We are all familiar with the phrase: “There’s an app for that.” When it came out, it was catchy phrase associated with the iPhone. Now it has come to mean that any smartphone you might have has an application that will make your life easier or more efficient.
More than that, it has come to mean an expectation that we have about our smartphones. These applications travel with us on our phones that we put in our pockets or purses. It is also true that we have come to depend on them. Don’t think so? Ask people to tell you the phone number of a close friend. Ask them where the nearest gas station or drug store is located. In order to answer your question, they will reach for their phone.
Try this on some of your friends. Tell them about a new app you just heard about. See how long it takes them to grab their phone can look for it. In fact, use the stopwatch on your smartphone to see how long it takes them.
I’m talking about all of this because the Apple App Store just celebrated its five-year anniversary. USA Today reports that App Store downloads “have surpassed an astonishing 50 billion.” Google’s own Play store is right behind.
Today we use our phones as phone directories, calendars, planners, organizers, GPS locators, music collections, news sources, email sorters, calorie monitors, game machines, radios, and flashlights. It was hard to imagine that these phones would become such an integral part of our lives. If they have become this important to our daily lives in just five years, what does the future hold?
It is fair to say that the advances in the phone technology and the addition of all of these applications have changed our lives. There is no reason to think they won’t continue to serve us and influence us as we have more Internet capability in our vehicles and on our person (through wearable computers). It is truly amazing what we can do with a device we hold in our hands and take with us wherever we go.

Dementia is typically a disease that affects the elderly. But doctors are starting to talk about a new type of cognitive condition affecting younger individuals. They call it “digital dementia.” It results, they say, from the overuse of digital technology, such as smart phones and computers. Brain function deteriorates because of digital overuse.
The left side of the brain is generally associated with rational thought (numbers, and facts). The right side is responsible for creative skills and emotional thought. If the right side is underdeveloped over a long period, dementia develops.
The phenomenon of “digital dementia” was first noticed in South Korea. That should not be surprising, since that country has such a large population of Internet users. It also is one of the most digital nations in the world and a place where Internet addiction was identified as far back as the late 1990s.
A doctor at the Balance Brain Centre in Seoul explained: “overuse of smartphones and game devices hampers the balanced development of the brain.” Heavy users of digital technology are more likely to develop the left side of their brains. This leaves the right side untapped and underdeveloped. This affects attention and memory span, which could lead to early onset of dementia in a percentage of the cases. They also found that children were more at risk than adults were because the brains of children were still developing.
The Korean findings come after a study, done at UCLA, found that young people were increasingly suffering from memory problems. A percentage of young men and women complained that their memory was poor.
These initial studies are one more reason why parents need to monitor the digital world of their children. Digital dementia is just one of many reasons we need to protect children from the digital media storm.

In less than a week’s time, two significant commentaries on robots appeared. Matthew Lynn wrote about “A Strategy for Keeping the Robots at Bay.” Holman Jenkins wrote that we should “Bring in the Robots.” The difference in the two articles illustrates the promise and fear robots create in our psyche.

On the one hand, we are excited about the possibilities robots provide us. Companies are developing a driverless car. Robots are found in nearly every factory in this country. Robots even perform surgical operations. Some futurists imagine a day “when machines perform whole categories of traditional human jobs.” This would even include “knowledge work.”

Robots now routinely perform tedious manufacturing jobs that used to be done by humans. They are more reliable, don’t need to take breaks, and don’t ask for pay raises. Other jobs will be affected by robotics. Scientists believe they will soon develop robots that will drive trucks and vans better than humans can.

That is why one of the commentaries argued that it was time to have robots take over certain forms of transportation. The two most recent accidents demonstrate that it was likely human error that caused the botched landing at San Francisco airport and the catastrophic train derailment in Quebec.

I’m not sure we are ready for pilotless airplanes or unmanned trains any more than we are ready for self-driving cars. But it is worth noting that Google’s driverless car is already licensed in three states. Legislatures may be ready for robots and self-driving cars long before the general public. Corporations are even more likely to remove employees in favor of automation.

That is why the other commentary talked about adapting to a world where robots take some of the jobs we used to perform. If you want a good job in this futuristic world, you will have to be creative and find new opportunities and industries.

When civil unions or same-sex marriages are legal, there are consequences. One is the loss of our liberty. Recently on “Face the Nation,” host Bob

Schieffer was surprised to hear that business owners (especially wedding vendors) are being persecuted (and even prosecuted) for refusing to participate in

same-sex “marriage” ceremonies. He told Tony Perkins that “this is under my radar.” He had never heard of these examples. Fortunately, the Family Research

Council has compiled a list of what happens to these businesses.

