In The Constitution

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Redirect the Prison, Don’t Move It

How would you like to save a cool three-quarters of a billion dollars? That kind of change would rattle nicely in pockets around the state. We can do it. All we have to do is leave the Utah State Prison where it is.

Developers want the land and Draper City wants them to have it. They will get big tax dollars from development in the area if the prison is relocated. Here is the rub: taxpayers will pay the $1 billion to relocate and the developers will get the profits. There is, of course, the usual chatter about the increased taxes revenue paying for all this and there’s some truth to that — eventually. Meanwhile, we, the taxpayers, will suffer the interest, liability and headaches. This deal isn’t stacked in our favor.

The State Prison Relocation Committee says buildings at the prison are in bad shape and need remodeling, which will cost $250 million. They want to tear it down and move it instead, costing three-quarters of a billion more. The state has spent a million dollars just studying the deal. The taxpayers paid that, by the way, not the developers.

Fred Willoughby is the chairman of Utah’s No Prison Relocation Committee. He is adamant the prison should stay where it is. He wants to improve it, turning it into a place that remakes those within its walls, rather than warehousing them. He first proposed his plan in the 1970s, and he’s bringing it forward again.

The three-part plan, which would apply to prisoners who are minimum security risks, is intriguing, and the acreage within the prison compound provides the resources to carry it out. The first part is a Center of Learning, a kind of university or trade school where inmates would learn to question, study, do research and use their minds instead of wasting their years of incarceration. The second part is a hospital to heal inmates, body and soul, with classes to teach family relationship and marriage skills and counseling for drug and alcohol problems, for starters. Part Three would bring commerce into the prison. The enclosed land would house small industries where goods would be created to sell in a prison store. Inmates would develop abilities in wood and metalworking, upholstery, automotive, agriculture, computers, construction trades, electronics and a host of other marketable skills, in addition to sales and advertising know-how. They would leave better prepared for life on the outside, making them less likely to end up back in the slammer. Their time in prison could be life changing and society would be the beneficiary. Leaving the prison where it now stands provides the resources, the customers and accessible volunteers to make this plan work.

Willoughby believes prison can be something better than it now is. His illustrious 55-year career in law enforcement has given him workable ideas. At age 16 he began helping his grandfather, who was also in law enforcement, transport prisoners between jails. The three years he spent wiping out gang problems in Boulder, Colorado, was a great tutorial. He has been a police officer, a parole officer, an interrogator and a college professor teaching all the above. He has also been a prison guard at the Utah State Prison, so he comes at prison reform from an educated perspective with viable solutions for improving the prison system.

Willoughby readily confesses that sentiment colors his desire to keep the prison in place. Woven into his prison experience is the story of Crazy Joe, an inmate in the prison who acquired his nickname because he was ugly mean. During a verbal fray with another guard, Crazy Joe screamed: “Treat me like a man! Just because I have a number on my back doesn’t mean I’m not a man!” Fred pulled him aside and in their ensuing conversation said, “You are a child of God, just like me, and I’m going to tell you something. You are a baby. You want to be treated like a man but you act like a baby. Real men don’t do the things you are doing.” Stunned at being called a child of God, Joe said, “Nobody ever told me that before,” and he wept. From that moment, Joe began to change. Within a few years, he won release from prison, got married, and died six months afterward, a free man.

This and other experiences left Willoughby with the indelible belief that there’s a spark of knowing right and wrong in every man, even the most hardened criminals. We can fan that flame and give these men a better chance. Prison reform could help, with hearts and hands to pump the bellows. In addition, Utah could set a model for other states to do the same.

http://globalfinance.zenfs.com/images/US_AHTTP_AP_FINANCIALTIMES/e7f8a254b0609113340f6a706700dcc2_original.jpg

Willoughby’s No Prison Relocation Committee needs help. They want to talk to families of prisoners currently housed in the Utah State Prison. When an arrangement similar to the above 3 point plan was presented to prisoners and their families in the 1970s, a five-minute standing ovation resulted. Reactions today would surely be the same.

