics is gross, but I was beginning to think it's disgusting. You go into politics because you hope that the good you do outdoes the bad." In the end, I think Young realizes that it's virtually impossible to "do good" in politics. You can think you are doing good, but in the end-it's all garbage.

The term "bipartisanship" epitomizes the word "spin". Ask yourself this-when your side wins, do you suddenly want them to throw down "bipartisanship"? No, you want them to run over the other side and advance their goals at every cost. "Bipartisanship" is what you say when you lose. It's the same with the word "Unity". "Unity" in politics always means "unite under my values and ignore yours." Unity means the same in religion too. Are Mormons going to suddenly "untie" with Catholics if it means they can no longer view the Book of Mormon as scripture? Of course not.

I'm ashamed of myself for many of the things I thought and did in the past. I honestly thought that my side was full of noble beings doing the best for the country. Now I realize that in all cases, politics is always choosing the lesser evil. All sides, from Libertarian to Democrat to Republican, are useless.

Scripture Sunday 3 Nephi 23:4-5

To a non-LDS, so many things are weird about our faith. The temples, the beliefs, the book of Mormon, everything. However something I've been surprised about is that many non-members have a hard time with modern day prophecy. This verse is one of my favorites about prophets in the Book of Mormon. It's brief, direct, and instructs us to search the testimonies of the prophets in order to see what they instruct believers to do.

Prophets speak to us in many forms in 2017-though General Conference is still the most popular  outlet to hear the prophets speak. Believers need to be careful though-if a prophet is speaking just as man, then his words should be accepted as that. When he speaks with his prophet hat on, then he is speaking with direct authority. To LDS we believe in authority. If a man isn't baptized and ordained as a prophet than he doesn't have the authority to speak as one. These two verses seem to indicate the importance of looking at the words of our modern day prophets.

Tampa tattoo convention!

This weekend is the Tampa tattoo convention! Sadly, it only happens once a year. As impractical as I admit it is, I'd like for it to happen twice a year-or even more. Yes, I know that artists can't rearrange their schedules and fly to Tampa that often, so this is said tongue in cheek.

What's not tongue in cheek is how much I love the convention. Seeing all these great artists under one roof is absolute paradise for tattoo junkies. There are many wonderful things about a tattoo convention. Since the people who go to them have to be really into the tattoo world, you know you are going to see some great tattoos and great artists. It's also nice to see all the artists fight over who can tattoo you. Sure, they just want your money and yes, I just want a well done tattoo. So it's a win for everyone.

Album of the weekend

Hole-Live Through This 

Courtney Love. Just saying her name you are bound to get a reaction. She's like the Ayn Rand of modern music.  This album has achieved widespread critical acclaim and with good reason. It's one of the best grunge  albums ever made, without question. It's one of the best albums of the 90's. Notice a trend? 

It was a controversial album for many people when it came out because the style of the the band changed from "riot grrrl punk" to "harmonious grunge". I can one hundred percent assure you that Courtney Love and Hole had the charge of "Sell out!" thrown at them. I don't understand why. The lyrics still deal with everything that the riot grrrl movement cared about. The interpretation of female beauty in pop culture, abuse of women, women's rights-it's a riot grrrl album with a different sound. 

Note-riot grrrl was a hardcore underground music movement that combined punk with feminist qualities. Basically some of the greatest music of all time was from this era. It's from the west coast and like everyone else, I think of Bikini Kill when I hear the term. 

Love her or hate her, Courtney Love brought the riot grrrl movement into the mainstream. Even if you hate the ideology, you shouldn't hate this album. 

The Hiroshima bomb

I first realized that I thought differently in high school. Even though it was 1997 and a decade away from the Soviet-America threat of nuclear war, nuclear bombs and Hiroshima were still a hot topic in my school. The large majority of students thought that America was wrong to bomb Hiroshima and that all countries should give up their nuclear weapons. Ever the free thinker, I disagreed with them on both issues.

First off, Hiroshima. Let's be very clear about something. Harry Truman actually saved lives in the long run by dropping the two nuclear bombs. War is hell. I've never been to war, thank God, but war back in 1944 was a special kind of hell. By all accounts Japan was ready to continue fighting and go out in a blaze of glory until Truman dropped the first nuclear bomb. By dropping the first bomb, he made it clear that he wasn't messing around anymore and that this war needed to stop. The more controversial second bomb also signified that Japan had better surrender. Japan did, thus saving the lives of countless Allied and ironically, Axis troops. Truman was correct to drop both bombs.

Second, let's talk about nuclear weapons. One of the core beliefs that separates children from adults is the acceptance that evil exists in the world. Like it or not, there are people in the world that want to kill you for any number of reasons and no, you cannot just love them into changing. To think that you can cuddle and hug people into good behavior is the fantasy of a child and tragically, I know of so many adults that haven't advanced past that stage. Am I saying we should get involved in every conflict out there? Play world police? Of course not. But we need nuclear weapons because bad guys have them. What stopped NYC from getting nuked by the Soviet Union from 1945-1991 was the certain belief that Moscow would be nuked if NYC was. Reagan was right about many things (yes, he was wrong about things too) but his peace through strength was one hundred percent accurate. We need nukes because the bad guys have them and the only thing keeping them from being used is the knowledge that we would punch back.

"No one cares about the Kardashians"

Have you heard that phrase before? I have. Several times. I'm not going to spoil it for you, but that statement is a total lie. Obviously, many people care about the Kardashians or else the family would be ignored. They are not ignored. Like it or not, this family sells magazine covers and gets good tv ratings. Until they don't, they'll be marketed and broadcast all over the place. The only thing you can do is ignore them. Don't buy the magazines. Don't click on stories about them. Don't watch their show.

But don't say "No one cares about the Kardashians." YOU may not care about them, and that's fine. You don't have to pay attention to them. Here is a little shock though: I'm sure that you have hobbies and interests that other people don't care about. Saying that "no one cares about X" shows how narrow minded and borderline selfish a person thinks. The world is a very diverse place and often times does not care about your personal interests.

By the way, I don't like the Kardashians either. Never paid attention to them.

Las Vegas shooting

Worlds fail when you encounter such massive evil in the world. There is nothing I can say that will provide any insight to this horrific act of evil. No good can come out from this. War only destroys, as does mass murder. Sure, you can say that you are proud of the city of Las Vegas for coming together through this and the first responders are immensely brave and they've earned my respect for what they did-but in reality, this is horrific. No one is denying that thankfully. 

Las Vegas, you are in my prayers. 

Matthew 28:20

LDS apostle passes away...

Elder Robert Hales has passed away at age 85.

I knew there was something probably up when it was said that he wouldn't attend General Conference this weekend.

May he RIP.