The past year will be remembered for its storminess and rightly so. We have been tossed and turned. Our ship has taken some water. And yet Utah households, businesses and elected leaders will right this ship. The sails have already been trimmed as we’ve responded to market signals. The winds of change are certain. . . .

Our economic ship will sail strong again.

Brown and his lawyer think they've found a loophole in the state's smoking ban that will allow his patrons to continue to light up coffin nails. (Oh yeah, like that missing comma that means we don't have to pay income tax.)

The Health Department, of course, has issued an official declaration saying Brown is full of it. Now, Brown's trying to figure out how far to push the bureaucrats before they come down on him like a 1,000-pound poop hammer.

Meanwhile, I'm calling on the geniuses out there to come up with a self-ventilated lexan bubble that fits over smokers' heads. We'll make a million.

Convincing rest of the world that Utah is normal.

We've got lots of things to offer in the state of Utah. If all we've got to offer them is alcohol, they'd better not come.

Frankly, I find that we have a lot of irresponsible drinkers in this state.

I'm the majority leader of the Senate! And, I'm a CPA — a check is as good as cash!

12 girls are confirmed victims of sexual abuse and neglect because they were married at ages ranging from 12 to 15.

43 girls — one in four pubescent girls on the ranch — were in an underage marriage.

91 FLDS families of 146 investigated were involved in sexual abuse or neglect.

Fear not, William Long is about as likely to have been the Sundance Kid as he was to have been Our Lady of Guadalupe. The effort by some of Long's descendants to establish that their great-grandfather was the famous outlaw is an exercise in fantasy genealogy.

Jim’s big brother, Scott Matheson Jr., had declined several requests to take part in the CW election issue. This exercise involved his completing a simple e-mail questionnaire on standard campaign issues. A reporter contacted Scott numerous times. He chose not to reply. His Republican opponent, Jon Huntsman Jr., had no such reservations. He even met former Editor Ben Fulton [now at the Tribune] at Burt’s Tiki Lounge for an interview. The election issue ran with a box of white space where Matheson’s comments and picture would have appeared.

I’ve never seen a politician exhibit this kind of behavior toward a newspaper at which I’ve worked. Not from a Republican, Democrat or independent. Three years of silence is a helluva sulk.

The average NBA player foundation put just 51 cents of each dollar it spent toward charitable programs, well below the 65 cents most philanthropic watchdog groups view as acceptable. Tax records show budgets are quickly eaten up by poor planning and administrative costs. . . . Up to a quarter of NBA player charities analyzed lacked even basic documentation required by the Internal Revenue Service.

• Traffic will double by 2040.
• Davis County will run out of farmland by 2020.
• Already overcrowded classrooms will explode.
• Water resources in our desert state will be depleted.
• Restaurants and airline flights crowded with screaming babies.
  

And the Legislature is demanding the governor call them into session so they can cut twice that.

Exactly where state spending will be gouged is unlikely to be decided until well into the new year, but no matter how it is done, Gehrke's article shows it will be painful, even in well-managed Utah.

• The Legislature passes a school voucher bill even though the public doesn't want it and has to overwhelmingly vote it down in a referendum.
• The state Senate blocks the advancement of an exceptional judge because he rubbed the gun lobby the wrong way.
• The public is disgusted with ethics on Capitol Hill, but it's already obvious lawmakers will kill any attempt at reform.
• Utah's election turnout is among the five lowest states in the nation.

He finally won Jessop's confidence and the door opened. He was even included in a prayer when Jessop, said:

No reporter has ever gotten past the driveway and into our house, and I hope I wasn't wrong to let this one in.

If you read Kurtz' lightweight article, you'll see that Jessop's prayer was answered. Kurtz offers a valentine to the FLDS way of life. No mention of sexual abuse, child brides or welfare fraud appears in the story. Nor does Kurtz offer any rebuttal to FLDS statements, including that the women are not "brainwashed" and "their children have higher levels of educational achievement than children from other parts of Arizona (including Phoenix) or Utah"

What I have seen and experienced in Colorado City and Hildale wasn't what I expected. I found a family a lot more normal than most reports would have you believe, except that they're a polygamous family.