Forward this column on to any who deal directly with prisoners in the prison or any interested in the issue. Contact Willoughby at fred@willoughby.me or (801) 703-0283 to offer help. Three-quarters of a billion dollars could be hanging in the balance.

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Saturday, February 14, 2015

What is Discrimination? It is Agency

What is discrimination? Jog through several dictionaries — Webster’s 1828, 1942, 1962 and 2009 editions, for a start — and you find that, for at least two hundred years, discrimination has been a basic human right: “to distinguish, to discern, to observe.” It’s your job to discriminate. If you don’t, you can’t make decisions. Under political correctness, however, discrimination has been redesigned: “You can’t think or act for yourself. You’ll offend someone.”

Discrimination is another name for using your head and making a choice, and it’s basic to life. You discriminate every day, every time you choose one thing over another. You decide to lunch with Jane, not Jill — you discriminate against Jill, and might hurt her feelings. You buy a Mini-Cooper rather than a Ford, you discriminate against Ford and the American auto industry by sending your money overseas. You go skating instead of going to the movies and you discriminate against the movie industry, cutting into its profits. You can’t escape it; by definition, discrimination is choice and every decision discriminates against the thing not chosen.

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So, the prefix “anti:” “hostile toward, preventive, opposing,” when attached to discrimination means you don’t get a choice; you lose your agency. You are told right and wrong and will comply. Good-bye, freedom.

We are on a national romp to pass anti-discrimination legislation for special interest groups. Such legislation thinks for you and tells you how to behave. We’re told this is necessary because some of our choices might limit others. This infers that you can’t act unless “others” approve. If that’s what society believes, expand your garage and pay for both the Ford and the Mini, take both Jane and Jill, and all your other friends, as well, every time you go to lunch, and learn to skate while going to the movies. “The law” is going to make sure no one is left out.

Freedom, defended by patriot blood, has defined America for centuries. Inherent in freedom is the right of choice. Yet, without a shot fired, freedom is dying from the “doctrine” of non-offense; the belief that you can’t make a choice someone else doesn’t like.

There’s a core issue here. If anti-discrimination is applied universally, to everyone in every situation, you get no agency and you are oppressed. If anti-discrimination is applied selectively, it discriminates. The law created to prevent discrimination becomes the agent of discrimination.

The current anti-discrimination “buzz” surrounds the LGBT community. Utah statistics say we have handled this issue well, despite noise to the contrary. According to Stuart Reid, former senator of Senate District 18, (2010-2014) as of two years ago there had been only three reported incidents of employment or housing discrimination against LGBTs since the state began keeping stats. All three, when investigated, were invalid. While other incidents since then are possible, it’s unlikely in a growing climate of LGBT acceptance. We are fair in our employment and rental practices. Why do we need legislation on the topic?

There are unfortunate social slights toward LGBTs, however, as Utah’s culture is based on biblical principles which speak to the issue. We should firmly discourage those slights. Unkindness toward anyone is inappropriate. This is not, however, a matter for legislation. A government that legislates beliefs and social interaction is repressive, indeed! We have the right to make decisions based on our moral beliefs and religious values, even if others disapprove. (Remember Jill, Ford and the movie industry.) LGBTs make moral choices concerning their actions. How, then, can they condemn others, including Christians, for doing the same? Utah is moving at a steady pace toward compatibility in this issue. Imposing laws and ordinances to right what is righting itself isn’t smart or necessary.

The inevitable effect of legislating actions based on moral beliefs isn’t good. Val Arbon, author of the “Which Way, America?” DVD series, identifies the process by which anti-discrimination legislation diminishes liberty. 1) A perceived problem is “remedied” through well-intentioned but bad laws. 2) Negative results overwhelm the intended positive results. 3) The courts get involved to fix the mess but rarely provide solutions that increase liberty.

In fairness, the Western world has sometimes persecuted those who are different. The Spanish Inquisition, aimed at Jews, and the Christian Crusades to destroy non-Christians were ugly. Americans have persecuted, as well, though less harshly. In the early 1800s, Baptists were discriminated against. Later it was the Mormons, the Jews and then the Catholics. We’ve “done a number” on the Irish, Italians, Greeks, Chinese, Japanese, American Indians and blacks. By the 1960s, the nation began the discrimination of anti-discrimination, which has not fixed the problem but, rather, redirected it. All discrimination, including anti-discrimination, is inappropriate to a society seeking moral strength, sound character and strong ethics. Fortunately, unfair treatment is dying of its own accord as people realize that treating others is a mark of maturity and good character. Our differences create strength.

