Snowbird • For Paul Fejte, getting to ski on Independence Day captures the holiday’s meaning: a celebration of freedom.

Fejte and his wife, Denise, drove an hour-and-a-half from Eden to experience their first Fourth of July ski experience, marking their 102nd day on the slopes this season.

“It was for sure worth the wait and the line," he said.

Fejte combined his love for skiing and patriotism by wearing a tall red-and-white striped hat atop his red-white-and-blue curly wig. He also wore a red-white-and-blue coat with his father’s “professional ski instructor” pin, to honor his father’s 50 years as a ski instructor.

He joined about 3,500 other skiers and snowboarders to spend the holiday on the slopes of Snowbird, and it was a rare treat.

“Snowbird has been open for 48 years and it’s only happened five times in those 48 years,” said Brian Brown, Snowbird communications manager. “It’s about every eight to 10 years that we get to do this.”

Brown said Snowbird received about 711 inches of snow this year, 200 more inches than their average snowfall.

“From the beginning of December, it started snowing and it didn’t stop snowing until the end of April,” he said.

Snowbird shifted from being open for winter sports every day to only weekends in late May. Last week, Snowbird executives decided they had just enough snow to mark the end of their season on the Fourth of July. None of Utah’s 12 other resorts was open.

“We always pride ourselves on having the longest season of all the resorts in Utah, so to be open on the Fourth really just kind of cements that,” Brown said.

The resort sold limited tickets, and by mid-morning they were sold out and prompted the resort to share a message on social media asking people to who weren’t at the resort to “refrain” from coming. And although there was enough snow to ski some runs, those that were open were expert terrain.

This season, Utah resorts had a record snow year. All 13 surpassed their averages; four broke accumulation records. It was welcomed after last year was one of the worst for snow in state history, which required resorts to do more snowmaking — and that significantly increases operating costs.

Happy 4th July from the top of the world! pic.twitter.com/3P4O7swIX9

— Snowbird (@Snowbird) July 4, 2019

Most patrons wore red, white and blue items Thursday, along with themed costumes and other festive outfits traditional for the last day of ski and snowboard season.

“It’s fun up here because it’s like a mixture of the last day shenanigans and Fourth of July stuff,” said James Perri, of Sandy. Perri skied at Snowbird the last time it was open on July Fourth — in 2011.

“One of the best parts is, there’s a couple places you have to ride through dirt to get to the other patches, so a lot of people will stop and hike and stuff,” he said.

David Weinsten, a new Salt Lake City resident from Chicago, said he had never dreamed of being able to ski in July, but he has held out hope since he moved to Utah.

“We’d been preparing for this for months,” Weisntein said.

Others said the decision to ski was spontaneous but still a “bucket list” item they were happy to check off.

“Just being able to say that you can do it. That was a big check off the list for me,” said Anthony Garcia, of Sandy. “Being able to do this just once made the line worth it.”

The ski run was open for five hours, and most participants said they waited from one to three hours in line but felt the experience was worth the wait.

“It’s just a unique experience. Not very often you get to ski this late in the year,” said Patrick Ferrara, of Salt Lake City.

Whether or not Jeff Green has made fans of the team he plays for happy has traditionally been determined nearly 100% by the expectations they place on him.

For Seattle SuperSonics fans, Jeff Green wasn’t enough. They traded Ray Allen, perhaps their best ever player, for the chance to draft Green. While he scored some, in general, Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook surpassed Green very quickly in their minds.

Then he was traded to the Celtics in exchange for Kendrick Perkins and Nate Robinson. From a Celtics fan perspective, Perkins was an integral part of their championship winning team in 2009, and many of their fans believed that the only reason they lost in 2010 was Perkins’ injury. Green came in during the 2011 season to try to add something different, but they haven’t made it back to the finals since.

Memphis, too, thought Green could push them over the top, so in 2015, they traded Tayshaun Prince, Quincy Pondexter and a first round pick that looks very likely to be a high lottery selection at this point to acquire Green. This will not shock you at this point, but Green did not lead them to great success; they lost in the second round to the Warriors that year, then got swept by the Spurs the year after.