Or, as one celestial wife told me, I was more normal than they expected, except that I'm in a monogamous family.

Boozer points to nearest exit.

As hard as it is to imagine this chutzpah, Congress set up automatic pay hikes for itself to avoid the embarrassment of having to stand up and vote for them. Utah Congressman Jim Matheson wants House members—who recently forced auto executives to accept $1 a year in salary—to at least have the huevos to vote on their pay raises:

At a time when people are losing their jobs, their homes and their retirement, I think the least we could do is openly debate whether we should take the pay increase this year or do some belt-tightening.

Speaking of bolas, Carlos Boozer tells ESPN he'll opt out of his $13 million Utah Jazz contract at the end of the season:

No matter what, I'm going to get a raise, regardless.

• Tax cuts.
• Military spending.
• An "Apollo-like" energy independence effort.
• Streamlining state and local governments before federal aid is granted.
• "All new spending projects should be selected by the responsible federal agency . . . , not by congresspersons and senators based upon favors and politics."

The Nice Jewish Guys Calendar features a different mensch for every month of the calendar year. Meet Ira the businessman and Noah, who doesn't look Jewish, but is.

It seems to have a very wide appeal...straight women, gay men, and a great deal of Asian women in particular seem to be drawn to it. Customers inquire if the men are really single and if they can be contacted.

No place on earth can speak to the balance of beauty and nature like these areas

If the suit fails, the leases—allowing drilling near Arches and Canyonlands national parks and Dinosaur National Monument—will be issued Friday.

House Speaker-elect Dave Clark says postponing action until the session will force lawmakers to raid something they hold sacrosanct: the state's rainy day account. (You might ask: What's it there for?)

Huntsman apparently hopes a combination of timely federal aid, a little borrowing, a vague state-level stimulus program and postponing some (sacrosanct) highway projects can stave off serious cuts in education and human services until the economy gains traction.

Budget chief Sen Lyle Hillyard says that without major cuts (as to what, the Lege, itself, isn't that clear on), the state will run out of money by April:

We can't print money. We can't bail ourselves out.

The unspeakable remains, of course. Raise taxes.

Understandably, Long killed himself at his home near Duchesne in 1936.

• His office awarded a lucrative contract to the law firm Siegfried & Jensen, which gave Shurtleff $60,000 and hired his daughter.
• Shurtleff is a long-time supporter of the payday lending industry, which has forked over tens of thousands of dollars to his campaigns.
• Shurtleff appeared at a Usana pep rally to wildly endorse the company, which happened to have given him $78,000.
  

The California Supreme Court says [to the state], you have already granted most of the rights of marriage through the Domestic Partnership Act. Why do you keep out the last five or six extras, plus the name marriage? This seems irrational to us.

A. Utah's state house reporters and God hold elected officials to higher standards for honesty than prosecutors and the courts. (Reporters' theory.)

B. Reporters know about horrible corruption, but never report it because they are part of the conspiracy. (The theory of the cranks who call me.)

C. Reporters are cynical bastards with a soft core of idealism. (Known fact.)

D. Reporters are drama queens when it comes to their beats. (Their editors' theory.)

E. Reporters are killer bees who exaggerate and slander. (Sen. Howard Stephenson's theory.)

But the conservative Lege, never big on subtlety, doesn't think that's near enough. Nor do they like the Guv's plan to borrow money for highway construction. They want Huntsman to call them into a special pre-session session where they'll fix things — mostly by chain-sawing out 15 percent of state spending — about twice the Guv's recommendation.

Huntsman, for some reason, fears his fellows Republicans are prone to overreacting and refuses to call the special session (only the governor can do that).

It appears the Guv is buying time until a federal stimulus package comes through, he hopes, before the session starts in mid-January. That aid, again he hopes, will reduce not only the need for deeper cuts, but legislative panic.

All things considered, this session is going to be the test of Huntsman's leadership.

It's not the version found in the holiday classic Rudolf the Red-nosed Reindeer.

