In his Deseret News' column, Doug Robinson points out the futility of boycotting the Bejing Olympics, ripping the Hollywood limousine liberals with his trademark codger Bircher style so popular in Utah County. And Doug makes some good points.

But I need to warn Doug that as a leading voice in Utah's leading faith publication, he crosses a propriety line when he writes:

"The usual celebrity crowd — Richard Gere, Mia Farrow, the Dalai Lama, Steven Spielberg, George Clooney—is leading the charge against the war in Burma, genocide in Darfur, air pollution in China and China's 57-year rule of Tibet."

Lumping a spiritual leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner like the Dalai Lama in with political dilettantes like Gere and Clooney seems, well, disrespectful and irreligious.

Isn't that the equivalent of tossing the of LDS President, Prophet, Revelator and Seer Tom Monson* in with the likes Donny and Marie Osmond? (Of course, many DNews readers equate Osmonds with deities.)

As at least one outraged emailer pointed out to me, the Dalai Lama is the spiritual and political leader of a country who had to flee Tibet or be murdered by invading Chinese.

Think Nauvoo, Doug. Would you have called for a 1840 boycott of an Illinois Olympics?

*Of course it's Thomas S. Monson, but you get the point.