Deseret Digest March 2024

THE DIGEST

March 2024 VOL. 2 / NO. 3

Deseret News

Church News

Deseret Magazine

What do Utahns, Latterday Saints say about Biden and Trump as people of faith?

Why the biggest football recruit in Idaho history is serving a Latter-day Saint mission

For the last half-century, American politics has been defined on a left and right spectrum.

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Utah Gov. Spencer Cox joins 14 other governors in Texas vowing to protect the border

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A NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER

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By Burke Olsen

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DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

WARNING - WARNING - WARNING

If Your Hands, Arms, Feet, or Legs Are Numb - If You Feel Shooting or Burning Pain or An Electric Sensation - You Are at Risk

Don’t Let Creeping Nerve Death Ruin Your Life Get The Help You Need - Here’s What You Need to Know...

Pleasant Grove, UT - If you experience numbness or tingling in your hands, arms,legs, or feet or if you experience shooting or burning pain, this is important. Please read this carefully.

Peripheral Neuropathy is when small blood vessels in the hands,arms, feet or legs become diseased and tiny nerves that keep the cells and muscles working properly shrivel up and die.

Early-warning symptoms include tingling and numbness, mild loss of feeling in your hands, arms, legs or feet, inability to feel your feet, which increases your risk of foot-injury and falling.

More Advanced Symptoms Include...

• Loss of coordination & dexterity, which puts you at increased risk of accidents.

• Inability to feel clothing like socks and gloves.

• High risk of falling, which makes walking dangerous, and makes you more dependent on others.

• Burning sensations in your arms, legs,hands or feet that may start mild, but as nerves and muscles die, may feel like you’re being burned by a blow torch.

Ignore the early warning signals long enough and you risk progressive nerve damage leading to muscle wasting, severe pain, loss of balance and a lot of staying at home wishing you didn’t hurt.

When every step is like walking on hot coals, sitting still may be the only thing you feel like doing. But there’s little joy in sitting still all day long.

Now here’s the scary part....

Copyright ©2021 Russell Communication

Drugs like Gabapentin, Lyrica, Cymbalta, & Neurontin are often prescribed to manage the pain. But, damaged nerves and dying cells do not heal on their own.

Pain pills do not restore healthy nerve function. They just mask the pain as the nerves continue to degenerate and cells and muscle continue to die.

• Nerve damage CAUSES cell damage.

• Cell damage SPEEDS UP nerve degeneration

Without treatment this can become a DOWN-WARD SPIRAL that accelerates.

The damage can get worse fast. Mild symptoms intensify. Slight tingling,numbness or lack of feeling can turn into burning pain.

Before you know it, damage can become so bad you hurt all the time.

Unless this downward spiral is stopped and nerves return to proper function - the damage to nerves and cells in the affected area can get so bad your muscles begin to die right along with the nerves and cells.

And that sets the stage for weakness, loss of mobility, disability, and dependence on others.

If you have early warning signs of peripheral neuropathy, (tingling &/or numbness, loss of feeling or pain) it’s CRITICAL you get proper treatment.

It’s critical, because with proper treatment the symptoms can often be reversed. Without it, you are playing Russian Roulette with your health.

Once your nerve loss reaches 85%, odds are there’s nothing any doctor can do to help. The most common method your doctor may recommend to treat neuropathy is prescription drugs

Taking endless drugs and suffering terrible side effects that may damage your liver &kidney and create even more problems, is not a reasonable path. You deserve better.

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4 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

COVER

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox joins 14 other governors in Texas vowing to protect the border Gov. Abbott of Texas said the state would expand its National Guard presence at the border

Brigham Tomco, Deseret News

Gov. Spencer Cox attends a press conference on border security with 14 other Republican governors at Eagle Pass, Texas, on Sunday, Feb. 4, 2024.

By Brigham Tomco Deseret News

EAGLE PASS, Texas — Utah Gov. Spencer Cox stood at the front line of the country’s roiling immigration crisis on Feb. 4 above the banks of the Rio Grande with 14 other Republican governors and Utah Speaker of the House Mike Schultz.

Flanked by several dozen national guardsmen and a fleet of sand-colored humvees, the governors, led by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, reaffirmed their position in an escalating constitutional standoff with the federal government and placed the blame for the country’s crisis-level immigration surge squarely at the feet of the president of the United States.

“Because of the extraordinary dangers that the state of Texas is facing, as well as states across the country, and because Joe Biden completely abdicated and abandoned his responsibility to enforce the laws of the United States, I have used a clause in the Constitution that empowers states to defend themselves,” Abbott told national media.

On Jan. 24, Abbott declared his intent to mobilize the state National Guard to secure the border — historically, and constitutionally, a federal duty. Citing Article I and Article IV of the Constitution, Abbott said if federal law goes

unenforced, and under the conditions of an “invasion,” states are authorized to engage in self-defense.

A day later, Cox, and 24 other governors, signed a joint statement to express “solidarity” with Abbott “in utilizing every tool and strategy, including razor wire fences, to secure the border.”

“It is really important that we enforce the laws of the United States of America. That’s really what this is about,” Cox told the Deseret News following the Texas press conference. “We need a president who will use the tools at his disposal and a Congress that will help fix some of those tools that need to be fixed to solve this humanitarian crisis that’s happening here.”

Abbott and Cox joined the Republican governors of Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, South Dakota and Tennessee on a tour of the border, accompanied by a briefing from Texas border officials on Feb. 4.

That afternoon, the governors held a media-only press conference, which the Deseret News attended, behind a heavily fortified, razor-wire fence patrolled by the state’s National Guard.

“I felt it was important to come down and see for myself and have these conversations with my fellow governors,” Cox said.

Speaking over bursts of wind and dust, the governors said

that Biden could end the border crisis with the wave of a pen by reinstating Trump-era border security measures, like finishing the border wall and implementing the Migrant Protection Protocols, or the “Remain in Mexico” program, which partnered with Mexico to keep migrants on the other side of the U.S.-Mexico border during the entirety of their immigration proceedings — which can last several years.

This approach would prevent the release of millions of undocumented immigrants into the country on parole awaiting a court date, Republicans have said, and changes the calculus for cartels and prospective migrants who are considering making their way, sometimes over thousands of miles, to America’s southern door.

“This is definitely not anything new,” Cox said of the high number of migrants crossing the border illegally, which existed under former President Donald Trump and Barack Obama, “but it is a crisis that is growing to the point where we just absolutely have to do something about it.”

Cox was home from his trip by that evening. At a press conference in Salt Lake City after his return, he expressed concern about the “over 160 people who are on the terrorist watch list in the United States” who have been apprehended at the border.

“Again, those are the people that we know about. So even if it’s less than 1% that are crossing that mean to do harm to Americans, that’s a huge number when we’re talking about 3.2 million people,” he said.

A years-long tidal wave of border crossings seemed to reach an unmanageable zenith last December at the exact spot where Sunday’s press conference was held, just blocks away from downtown Eagle Pass, Texas.

At its peak late last year, border patrol agents in the Del Rio Sector, which includes Eagle Pass, were processing up to 5,000 migrants a day, Abbott said, representing the majority of a record-breaking 10,000 daily apprehensions that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection recorded multiple times in December.

The press conference was held at Shelby Park, which is located underneath one of the two international bridges connecting Eagle Pass to Piedras Negras, Mexico. The park became the go-to image for news in December that U.S. Border Patrol had recorded 302,000 encounters along the country’s southwest border — the most in American history.