Lame-duck U.S. House members—those retiring or have been voted out of office—are cast out of their plush offices to make room for incoming freshmen. Instead, they finish their terms in room B339 of the Rayburn House Office Building, the "Departing Member Service Center." As Fox tells it:

Rep. Chris Cannon is in cubby No. 1 -- perhaps assigned No. 1 because he lost his primary in late June to Rep.-elect Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a full four months before other members of Congress were defeated in November.

Seniority is everything on Capitol Hill. Even in defeat.

"I haven't been over there," Cannon said, referring to the Island of Misfit Toys.

Instead, Cannon wanders the halls with a briefcase.

"This is how you can tell if a member lost," Cannon told me, holding up a briefcase as he walked into the Speaker's Lobby. "We all carry briefcases. Without an office, I'm now a member of the 'Briefcase Caucus.'"

Who knew that Samsonite was the congressional equivalent of the Scarlet Letter?

[Obama] will not be the next president. I said on my home page in August that if he lost to expect to see the 'riots' that 2 Peter 2:13 tells us about. He didn't lose. But the story is not finished yet. I still think they may begin the riots before Christmas 2008.

We've had people who have left the lab because it's too hard to deal with the death, grief and blood of it.

An interpretive dance of the IRS coming for ODC.

Derryl is Derryl. He's a dance guy, not a financial guy.

I have not heard of any major cancellations.

Any time people say they want to change their plans and ski somewhere else, that's a concern. But luckily, it's been unfounded.

It's likely that gays and lesbians will think twice about going to Utah. The state is closely associated with the [LDS] church and the church said, 'You're not welcome.' That likely will have some outcome. But it would be wrong to punish an entire state for the actions of the church.

The economic times coupled with the fact that you can get fired [in Utah] for being gay could explain why there wasn't a huge showing today. A lot of [employers] in Salt Lake City are fair and equitable so some people chose to make their statement by going to work today.

I don't know that I need to be "coached." That's the polite word for "threat."

I have no control over how people interpret things. I only know what my intention is.

Who could withstand this?

He's a skilled businessman who rescued the 2002 Winter Olympics from a fiscal morass; he's a former governor with loads of experience dealing with big bureaucracies; and he's familiar with the auto industry because his father led American Motors. Romney suggested in a New York Times op-ed that Detroit be allowed to go bankrupt, so you know he'll play hardball.

Huntsman sneaks up on the competition.

He is an expert on China and speaks Mandarin Chinese fluently. He is far more progressive on the environment than many within his party. He has built a record of economic recovery and growth during his first four years in office at which even Democrats marvel. And, most importantly (and interestingly), he sees himself as a force for bipartisanship in Utah.

Reported John Daley:

One thing Utah shares with the state of Illinois is some of the most lax ethics laws in the country. It's something Gov. Huntsman hopes to change. He's expected to announce a new ethics commission in the next few weeks.

Add Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich to the list of national political notoriety. There's no direct Utah connection. (Here's the sexy part . . .) But the story resonates here after a year in which bribery accusations against Utah lawmakers flew on Capitol Hill.

We listened to the arguments of business owners and others that taking any action that could hurt the local economy is not wise during what might be the worst recession since World War II.

It has been painful to watch a group of people for who I have a great deal of respect try in vain to take on the role of innocent victim.

While I don't support vandalism or violence of any kind, I believe that anger at the LDS church hierarchy is completely justified. They are simply reaping what they have sowed.

Sports teaches character and teamwork.

Earlier this year, a football player was found guilty of forcible sexual abuse and attempted forcible sodomy for a series locker room incidents hazing incidents.

Set that to music, Disney Channel.

Craig pleaded guilty to the charge and paid the fine, but for some reason, changed his mind after his arrest became national news. Craig, who says he is not gay, is apparently, however, a masochist who enjoys being flogged by late-night television comedians.

Newsweek:Jesus "preached a radical kind of family."

Would any contemporary heterosexual married couple . . . turn to the Bible as a how-to script?

In reality, the Yes on 8 campaign might as well have been a wholly owned subsidiary of the LDS Church.

