Sens. Lee, Hatch Introduce Bill Renaming VA Outstation After Major Brent Taylor
WASHIGNTON - Today, Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) introduced a Senate resolution renaming the North Ogden Department of Veteran’s Affairs outstation the Major Brent Taylor Vet Center Outstation. A companion bill was introduced on Tuesday, November 20th, 2018 by Rep. Rob Bishop (R-UT) and was cosponsored by Reps. Chris Stewart (R-UT), John Curtis (R-UT) and Mia Love (R-UT). The bill would rename the outstation after Major Brent Taylor, who made the ultimate sacrifice on November 3rd, 2018 while deployed to Afghanistan. Prior to that deployment, he served as Mayor of North Ogden, where the outstation is located.
“Major Brent Taylor’s life may be best defined by the word ‘service.’” Sen. Lee said. “When he said ‘service is what leadership is all about,’ he knew that from personal experience, and he exemplified that motto in all aspects of his life. Bestowing his name on an outpost that aids his fellow servicemen and women in the town that he loved and served is a poignant way to honor his legacy of service, leadership, and Christ-like love. I am honored to join with my fellow Utah delegation members to bring this bill to the floor.”
“Brent Taylor was a hero, a patriot, a loving father, and a dear friend,” Sen. Hatch said. “News of his death in Afghanistan was devastating to all Utahns. Renaming this facility after Brent is a fitting tribute to his leadership, courage, and integrity. I hope it will also show Jennie and the Taylor family how much we honor their sacrifice.”
Bill text and an online version of this release can be found here.
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Bishop Statement on Passing of President George H. W. Bush
“While I’m sad to learn of the passing of President George H. W. Bush, I can’t help but smile at the thought of him being reunited with his beloved wife, Barbara. So much more than just a President, he exemplified service to our nation and devotion to family. My prayers are with the Bush family during this challenging time.“
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Story Untold
Share New Music Video For
Waves & Waves (Acoustic Sessions)
Out Now
November 30th, 2018 - Canadian pop-rock band Story Untold have shared a new music video for "Chasing Feelings" off their most recent album Waves. Fans can check out the music video here: smarturl.it/ChasingFeelingsVideo
Earlier this year, Story Untold also shared the Waves (Acoustic Sessions). The songs are taken from Waves, which was released on February 2nd of this year. Currently, they are on a tour throughout Canada, with Selfish Things. Early next year, they will kick off a North American tour with Makeout, Handguns, and Oh, Weatherly. For a full list of dates, please see below.
Story Untold is a pop-rock band based out of Montreal, Canada. The band found its humble beginnings in the bedroom of lead vocalist Janick Thibault who laid the foundation for Story Untold through his creative renditions of popular alternative songs that he released through YouTube. After several years of releasing covers, Janick formed eventually formed Story Untold with Jessy Bergy, Aiden Von Rose, and Diego Stranger.
Since their beginnings, Story Untold has cultivated an impressive following of over 330,000 subscribers on YouTube, with over 30 million views including over 300,000 likes on Facebook and thousands more across other various social media platforms. They have since toured North America with Simple Plan, released their self-titled EP, and their debut full length Waves, which is now available to purchase or stream.
Upcoming tour dates:
November 30 - Ottawa, Canada @ Mavericks
December 1 - Montreal, Canada @ Le Ministere
December 3 - Quebec, Canada @ L'ANTI Bar & Sepctacles
December 5 - Windsor, Canada @ Phog Lounge
December 6 - London, Canada @ Rum Runners
December 7 - Hamilton, Canada @ Absinthe
DecemBER 8 - Toronto, Canada @ Adelaide Hall
w/ Makeout, Handguns & Oh, Weatherly
January 11 - Lakewood, OH @ The Foundry
January 12 - Chicago, IL @ Cobra Lounge
January 13 - Detroit, MI @ The Shelter
January 15 - Pittsburgh, PA @ The Smiling Moose
January 17 - New York, NY @ Knitting Factory
January 18 - Boston, MA @ Once Ballroom
January 19 - Philadelphia, PA @ Voltage Lounge
Keep updated on Story Untold:
Facebook: www.facebook.com/StoryUntoldCA
Twitter: www.twitter.com/storyuntoldCA
Instagram: www.instagram.com/storyuntoldca
For more information
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China Policy: Disappointment Is No Excuse
By Mel Gurtov
500 words
Greg Sargent writes in the Washington Post (November 30):
For years after Deng Xiaoping’s decisive turn toward modernization in the late 1970s, U.S. business executives and diplomats supported not only opening the U.S. market to Chinese goods, but also a range of academic, cultural and even military contacts, on the theory that including China in a U.S.-led global system would induce Beijing’s Communist rulers to open their economy and, over time, political system as well. By now, it is abundantly clear to people across the political spectrum that this bet has not paid off. Where there was once a bipartisan consensus in favor of broad engagement with China, now there is almost equally widely shared disappointment with China’s failure to reciprocate as expected.
I think the writer correctly cites America’s disappointment with China. We can go back three or four administrations and find presidents and other top US officials expressing the same sentiment: the more deeply engaged China is in the global economic system, the more cosmopolitan its leaders will become and the more likely it is to succumb to liberal political change. But that all-too-easy formula hasn’t worked. Nor should there have been such widespread expectations that it would work. It rested on an inflated notion of capitalism’s magic, and on a misunderstanding of China’s political history.
For Chinese leaders during and since Mao’s time, the chief purpose of economic strength has been to promote social stability and elevate China’s standing in the world. Political liberalization, far from being the goal of a more powerful economy, has been the outcome to be avoided. “A fortress can be most easily captured from within,” China’s leaders have said, and “bourgeois capitalism” is the kind of force that, if not properly managed, can undermine the one-party state. Under Xi Jinping, China’s extraordinary economic rise has been coupled with stark social controls and emphasis on communist party discipline, precisely in order to prevent certain dangerous features of Western politics from infecting China. Chinese Communist Party Document No. 9 in 2013 cited seven threats to party control, including “Western constitutional democracy,” human rights, pro-market “neoliberalism,” and Western-inspired ideas of media independence and civic participation. That view, reminiscent of Mao’s concerns, should have been taken into account long ago by US leaders.
The two most fundamental problems today in US-China relations are their utterly different political-economic trajectories and the structural dilemma of a (lonely) superpower facing a rapidly rising challenger. America’s disappointment with China is no basis for dealing with these problems—no more so than Chinese disappointment with America’s failure to acknowledge China’s new status in world affairs. China’s rise is irreversible, and the model of economic growth without political liberalization is going to have its appeal—and failures—regardless of American criticisms or insistence on forever being Number One. The proper US response is to compete with China—in trade, development assistance, accountable governance, respect for human rights, and protection of the environment, for example—rather than punish it for deflating American dreams.
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Mel Gurtov, syndicated by PeaceVoice, is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Portland State University.
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