One more team, in 2016, thought Jeff Green was worth a first round pick to acquire: the L.A. Clippers in the Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, DeAndre Jordan era. That pick turned out to be No. 20 in this year’s draft, which was used to draft Matisse Thybulle. The trade earned them a first round loss to the Portland Trail Blazers.

The Magic spent $15 million on him in free agency the next year, 2016-17, and that team won 29 games.

But though it took six teams and 10 years to get to this point, we’ve arrived here: Jeff Green might be accurately rated, even underrated. The one-year, minimum-level deal he agreed to with the Jazz on Tuesday is his third consecutive minimum deal, and in that time, he’s honestly helped two flawed teams, the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Washington Wizards. It’s gotten to the point where Dwyane Wade even tweeted about it:

I do NOT understand how and why Jeff Green keep signing these 1 year deals for the minimum. This is now 3 years in a row. He’s never injured, He’s never been a problem in the locker room, He’s athletic, he can shoot the 3, he can guard multiple positions and he’s not old 🤷🏾‍♂️.

— DWade (@DwyaneWade) July 3, 2019

Wade’s scouting report is essentially accurate. Beyond the 2011-12 year, which he missed the entirety of due to a heart condition, Green’s been able to stay on the floor. He is still athletic. Even at 32 years old, he still dunks the ball frequently. Green had 39 dunks last year, in comparison, Donovan Mitchell had 31. He’s 6-foot-9 with a 7-foot-1 wingspan, which helps immensely in his ability to stay on the court and perform.

He can certainly shoot the three, but he’s not especially good at it. For his career, he’s a 33% 3-point shooter. Last year, he shot 34.7% from deep on 4.2 attempts per game. Again, for a Jazz comparison, think Jae Crowder in terms of accuracy.

Defensive versatility is definitely a strength of Green’s. This FearTheSword blog post about Green’s defense from a year ago sums it up: “Since the All-Star Break ... he has guarded everyone from post-behemoth Jusuf Nurkic to defending MVP Russell Westbrook and all sizes in between.” Last year for the Wizards, Green played mostly power forward, but he played a surprising number of minutes at center due to Wizards injuries, and those lineups were actually very effective. I don’t know if we’ll see that for the Jazz, but it’s an option.

Is he actually good defensively? I think there’s scant evidence of that. His teams have traditionally been better with him off the floor on defense, though his time with the Cavs was an exception. He’s always had below-average block and steal rates. He doesn’t commit fouls very often, so that’s good, but overall, it seems like he can do the right things, but doesn’t always do them.

Whether 32 is old in the NBA deserves some discussion. He’ll be 33 by the time the season starts. That is traditionally when we start to see downturns in players’ careers, but Green’s athleticism probably will allow him to hang on for longer than the average player. There was a downturn in the number of times he shot at the hoop last year, which might reflect some aging in his game, but he still attacks the rim frequently enough that he’s capable of it. And he was actually really efficient when he got to the rim, making 74% of his shots there, so that’s a good sign he still has it.

There are some things that Wade’s tweet didn’t mention. Green, despite the fact that he’s occasionally played center, is an awful rebounder for a wing or a big man. Crowder’s rebounding was often criticized last year when he picked up 9.6% of available rebounds, Green is at 8%. The Jazz will need to count on other players for boards when Green is in the game. Green isn’t an assist man, and often doesn’t keep the ball moving. He’s not a creator for others.

But he can score in various ways. The Wizards actually used him fairly frequently to set screens last year, and he performed well as a wing roll man. He posted up on occasion, and scored 1.01 points per play on those postups. He can use his physicality to cut to the rim and score well, and his athleticism is a real boon in transition. He scored 12 points per game last year, and it wasn’t for nothing.

All in all, Crowder is actually a pretty reasonable comparison for Green: both aren’t good shooters, passers, or rebounders. But both use their physical traits — for Green his length, for Crowder his strength — to give their teams something on the defensive end. And both are wing fours who can open up some space for Rudy Gobert, Donovan Mitchell and the rest to do their things.

For the minimum, that’s enough, a nice contribution. But if we’ve learned anything from Green’s career, it’s this: if you set your expectations too high, he’ll fall short. If you don’t expect much, he’ll pleasantly surprise you.

