Listen Now

Donald Trump and Joseph Smith were likely the most polarizing presidential candidates that America has ever had but they have at least three more major similarities. Both were accused of inciting riots while they were presidential candidates but never convicted. While Joseph Smith wasn't calling to "drain the swamp" he did believe that America's democracy was highly flawed and corrupt and needed a major overhaul and a new direction. Much like Trump and he was probably the most anti-establishment candidate America had ever seen: disliked by many but fervently loved, and obeyed by his dedicated followers. Smith's bid for the Presidency was cut short when he was murdered by a mob. Still, there is plenty that can be learned from the last time that a huge segment of the population demonstrated such vitriolic outrage for a set of beliefs and a movement lead by a massively ambitious leader. In this podcast we reveal surprising new evidence that shows just how far The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints prophet, leader, and founder wanted to go in his ambitions and transform the United States into a theocracy. Visit UtahStories.com to subscribe to our weekly digital newsletter. Follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook Support this program by buying from CMRbeef.com/UtahStories

Get the story behind the settlement and development of the Great Basin in this episode of the Utah Stories Show that dives deep into Mormon Pioneer history and the community-building efforts of the early pioneers. Find out what they had right, that we have largely forgotten. Why is this relevant today? Utah has now more tech jobs per capita than any other state. Our educated workforce, strong family values and comparatively cheap real estate has successfully landed big tech in little Utah. But what is to stop Utah from becoming just like California? Great for the elite tech workers and rich; but terrible for middle-class working Americans who are only watching their dreams of owning homes and businesses disappear. Utah once had very clearly defined priorities and values. Those values defined the entire Great Basin area and most western states. The values were to keep government small, maintain a strong middle class and maintain limited government by maintaining a strong civic partnership between small and medium-sized businesses and government. Today, more than ever our government is operating like a plutocracy, for the rich, by the rich -- and catering to big corporations and massive tech companies. It's time we returned to the original western values which defined the culture of the region. Brigham Young and Joseph Smith's ideals to create strong local economies and communities have been largely forgotten. In this episode, we illustrate how Brigham Young and the Latter-day Saints successfully built nearly 600 small communities throughout the West, from Canada to Mexico and throughout the entire Great Basin. Visit UtahStories.com to subscribe to our free digital newsletter. Follow Utah Stories on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. You can also support Utah Stories by supporting our advertisers and subscribing to our monthly print magazine.    

Bitcoin is surging in value; as is gold, real estate and all precious metals. More people than ever are getting out of storing their money in dollars and putting their wealth into other assets. Average people are now putting their extra cash into stocks, which is causing the markets to reach record surging levels in a recession. But "average investors" are refusing to be pawns to a system they cannot control. Reddit groups are learning how to "game the system" to stick it to hedge fund investors who maintain methods to rig the system as demonstrated with the billions hedge funds lost due to the GameStop revolt. Where will all of this end? Very likely fiat currency and the banking cartels will be losing their power as crypto currency and peer-to-peer lending becomes a reality replacing the banking industry's cartel on lending. Furthering this massive sea-change in finance is how fiat currency is going out of style. Fiat dollars enable governments to maintain cartel control on the exchange of goods and services-- is slowly going to end as Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies become more widely accepted methods of exchange. The world of finance is ending as we know it, and it's happening more quickly than you might realize. What can you do to prepare for these changes? We offer a few suggestions in this episode of the Utah Stories Show. This is one part of our "End of the World" series if you enjoy this please give us a thumbs up and subscribe. We have far more content available on UtahStories.com

The LA Times, Wall Street Journal and all major networks are reporting on how the mass exodus from California is intensifying. In Utah we are beginning to feel the tsunami of Californians flooding into our state. This is reflected in our sky-rocketing real estate prices. Soaring home prices, a massive growing tech sector and a growing homeless population are all becoming realities in Utah. This all sounds very familiar to the conditions that already exist in California and Washington's tech areas. Will Utah repeat the same mistakes? In this in-depth analysis we examine how and why California is suffering from an ever-increasing homeless population which is driving the middle-class and working poor away from LA Counties. It appears the problem will only intensify before it gets better. In Utah we need to realize that former CA residents will be coming here in ever-increasing numbers. How do we best handle all of this growth?