These totals came after fiscal year 2022 and 2023 saw the greatest number of border encounters between migrants and field agents since the country began keeping track, with totals coming in at 2.8 million and 3.2 million respectively, according to CBP data.

“That’s basically the population of the state of Utah in one year that crossed the border,” Cox said.

These staggering statistics exclude the number of “gotaways” who successfully evaded Border Patrol agents. During a congressional hearing last year, United States Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said the number of migrants who entered the country without encountering border patrol was estimated to be more than 600,000 in FY 2023.

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6 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024 The sight of thousands of migrants from all over the world emerging from the Rio Grande, drew what was purportedly the largest congressional delegation ever to visit the southern border to Shelby Park in early January, followed a few days later by a visit from Mayorkas, who is currently undergoing initial impeachment proceedings in the GOP-majority House for an alleged failure to maintain national security and instead fostering a “porous” border.”

Biden, up for reelection this year — as are the 15 governors, has countered that the problem is not a lack of executive action but an outdated asylum process from 1980. The Democratic president has committed to sign a bipartisan immigration package released by Senate negotiators Sunday night. It would first have to pass a gridlocked Congress.

But Utah House Speaker Schultz, R-Hooper, said Abbott’s experiment with state-led — and funded — border security measures is a proof of concept that enforcement of current laws might be more pressing than new legislation from Washington, D.C. “Just a few months ago there were thousands of people crossing this border every day,” said Schultz, who appeared to be the only state lawmaker in attendance. “And today, there’s three people getting across this border every day. So it shows what the federal government should be doing, not just here in Texas, but all the way up and down the border.”

When asked whether Utah has a unique way of approaching immigration, Cox said Utahns understand “we do need to show compassion to those immigrants who are coming to our state.”

“This is the false narrative that people want us to employ, that if we’re securing the border that means we hate immigrants,” Cox said. “That’s not true at all. In fact, immigrants are in danger because what we’ve done is we’ve just incentivized the cartels who are making hundreds of millions, maybe billions, of dollars off of trafficking people. It’s very

Brigham Tomco, Deseret News

Texas National Guard members stand in the background at a press conference on border security with 15 Republican governors in Eagle Pass, Texas, on Sunday, Feb. 4, 2024.

unsafe for them.”

Cox said he also thinks lawmakers need to “fix legal immigration so that we’re not forcing people to do it the wrong way.”

The volume of migrants attempting to enter the U.S. illegally dropped precipitously in the first few weeks of the year, according to the CBP. Abbott has claimed this is a sign his tactics are working.

But other reporting suggests the drop may be the result of negotiations between the Biden Administration and Mexican leadership, which has resulted in increased apprehensions and deportations of migrants by Mexican law enforcement.

On Feb. 4, Abbott, and several of his gubernatorial colleagues, said they would continue to send national guardsmen to the Texas border for the foreseeable future to bring a halt to migrant crossings.

“As we speak right now, the Texas National Guard, they’re undertaking operations to expand this effort,” Abbott said.

“We’re not going to contain ourselves just to this park; we are expanding to further areas to make sure we will expand our level of deterrence and denial of illegal entry into the United States.”

In response to an emergency appeal filed by the Biden administration, the Supreme Court said on Jan. 22, that federal officials could cut razor wire installed by Texas along the U.S.-Mexico border if it interfered with their ability to carry out immigration proceedings.

But a national guardsman and border patrol agent, both stationed at Shelby Park, confirmed separately to the Deseret News that Abbott had instructed state law enforcement to refuse entry to the federally-controlled border patrol except in the case of life threatening border crossings of the Rio Grande.

This is the latest in a series of demands by the Biden Administration for Texas to cease and desist, which Texas has continued to flout, making Eagle Pass the epicenter of a high stakes stalemate, with Biden threatening to federalize the Texas National Guard if Abbott does not back down.

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POLITICS

What do Utahns, Latter-day Saints say about Biden and Trump as people of faith?

Compared to a national poll, Utahns’ views differ on whether Biden, Trump and also Romney are people of faith

Patrick Semansky, Associated Press

President Donald Trump holds a Bible as he visits outside St. John's Church across Lafayette Park from the White House in Washington in this June 1, 2020, file photo.

By Samuel Benson Deseret News

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints living in Utah who are Republican are less likely than Republicans nationally to view former president Donald Trump as a “person of faith,” and are more likely to say President Joe Biden is a person of faith, according to a new poll.

The Deseret News and polling firm HarrisX conducted a series of national surveys in late 2023 gauging U.S. voters’ perspectives on politicians’ faith. In an October poll, 53% of Republicans said Trump is a person of faith; in December, 62% of Republicans said he is.

But a new Deseret News/Hinckley Institute poll of Utah voters shows that Latter-day Saints in the state — even those who identify as Republicans — are much less likely to view Trump as a person of faith.

According to the poll, 35% of Utahns who identify as “very active” Latter-day Saints say Trump is a person of

faith; among “very active” Latter-day Saints who are registered Republicans, that number grows to 41% — over 20 percentage points below the national Republican average. Among Republican Latter-day Saints who say they are “somewhat active” or “not active,” over half — 54% — say Trump is a person of faith.

Among the poll’s full sample — 801 registered Utah voters, regardless of religion or political affiliation — views of Trump’s religiosity are even lower, with 33% of respondents saying Trump is a person of faith. Less than half, 47%, said President Joe Biden is a person of faith; over three-fourths, 77%, said Sen. Mitt Romney is.

Utahns are more likely than Americans at large to see Biden and Romney as people of faith. In the national Deseret News/HarrisX poll, 41% of registered U.S. voters said Biden is a person of faith, and 43% said Romney is.

The Deseret News/Hinckley Institute poll was conducted from Jan. 16 to 21. The margin of error is +/- 3.02 percentage points.

Latter-day Saints have been a majority-Republican voting

bloc for decades. But Trump’s rise was met with skepticism by many in the faith. In 2016, he finished third in Utah’s GOP caucus and fared worse in the general election than any Republican since 1992; in 2020, Biden outperformed any Democrat presidential candidate in the state since 1964.

In a 2023 poll conducted by the American Enterprise Institute, a majority of U.S. Latter-day Saints maintained a negative view of Trump, leading one AEI official to proclaim Trump’s Latter-day Saint support is “deteriorating.”

In addition to his campaign for the GOP presidential

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

nomination, Trump is facing a series of legal challenges, including 91 criminal charges. Last week, a jury ordered Trump to pay $83.3 million for defaming author E. Jean Carroll, who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her.

Nonetheless, in the January Deseret News/Hinckley Institute poll, 39% of Utah Republicans who identify as “very active” Latter-day Saints say they’d vote for Trump if the GOP primary election were held today. Another 27% say they’d back Nikki Haley and 16% are undecided. (Eighteen percent say they would back Ron DeSantis; the poll was conducted shortly before DeSantis dropped out.)

Utahns views on Romney and Biden as men of faith Utah Republicans who identify as “very active” Latter-day Saints are also much more likely than Republicans nationally to say Biden and Romney are people of faith. Among

Utah GOP Latter-day Saints, 35% say Biden is a person of faith, compared to 13% of Republicans nationally; 85% say Romney is a person of faith, compared to 34% nationally.

Among all Utah Latter-day Saints regardless of political party, those figures are comparable: 41% say Biden is a person of faith, and 85% say Romney is.

Biden is a Catholic. According to Ryan Burge, an assistant professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University, Biden is the “most religiously active president we’ve had in generations.” According to publicly available data, Biden has attended Sunday church services more in the first three years of his presidency than any president in recent history.