Los Angeles • The strongest earthquake in 20 years shook a large swath of Southern California and parts of Nevada on Thursday, rattling nerves on the July Fourth holiday and causing some injuries and damage in a town near the epicenter, followed by a swarm of ongoing aftershocks.

The 6.4 magnitude quake struck at 10:33 a.m. in the Mojave Desert, about 150 miles northeast of Los Angeles, near the town of Ridgecrest, California.

Multiple injuries and two house fires were reported in the town of 28,000. Emergency crews were also dealing with small vegetation fires, gas leaks and reports of cracked roads, said Kern County Fire Chief David Witt.

He said 15 patients were evacuated from the Ridgecrest Regional Hospital as a precaution and out of concern for aftershocks.

Kern County District Supervisor Mick Gleason told CNN there were some structural issues with the hospital and some patients had to be moved from one ward to another and that others were taken to a neighboring building.

Gleason did not say what the structural issues were.

Ridgecrest Mayor Peggy Breeden said that utility workers were assessing broken gas lines and turning off gas where necessary.

The local senior center was holding a July 4th event when the quake hit and everyone made it out shaken up but without injuries, she said.

"Oh, my goodness, there's another one (quake) right now," Breeden said on live television as an aftershock struck.

President Donald Trump said he was fully briefed on the earthquake and that it "all seems to be very much under control!"

A series of aftershocks included a 4.5 magnitude temblor, according to the United States Geological Survey.

"It almost gave me a heart attack," said Cora Burke, a waitress at Midway Cafe in Ridgecrest, of the big jolt. "It's just a rolling feeling inside the building, inside the cafe and all of a sudden everything started falling off the shelf, glasses, the refrigerator and everything in the small refrigerator fell over."

Video posted online of a liquor store in Ridgecrest showed the aisles filled with broken wine and liquor bottles, knocked down boxes and other groceries strewn on the floor. Flames were seen shooting out of one home in the community.

Lucy Jones, a seismologist with the California Institute of Technology's seismology lab, said the earthquake was the strongest since a 7.1 quake struck in the area on October 16, 1999.

"This has been an extremely quiet abnormal time," Jones said. "This type of earthquake is much more normal ... The long term average is probably once every five or 10 years somewhere in Southern California."

Jones said that the 6.4 quake centered near the town of Ridgecrest was preceded by a magnitude 4.2 temblor about a half hour earlier.

She said vigorous aftershocks were occurring and that she wouldn't be surprised if a magnitude 5 quake hit but that they were striking in a remote area, sparsely populated area. "This is an isolated enough location that that's going to greatly reduce the damage," she said.

People from Las Vegas to the Pacific Coast reported feeling a rolling motion and took to social media to report it.

Local emergency agencies also took to social media to ask people to only call 911 for emergencies.

"We are very much aware of the significant earthquake that just occurred in Southern California. Please DO NOT call 9-1-1 unless there are injuries or other dangerous conditions. Don't call for questions please," the LAPD said in a statement published on Twitter.

There were no reports of serious damage or injuries in Los Angeles, the department said.

The quake was detected by California's new ShakeAlert system and it provided 48 seconds of warning to the seismology lab well before the shaking arrived at Caltech in the Los Angeles suburb of Pasadena but it did not trigger a public warning through an app recently made available in Los Angeles County.

USGS seismologist Robert Graves said the ShakeAlert system worked properly.

Graves said it calculated an intensity level for the Los Angeles area that was below the threshold for a public alert. The limits are intended to avoid false alarms.

Ashleigh Chandler, a helicopter rescue EMT at Fort Irwin, California, said the quake happened as she was getting ready for a July Fourth party.

"I was just in the living room getting everything ready, we start to feel the shaking, so then I look up and then the wine bottles start rattling and I thought, 'They're going to fall.'

"My stepson was in the house and my dog, so we just got everyone outside and then it ended. It was like 15, 20 seconds, maybe. It was pretty good shaking, so I'm out of breath."

"Everyone's OK."

Rodriguez reported from San Francisco. Associated Press writer Rachel Lerman in San Francisco and AP Radio reporter Shelly Adler in Washington, D.C., contributed.