I thought by now you'd be some place where U.S. law can't reach you—like Bali or Utah.

George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, riding bareback and backward in the last gasp of their fossil-fuel governance, are holding fast to their dictum that what is good for the oil business is good for the country. In the interior West, we know this is a lie. Just look at Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah and see how they have been laid to waste, a wide-open wound in America's failed energy policy. Among many Westerners, the consensus is this: We are not against oil and gas development. We are against the greed, speed and scale of it.

According to Houston* (B.C.) Today, Tyler Beck and Brad Blazzard (hometowns not given, so we assume Alpine, Utah) had been prosthelytizing in the area for seven months when they discovered the 20-inch footprints. Sayeth Elder Beck:

The first thing we thought was that someone was playing a trick on us. But we don't know anyone our age who would do that and our house in on the southside, so pretty much in the middle of nowhere."

I have to rule a hoax out. First, Canadians have no sense of humor and elders cannot lie, plus they are trained to be highly skeptical of hard-to-swallow yarns. Thus, I can only think of a couple of things that might explain the elders' find:

A. A troubling variation on the beloved Three Nephites myth.

B. The president of the church's new Yeti mission stopped by for a chat.

C. Sister LaDonna of LaVerkin and Sister Brunhilda, Midway, posted in nearby Buck Flats, still haven't gotten the knack to wearing shoes.

D. Elders Beck and Blazzard desperately need a convert.

Hat tip: Voice of the Deseret

*Fun fact: Houston, B.C., the "World Steelhead Capital," also is the home of the world's largest fly rod!

State Superintendent Patti Harrington, apparently one of the seven listeners early Saturday morning, complained:

The title for his show was beyond the pale. I was disappointed in that from Sen. Stephenson.

Stephenson hammered state "educrats" for "subversiveness," dishonesty and resisting high-tech change. In short, they didn't do what he told them to do.

With a fair amount of struggling you might be able to get a podcast of the show here.

I doubt that what they've proposed would be enough to stop the bleeding, but it will slow it down. The worst thing you can do is, when people are pulling back on their spending and losing their jobs, is pulling back on spending and raising taxes.

Front doors that were never installed with knobs swing open day and night. Strangers doing drugs and having sex in abandoned houses have to be chased out, and raccoons have infested many. There is a sinkhole in one of the streets. Holes dug for basements are collapsing, posing a danger to the children who play there. The foundations of some of the homes are cracking and sinking. A pile of abandoned furniture sits in front of one home. There may be squatters living in another. Several of the abandoned homes have been vandalized, the perpetrators removing granite countertops, appliances, even pulling up the wood floors. Someone used a car to smash in the garage door of one home.

There is anger in my heart. I feel like I was lied to. I was deceived by people.

. . . don't you think it's only right to send 'Happy Holiday' cards to the Grinch who stole Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Festivus? We do, so we'll be bringing holiday greeting cards for everyone, and then we'll make sure they're delivered to . . . Senator Chris Buttars.

The five guards, all military veterans, were indicted in Washington, D.C. in connection with a 2007 shooting melee in Baghdad that left 17 Iraqi civilians gunned down and dozens of cars riddled with bullet holes.

The legal maneuver is possible because one of the accused is Donald Ball of West Valley. Ball is a decorated Marine, who did three tours of duty in Iraq before returning as a Blackwater guard.

Howard knows how to handle educrats.

Stephenson says he's had a gut full of the subversive acts to overturn the legislature's education reforms by the bloated 500-plus employee organization and will give specific examples of how too many career bureaucrats don't give a damn about the law, education improvement, or providing teachers the tools they need to do their jobs. He will show case by case how the educrats work to prevent money from reaching the classroom and how they try to punish the most qualified and highest performing classroom teachers.

The average age is dropping for a lot of factors, but I think there’s a sense that HIV is not an issue anymore. [They think:] It’s not a problem, not a lot of people have it, there might be a cure. It’s the same misconception because [HIV/AIDS] is not talked about very much any more.

Huntsman keeps an eye on the exit as he delivers the news.

I expect a philosophical debate over bonding. We can bond and we can get by and we can be just fine.