Romney is a Latter-day Saint. He served a proselytizing mission as a young man to France, and he served as a bish-

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op and stake president in Massachusetts. “My faith is at the heart of who I am,” Romney said in a speech on the Senate floor in 2020.

Trump was the first U.S. president since Dwight Eisenhower to change his religious affiliation while in office.

Though he was raised Presbyterian, Trump now identifies as a nondenominational Christian.

Trump boasts massive support from evangelical Christians, who make up a significant portion of the Republican electorate. Many evangelicals credit Trump for nominating three conservative justices to the Supreme Court who overturned Roe v. Wade.

“No president has ever fought for Christians as hard as I have,” Trump said at an event in June. “I got it done, and nobody thought it was even a possibility.”

10 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

CHURCH NEWS

Why Gatlin Bair, the biggest football recruit in Idaho history, is serving a Latter-day Saint mission Gatlin Bair doesn’t consider it a sacrifice to step away from his college football dream — ‘I really don’t,’ he says into good human beings,” he said.

The family strived to make the Church and their Latter-day Saint faith their highest priority. There were no competitions on Sundays.

“We always went to Church and were probably like everybody else — hit or miss with family home evening and scripture study — but we did our best,” the father said. “We wanted to help them understand that faith was the most important thing in life and the real reason why we’re on the earth. It’s not to run track and play football, it’s to prepare ourselves to meet God. That has always been our No. 1 priority.”

His wife agreed.

“Example is the biggest thing,” Shae Bair said. “If we show that it’s important to us, then you hope your example will set that precedence for them.”

Family of missionaries

Megan Nielsen, Deseret News

Gatlin Bair poses for a portrait at Burley High School in Burley, Idaho, on Thursday, Jan. 25, 2024. Bair, the highest-rated recruit in Idaho history, will serve a Latter-day Saint mission before playing college football.

By Trent Toone Church News

BURLEY, Idaho — Gatlin Bair was pulled up to play varsity high school football after his first freshman game in fall 2020, but achieving his dream of playing major college football felt more realistic a year later as he stood on the sidelines at Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City and watched the University of Oregon play the University of Utah.

As Bair sized up the players and observed the game up close, he had a surge of confidence.

“I can be as good as these guys. I can see myself in that situation,” he said in a recent interview with the Church News. “Seeing those guys in person is the point where I thought I could physically play the sport at the next level.”

More than two years later, not only has Bair shown he can play with the best, but the 6-foot-2 wide receiver could almost have his pick of any program in the country. They have all expressed interest in having him.

After demonstrating his skills and speed at the All-American Bowl against the country’s top high school players, Bair is listed as the nation’s No. 27 overall prospect and is the highest-rated football recruit in Idaho history.

The 18-year-old announced his choice to play for the University of Oregon, on Feb. 7, the national signing day for college football prospects.

But then Bair is stepping away from the game he loves to do something he feels is more important — serve a full-time mission

for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Bair doesn’t view two years away from football as a sacrifice.

“I’ve always wanted to go on a mission. It’s never been a question in my mind,” he said. “I think the biggest sacrifice — like any other missionary — is being away from your family. Not seeing my older brother [who is currently serving] for almost four years will be tough. ... I don’t think [leaving football] is a sacrifice, I really don’t. If anything, I’ll be more blessed for it. Football will always be here when I get back. Football is not going anywhere.”

Family, running and faith

Understanding Bair’s decision to serve a mission begins at home with his family and upbringing.

His parents, Brad and Shae Bair, met in high school and were star track athletes at Utah State University. She was an All-American pole vaulter, and he was a conference decathlon champion.

“Obviously she was a very competitive and elite track athlete,” Brad Bair said. “The joke at our wedding was I was the only one who could catch her. That’s why we ended up together.”

Following college, the couple settled in Kimberly, Idaho, where they coached the high school track team and oversaw a youth track club. Gatlin, the third of five children, began training when he was 5 years old.

“The kids grew up going to the track,” Brad Bair said. “It’s something we did as a family, and it’s kind of our identity. It’s just how we spent time together.”

Beyond running and friendly competition at the track, the parents wanted to be relevant in their kids’ lives and help them “grow

An example of missionary service in the Bair family started with Brad Bair. Prior to marriage, he served a mission as a young man in Paraguay.

In the Church of Jesus Christ, a mission is a period of volunteer service — typically 18 months for young women and 24 months for young men — where missionaries devote themselves to teaching the gospel, humanitarian assistance or other service opportunities.

Those who don’t understand what a mission entails are understandably skeptical of why a young athlete would leave his sport in the peak of his development, Brad Bair said.

“What they don’t understand is that the mental, emotional and spiritual growth is going to help him be a phenomenal football player,” he said. “The physical part is easy. The hard part is the mental, spiritual and emotional part. What prepares you better for anything than a mission? How much better of a football player is he going to be because he has that piece that most kids don’t have?”

Gatlin’s oldest brother, Peyton Bair, served in the Arizona Mesa and Mexico Cancún missions before returning to compete in multiple events for the Mississippi State University track and field team. Peyton Bair also serves as second counselor in the presidency of the Starkville Mississippi Branch.

The Bairs’ second child, Jaxon, is currently serving in the Bolivia Santa Cruz North Mission. When he returns, Jaxon will compete for the University of Arkansas track and field team.

Along with his parents’ support and encouragement, witnessing his older brothers’ missionary service has greatly influenced Gatlin.

“One of the biggest things people tear me down for is my decision to serve a mission. Some people say I’m pretty dumb for doing it, that it will ruin my career and I will come back slower.

They don’t understand why I’m doing it or the reasoning behind it, not being [Church] members or experiencing the blessings,” Gatlin said, mindful of seeing the effects of missionary service for his parents and brothers. “I think I am going to come back and be very blessed for serving. Even if I did come back and wasn’t quite

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

11

where I was, I think it would all be worth it.”

He continued: “My brother Peyton has been back for a year and a half now. The blessings he has had, the growth and things he has been able to achieve, are remarkable. I’m not worried about it at all. I think I am going to be just fine.”

Gatlin has been assigned to serve in the Texas Dallas West Mission. He begins his mission service Feb. 19. Peyton Bair is grateful that his little brother has decided to “put the Lord first.”

“It’s really been a blessing in my life,” Peyton Bair said of his mission. “I learned a lot in those two years, and it has helped me a lot personally and in my athletic career. ... I think it’s a blessing in disguise. He will be more mature and developed when he gets back, which is advantageous for sports. On top of that, he’ll have a stronger testimony and be able to make better decisions.”

Hard work, perseverance, discipline

Because his parents were track athletes, many incorrectly assume Gatlin Bair is just a “genetic freak” who was born with sprinter speed. It’s true, to a certain degree, his father said, but speed can also be developed.

“You don’t come out of the womb running 10.15 [seconds in 100 meters]. It’s been a long process, and he’s worked hard at it,” Brad Bair said. “He’s been training pretty much his whole life.”

Years of consistent training paid off in a big way last year when Gatlin clocked a time of 10.18 seconds in the 100-meter dash at the Texas Relays. He went on to win the finals with a time of 10.25.

More than a month later, Gatlin clocked a record-breaking time of 10.15 in the 100-meter dash in the prelims of the Idaho High School State Championships in Meridian, Idaho. The next day he tied his own state record with another 10.15 in the finals. He was named the Gatorade Boys Track and Field Player of the Year in Idaho.