More people are choosing experiences over material things; Time well spent rather than time on the clock. The rising "gatherings" of Winter Count and Rabbit Stick is a demonstration of how people want to get into away from the corporate world of screens, cubicles and punch clocks -- and back to working in nature with natural materials. In this episode we explore the people who define this movement including a leather tanner, a basket weaver, a flit knapper, a mountain man and a young man who dropped out of a lucrative sales career to make his own bows and arrows so he could hunt his own food. Are these people crazy? Or are these perhaps the last of the normal people in a world that gone insane? It's a fascinating study. We also examine the changing diets of neolithic people and what the Ute Indians of Utah ate.

Big-tech is taking aim at the voices on the right and silencing decent. They do this under the pretense that they are preventing violence and hate speech. This perhaps seems justified to many Americans. But now voices on the center and independent publishers are being silenced as well. Utah Stories mission is to promote civil discourse and the voices on both sides of political debate. But when we attempted to cover the protests on Utah's Capitol Hill on January 6th we had a post banned by Instagram. We want to believe that this ban was the result of their bots and their algorithm inaccurately tagging our photo (which was of two musicians). We want to believe that Instagram (owned by Facebook) doesn’t want to silence independent voices, but prevent the spread of hate and violence. But according to Debbie Aldrich of Creative Destruction Media, this is simply not the case.

Utah Capitol building-- The Proud Boys, local militia groups, retired veterans and angry citizens were all on hand to protest the final confirmation of Joe Biden's electoral victory. Utah Stories’ objective was to understand if indeed Trump supporters were disavowing themselves from the Republican Party. We spoke to about a dozen protestors who feel that the election was fraudulent. Many did believe that the Republican Party is now turning its support away from Trump, and many of them were turning their support away from the Republican Party.

There are stories that are hidden, that aren’t getting attention, that are not getting the coverage they deserve because of some high authority's disapproval. I would like to share some of them with you. Investigative journalists not allowed to report on the truth The Inland Port is illegal The corrupted leader who tainted Utah’s Medical Cannabis Program Dominion voting machines designed to create an error?

What was happening in Utah when Christianity began to flourish in western Europe?  How did the Society and societies of Native Americans evolve over the same period of history (200 BC- 1800 AD) which we are all much more familiar with.  We talk to Joel Janetski PhD who taught at BYU for 28 years and has written numerous books on Native American tribes including the Fremont people.

The development projects over farmland are contrary to the original Mormon Pioneer’s vision of a sustainable future. Brigham Young is quoted saying “Utah’s fertile soils were worth their weight in gold and called upon state and local officials to preserve our farms, concluding that “the value of these lands surpasses … the value of nearly every other conceivable use, and should be reserved for our food security needs.” Why now are so many of Utah’s political leaders so ready to rezone agricultural areas into residential and vacation properties? According to the ranchers Utah Stories spoke to, it is because many of the political leaders are in the property development business.

We examine the following: Rebel Saints Party Against Covid Utah Bans Slavery Igloos for outdoor dining Fall Hiking with Dogs Was the recent Covid spread in Utah County due to a rebellious group of young people who gathered around Utah Lake to rebel against government mandates? Also, what was the ballot referendum all about that banned slavery? Did slavery exist in Utah prior to the ban? We examine how the spread of "feel good" measures to condemn old laws and language is spreading in the United States.