Ivanka Trump — prized first daughter, presidential sounding board, sometime diplomat — managed to ignite the rage of the Internet by just doing her job.

Wait, what job is that exactly? Officially, the 37-year-old is a senior adviser to the president, who happens to be her dad, Donald J. Trump. In practice, she seems to have unlimited responsibilities. And her “Where’s Waldo?” appearance at the 2019 G-20 summit in Japan — there she is smizing with Shinzo Abe! holding her own with Theresa May! — was further evidence of just how far her sphere extends.

The nature of Ivanka's job would be enough, in a normal profession, to drive an HR manager to tears. It's not simply that she got her role through nepotism, explains Jennifer Lawless, professor of politics at the University of Virginia. It's the fact that she now seems to have so much power with zero accountability: "She's not secretary of state, but she's acting like she has the same clout as Mike Pompeo. She is not a formal diplomat, but she's the one having formal conversations."

Ivanka's shadow position in the administration includes advocating for a shifting roster of buzzwords like "female empowerment," "entrepreneurship" and "economic growth." Because none of her roles can be pinned down, she can't be truly held responsible. "I'd rather have that job," says Lawless, "instead of one with a clear set of performance outcomes."

Watching Ivanka’s role unfold must also be torment for career foreign policy professionals — especially women. One female foreign policy expert, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, had a single word to describe Ivanka’s performance at the G-20 summit: heartbreaking. “Many of us work incredibly hard over a very long period of time to build our careers and will never come close to attaining this level of success — despite our education and qualifications,” she said. “Moreover, the struggle is real — many of us do battle every day to have our voices heard in the workplace.”

So it's not simply that Ivanka's seat at the table is unearned but that it displaces the long line of qualified women behind her. Rather than uplifting them, she's negating their experience.

"I would be extremely disheartened to see women who are not qualified occupy these roles and to be seen as functioning in these roles as if this is what it looks like," says Cynthia Burack, a political theorist in the department of women's, gender and sexuality studies at Ohio State University. "This is not what it looks like." Burack worries that the disregard for protocol could have lasting impact on how we govern after this administration.

Lawless is more hopeful. "This issue has more to do with Donald Trump being Donald Trump instead of undermining women's credentials more broadly as a nation," she says.

Of course, nepotism isn’t new to presidential administrations. The federal anti-nepotism statute was born out of President John F. Kennedy’s appointment of his little brother Bobby as attorney general. Hillary Clinton got her fair share of flak when her husband, President Bill Clinton, named her as chair of the Task Force on National Health Care Reform and gave her an office in the West Wing — a first for a first lady.

But Ivanka's lack of relevant credentials or clearly defined role is probably pushing the guardrails of nepotism even further. According to Burack, the key distinction between the Trumps' brand of "all in the family" and other administrations' instances of nepotism boils down to competence. The question isn't just should she be doing this job, but can she?

The White House, for its part, responded to criticism of Ivanka's participation with its trademark victimhood snark. Jessica Ditto, a White House deputy director of communications, said that it was "sad but not shocking that the haters choose to attack Ivanka Trump, a senior adviser to the president, when she is promoting U.S. efforts to empower women through strategic partnerships with world leaders."

But hating and legitimate criticism are not cousins. And arguably, the West Wing’s knee-jerk response to “the haters” does more harm than good. “If anyone is undermining women,” says Lawless, “it’s the lack of a substantive defense offered by the administration I think is the most damning.”

Helena Andrews-Dyer is the co-author of The Reliable Source. She joined The Post in 2013. Send your hot tips, sightings and gossip to reliablesource@washpost.com.

@helena_andrews

She spends winters east of Kanab and the rest of her time between Panguitch and Alton, in an area of Utah known for its trophy deer hunting.

For many of her species, living on the premium hunting territory known as Paunsaugunt unit could be a problem. But for this rare antlered doe, her home turf and apparent genetic abnormality could be the key to her longevity.

“There’s more bucks on that unit [where she lives], and that kind of allows hunters to be a little bit more selective with what deer they are harvesting, and so a deer with antlers that size wouldn’t even be close — like even in the realm — of what a hunter with a tag for that unit is looking for,” said Phil Tuttle, outreach manager with the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.

