MAKING THE MAGIC HAPPEN

Several months ago, I posted about Elna Baker, the performer and author of the soon-to-be-published memoir "The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance." I had heard a piece of hers on "This American Life" and thought it was amazing.

So I wrote a little post on her and it is now the most popular search term that leads to this site (even more than Thomas Storesund). I was amazed to find an example of someone who is both Mormon and funny and wholesome and even a bit edgy. There's not a lot of that going on.

In keeping with my role as a taste maker, some friends of mine read the post and decided to convince Ms. Baker (based in NYC) to perform a show in LA. Tonight, that show happened. Of course, I wasn't there. A plane ticket from here to LA currently runs somewhere in the neighborhood of $600. I'm not made of money, you now.

But by all accounts, the show was a big success. I'm told there were some agents and casting types in the audience. It's obvious the woman is heading places, so allow me to take credit for the success of the show and any future successes Ms. Baker may have in the future.

You're welcome.

MORMON HUMOR... REALLY!

We Mormons are not a very funny lot. I guess I should clarify that a little bit. If you take a few steps back, we're hilarious. Our guilt burden places us somewhere between the Jews and the Catholics, but God won't let us drink to take the edge off. Then there's the peril of the single Mormon, especially the ones in their 20s and 30s.

The Mormon faith asks a lot of its young people. That whole "no sex before marriage" thing can be a major drag. A lot of Mormons get married in their late teens and early 20s, and it's not hard to see why. And the hearty souls that remain can become seething wads of sexual tension. There are people out there who believe homosexuality is an unnatural sexual practice. The reasoning being that it's doing something with the body for which it was not intended. Let me tell you, celibacy in your 20s is a far more unnatural sexual practice (or non-practice, as the case may be). The body is not designed to do that... trust me.

But I'm getting off on a tangent here. The point is that Mormons are quite funny, as in odd. But we don't have the best sense of humor. Jokes about the Mormon experience are not always greeted well within the community. Mormon taste in humor tends towards the cornball, "Donny & Marie" variety.

So you can imagine my delight when I was listening to This American Life this week and I heard a story about a woman working at a toy store in New York. The story was a funny yet poignant recounting of what happened when the store ran out of white babies before Christmas. I won't say anything more about it except you should listen to the whole thing yourself. (That mp3 will likely be up for only about a week or so, so don't drag your heels.)

At the end of the story, Ira Glass noted that the author had written a memoir called "The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance." A title like that can only have come from one of my people. A short Internet investigation found that Elna Baker is, indeed, Mormon. And the video clip on her MySpace page revealed that she is also very funny.

Below is some video of a show she did where she tells the story of the fateful Halloween dance from which the title of her memoirs apparently comes. It restores my faith that we Mormons may yet find a way to laugh at ourselves. After all, it's worked well for the Jews.

NON-PRESIDENTIAL HAIR

Yesterday I wrote of Mitt Romney's presidential hair. Actually, I was writing about Mitt's religion, but his presidential hair did merit a passing mention. Where was I? Oh yes, hair. Mitt has a fantastic head of hair, as do many other Mormons including Donny Osmond and Aaron Eckhart. What about Gordon Jump? Well, no religion is perfect.

This afternoon my Norwegian friend sent me some pictures from a bygone era where my hair was not up to proper Mormon grooming standards.

As my friend put it, "You tended to get one haircut per semester, and I think you were pretty close to the end of the cycle. My hair almost looks like a wig in some of these photos.

What you're actually seeing here are screen captures from a film project my friend did when we were at school. Here I'm reciting a bit from Allen Ginsberg's "America."

Well, ok, I'm about to recite some of it. I'm embarrassed to say I was not all that familiar with the poem during the shoot. Many years later, I heard a recording of Ginsberg himself reciting "America" and realized I had likely done his work a great disservice during this project.

Sorry. I wasn't hired for my acting ability... just the hair.

THE MORMON QUESTION

I finally got around to watching Mitt Romney's speech on religion in American life. This was billed as Romney's "JFK moment," where he reassured the country (or, in this case, conservative Christians) that he was fit to be president despite the fact that he's not a mainline protestant or a mason or whatever.

Watching the speech, I found myself a little annoyed that he had to give it at all. He actually has a pretty decent resume for the job. He has executive experience, he's turned around failing organizations, he knows French (in a Republican primary, that may actually be a liability). Why should people care all that much about the finer points of his religious beliefs? As far as I'm concerned, a candidate can think he's the reincarnation of the sun god just so long as he uses effective management techniques, doesn't get us into frivolous wars, and doesn't tap my phone without a warrant.