Anti-discrimination legislation enacted across the country and now proposed in Utah would legally dictate favoritism for special interest groups by making their needs more important than others. If we dictate behavior toward one sub-group, we must fairly dictate toward all and terminate individual choice.

Legislation can be drafted that benefits special interest groups without taking away the rights of the rest. Utah is capable of that. We have exceptional individuals in our Congress who can give us such legislation. Ladies and gentlemen of Utah’s Congress, its time. Step up to the plate and give us something that works for all.

Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Anti-discrimination Legislation Wants to Fool Mother Nature

Anti-discrimination legislation is knocking at Utah’s doors. This legislation would allow members of the opposite sex into public facilities where privacy matters — boys in girls’ bathrooms, girls in boys’ locker room showers and vice versa. You won’t like that.

Though they are not new, transgender issues are increasing. Individuals with Gender Identity Disorder wrestle with their biology in a culture that is rooted in biological reality. They deserve compassion and efforts to meet their necessities in public facilities. Our society cannot, however, jettison the needs of the rest in doing so. Utah’s considered anti-discrimination legislation will do just that — strip the privacy rights of the majority in favor of a very small minority, estimated at one-half of one percent of American youth.

Many issues surround anti-discrimination legislation, including the so-called bathroom problem — the privacy issue in public facilities. Utah’s proposed legislation would give full access of bathrooms and locker rooms to individuals according to the gender they feel they are rather than the gender they were born to be. This puts biological males and females in the same bathrooms, locker rooms and showers. That doesn’t work. Parents want their kids shielded from an inappropriate gender mix in private situations and we have separate facilities because privacy matters. Modesty is a characteristic of advanced, civilized societies and this violates modesty.

A real-life example illustrates the problem with anti-discrimination legislation. A complaint has been lodged against the activities of “Colleen Francis,” a 45-year-old biological male at Evergreen State College in Washington State. The complaint alleges that Francis lounges nude with legs apart in the women’s locker room at the college in full view of coeds and girls as young as six. College authorities refuse to take action because Francis says he feels he is a woman. They ignore those who protest because Washington law protects his behavior. They say “the transgendered individual has the right to use our facilities, including the locker rooms.”

Thus the Pandora’s Box of anti-discrimination: it cajoles the few and violates the many. This is a direct breach of our Constitution and any freedom-based government — they are always majority-based. A minority-based government is called tyranny; it automatically discriminates against the many to favor the few. Wise law never creates the very thing it proposes to solve, yet in this case the law, itself, would discriminate against those who are not transgenders.

Anti-discrimination legislation is on the menu for Utah in 2015 and the Senate Rules Committee is currently assigning a bill on this topic to a sub-committee that will trek it through the state’s legislative process. The legislation hinges on one criteria: the conflicted individual “feels” he or she is the opposite gender. The proposed legislation, then, says the feelings of those individuals matter more than the feelings of the rest of us. In effect, we do not all qualify for the same rights.

The LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) community, which is strongly pushing anti-discrimination legislation, claims discrimination of its members but, in fact, they discriminate. They boycotted Utah author Orson Scott Card’s work when he joined the Board of Directors for the pro-traditional family National Organization for Marriage. The LGBT community engineered a public firestorm that drove Brendan Eich from Mozilla, the company he cofounded, over his personal contribution to California’s Proposition 8 several years earlier. This attack was personal, as Mozilla does not discriminate against LGBT employees.

Utah Senator Steve Urquhart (29th Senate District, Washington County), in speaking to Utah’s LGBT organization, Equality Utah, in 2013, used scripture to applaud the State’s anti-discrimination legislation he is spearheading. He quoted 2 Kings 6. Elisha’s servant decried a massed army poised against them and Elisha replied, “Fear not: for those that be with us be more than they that be with them.” Utah’s Eagle Forum says the senator compared today’s LGBT agenda with “Elisha restoring the sight, and turning the hearts of his enemies.” Senator Urquhart sympathetically declared, “Just as you gave me vision and turned my heart, we must open more eyes and turn more hearts.”