For example, a lesbian woman tried to hire Elane Photography in New Mexico for a same-sex ceremony. I might mention that New Mexico law does not

recognize civil unions or same-sex marriage. Nevertheless, the Christian husband and wife of the photography studio were prosecuted under the state’s Civil

Rights Commission.
The New Jersey Division on Civil Rights ruled against a church group that would not rent space to a lesbian couple who were going to have a civil union

ceremony. They ruled that the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association violated the public accommodation provisions of the state’s Law Against

Discrimination.
A Vermont country inn settled a lawsuit brought by two New York women by paying a civil penalty to the Vermont Human Rights Commission and placing

additional funds in a charitable trust. Their business initially refused to host the lesbian couple’s wedding reception.
A husband and wife that refused to bake a cake for a lesbian wedding, due to their Christian faith, have been facing renewed attacks from gay advocates

whom they say are determined to run them out of business. Some of the caustic emails and telephone calls call for the husband to be shot and raped and for

illness to befall the couple’s children.
These are just four of the 15 examples listed by the Family Research Council. Bob Schieffer may not have heard these stories. Now you have heard some

of them.

As you no doubt have heard by now, the Obama administration decided to suspend the Obamacare mandate that all companies with more than 50

employees must provide health insurance by January 1, 2014. Essentially, they postponed the mandate for a year. It should take effect in 2015.

As I record this commentary, there is still some uncertainty about the impact this might have on Christian businesses like Hobby Lobby and Mardels. They

along with various Catholic groups are challenging the contraception mandate in Obamacare.

The greater question is whether the White House has legal authority to suspend or postpone a portion of a law that Congress passed with specific

timetables. Many American business owners may be grateful they won’t have to implement the Obamacare mandate in their establishment. But, there is a

dangerous precedent involved in this decision.

As I have mentioned in previous commentaries, this president has refused to enforce various laws. Now his administration has decided to postpone the

implementation of another law. Will future presidents feel the freedom to not enforce laws they didn’t like? Will they feel free to postpone or suspend laws if

they feel they will have a negative impact on an upcoming election?

Let’s be honest. The administration decided to suspend the mandate so they could postpone it until after the 2014 elections. Members of Congress who

voted for the bill won’t have to defend its impact on business until after the elections. A former budget director said the suspension of the employer mandate

past the 2014 election as “deviously brilliant.” It may have made political sense, but it is a bad precedent for the republic.

Can you imagine the outrage we would have heard if a few months ago congressional leaders suggested that the employer mandate be delayed a year?

They would have been branded as heartless and uncaring. That, of course, is just what this administration has just done. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my

point of view.

You have to be amazed that at a time when the scientific consensus on global warming is at it weakest, that is when President Obama decided to announce his new climate agenda. Wiping his brow while speaking at Georgetown University in the late-June heat, the president put forth a climate action plan.

Various climate models predicted that global warming would be accelerating right now. That is not what is happening. The warmest year on record was 1998, and there has been significanty less warming in the last 15 years.

The president is directing the EPA to take over large segments of the American economy. His plan covers everything from power plant emission controls to fuel mileage rules for heavy trucks to efficiency standards for home appliances. The most significant are rules that will adversely affect coal-fired power plants.

The president believes that now is the time to act and has no patience for those who question whether there is a firm consensus concerning anthropogenic
(human-induced) global warming. Even if we assume that global warming is a major threat, the policies that the president proposes do not necessarily follow. Limits on greenhouse gases in the U.S. will have no effect on a world that includes China, India, and other nations manufacturing products and driving cars.

One climatologist used an extreme example to prove the point. Even if the U.S. achieved a 50% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, the net impact would be a reduction in global average temperature of 7 hundredths of 1 degree Celsius.

We should also mention that there is a cost to EPA regulations. Some estimate that for every $1 billion spent complying with an EPA rule, there is a subsequent loss of 16,000 jobs and a cut in GDP of $1.2 million.

We don’t need more EPA rules limiting manufacturing, power production, and transportation at a time when millions of Americans are already out of work and wages have fallen for the last five years.

Laws and public opinion are changing concerning marijuana. But while legal and social mores are changing, medical research is finding more reasons to be concerned about marijuana use.