So, he said, “The chances of that deer being harvested ever are really, really low.”

As long as she stays in that unit, doe hunters will look past her thinking she’s a he, and buck hunters will pass her up — with her small, lopsided rack — for the renowned behemoths they trekked to the unit in southwest Utah to bring home.

DWR staffers first learned of the antlered doe in the late fall of 2017, when they shot a net at her from a helicopter to collar her in order to track and study deer migration patterns.

When staffers got close enough, they were surprised to find the deer was a she — despite the antlers, Tuttle said.

Like male deer, Tuttle said this antlered female sheds and regrows her antlers every year. Officials believe she has a rare condition that caused her reproductive organs to develop differently, which led to abnormally high testosterone levels and has apparently triggered the antler shedding and regrowth.

Tuttle said it’s unclear if the deer has ever reproduced.

If a buck hunter did happen to shoot the female deer, Tuttle said they wouldn’t get in trouble because the animal did have antlers.

But DWR officials don’t want people shooting collared deer, or any of the animals that are collared for tracking, according to its Facebook page.

“Because capturing and collaring deer is an expensive and time-consuming process, we ask that hunters avoid harvesting them,” the post states.

The post about the deer on the DWR’s Facebook page had garnered 430 comments by Thursday evening and nearly 900 shares.

Many commenters wondered if the animal had ever reproduced and the legal ramifications for hunting a deer with a collar, or shooting this female deer thinking it was a male. Some told their own tales of hunting what they thought was a male animal, only to learn afterward it wasn’t. Others saw the androgynous deer as a bit of an LGBTQ icon.

Whatever it was that drove commenters’ curiosity, Tuttle said he was surprised by how popular the post was.

“It’s kind of interesting and definitely rare, and it’s just kind of fun to see rare things, and people get a kick out of it," Tuttle said.

For now, he said, the DWR doesn’t have plans to study the deer further — but he didn’t rule it out, either.

Having learned Sunday that the Los Angeles Angels were sending him back down to the Salt Lake Bees, pitcher Luke Bard shared a goodbye hug with his locker neighbor, Tyler Skaggs.

“The next day,” Bard said solemnly, “he was gone.”

Skaggs, 27, died Monday of an unknown cause in a hotel room in Arlington, Texas, where the Angels had traveled to begin a four-game series vs. Texas. Bard and the Bees returned Thursday to Smith’s Ballpark, as manager Lou Marson and his players continued to process a stunning development in the Angels organization.

Because of Skaggs' personality, his death hit home for a big chunk of the Bees' roster. “It didn't matter if you were Mike Trout or Michael Hermosillo, he was going to treat you the exact, same way,” said Hermosillo, a Bees outfielder.

“I can’t say enough good things about Tyler as a person,” Bard said. “He was just an awesome guy. He had a way of encouraging everybody, lifting you up. … It’s going to be a huge void that’s never going to be able to be filled.”

Salt Lake Bees pitcher Luke Bard, on the impact of the late Tyler Skaggs in the Angels organization and beyond. pic.twitter.com/1sPQ8wfuMM

— Kurt Kragthorpe (@tribkurt) July 5, 2019

Drafted by the Angels in 2009, Skaggs pitched briefly for the rookie-league Orem Owlz. After being traded to Arizona and coming back to the Angels, he pitched for the Bees in 2014 and returned to Salt Lake in 2016 during his recovery from Tommy John surgery.

Skaggs was outstanding for the Bees that summer, posting a 3-2 record and 1.67 ERA in seven starts, with 45 strikeouts in 32 innings. While being limited to six innings and 90 pitches during his rehabilitation, he tied Jered Weaver's franchise record with 14 strikeouts in a game at Omaha.

Listening to the home team’s radio broadcast, a fan informed Skaggs of the achievement as he walked toward the dugout after the sixth inning. Having grown up idolizing Weaver in southern California, Skaggs lobbied then-Bees manager Keith Johnson and pitching Erik Bennett to let him stay in the game. By broadcaster Steve Klauke’s account, the Angels employees told Skaggs, “We like our jobs,” and kept him in the dugout.

Skaggs' response was a 12-strikeout performance at Iowa in his next start, and he was satisfied to know he owned the record for the most strikeouts in consecutive appearances.