Even with 73 catches for 1,113 yards and 20 total touchdowns in football as a junior, it was Gatlin’s performance on the track that turned the heads of football recruiters. Bair began fielding calls and receiving visits from the likes of University of Oregon head football coach Dan Lanning, former Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh, former Alabama head coach Nick Saban, Georgia head coach Kirby Smart and many others, said Cameron Andersen, Gatlin’s football coach at Burley High.

“Every single team in America would take him right now,” Andersen said. “To see him experience those cool moments, because of his hard work, is absolutely awesome.”

Gatlin said the recruiting process at times was almost overwhelming. Andersen was able to shepherd him through the recruiting process because he had previously helped another player, former Gooding High star Colston Loveland, land at Michigan.

The majority of coaches were somewhat familiar with what a mission is, and Gatlin said all were willing to hold a roster spot and scholarship for him. One program even offered to finance his mission, although the family declined. This is to say nothing of other “name, image and likeness,” known as NIL, opportunities, which he says won’t mean anything until he starts playing football anyway.

Megan Nielsen, Deseret News

Gatlin Bair poses for a portrait with his parents, Brad and Shae Bair, at Burley High School in Burley, Idaho, on Thursday, Jan. 25, 2024.

“At the end of the day, the money that you can make off NIL deals comes from your production on the football field,” Gatlin said. “If you base your decision off the number they are throwing at you [during recruiting], then you’re probably not picking the school for the right reason.”

Gatlin was already a high-profile prospect in Idaho when his family moved from Kimberly to Burley before his junior year. Because of his talent and success, there has been pressure to perform at a high level while being the main focus of every defense; he’s faced heckling and taunting by opponents and fans, and he’s been a favorite target on social media.

Yet Andersen says his star player has remained humble, persevered and continued to work. He also found solitude and spiritual strength by attending seminary, where he studied the scriptures.

Looking back, learning to deal with adversity and a big spotlight fostered maturity and growth for Gatlin, all of which helped prepare him for a mission.

“It’s been really cool to watch him, through thought and prayer, handle those situations, listen to the advice of others, and take a mindset well beyond his years about understanding others, and how that doesn’t impact him,” the coach said. “He’s going to be a fabulous missionary.”

Andersen also says Gatlin is so disciplined in health and nutrition that his friends and teammates can’t even get him to eat a candy bar.

“If you eat something bad, you are going to get a short lecture about what’s in it and how it is going to negatively impact your

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body,” Andersen said. “He is so focused on achieving his goals, it is almost impossible to get him to eat things that aren’t beneficial to achieving those goals.”

Serving in the ‘football capital of the world’

Andersen says Gatlin Bair further proved himself as a top college prospect with his performance against other elite players during practices and workouts leading up to the All-American Bowl in San Antonio, Texas, on Jan. 6.

Gatlin appreciated the opportunity to connect with several players, many of whom asked about his mission plans.

“A lot of them asked questions about training, how that would look and what I thought about it,” said Gatlin, who hopes to exercise as much as his mission rules allow. “I explained how that looked and that I thought it would be a good thing for me.”

Gatlin will soon return to Texas in a different uniform. Instead of a jersey, helmet and shoulder pads, he will be sporting a white shirt, tie, dress pants and a black name tag. He knows he will fit right in.

“I think I was called to Dallas for a reason. It’s probably the football capital of the world. I feel like I’m really going to connect with people down there,” he said with a smile.

Gatlin hopes other Latter-day Saint youth who read his story will consider missionary service as well.

“If you dedicate that time to the Lord, you’ll be blessed for it,” he said. “And when you do get back, you’ll find that you’ll probably be more successful than if you decided not to go.”

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DESERET MAGAZINE

The myth of left and right

For the last half-century, American politics has been defined on a left and right spectrum. What if it’s a myth?

David Bonazzi for the Deseret News

By Hyrum Lewis Deseret Magazine

American politics is at a breaking point. This became obvious when a mob of American citizens, upset with the results of the 2020 presidential election, stormed the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., to stop Congress from tabulating the electoral votes. In order to work, democracies require citizens who respect the rights of individuals, defer to the outcomes of elections, and abide by the rule of law. But today’s toxic political culture has caused many Americans to abandon these vital norms. Ideological tribalism and partisan hatred have become so rampant that frightening numbers of American citizens countenance violence against their political opponents to get their way.

How did we get to this point? The standard explanations — media echo chambers, party polarization, racism, status anxiety,

misinformation, demographic sorting and even fear — tell only part of the story. An important but overlooked contributor to American political dysfunction is a widespread misunderstanding of ideology.

The standard view of American political ideology says that politics is largely a clash between two worldviews that can be modeled on a political spectrum. The left-wing worldview, we are told, is expressed in a preference for greater government control of the economy, social permissiveness and foreign policy dovishness, while the right-wing worldview is expressed in a preference for free markets, social restriction and foreign policy hawkishness. Taking these worldviews to extremes leads to totalitarianism — fascism at the far right or communism on the far left — while the more respectable positions exist at the center left (“progressivism”) and center right (“conservatism”).

This model of politics frames our thinking, shapes our lan-

guage and sets the terms of public debate. It creates a sense of personal identity for millions of Americans, is taught in classrooms across the country, and is used in nearly every political discussion, whether on social media, in the halls of Congress, on cable news or around the dinner table. It is, without question, the most influential political paradigm of 21st-century America.

It is also completely wrong.

In this last half-century, Americans have increasingly used a simplistic left-right spectrum to describe politics and, at the same time, politics has become ever-more divisive, hostile and rhetorically extreme.

This is not a coincidence. Thinking of politics along a spectrum contributes to the rancor and dysfunction that characterize public discourse today. While most people acknowledge that politics has become increasingly tribal, they generally assume that there must be some bedrock philosophy or value that each

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024 tribe rallies around. There is not. Terms are useful inasmuch as they are predictive, and it turns out that ideological terms are only predictive across contexts describing who people support (tribe) but not what they support (a philosophy). The single biggest fallacy in politics today is that the political spectrum refers to divergent worldviews when, in reality, it refers only to divergent tribes.

In the 2024 election season, for example, candidates will be discussing topics as diverse as abortion, budget deficits, immigration, inflation, climate change, aid to Ukraine, drug control and affirmative action, but contrary to a century of conventional wisdom, we can’t model all of these issues on a single spectrum.

Where on a unidimensional spectrum do we place someone who wants both more redistribution of wealth and more restrictions on abortion? Where do we place someone who wants aggressive action to stop both climate change and crime? The left-right binary spectrum we use to understand American politics presumes that politics is about one thing, but the reality is that politics is about many things and complex humans in such a complex realm will have many sets of diverse views that can’t possibly be modeled on one line.

This seems obvious, but one of the most prevalent myths of our time is “political monism” — the idea that politics in America can be defined by a single issue. For most people, that issue is “change”: those who favor change are on the “left” and support the bundle of policies considered “progressive,” while those who oppose change are on the “right” and support the bundle of policies considered “conservative.” The prevailing wisdom says that a person’s orientation on the single issue of change determines their position on all other issues.

Political monism is the dominant paradigm among politicians, academics, journalists and the politically active public. Nearly every Republican running for office this year would say that they support Republican policies because they are “conservative” while nearly every Democratic candidate would say that they support their party’s policies because they are “progressive.”

They have convinced themselves that the position they take on the one big issue determines their position on all other issues.

This conception of politics is wrong. Not only does political monism defy common sense, but there is simply no evidence for it. The reality is that politics, like any other complex realm of life (such as medicine, physics, art or chemistry), is pluralistic.