Already Colorado and Washington have legalized it by decriminalizing its recreational use. Nineteen states have legalized medical marijuana, while 10 more are considering similar legislation. And a growing majority of Americans support these laws. Back in 1969, only 12 percent favored legalizing marijuana. The percentage has now risen to 52 percent.

Meanwhile, scientists have documented numerous medical risks. Marijuana is addictive (like other drugs), is toxic to the body, and can be a gateway drug to other even more harmful and addictive drugs.

Scientists have now also documented the connection of marijuana use to mental illness. A recent column by Dr. Samuel Wilkinson (Yale School of Medicine) summarized these dangers.

The “highly respected British Journal of Psychiatry reviewed four large studies, all of which showed a significant and consistent association between consumption of marijuana (mostly during teenage years or early 20s) and the later development of schizophrenia.” Another study published in Lancet (a British medical journal) concluded that marijuana use increases the risk of young people developing psychotic illness, such as schizophrenia.

That doesn’t mean that all pot smoking youths will develop schizophrenia. The research indicates, “that marijuana precipitates schizophrenia or related psychotic disorders in people whose brains are inherently vulnerable to psychosis.” You may not know your vulnerable until after you fall off the cliff of sanity.

Schizophrenia already affects three million Americans. Legalizing marijuana will no doubt increase the number significantly. That is reason enough to reconsider whether we want to legalize an addictive drug.

When the Supreme Court ruled two weeks ago on marriage, Justice Antonin Scalia delivered a blistering dissent from the bench. He was critical of the tone and argument of Justice Anthony Kennedy when he and four other justices declared DOMA unconstitutional.

Scalia said they resorted to calling opponents of gay marriage “enemies of the human race.” He said “to defend traditional marriage is not to condemn, demean, or humiliate those who would prefer other arrangements, any more than to defend the Constitution of the United States is to condemn, demean, or humiliate other constitutions.” But the justices implied that supporters of DOMA had as their “purpose to
‘disparage,’ ‘injure,’ ‘degrade,’ ‘demean,’ and ‘humiliate’ our fellow human beings, our fellow citizens, who are homosexual.”

Scalia observed that Kennedy wrote that people who supported DOMA did so because they wanted to injure, degrade, and humiliate homosexuals. It is worth mentioning that Senators Chuck Schumer, Pat Leahy, Harry Reid, and Joe Biden voted for DOMA. President Bill Clinton signed DOMA into law. I doubt Justice Kennedy was talking about them.

Actually, Justice Kennedy was talking about you (assuming you support traditional marriage). This decision by the Supreme Court illustrates how the debate about marriage is changing. It is no longer a disagreement (you have one view, I have another). It has become a moral crusade (I am right and moral, you are wrong and evil).

Paul Diamond is a barrister in the U.K. who has been defending Christians in their courts. The last time he was in my radio studio he recounted how the British courts used similar arguments to prosecute Christians. He noted that “once they label you as a hater, they can do anything to you.” Americans who oppose same-sex marriage are being labelled as such. Sadly we seem to be heading down the same road as England.

Every year politicians talk about tax reform, but nothing really happens. They might get slight modifications in the tax code, but that is about it. At the moment, the U.S. Tax code runs 74,000 pages. It has 9 million words. And it seemingly becomes more complex each year.

The Senate’s two tax writers (Democrat Max Baucus and Republican Orrin Hatch) are proposing that we rewrite the tax code from scratch. They propose that we start with a blank slate and require lawmakers to justify every tax preference.

In a letter to their colleagues they explain that: “we plan to operate from an assumption that all special provisions are out unless there is clear evidence that they: (1) help grow the economy, (2) make the tax code fairer, or (3) effectively promote other important policy objectives.” Members of Congress are to submit legislative language or detailed proposals by the end of this month.

This tabula rasa principle does not play favorites. The Senators on the Finance Committee will have to judge one tax preference over another. Then other members of Congress will have to do that same.

The need for real tax reform should be obvious. The complexity of the tax code makes it difficult to accurately file a return. The favoritism in the tax code benefits certain businesses and individuals over others. The current tax code also costs taxpayers in compliance costs and prevents the federal government from fairly collecting from those who owe more. A study by George Mason University’s Mercatus Center found that “Americans face up to nearly $1 trillion annually in hidden tax-compliance cost, while the Treasury forgoes approximately $450 billion per year in unreported taxes.”

Of course tax reform will go nowhere if the special interests have their way. The Gordian knot in the tax code cannot easily be untied. But let’s give credit to these two senators who are willing to pull out a sword. I wish them success.