Writer's Block: Do you see psychics in your future?

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Clairvoyant, n. A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron -- namely, that he is a blockhead. (Ambrose Bierce)

'Nuff said.

The Magic Lantern

Had a real treat tonight. Many people are familiar with the photography work of C.R. Savage, best known for his 1869 series of photos depicting the linking of the first transcontinental railroad.



Tragically, most of Savages negatives were destroyed in two disastrous fires, one in 1883 and the other in 1909. While prints of much of his work exist, a series of 1600 glass slides, which had been exposed and developed directly onto glass - thus qualifying as negatives - were preserved in a separate location, and a family has been going around showing these slides to people in the intermountain West for three generations.

Tonight we had a chance to see about 100 of these, taken between 1860 and 1900, mostly focusing on the area around the Salt Lake Temple. Our congregation is celebrating its 160th year of existence this year, and this was a wonderful part of the festivities.


Richard K. Winter, on the right, with his 1909-era projector and one of the glass slides which have been in his family for three generations.


"Amelia House", the home of Brigham Young's favorite wife. Looks like the Addams Family mansion, doesn't it?


The Lion House, Church Offices, and Beehive House (Brigham Young's residence).

I was delighted to have been able to experience this rare bit of history.

Benevolent Dictatorship

Caveat: Secular Humanists may want to skip this post.



Tonight's Schlock Mercenary brought me up short. One doesn't usually hear people extol the virtues of dictatorship in public, at least not if they're worried about their political future.

While the country could use people in office with the acumen and common sense that Howard Tayler displays, tragically he seems occupied with being a cartoonist and is thus subject to the scorn of nations on a regular basis. One more batch of scathing, vitriolic emails from disgruntled readers shouldn't make much difference.

Fortunately, to balance the equation, there are those whose understanding surpasses that of the unwashed masses:



But back to my thesis: It would be good to live under a just, enlightened and moral ruler who afforded his subjects their agency. This sounds only like a contradiction in terms because there have been so few examples of this kind of leadership in human history.

Monday's strip immediately put me in mind of the words of an ancient American prophet-king named Mosiah:

"Therefore, if it were possible that you could have just men to be your kings, who would establish the laws of God, and judge this people according to his commandments, yea, if ye could have men for your kings who would do even as my father Benjamin did for this people—I say unto you, if this could always be the case then it would be expedient that ye should always have kings to rule over you." (Book of Mormon, Mosiah 29:13)

In the secular environment, this model fails on all levels, because the concepts of justice and morality are relative, and impossible to pin down with any certainty. In the regular (i.e. the opposite of secular) environment, the most obvious parallel is the millennial rule of Christ as Theocrat/King. Outside of that, a just and moral dictator would have to be following an absolute standard of justice and morality, based on absolute fairness - which could only happen if the ruler were in regular contact with Divinity, hence, a prophet as well as a king. No ordinary mortal could pull it off.

From "Fiddler on the Roof"
What's wrong with being rich?
It's no reason to marry.
Money's the world's curse.
May the Lord smite me with it, and may I never recover!

I'm with that. May God smite the nations of the world with such rulers.