It is about many things, not just one big thing. Yes, there are two main political parties, but each party stands for a basket of unrelated policies, some of them good and some of them bad.

Ideas have consequences, and this idea of a left-right binary has many negative consequences. Here are just a few: Political monism gives the illusion of omniscience. The reality is that we are all flawed humans with incomplete knowledge trying to find workable solutions to difficult public problems, but monism tells us that we can know the correct answer to every public problem simply by choosing the correct side of the one big issue. Thus, the political spectrum turns us from scouts into soldiers and tells us that solving political problems is as easy as defeating the forces of darkness on the other side.

Political monism is largely responsible for the cancel culture that has taken such a firm hold of society. If all of the policies of my side are rooted in a single righteous principle (progressivism or conservatism), why would I allow someone who disagrees to speak when I know that their position is rooted in evil? If all left-wing policies promote progress, then an opponent of any left-wing policy is, by definition, an opponent of progress who doesn’t deserve to be heard. If all conservative policies defend traditional values, then any progressive policy should be viewed as an attack on those values.

Political monism also turns the virtue of principled dissent into a vice. Since each party stands for a bundle of unrelated positions, we should applaud those who are willing to speak out against the failings of their own side, but the monist delusion tells us that since all the policies of one’s own party are connected by one key value (“progressivism” or “conservatism”) then breaking with the party means betraying that sacred value.

Deviation from the party line isn’t courage; it is “selling out.”

No wonder dissenting politicians like Jeff Flake or Tulsi Gabbard have been run out of their parties as traitors — there can be no room for disagreement when policies are connected by a single righteous principle. Monism takes the admirable trait of independent thinking and reframes it as a lack of conviction.

Political monism reduces our ability to compromise. Histori-

Ideological tribalism and partisan hatred have become so rampant that frightening numbers of American citizens countenance violence against their political opponents. cally, politicians have cooperated with those of the other party in the name of putting the public interest ahead of partisan interest, but today’s political monism tells us that such compromises amount to “cooperating with evil.” Political monism serves to misinform and confuse. It leads us to believe things about people and groups that simply aren’t true. George W. Bush expanded the size and scope of government far more than did Barack Obama and yet Obama (“on the left”) was routinely denounced as a socialist and Bush (“on the right”) was routinely denounced as a free market fundamentalist. Monism led people to believe lies about our presidents and their records.

Perhaps most tragically of all, political monism reduces our capacity to think. People who conceive of politics in terms of a spectrum demonstrate lower cognitive ability, are more given to motivated reasoning (allowing emotions to affect how information is processed), are less intellectually accurate, are philosophically inconsistent, and are more likely to believe outright falsehoods. One of the greatest ironies in all of this is that people adhere to political monism in the name of advancing a righteous principle (“progressivism” or “conservatism”) and yet the research shows that monists are generally far less principled than political pluralists.

If political monism is false and damaging, why does it persist?

One reason is that as a theory of political science, monism explains the curious fact that distinct issue positions tend to bundle together in a binary pattern. That is, someone who supports abortion-rights is also more likely than the average person to believe in raising income taxes while someone who is anti-abortion is also more likely than the average person to believe in cutting income taxes. Many see this correlation and draw the understandable conclusion that a person’s views on taxes and abortion must be connected at some fundamental philosophical level. Since political beliefs tend to cluster into two major bundles, people assume that there must be a single issue underlying all others leading to this binary pattern.

But we don’t need political monism to explain this correla-

13

tion; tribal conformity explains it much better. Policies tend to coalesce into two bundles not because there are two main approaches to one big issue (progressive or conservative) but because there are two main political tribes in America (Democrat and Republican) and people tend to conform to the positions of their tribes. Political monism says that people start with a philosophy (e.g., for or against change), adopt political positions based on that philosophy, and then join the tribe that shares their positions. Actually, this is backward. People first anchor into tribes — because of family, peers, leaders or a single issue they care about — adopt the positions of their tribe for social reasons, and then invent an after-the-fact story explaining how all of those positions are philosophically connected. Political tribes naturally tend to be binary (because of the rule-oppose nature of politics), but political dispositions do not. There is a reality of binary political tribes, but not a reality of binary political outlooks — that is the myth of left and right.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that nobody in politics has any principles, it only means that conformity explains the correlation between distinct issues much better than political monism.

For example, someone who is strongly pro-life for principled reasons is likely to associate with other pro-lifers, join the Republican Party, start watching Fox News, identify as a “conservative” and then adopt the tribe’s position on income taxes. It’s not that an underlying “anti-change” worldview makes someone against both abortion and taxes, but that people anchor into tribes for principled reasons and then adopt their other policies.

If this seems a little confusing, here’s an analogy that can help: Think of political parties like baskets of groceries. Currently, if we go to the store, we just pick the products we like, one by one, and put them in our basket. But what if the grocery store required us to pick one of two preselected baskets full of random products? We would naturally choose the basket that had more of what we liked and less of what we didn’t like, but we wouldn’t pretend that everything in the basket we chose was somehow philosophically connected and therefore better than everything in the alternative basket.

And yet this is exactly what we do in politics: The monist myth tells people that all the many political “products” (issues) in their “basket” (party) are philosophically united (by “conservatism” or “progressivism”) and therefore superior to all the products in the other basket. This leads people to consider anyone who chooses the other basket as wrong about all products and therefore stupid and/or evil for choosing that basket. While it’s true that we can’t vote issue by issue — we must choose either the Democrat or Republican “baskets” — we can think issue by issue by rejecting political monism.

Doing so solves many of the puzzles that are currently baffling political analysts. Many are confused, for instance, about how conservatives who had once been such avid champions of spreading freedom in the world can now be so indifferent to the plight of Ukrainians. If the conservative philosophy led people to support Iraqi freedom, why isn’t it now leading them to support Ukrainian freedom? The answer is that it was never about philosophy. Conservatives didn’t tend to support the Iraq War because of an anti-change worldview (indeed, invading Iraq was highly revolutionary) but because of tribal solidarity. The historical record shows that support for military intervention by self-described liberals or conservatives is entirely contingent upon who is in the White House.

Tribalism also helps us solve the puzzle of conservative support for Donald Trump and “National Conservatives” more generally. Many see self-described conservatives advocating expanding government power for nationalist ends and ask, “How is it that these conservatives can support big government when conservatism is a philosophy of limited government?” The answer is that conservative policies do not emerge from a philosophy, but from a tribe that is always changing as the coalition changes.

CONTINUES ON PG. 14

14 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024 Although tribal conformity is a much better explanation for issue-position bundling than political monism, committed partisans have a hard time accepting this reality. By and large, they prefer to believe that a single issue on a spectrum, not socialization, explains the policies they support. Why the self-delusion?

Because it allows them to be tribal without feeling tribal. It allows them to conform to everything their team supports while feeling like they are being principled in following the philosophy of “progressivism” or “conservatism.” We humans are naturally tribal beings — we need groups to belong to and identify with — and although nearly everyone understands this, what is far less understood is how much we humans are given to disguising our tribalism with noble-sounding stories, often without even knowing it. Political monism makes us feel like philosophers when we are behaving like lemmings.