But for an embarrassing number of Americans, this really does matter. About 25 to 30 percent of Americans routinely say they wouldn't vote for a Mormon for president under any circumstances. A few weeks ago, I was watching videotape of a focus group on C-SPAN (yes, my life really is that empty) and I was stunned some of the things I heard. One woman claimed she won't vote for Romney because a friend gave her a copy of the Book of Mormon and the spirit told her not to read it.

Say what? You decided not to read a book, so someone who did read it shouldn't be president? That may actually be a worse decision making process than flipping a coin. But I digress.

I was somewhat impressed by Thursday's speech, more so for the delivery than the content. He looked and sounded presidential. And, as always, he had fabulous hair.

The rhetoric was a little more weak. Calls for religious tolerance were welcome, and the story about Sam Adam's call to prayer during the first constitutional congress was inspiring. But it fell apart when Romney made some clearly untrue statements (freedom needs religion and religion needs freedom? history says otherwise) and didn't seem to have much tolerance for non-believers.

When I wrote about Mitt last June, I said people shouldn't vote for him based on his views on "enhanced interrogation" and GITMO detentions. I wrote this despite the fact that I'm Mormon and, like every minority or sub-group in America, I'd like to see one of my own in the White House some day.

After seeing the Thursday speech, I'm left with the same conclusions. I wish it were otherwise.

MORMON BEEFCAKE, SERVED HERE

This week a friend told me about a calendar coming out this year that features hunky Mormon missionaries. Well, not exactly hunky Mormon missionaries, they're not allowed to pose topless for calendars... or anything, really. Instead, it features hunky Mormons who were recently missionaries. One shot shows the RM (that's Mormon code for "returned missionary") dressed in a short sleeve white shirt and tie. In the next picture, that same guy is a buff, well oiled piece of man-meat.

Many years ago, I was a Mormon missionary in San Diego. Back then, I was told that Playgirl published a survey that found Mormon missionaries were the Second Sexiest Men In America. We lost the top spot to firefighters, but second place isn't all that bad when you consider the competition. Indeed, I did notice women paid much more attention to me once I put on the white shirt, tie, and black tag. (This was especially true in grocery stores, where that outfit could also mean you were a store manager.)

But aside from my anecdotal evidence, it appears the Men in White really are viewed as sex objects in certain circles. The folks that brought you South Park once made a movie where a Mormon missionary was recruited into becoming a (chaste) porn star. And gay cinema recently brought us "Latter Days" where some guy falls in love with a member of God's Army.

All this romantic longing despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that missionaries are only allowed contact with members of the opposite sex via handshake... and even that shouldn't last more than 3 seconds.

But getting back to this calender. The article says the topless guys got paid $500 to pose. Anyone who knows me knows I love $500, but I'm a bit past the age they're looking for in this project. But if they ever put out a "history's hottest" edition of the missionary calender, allow me to submit this gem featuring three newly returned missionaries... totally topless!

You can make out the $500 check to Matthew Workman. Nobody really cares about those other two guys.

9/11 +6

I doubt I’ll write about September 11th again. Six years on, everything that can be said on the subject has already been said. (Except for, “I’m sorry for using 9/11 as an excuse for an unjustified war against Iraq.” But that’s really hoping for too much.) I know I pretty much wrote my share last year.

And with the passage of time, the day is slowly losing its impact. On September 11th, 2002, I wrote a pained editorial for The Daily Sundial asking, “When will we laugh again on this tragic date?” Twelve hours later, David Letterman answered that question by doing a short tribute to the Twin Towers, then launching into a Top Ten list that skewered New York City. September 11th has been much less somber since, and I’d say that’s a good thing.

While the September 11th anniversary will likely top our local and national news coverage, I’m not aware of any major prime time tributes this year. In another six years, there will be junior high school students who weren’t even born when the 9/11 attacks happened. To them, 9/11 will be like Pearl Harbor Day: a date that was to live in infamy forever, but is really only talked about by old people.

If you want to know how much things have changed, look no farther than the latest Osama bin Laden tape. They used to have the power to send oil prices through the roof, but this latest one almost seems a little silly. In it, bin Laden didn’t threaten the U.S. with any more attacks, but he did urge all Americans to convert to Islam.

It appears Osama has learned that a decades long campaign of murder and terror hasn’t earned him many converts here in the states. So it’s time to soften the message. I know a little something about all this, as I was once a Mormon missionary and spent two years trying to convince people to convert to my religion.

Our early attempts at terror-based conversion had limited results.(You have a lot of questions about this picture, but I don’t have time to answer them. Suffice it to say that everything in the above image would make sense if you had all the background.)