For Klauke and other longtime staff members of the Bees and Angels, such as Salt Lake general manager Marc Amicone, Skaggs' death evoked memories of Angels pitcher Nick Adenhart's being killed by a drunk driver after an April 2009 game in Anaheim. In that case, the Bees' season opener was postponed. Adenhart had pitched in Salt Lake for most of the 2008 season and was a friend of many of the '09 team's players.

Like Adenhart, Skaggs will have a legacy with the Bees, who painted his “TS” initials on the grass just outside the third-base line, hung his jersey in the first-base dugout and placed his No. 45 in a circle on a black backdrop on the fence in right field Thursday.

The Angels' game at Texas was postponed Monday; so was the Bees' scheduled contest at Tacoma. In the first game of a doubleheader Tuesday, Bees pitcher Nick Tropeano – a good friend of Skaggs – allowed only one hit in six innings, while walking one batter and striking out seven in one of his best performances in a long time at any level.

That effort impressed Marson, who said, “A lot of guys on this team were very close to Tyler Skaggs. [Tuesday's doubleheader] was a weird feeling, for sure. … Everybody was shocked.”

Marson knew Skaggs through veteran pitcher Joe Smith, Marson's former teammate as a catcher with Cleveland. They played pickup basketball in the offseason and conversed in spring training in Arizona.

That's a recurring theme in interviews with the Bees, how Skaggs would talk to everybody. “I just think about all the conversations we had in spring training,” Hermosillo said. “He was always there for me.”

The left-hander, Bard said, was “the life of that clubhouse, obviously.”

Washington • President Donald Trump celebrated “the greatest political journey in human history” in a Fourth of July commemoration before a soggy but cheering crowd of spectators, many of them invited, on the grounds of the Lincoln Memorial. Supporters welcomed his tribute to the U.S. military while protesters assailed him for putting himself center stage on a holiday devoted to unity.

As rain fell on him, Trump called on Americans to "stay true to our cause" during a program that adhered to patriotic themes and hailed an eclectic mix of history's heroes, from the armed forces, space, civil rights and other endeavors of American life.

He largely stuck to his script, avoiding diversions into his agenda or reelection campaign. But in one exception, he vowed, “Very soon, we will plant the American flag on Mars,” actually a distant goal not likely to be achieved until late in the 2020s if even then.

A late afternoon downpour drenched the capital's Independence Day crowds and Trump's speech unfolded in occasional rain. The warplanes and presidential aircraft he had summoned conducted their flyovers as planned, capped by the Navy Blue Angels aerobatics team.

By adding his own, one-hour "Salute to America" production to capital festivities that typically draw hundreds of thousands anyway, Trump became the first president in nearly seven decades to address a crowd at the National Mall on the Fourth of July.

Protesters objecting to what they saw as his co-opting of the holiday inflated a roly-poly balloon depicting Trump as an angry, diaper-clad baby.

Trump set aside a historic piece of real estate — a stretch of the Mall from the Lincoln Monument to the midpoint of the reflecting pool — for a mix of invited military members, Republican and Trump campaign donors and other bigwigs. It’s where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I have a dream” speech, Barack Obama and Trump held inaugural concerts and protesters swarmed into the water when supporters of Richard Nixon put on a July 4, 1970, celebration, with the president sending taped remarks from California.

Aides to the crowd-obsessed Trump fretted about the prospect of empty seats at his event, said a person familiar with the planning who was not authorized to be identified. Aides scrambled in recent days to distribute tickets and mobilize the Trump and GOP social media accounts to encourage participation for an event hastily arranged and surrounded with confusion.

Back at the White House, Trump tweeted an aerial photo showing an audience that filled both sides of the memorial's reflecting pool and stretched to the Washington Monument. "A great crowd of tremendous Patriots this evening, all the way back to the Washington Monument!" he said.

A great crowd of tremendous Patriots this evening, all the way back to the Washington Monument! #SaluteToAmerica🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/nJghdfqIhX

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 5, 2019

Many who filed into the sprawling VIP section said they got their free tickets from members of Congress or from friends or neighbors who couldn't use theirs. Outside that zone, a diverse mix of visitors, locals, veterans, tour groups, immigrant families and more milled about, some drawn by Trump, some by curiosity, some by the holiday's regular activities along the Mall.