Even as there are individual psychological incentives to perpetuate the monist delusion, there are also institutional incentives. Our two main parties propagate the myth of left and right because it creates loyalty, energy and support among the membership. The falsehood that a party stands for a righteous philosophy creates an angry and motivated base that will spend much more time, effort and money advancing the party’s cause. For instance, the Republican Party is far more likely to raise funds with a letter that says, “If you want to promote the cause of conservatism and defeat the evil forces of left-wing extremism, donate to the Republican Party today!” than a letter that says, “The Republican Party stands for many unrelated issues, but we hope you agree with enough of them to donate.” We find similar institutional incentives in today’s news and information outlets.

We have a choice to make in this upcoming election season.

We can either cling to the monist delusion and talk about politics in terms of a left-right binary, with all of the confusion and rancor this entails, or we can embrace the pluralist reality and see our tribes as grab bags rather than philosophies. Not only would the pluralistic outlook reduce hostility and open our minds, but it would also help us see more clearly to understand

David Bonazzi for the Deseret News

and evaluate the candidates and movements that are growing in prominence this year. We need less talk of “left-right,” “progressive-conservative,” and more talk of actual issues. Ultimately, we need more political conversations based in reality and fewer based in the myth of left and right.

Adapted from “The Myth of Left and Right: How the Political Spectrum Misleads and Harms America” by Hyrum Lewis and Verlan Lewis. Copyright @ 2023 by the authors. Oxford University Press.

This story appears in the January/February 2024 issue of Deseret Magazine.

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OPINION

How would a major league stadium involve Utah taxpayers?

The governor and some lawmakers oppose public subsidies, but could financing be done in a way that protects taxpayers?

Larry H. Miller Company

The Larry H. Miller Company and Miller family unveiled renderings for the Power District, a nearly 100-acre site adjacent to the Utah State Fairpark and the Jordan River, Feb. 15, 2024. Here is an aerial view of the Power District looking east.

By Jay Evensen Deseret News

Baseball fever seems to be taking hold of Utah. It’s hard not to get swept up in it.

You want bipartisanship? How about both Republican Sen. Lincoln Fillmore and Democratic Minority Leader Luz Escamilla donning baseball hats on the Senate floor in support of a resolution welcoming the big leagues to Utah.

“I think this is going to be a state jewel,” Escamilla said.

“It’s going to be more than just something for the west side of Salt Lake City.”

You want exposure? A major league team in Utah would be a strong selling point for any business looking to relocate or expand.

But it isn’t likely to come cheap.

Las Vegas could serve as a guide. The Nevada Legislature last year passed legislation committing up to $380 million

in public financing to help build a stadium that is expected to cost $1.5 billion.

And a baseball stadium may not be the only sports venue in Utah taxpayers’ future. Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith’s Smith Entertainment Group has formally asked the National Hockey League for an expansion franchise in Utah. Because the Delta Center is not designed with sightlines that can ideally accommodate hockey, a new arena presumably would be built.

Would that involve taxpayers, too? It’s hard to know at this point.

At the moment, opposition is tiny, but not insignificant.

Only three state senators voted against the baseball resolution. One of them was Sen. Mike Kennedy, R-Alpine.

“Like most Americans, I love baseball and support efforts to bring an MLB team to Utah,” he told me in a text message.

“I do not support tax dollars being used for this purpose.”

Last spring, when officials from the Larry H. Miller Com-

pany and others formed Big League Utah and announced plans to acquire a team, Gov. Spencer Cox expressed a similar opinion.

“I’m on the record saying that I don’t think taxpayers should subsidize billionaires,” KSL quoted him saying. “I don’t think that’s strong economic policy. I don’t think that’s good for taxpayers, especially when most of the benefits of that (go) directly to the franchise owners.”

But the governor also has expressed his support for the drive to acquire a team. Would he be opposed to every type of public funding? If tax dollars are used, how would this happen?

At a meeting with reporters in the state Senate president’s office last week, state Sen. Lincoln Fillmore, R-South Jordan, who sponsored the resolution welcoming the big leagues to Utah, said lawmakers were looking at various funding mechanisms being used for stadiums nationwide.

“We found some very good models that protect taxpayers to make sure that we’re not putting taxpayer money at risk,” he said. He later told me it’s too soon to talk about specifics.

Senate President Stuart Adams reassured Utahns their investment would be paid back in spades.

“There’s going to be an economic kick from this,” he said.

“There’ll be more property tax, There’ll be all kinds of sales tax revenue, but it will have to sustain itself, I think that’s pretty evident. And I think it will do more than sustain itself. It will raise the entire area.”

The stadium is planned for a 100-acre site along North Temple, between the airport and downtown. It is near the Fairpark neighborhood, which has been struggling economically. Adams said the ballpark, which presumably would be part of a larger commercial and residential project, would “breathe life” into the area.

A common method of funding construction projects is to use tax increment financing. A public entity loans money that is paid off by the extra property tax money the project generates after completion. Generally, this does not require a tax increase. Others have talked about setting up a ballpark authority, with its own board, to govern how tax money is used. The term “public-private partnership” is heard a lot on Capitol Hill.

The legislative resolution said a big league team would enhance the state culturally and economically. It’s hard to argue against that, particularly for a metro area and state in the far West struggling for national recognition.

For the most part, Utahns seem thrilled with the idea. An opinion poll conducted for the Deseret News and the Hinckley Institute of Politics last spring found 81% of Utahns in favor of efforts to bring a big league team to the state.

As this plays out, the political struggle over if, and how, taxpayers get involved will be interesting to watch.

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

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SPORTS

Where do BYU, Utah and Utah State land in bracketology projections midway through February?

The Cougars and Aggies are staying strong in their pursuit of an NCAA Tournament berth, while the Utes have fallen off • Utah State: No. 5 seed vs. Appalachian State in the first round, Spokane regional.

• Utah: Not included, designated among First Four Out.

Fox Sports

• BYU: No. 5 seed vs. McNeese State in the first round.

• Utah State: No. 7 seed vs. Grand Canyon in the first round.

• Utah: Not included.

The Bracketeer

• BYU: No. 6 seed vs. Nebraska in the first round, Pittsburgh regional.

• Utah State: No. 7 seed vs. Ole Miss in the first round, Omaha regional.

• Utah: No. 11 seed vs. Gonzaga in a First Four game, Dayton, Ohio.

What stands out about the latest BYU, Utah State and Utah bracketology projections?

Laura Seitz, Deseret News

Fans cheer as the UCF Knights and the BYU Cougars meet at the Marriott Center in Provo on Tuesday, Feb. 13, 2024. The Cougars prevailed.

By Brandon Judd Deseret News

Selection Sunday, March 17, is just over a month away.

As of right now, BYU and Utah State look like locks to make the men’s basketball NCAA Tournament.

Utah, meanwhile, was once seen as a strong candidate to end its NCAA drought, but that’s changed in recent weeks.

The next four weeks will ultimately determine their postseason fates, with the regular season wrapping up and conference tournaments soon thereafter.

Here’s a look at several national bracketology projections for BYU, Utah and Utah State with February halfway over.

What are the latest bracketology projections for BYU, Utah and Utah State?

ESPN

• BYU: No. 5 seed vs. Samford in the first round, Salt Lake City regional.

• Utah State: No. 7 seed vs. Butler in the first round, Charlotte regional.

• Utah: Designated at Last Team In, No. 11 seed vs. Nevada in a First Four game, Dayton, Ohio.

CBS Sports

• BYU: No. 5 seed vs. Samford in the first round, Pittsburgh regional.

• Utah State: No. 5 seed vs. Appalachian State in the first

round, Spokane regional.

• Utah: Designated among Last Four In, No. 11 seed vs. Texas in a First Four game, Dayton, Ohio.