This is our special Halloween Edition of the Hidden Utah Podcast. On today’s program, we visit Utah's most haunted shop.  We have done a few stories on Utah Book and Magazine and Pete and his ghosts, today we are revising his shop where he shows the latest antics of his ghosts. And they will surprise you! Also, we will be examining a few important Utah headlines. These are a combination of headlines from our daily newspapers, blogs, magazine stories and other places we find things online. It’s what we are calling “Utah Tidbits”. What we do is span the Utah news universe to bring you the most interesting, compelling and culturally representative Utah stories. Also, we will be talking about how haunted houses are surviving despite Covid-19. If you are new to Utah you might notice how completely obsessed people here are with Halloween. People here, I think it’s mostly Mormons, go completely nuts over Halloween. They love the gore, the costumes, the horror, the macabre-- I think when you live in a culture, anything that is allowed they will do to a maximum level. But anyhow, we will check out what Utah’s most famous haunted houses are doing to stay open despite Covid.

Green energy: it’s become a topic of political contention because everyone especially on the right is fearful of how we are going to pay for it and how it might be a trojan horse to usher in socialism or fascism. The far left believes that if we don’t embrace green energy now, we will destroy our planet due to climate change. The right believes that the risk of destroying our economy in hopes of mitigating the effects of climate change makes no sense because there is no conclusive evidence if we lower carbon emissions even significantly that that will make a significant impact on climate change. Who is right? Visit us at UtahStories.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook.            

We are all standing over the Grand Canyon of political chasms. Two completely different landmasses are separating further and further and it seems that the distance apart is growing because neither of the two sides is on speaking terms, instead, they are speaking past each other. While the mainstream media networks are the most obvious examples of these distancing lands, the polarization of our country in this presidential election year is becoming stark and binary. The most disturbing trend is that –as a person who has resided mostly in the center– it seems that both camps are only offering a “winner-take-all” solution and strategy in winning the upcoming election.

In our hour-long discussion, we get into many of the misconceptions that suburbanites and whites have about the Black Lives Matter Movement.  Lex Scott, Director of Black Lives Matter Utah also states all of the criminal justice reform objectives that Black Lives Matter Utah would like to see. “I’ve been protesting for seven years, I’m sick of protesting. Let’s pass some police reform.”

This episode of Utah Stories show focuses on: —The huge destruction around the city caused by the 100 MPH winds from a hurricane —Zoom meeting depression and the lack of authentic connectivity due to COVID —Millennials finding creative ways to have fun during COVID: Having fun protesting Visit us at www.UtahStories.com Follow us on Instagram  Utah Stories. Subscribe to our online newsletter www.UtahStories.com

It's clear that we currently live in a divided state concerning COVID policy. School districts are divided as to how we best manage students' return to schools. How we handle our children returning to school might be one of the most important debates we are currently we are concerned with. To shift the focus away from politics we begin with a few facts for consideration.

If you love eating out, local food, and appreciate how much great local restaurants add to our communities you will be interested to hear from owners of Yoshi's and Caffe Molise regarding the impact of COVID on their businesses.

One of the most difficult, competitive and ever shrinking professions is local journalism. With the rise of social media, blogs, fake news and YouTube— competing for viewer/reader interest is incredibly difficult. But there are a few courageous souls out there who still love local stories and news and want to share the greatness of their local community in print and online. Claire McArthur is a local journalist in Salt Lake City who has worked for several newspapers, magazines and who says she has known since before she entered college that her dream was to be a local journalist and to write for magazines and newspapers. For McArthur, all of the ancillary positions such as Public Relations, content marketer or blogger just don’t compare to going out and finding great stories to share; as well as being paid to satisfy her natural curiosity and questions about the world around her.

Darlene McDonald is a member of Salt Lake City’s new Racial Equity in Policing Commission and a Black community leader in Utah. Similar to most Black Lives Matter supporters, McDonald believes that America is an inherently racist country and that "institutional racism" is a fact of life in Utah and America and major reform is required. Darlene McDonald was present for the Cottonwood Heights police protest that was held on Sunday evening (August 2nd). She was invited to speak. In this interview, we discuss police reform in Utah.