Protesters earlier made their voices heard in sweltering heat by the Washington Monument, along the traditional parade route and elsewhere, while the VIP section at the reflecting pool served as something of a buffer for Trump's event.

In the shadow of the Washington Monument hours before Trump's speech, the anti-war organization Codepink erected a 20-foot tall "Trump baby" balloon to protest what activists saw as his intrusion in Independence Day and a focus on military might that they associate with martial regimes.

"We think that he is making this about himself and it's really a campaign rally," said Medea Benjamin, the organization's co-director. "We think that he's a big baby. ... He's erratic, he's prone to tantrums, he doesn't understand the consequences of his actions. And so this is a great symbol of how we feel about our president."

The balloon remained tied down at the Mall because park officials restricted the group's permission to move it or fill it with helium, Benjamin said.

Protesters also handed out small Trump-baby balloons on sticks. Molly King of La Porte, Indiana, a 13-year-old Trump supporter in sunglasses and a "Make America Great Again" hat, happily came away with one.

"They're making a big stink about it but it's actually pretty cute," she said. "I mean, why not love your president as you'd love a baby?"

A small crowd gathered to take pictures with the big balloon, which drew Trump supporters and detractors.

"Even though everybody has different opinions," said Kevin Malton, a Trump supporter from Middlesboro, Kentucky, "everybody's getting along."

But Daniela Guray, a 19-year-old from Chicago who held a "Dump Trump" sign, said she was subjected to a racial epithet while walking along the Constitution Avenue parade route and told to go home.

She said she did not come to the Mall to protest but ended up doing so. "I started seeing all the tanks with all the protests and that's when I said, 'Wait, this is not an actual Fourth of July,'" she said. "Trump is making it his day rather than the Fourth of July."

Trump had sounded a defensive note Wednesday, tweeting that the cost "will be very little compared to what it is worth." But he glossed over a host of expenses associated with the display of military might, including flying in planes and tanks and other vehicles to Washington by rail.

Not since 1951, when President Harry Truman spoke before a large gathering on the Washington Monument grounds to mark the 175th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, has a commander in chief made an Independence Day speech to a sizable crowd on the Mall.

Pete Buttigieg, one of the Democrats running for president, said: “This business of diverting money and military assets to use them as a kind of prop, to prop up a presidential ego, is not reflecting well on our country.” Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Ind., is a Navy Reserve veteran who served in Afghanistan in 2014.

Two groups, the National Parks Conservation Foundation and Democracy Forward, want the Interior Department's internal watchdog to investigate what they say may be a "potentially unlawful decision to divert" national parks money to Trump's "spectacle."

Trump has longed for a public display of U.S. military prowess ever since he watched a two-hour procession of French military tanks and fighter jets in Paris on Bastille Day in July 2017.

Washington has held an Independence Day celebration for decades, featuring a parade along Constitution Avenue, a concert on the Capitol lawn with music by the National Symphony Orchestra and fireworks beginning at dusk near the Washington Monument.

Trump altered the lineup by adding his speech, moving the fireworks closer to the Lincoln Memorial and summoning the tanks and warplanes.

Police say a woman arrested for allegedly starting a brush fire that threatened houses near Point of the Mountain in Draper told a witness she started a small fire and the wind blew it out of control.

The fire started Tuesday around 1:45 p.m. and could be seen burning in dry grass near Interstate 15. It also burned near four homes, but fire crews were able to cut a line behind the houses, stopping it from moving closer.

Residents were on standby for evacuations, but were never asked to leave, fire officials told The Salt Lake Tribune.

Police arrested the 20-year-old woman on Wednesday after speaking with a witness who said the woman told him she had started a small fire and the wind blew it into a gulley. He also said the woman grabbed a broom to try to stamp out the flames, according to her probable cause statement.

The woman’s sister told police the 20-year-old admitted to starting the fire, according to the statement.

When police went to arrest the woman, they saw her carrying a bucket, “assumed to contain water," and took her into custody.

She was booked into Salt Lake County jail on suspicion of reckless burning, a class A misdemeanor. She has since been released.