Team Rankings

• BYU: No. 4 seed.

• Utah State: No. 5 seed.

• Utah: No. 10 seed.

USA Today

• BYU: No. 5 seed vs. UC Irvine in the first round, Spokane regional.

• Utah State: No. 6 seed vs. Utah-Nebraska winner in the first round, Memphis regional.

• Utah: Designated among Last Four In, No. 11 seed vs. Nebraska in a First Four game, Dayton, Ohio.

Stadium

• BYU: No. 5 seed vs. Richmond in the first round, Salt Lake City regional.

• Utah State: No. 6 seed vs. Grand Canyon in the first round, Omaha regional.

• Utah: No. 9 seed vs. Northwestern in the first round, Brooklyn regional.

The Washington Post

• BYU: No. 5 seed vs. McNeese State in the first round, Salt Lake City regional.

• BYU: The Cougars are seen as a No. 5 seed by six of the eight projections used for this story, with one going as high as a No. 4 and another going as low as a No. 6 seed.

Three predictions have BYU playing in the Delta Center to start the NCAA Tournament (the venue hosts the first two rounds this year).

• Utah State: The most common seed for the Aggies right now is a No. 7 seed, though they are getting some votes for a No. 5 or a No. 6 seed as well.

• Utah: The Runnin’ Utes, after losing two games at home last week, are squarely on the NCAA bubble — a couple of the bracket projections don’t have Utah in the field, while four others have the Runnin’ Utes playing a First Four game.

How are BYU, Utah State and Utah trending right now at February’s midpoint?

• BYU: The Cougars (18-6, 6-5 Big 12) have won four of their past five games, including fending off a wild last-minute rally from UCF on Tuesday, and are currently No. 9 in the NET rankings. BYU finds itself in the upper half of the Big 12 standings and above .500 in league play for the first time, with seven regular-season games to play.

• Utah State: The Aggies (21-4, 9-3 Mountain West) sit atop the Mountain West Conference standings after beating Boise State by 19 points in their most recent game, helping right the ship after a rare two-game losing streak. Utah State, which is No. 27 in the NET rankings, still has games at Colorado State and at home vs. San Diego State and New Mexico — all three are currently in the NET’s top 30.

• Utah: The Utes (15-10, 6-8 Pac-12) dropped below .500 in league play for the first time this season after losing at home against Arizona and Arizona State, their first two home losses of the year. Utah, No. 48 in the NET rankings, has now lost four of five and will play five of its final seven regular-season games on the road — the Utes are just 1-6 in true road games this season.

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

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20 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

HUMOR

BYU has a Taylor Swift class.

Here are the classes I wish had been available when I was there There have to be at least tens of us who could have benefited from a ‘How to live your life’ class

The thousands of vents in your home and how to clean them

One of the most alarming and unwelcome discoveries of home ownership is the ubiquity of vents. Everything has a vent.

And guess what — all those vents need to be cleaned. What happens if you fail to clean those vents regularly? From what I can gather, your house burns down. So how do you know how to clean them? When the vent starts to smell weird, you search frantically on YouTube until you find a suburban dad’s channel and fast forward through the 20-minute intros until you finally get to the vent-cleaning tutorials.

I would much prefer a course where we studied the user manuals for hair dryers, clothing dryers, microwaves and duct systems until we mastered the cleaning protocols and turned in an Excel sheet with a cleaning schedule for our final exam.

Driving on ice 101

I’m not the only one who would benefit from this class.

During my time as a Coug, I lived in a house on a main road just short of the BYU campus. One morning after a snowstorm, my roommates and I sat and watched the road and saw five different drivers lose control of their vehicle and collide with a snowbank.

No one knows what to do when their car stops responding to the steering wheel or the brakes. We probably covered it in driver’s ed, but it’s really just a matter of luck and adrenaline when I, or anyone, manages to drive on ice unscathed. I would appreciate a course that actually teaches me what to do when the wheels start slipping.

Eliza Anderson, Deseret News

By Meg Walter Deseret News

This semester, 30 students at Brigham Young University are enrolled in “Ms. Americana: Taylor Swift on Ethics and Society,” a political philosophy course taught by self-proclaimed Swiftie and philosophy professor Ryan Davis. According to the course description, Davis and his students will study Swift’s song lyrics through a philosophical lens.

It sounds fun. And I’m a little jealous. Not because I wish there was a Taylor Swift class when I was at BYU. I hate to age myself, but when I was there, Swift was still performing country music and maybe that song about wearing T-shirts and sitting in the bleachers. There wouldn’t have been enough material for a semester-long philosophy course.

And even if I could somehow bend space and time to be a BYU student in 2024 — the era of Swift’s pop-culture juggernaut status, with 10 albums of study material — the course would not be for me. I’m one of seven people left on Earth who is neutral on the pop singer, and it would be unfair for me to take the seat

of a dyed-in-the-wool Swiftie.

What makes me jealous is the existence of a class like the one taught by Davis — the sense of immediacy and relevance for the students enrolled. It’s a class that could have real-world application, even if it’s only a fresh angle to bring to Taylor-adjacent conversations at parties.

I loved my university education and the things I learned at BYU, but not a lot of people at social functions are super interested in hearing about the history of British literature or the post-colonialism themes in “Heart of Darkness.” And I haven’t found a ton of real-world applications for the things I learned in my years of studying for an English degree, other than, you know, my job as a writer.

So I just kind of wish there had been some classes with less esoteric and more practical knowledge that I could have taken to supplement my academic know-how with some everyday knowhow.

When I do manage to bend space and time and return to life as a college student, these are the sorts of courses that I hope will be offered.

Small talk for beginners

This one might actually be just for me, but I have never walked away from a small-talk conversation feeling like I did anything other than embarrass myself. I am constantly fighting for my life trying to keep the conversation from stalling out but also not saying anything off-putting. I have yet to win that fight.

I inevitably find myself making an excuse to walk away from the conversation two minutes after it started or asking who the other person voted for in the most recent presidential election.

This course would be a painful but necessary one, with lots of role-play opportunities and a thick textbook that covers what is appropriate to ask someone you just met at an acquaintance’s gathering or on a ski lift — and what isn’t.

I’d also appreciate courses on which tax forms I need every year, and how to schedule my sprinkler system.

Maybe these classes are already offered and I missed them in the course catalog. Maybe everyone else has been able to pick up on these practical life skills in their actual, practical life. But there have to be at least tens of us who could have benefited from a “How to live your life” class.

Just something to think about for the coming semesters.

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

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UTAH

Bountiful’s Vito: a one-man cheesesteak band For 3 hours in the heart of every weekday, Vito’s eatery reigns supreme in downtown Bountiful

Megan Nielsen, Deseret News

Vito Leone, owner of Vito's, poses for a portrait holding a Philly cheesesteak at Vito's in Bountiful on Monday, Jan. 8, 2024. Vito's is a cash-only eatery specializing in Philly cheesesteaks.

By Lee Benson Deseret News

We’re here on First South and Main Street in the heart of Bountiful, behind a crowd of people trying to get in the front door of a newish red brick building. It could be a bank run, or maybe something to do with Taylor Swift tickets.

Turns out it’s none of the above. The people standing in line are waiting to order a Philly cheesesteak.

This is not a one-time thing, the people queuing up will tell you. Most every day, rain or shine, it’s like this. At lunchtime, there’s no place in downtown Bountiful more popular than Vito’s.