A recent study in Utah indicated that talking on a cell phone while driving is just as dangerous as driving under the influence and that both acts made drivers four times more likely to become involved in an accident.

The same University of Utah study indicated that drivers talking on a cell phone were far more distracted than drivers actually having a conversation with someone in their vehicle.

It’s amazing. Hollywood liberals, who usually shout “McCarthyism!” as a first resort, see nothing wrong with this. If Jews were attacked in this way for giving too much money to a political cause, Barbra Streisand would already have a French passport.

Jonah does not mention the fact that the Mormon hierarchy planned this campaign for 11 years, that their decision to make this a public issue is unprecedented in the history of the LDS church, and that their donations made up a huge proportion of the Prop 8 forces.

He doesn't mention that their public bluff that they only care about the m-word and favor rights for gay couples has been called in Utah, where gay rights advocates are demanding the LDS church back strong civil union laws (and the LDS church is resisting).

The main focus is going after the Utah brand . . . It is a hate state.

Does the organizational and fund-raising prowess displayed by the LDS church during California’s Proposition 8 campaign augur future political might?

We don’t have an alternative. If we had another theater we could walk down the street to, we might be thinking about that.

Judge David C. Dahlquist told Coleman, "I'd rather not see you here again."

Utah's littlest celebrity cheerfully answered: "I would not like to see me here again, either."

The charcter on South Park of the same name is just a coincidence.

This man should in no way, shape or form be allowed to have so much power concentrated in his hands.

Holder was the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia when Enid's dreams of power — not to mention her marriage — melted down as she and her husband/campaign manager Joe Waldholtz were investigated on allegations of bank fraud and campaign finance corruption. Joe (right) went to prison.

But Enid, who ran for office as a human with an IQ above 70, claimed she had no idea what Joe was up to. She divorced him, was cleared of almost all wrongdoing and returned to Utah where she has a radio show and sometimes gets to lead the state Republican Party.

But I'm going to run it and see what happens.

And why don't Mormons have beards anymore?

Prohibition Is Dead! Mormons Killed It! Whoopee! Happy Days Are Here Again!

What convinced me was a gaze upward at the Milky Way Friday night — Lordy. Anything that might impair that view is a really bad idea.

The Tribune's Sheena McFarland points out that Utah light pollution already is so bad that only two parts of the state still have pristine dark skies: Natural Bridges National Monument and Capitol Reef National Park.

On my way home, I passed the wind farm in Spanish Fork Canyon making electricity. While not exactly beautiful, they definitely offer more appeal than heavy trucks and derricks around the Delicate Arch, which in my opinion, is the symbol of everything wonderful about Utah.

You might think that an organization that for most of the first of its not yet two centuries of existence was the world’s most notorious proponent of startlingly unconventional forms of wedded bliss would be a little reticent about issuing orders to the rest of humanity specifying exactly who should be legally entitled to marry whom. But no. The Mormon Church—as anyone can attest who has ever answered the doorbell to find a pair of polite, persistent, adolescent “elders” standing on the stoop, tracts in hand—does not count reticence among the cardinal virtues.

As Richard and Joan Ostling write in “Mormon America: The Power and the Promise” (2007), “Smith and his successors in Utah managed American history’s only wide-scale experiment in multiple wives, boldly challenging the nation’s entrenched family structure and the morality of Western Judeo-Christian culture.”

Steve Young is a graduate of Brigham Young University, which is named for his great-great-great-grandfather. ... It wasn’t enough this time. But the time is coming.

Here's what I don't get about California and the recent Proposition 8 vote: Why all the commotion over yet another passage of yet another marriage amendment? . . .

In twenty-nine of [other] statewide votes, nobody threw a tantrum.

One day I was looking around in despair and thought, "Hey, there's nothing wrong with this place that half a million Mexicans wouldn't fix."

I immediately had similar thoughts about blacks, Asians, Puerto Ricans, hippies, surf bums and every other kind of group I was used to having around me for personal contrast.

As the ones who made those committee selections, we affirm unequivocally that there were no quid pro quo for votes against Hilder.