Legal experts say the statutes and policies of local communities on this matter could crumble if any Utah legislation is passed containing the phrases “sexual orientation,” “anti-discrimination” or “gender identity”. This would destroy one of the hallmarks of our federal and state Constitutions: the right of communities to set their own standards, some of which will not favor the LGBT agenda. This is not an issue of whether LGBTs can live and behave as they choose. They have that right. At issue is whether their demands will remove the rights of the rest, including the right to privacy in private places for private bodily functions.

If our legislature acts wisely, they will enact laws that give transgenders access to the physical facilities they need while not sacrificing the privacy and security of others. Logical, creative alternatives can be found, such as one designated bathroom in the school and separate times or areas in locker rooms. If LGBTs have any sense of fair play, they will join in a compromise effort. In rare circumstances where no alternative can be found and one group must yield, logic says biological reality should prevail.

There is nothing about gender disorientation that qualifies it to take away the rights of the majority. The lobby backing transgenders demands that all differences between those who live their biology and those who want to change it be removed. Society can sympathize and help, but reality is what it is. Sometimes biology can’t be undone. After all, you can’t fool Mother Nature.

Friday, January 30, 2015

Beware of Euthanasia!

As our nation races further from its moral moorings, things that were previously unacceptable will become acceptable, even fashionable. Euthanasia--assisted suicide--is one of those. It is a slippery road to ugly things.

Once a society embraces the idea of getting rid of some people, its a minor matter to change the line between those valued and those of little worth. This terrible process--putting someone to death who is "unneeded"--will begin with a "mercy stance"--the soft, loving "This will be so good for you" approach seen in the article that follows. Once this door is opened, however, it will lead to atrocities.

Be alert to this social movement and refuse it. We must not become a nation of mercy killings. Nations that do eventually change the meaning of mercy, and redefine it to justify their political and social goals. this gives ugly permission to end the lives of some who are deemed unnecessary.

This article was republished in the Daily Herald under Media Voices:

November 23, 2014 10:00 pm • By

Assisted suicide becoming more acceptable

We are hearing more these days about "death with dignity," which is a dignified way of saying it makes sense to breathe our last in the most painless and pleasant way possible under terms we control.
Techniques range from withholding life-sustaining medical intervention to more controversial but increasingly acceptable assisted suicide.
The latter got a lot of publicity recently when 29-year-old Brittany Maynard took her own life rather than suffer the ravages of brain cancer. She had moved to Oregon, one of five states where a doctor can legally prescribe drugs to end life. She did it consciously and with full support of loved ones, whose last memories of Brittany are of a person most comfortable and in most control who simply went to sleep. Brittany wanted to say goodbye on her own terms.
Society continues to struggle with this concept. Only in recent generations have we had the real option. Life in years past ended earlier and with less warning. Medical science lacked the means for preserving life as it can now, a new ability that brings great benefits but new challenges as well.
Too often today sick people and loved ones — and society in general — insist physicians do everything possible to keep an ailing patient alive even when hanging on is bad for all concerned. We all know of people in comas, in vegetative states, who are maintained indefinitely at great expense and trauma to loved ones. More common are people so old and mentally deficient their lives are a burden.
We all can imagine similar scenarios.
In such cases, everyone hangs on — for what? Would it not be better if, with everyone's consensus, an earlier decision would be made to peacefully end life at an appropriate moment? With a physician's instruction, a simple dose could be taken at bedtime, like a sleeping pill. This sort of goodbye could be much more pleasant for everyone.
We're getting there. States are beginning to consider life-ending legislation that will allow individuals and designated legal decision helpers to make a much better issue of the final moment.

Columbia (Missouri) Daily Tribune

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

The 1st Amendment Through the Eyes of a Child

Here is a big Thank You to all our Veteran's who have defended our Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic. The new movie "American Sniper" has helped educate our public about war, and the restraint our military has shown in defending freedom all around the world.