This is true even if, on paper, it doesn’t make sense. At least not in a Harvard Business School business plan sort of way. Consider the following: Vito’s is open just three hours a day, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., and only on Monday through Friday. It’s closed on weekends.

Vito’s accepts only cash; no credit or debit cards.

When Vito’s runs out of food it shuts down. On especially busy days that might be 1:30 or even earlier. At which point, Vito will inform those in line they’ll have to come back tomorrow.

Oh, and when Vito gets sick or takes a vacation (which he does for 21⁄2 weeks every April) he tapes a sign on the front door that says, “Closed.”

Vito’s, in short, manages to veto just about everything other conventional eateries do. In the cookie-cutter, copycat, franchised, cutthroat, stressed-out restaurant world, this is the glaring exception.

At the center of it all is 53-year-old Vito Leone, a friendly man wearing shorts, running shoes and a John Deere ball cap — the unconventional mastermind behind Vito’s many unconventions.

Except for a hired hand named Ron who wipes the tables, restocks the chips and mops the floor during rush hour, Vito’s IS Vito. A one-man band. A solo show. He does it all, takes the order, cooks the food, puts the sandwich on the counter, then waits on the next guy. He does this with re-

markable alacrity. The line moves fast. It takes him less than a minute to cook a cheesesteak. The cash-only system works like a Swiss clock. It’s something he picked up from a street vendor selling doughnuts in Manhattan.

“Just put your money in the box and make your own change,” he says. “It’s the honor system. I figured if he can do that in Times Square, New York, I can do it in Bountiful, Utah.”

He likes not hassling with cards, he likes running his own show, he likes keeping things simple. “I don’t want a crew,” he says, “don’t want the hassle.”

He first paid his dues in the mainstream restaurant business. As a kid he learned to love food from his mother, Linda, a great cook who he credits with teaching him everything he knows. Even before he graduated from Kearns High School he was cooking pizzas at a restaurant he later became a partner in. After that folded, he waited tables, bartended, worked the front of the house and the back of the house.

He was managing a bar at Carver’s Steak House in 2007 when he decided to branch out on his own and open a food cart selling pastas, bratwursts and sausage sandwiches. He first tried downtown Salt Lake, with limited success, so he switched to Bountiful, where he got much better feedback when he took his cart to the weekly farmer’s market.

Soon, the food cart evolved into the very first food truck licensed in Bountiful. One day, on a whim he decided to put a Philly cheesesteak on the menu. He’d never made one before. The response was so enthusiastic that one of his customers, John Hepworth, a Bountiful real estate developer in addition to being a cheesesteak connoisseur, offered to build Vito a restaurant on land he owned on Main Street.

They shook hands, Hepworth built the red brick building in 2012, and Vito has been doing it his way ever since.

“I run it like a food truck, but I’m inside,” he says.

He has two items on the menu, an Italian sausage sandwich and Philly cheesesteaks, which account for 90-something percent of his business. Everything’s included in the price: drink, chips, even tax.

He takes your order, shouts out what you owe him, then it’s up to you to put the cash in the box on the counter. He says he’s never been short. “People are really honest. Sometimes I’ll find an envelope at the back door with some cash in it from a customer who didn’t make the right change.”

In the beginning he was open for lunch and dinner. “But after working 80-90 hours a week I said, ‘that’s it, I’m going back to lunches.’”

His work days are nine hours now, starting at 7 when he arrives to prep and ending at 4 after he’s cleaned everything and locked the door.

People are constantly telling Vito he should franchise.

“I looked into it,” he admits. “I’m like, nope. I’m a noncorporate kind of guy, I’m just a low tech guy in a high tech world.”

With a line out the door, and no one to answer to other than himself.

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

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24 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

© 2024

40, No. 12

Oobleck gets it name from a book by Dr. Seuss.

In the book, sticky green gobs of goo fall from the sky. They call it Oobleck.

Use the code to discover the name of the book.

Is it a liquid?

Or is it a solid?

Oobleck acts like both a liquid and a solid! Make some yourself and feel this crazy substance!

TRY THIS:

STUFF YOU’LL NEED:

After your Oobleck is well mixed, gently

• 1 cup of cornstarch • ½ cup of water • Food coloring (just for fun) • A bowl • Your hands

feel the top.

What does it feel like?

Next, pick up a handful of Oobleck and squeeze it into a ball. What does it feel like now?

DIRECTIONS:

a bowl. If you 1. Measure ½ cup of water and pour into the water. to s drop few a have food coloring, add your bowl.

2. Measure 1 cup of cornstarch. Pour into minutes to 3. Mix the water and cornstarch for 10 take turns with to t wan t migh You . right just it e mak a partner. s. nsion

e experiments; understand suspe

scienc Standards Link: Conduct simple

Oobleck Advertisement

Look for an advertisement in the newspaper that you like.

Rewrite the advertisement to make an ad to sell Oobleck.

Standards Link: Language Arts: Write persuasively.

Can you pick up any other liquids and make them into a solid ball?

Open your hand with the Oobleck ball sitting on your palm. What happens?

A= B= C= D=

E= H= K= L=

M= N= O= P=

R= S= T= W=

Standards Link: Language Arts: Follow simple written directions.

ACTS BALL BOWL CRAZY CUP DROPS FEEL HAND LIQUID MIX OOBLECK OPEN POUR SOLID WATER

Z C J O W A T E R O

C N E P O H Q O Y D

X U L L A B R V Z B

S K P N C O L F A Y

D Q D N T W I E R H

I R P M S L Q E C A

L X O H I Y U L J K

O E U P W X I V P L

S N R I S B D W S D

Standards Link: Letter sequencing. Recognize identical words. Skim and scan reading. Recall spelling patterns.

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

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26 DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

EVENTS

Baseball Auction Banquet March 13 Time: 6pm-10pm Location: 3000 N Center St - Lehi | (801) 610-8820 https://calendar.google.com/calendar/embed?src=alpinedistrict.org_rgs6ku5vqrhofuv2v9a9voj0h8%40group. calendar.google.com&ctz=America/Denver Senior Lunch Bunch March 13 Time: 11am-12pm Location: 10 East Center Street - North Salt Lake https://www.nslcity.org/calendar.aspx TFNU Author Dinner Event with Anne Hillerman March 14 Time: 5pm-8:30pm Location: 1701 Park ln - Ogden https://www.tfnu.org/author-event-2024 Locals Rock March 15 5:30pm Location: 455 25th St. - Ogden Price: $15.00 https://www.nowplayingutah.com/event/locals-rockthe-monarch Recess on Main - Understanding Complex Wines March 15 Time: 6:30pm-7:45pm Location: 255 Main Street - Park City Price: $59.00 https://www.foxschoolofwine.com/friday-live-classes--recess-on-main.html#

Guru’s Cafe Karaoke March 16 - 6 Location: 45 East Center Street - Provo http://www.downtownprovo.org/#!events/cnrh Last Chance Beach Bash March 16 - April 6 Time: 2:30pm-4:30pm Location: 12000 Big Cottonwood Canyon Rd Solitude https://www.nowplayingutah.com/event/last-chancebeach-bash-2

Danny Elfman’s Percussion Concerto: Finishing Touches Rehearsal March 22 - 23 Time: 10am Location: 123 W South Temple - SLC https://utahsymphony.org/event/id/30676 Plazapalooza March 22 - April 6 Location: Highway 210 Little Cottonwood Canyon - Snowbird https://www.snowbird.com/event/plazapalooza

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*Events and details are subject to change. Please visit the event websites for the most up to date and correct information.

DESERET NEWS | MARCH 2024

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