But then we softened our message a little bit, ran some very touching TV ads, and things went a lot better. For instance, instead of putting threatening videos on TV, might I suggest bin Laden produce a 30 second spot that goes a little like this:

“Sure, you know about Christ’s ministry in Jerusalem 2000 years ago, but did you know about another book that mentions Jesus: the Koran! Call this toll free number now and we’ll sent you your very own copy of the Koran free of charge. If you’d like, two nice, non-threatening young men can come by your home and tell you more about the Koran.”

Laugh if you want but there’s an urban legend floating around that bin Laden was spotted in Utah. Can it be much longer before his minions start going door-to-door?

“Hello, I’m Elder bin Laden, and this is Elder Atta. We’re representatives of… well, that’s not all that important. We’re going around your neighborhood sharing a brief message about…”

I don’t know what happens next because that’s generally when people shut the door. But this new era of proselytizing by al-Qaeda could lead to a promising new era where extremists are merely annoying instead of deadly. An if that happens, perhaps we don't have to devote much time to commemorating 9/11 in the future.

And if they need any ill-fitting white shirts, I’ve got plenty in a box somewhere.

LOSING FAITH IN MITT

While I hardly consider myself a Republican, I’ve spent the last few months rooting for Mitt Romney as he runs for president.

The first reason is perhaps the dumbest: he’s Mormon. You see, I’m Mormon, too, and it’s every minority or sub-group’s dream to put one of their own in the White House. Think of how excited the Greeks got when Dukakis was running 20 years ago. (Someone had to be excited about that, right?)

This instinct has its limits, however. I’m not so Mormon that I could bring myself to support Orrin Hatch during his no-hope presidential bid in 2000. Nor do I believe that Mormons are inherently good at running things. The state of Utah has been run by Mormons for 150 years, and its government spends most of its time trying to figure out if Satan loves illegal immigrants.

But Mitt does have a lot going for him. He was a successful businessman. He turned the Salt Lake City Olympics from a scandal-ridden joke to a successful and profitable event. He got elected governor in a Democratic state and actually enacted a universal health coverage plan. That’s not a bad resume, really. (Although not as good as Bill Richardson’s.)

And, yes, Mitt does have presidential hair.

But Mitt does have a few things going against him. First, he’s changed some crucial opinions a few times in his political career. As a result, conservatives think he’s a moderate dressing up as a right winger, and moderates think he’s a right winger pretending to be centrist. Not a good place to be.

But he’s got another big liability: he’s Mormon. Before the campaign, I naively thought this wouldn’t be much of an issue, but I’m clearly wrong.

Mormons haven’t always had the easiest time in America. For several decades, they were driven from city to city by angry mobs. It was actually legal to kill Mormons in the state of Missouri until 1976. In the 1970s, my dad was on an airplane when a woman discovered he was Mormon. She asked to see his horns.

But that’s ancient history, right? Nope. While I can honestly say that I’ve never experienced any discrimination because of my religion (except for that one time when my Jewish friend wouldn’t set me up with any of her friends because of my chaste lifestyle) there is apparently more than a little hostility to Mormons out there. Over the past few months the press has been filled with hateful and distorted information about Mormons coming from both the left and the right. I’m not going to bother linking to any of it, but when both Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton are ganging up on you, it’s not good news.

Mitt’s stiffest challenge may be in the south, where more than a few people labor under the misapprehension that Mormons eat their babies in secret temple rituals. Even in the nation as a whole, around 30 percent of people say they wouldn’t vote for a Mormon under any circumstance.

It’s a little disheartening, really. I thought we had gotten past all this nonsense when JFK got elected 47 years ago. “A Catholic in the White House!? So now the Pope gets to run our country?” Yet many people who would find the previous statement offensive or absurd have no problem openly admitting they wouldn’t vote for someone strictly because of their religion.

Of course, they shouldn’t vote for Mitt. Nobody should, in my opinion. I came to that sad conclusion after the May 15th Republican debate on Fox News. In that debate, Mitt said the US should double the size of our prison in Guantanamo. He also supports “enhanced interrogation” which is the new code word for “torture.” You can see his full comments here… (Mitt's campaign actually posted this on YouTube)

For a man as smart and savvy as Mitt not to understand that GITMO detentions undermine all that we stand for as a nation is simply unacceptable. He’ll say that the War on Terror ™ is a fight for our way of life. But if we destroy our way of life in the process, when what are we really fighting for? If he can't understand that, then he's really not fit to be president.

Oh Mitt, I once had such high hopes for you. The dream of a Mormon president will have to wait for another time, and for a more attractive candidate. President Donny Osmond, anyone?