Deseret News Columns

Contrasting religious practice

Originally published in the Deseret News.

This weekend members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will gather for what many believe will be a historic conference weekend. With three vacancies in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Mormons will watch with anticipation, love and faith as the LDS Church makes orderly and what many believe to be inspired choices about its leadership. More importantly, the approximately 15.5 million LDS faithful will receive words of inspiration and wisdom from their leaders helping them to live better lives.

Conference weekend stands in stark contrast to the sadness I felt this week as I watched CNN’s prime-time television program “This is Life with Lisa Ling: Children of the Prophet.” The program features two of Warren Jeffs’ children. Both have alleged the imprisoned leader of a polygamous sect sexually abused them as children. In 2011 Jeffs was convicted of two felony counts of child sexual assault and today he sits in a federal prison. His is a tale of darkness, and I hurt for the victims. I also hurt for the way his actions are associated with the Mormon Church.

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Blog, Utah Business Columns

When stars align: A new policy institute will help Utahns make informed decisions

Originally published in Utah Business.

I’ve learned over the years to pay attention when stars align in a powerful way. It happened when my daughter, who was attending an out-of-state college, landed a job with the school paper, committed to a major and established great friendships. Suddenly, her college education and experience took off. It happened when Urban Meyer brought his coaching skills to build a team with a 22-2 record and reinvigorated the MUSS, or the Mighty Utah Student Section, at Rice Eccles Stadium. Stellar coaching and engaged students helped the Utes win and laid the foundation for a winning program.

When stars align, a better future unfolds. I’m always working and watching for these moments. And one of those moments happened last month, when the University of Utah launched the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute.

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Blog, Deseret News Columns

Singing my mother to heaven

Originally published in the Deseret News National Edition.

My mother passed away about a month ago. The passage of time has allowed me to reflect about, internalize and process the experience. I finally feel I can write about it and want to share an experience from the final years of her life. My thoughts start and end with women and song.

As context, let me provide a little background. I’m the youngest of 11 children, which tells you my mother was a warrior of sorts. Truly nothing intimidated her. My mother lived a nigh-perfect life — great marriage, loving children, spunk and spirit, a love for mankind and world travel and a sure commitment to her maker. She died at 93 in her own home, surrounded by her children, in perfect peace. While leaving a pit in my heart, her death was a beautiful experience because of the life she lived.

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Blog, Utah Business Columns

Reading Utah’s economic game film

Originally published in Utah Business.

Just as a coach reviews game film to assess his or her team, I like to read economic game film to understand Utah’s economy. While sports analogies are often overused and frequently incomprehensible to those who lack specific sports expertise, I find the ‘game film’ analogy to be quite useful in thinking about Utah’s economy.

What is economic game film? It’s not unlike the game film Kyle Whittingham and Bronco Mendenhall review after each Ute or Cougar football game. The footage shows every play call, every pass, every tackle, every block, every punt and every turnover. The term “reading game film” is used because coaches study and evaluate every play they see in order to make changes. Did the quarterback make the right throw based on the coverage? Did the offensive line make the assigned blocks? What caused the fumble? How did the field goal kicker perform in a game time situation? Did the game plan work and what needs to change?

When you apply the same process to the Utah economy, you gain a better understanding of what’s working, what’s not and what needs to change. Here’s my take.

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Blog, Deseret News Columns

Two Utah’s and the need for investment

Originally published in the Deseret News.

While driving in downtown Salt Lake City this week I witnessed a vivid contrast. It was lunchtime and the city I love was teeming with life. A TRAX light-rail train rambled through traffic, a guy in a suit pedaled along on a lime green bike-share bicycle, construction workers labored in a new high rise, and lunch-hour pedestrian traffic filled the streets. As if to put punctuation on our growing and thriving urban center, I saw 20 or so rather large guys dressed in power-blue-and-maize outfits walking up State Street together. They were members of the Michigan football team taking a stroll before the big game against the University of Utah. From this vantage point, Utah’s capital city was unmistakably on the rise. I felt a certain sense of hometown pride.

And then a different vantage point emerged. While at a traffic light, I watched as a man started waking diagonally through the busy intersection of State Street and 100 South. He appeared dirty and completely lost. He was bare-chested, talking to himself, and looked completely oblivious to the cars around him. The situation was as sad as it was dangerous. This man needed help.

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Salt Lake City is Earning a New Title: ‘Wall Street of the West’

Originally published in the Deseret News.

Salt Lake City is now the second-largest Goldman Sachs office in the United States and the fourth-largest in the world. What was in 2000 a small regional operation has blossomed into a workforce of several thousand people and growing. With the workforce of Fidelity Investments, the Royal Bank of Scotland, Wells Fargo and other financial service companies, Utah’s capital city now rightly claims the title “Wall Street of the West.” The Utah economy is larger, stronger and more diversified, thanks to the growth in this important industry.

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Blog, Utah Business Columns

Summer Reading — The Road to Character: Advice for Developing Inner Virtues

Originally published in Utah Business.

I once visited the National Archives in Washington, D.C., with a group of Utah business leaders as guests of Sen. Orrin Hatch. I will never forget the experience. Serving as the senior U.S. senator gives you extraordinary access to the nation’s archival treasures.

At one table I saw the actual handwritten first inaugural of George Washington. It was breathtaking. In it Washington declares, “I was summoned by my country, whose voice I can never hear but with veneration and love.” This was a man who understood love of country.

What I saw and heard at another table has also stuck with me over the years. That table had the actual handwritten radar readings from Pearl Harbor. In the center of the two-foot by three-foot document (it looked like a white poster with polygons in the middle) was the island of Oahu. Drawn in increments of time were lines depicting the incoming squadrons of Japanese aircraft. Those of you familiar with our history will not be surprised to learn the lines stopped about an inch away from Oahu as the radar technicians were called off and told “Don’t worry about it.” A first lieutenant with the Army Air Forces mistakenly assumed the incoming aircraft were a flight of U.S. B-17 bombers expected from the mainland.

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Too Much Ego in Politics Detracts from Seriousness of Noble Callings

Originally published in the Deseret News.

“I come to you at a strange time in American politics.” Well-known journalist and author Cokie Roberts expressed this sentiment in a speech this week in Salt Lake City. Thursday night’s debate underlined this statement. A full one year and three months before Election Day, 10 Republican candidates squared off in the first primary debate. Seven other Republican candidates participated in a “Happy Hour” debate before and the Democrats will join the fray this fall. Unfortunately for the American public, the extended campaign, substance-lacking debates and made-for-TV drama fall short of the task at hand. There is too much ego in politics.

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America, Drugs, and the ‘Power of the Dog’

Originally published in the Deseret News.

“Deliver my soul from the sword; my darling from the power of the dog.” — Psalms 22:20

The escape of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman from a maximum security prison in Mexico is the stuff of movies. The kingpin of the Sinaloa Cartel escaped through a mile-long, lighted and ventilated tunnel. Now the person the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency calls “the godfather of the drug world” is on the run again.

El Chapo is a very smart and powerful man. Some estimate he has a net worth of well over $1 billion, but that’s not even close to his real power: the network he commands. It’s a mega cartel that traffics in evil. Some estimate El Chapo and his gang have been responsible for over 100,000 brutal deaths over the past decade and a half. Well before the emergence of the Islamic State, the cartels in Mexico were killing at will and using graphic images and the media to spread fear and terror. They truly embody what is referenced in Psalms as “the power of the dog.”

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Writings and Reflections