The crowded field of candidates vying to lead Salt Lake City squeezed onstage together Wednesday night at the downtown library for the first major debate of the campaign.

There, the mayoral hopefuls presented their own visions for the city — and though they seemed largely in step on issues relating to the inland port and homelessness, they disagreed on who was best positioned to manage air quality, which some candidates cited as the No. 1 issue facing the city.

Former state Sen. Jim Dabakis, who early polls show is the front-runner in the race, advocated for free UTA fares within city boundaries and for city taxpayers as a way to promote transit ridership and improve air quality.

“Free UTA only brings in 11% of the budget,” he said. “We can do that. We can pull those cars off. We can pay for it just by the money we’re going to save in roads. This is something pragmatic that can happen and it needs leadership and a good liaison with the state. I can do that.”

Earlier this year, UTA and other partners offered three free-fare days, which increased overall ridership about 16%, according to UTA officials. The agency estimated about 10,500 vehicles were removed from the road each those days and had prevented more than 2.5 tons of pollutants and 80 tons of greenhouse gases daily.

“Thank you, Jim,” responded current state Sen. Luz Escamilla when he had finished. “I will be the liaison with the state. I actually have experience passing bills in the Legislature and I think that’s important.”

With a jab at her former legislative colleague’s record — Dabakis had a reputation as more bomb-thrower than bill-passer — Escamilla pointed to her success passing legislation to increase the statute of limitations for polluters and said if she was elected mayor she would work with the state to partner on other initiatives, as well as work to decrease vehicle emissions.

But Dabakis sought to turn those triumphs around on his opponent.

“I do want you to be the liaison,” he joked to laughter from the audience. “You’re the best senator, so you can be there. I’ll call you while you’re on the Senate floor.”

Salt Lake City Councilwoman Erin Mendenhall, who serves on the State Air Quality Board and got her entrance into politics through air-quality advocacy, touted her own record on the issue over the years but noted that there’s a long way to go. “We have to accelerate our transition to renewable energy faster than we have scheduled to today,” she said. “And next year when we negotiate that contract with Rocky Mountain Power, I want to be your mayor at the table that makes sure we get that clean energy into our city faster than it’s scheduled to today.”

Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski, who is not seeking a second term, has promised residents net-100% renewable energy by 2030, but Mendenhall and other mayoral hopefuls have criticized even that expedited timeline as not aggressive enough.

Mendenhall also advocated for growing the city’s bus network to get people out of their cars, raising environmental building standards within the city and working with the state to expand programs to get rid of dirty lawnmowers and snowblowers.

David Garbett, the former executive director of the Pioneer Park Coalition, pointed to his time as a staff attorney on the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance fighting for environmental sustainability as a reason voters should choose him to lead forward on air quality issues.

The city needs to “put together an actual plan for how we get to clean air so we know what every single step does for us,” he said. “That is the key step the city has to take and I will provide that leadership we’ve lacked at the state level and at the county level. That’s step No. 1. Two is the litigation wing at the city attorney’s office and three is we have to move the refinery and the power plant. These are things that I’ll pursue as mayor.”

David Ibarra, a local businessman, advocated for a holistic approach to the issue that involves getting more people into affordable housing so they have shorter commutes and pollute less.

“The key is the affordable housing, moving people into the city,” he said. “And again, I’m going to talk about that electric autonomous people-mover that can bring people from five miles out inside the city. … We’ve got to think beyond ourselves.”

Many of the mayoral hopefuls noted that Salt Lake City does not exist in a bubble and talked about the importance of strong partnerships with the state to address air quality. But former Salt Lake City Councilman Stan Penfold criticized that approach.

“I do find it more than moderately entertaining to listen to mostly minority party members up here talking about how we’re going to change the state of Utah,” he said to laughter from the audience.

Instead, he said he would focus on what the city could accomplish through providing free fare days — an experiment he’d championed at the city and that he said would be fully implemented within his first 100 days if elected as mayor — and by working with government partners in the valley.

Richard Goldberger, a freelance journalist, said he would like to see all city vehicles brought up to factory specification in order to reduce pollution and also advocated for an idea called a “butt mobile” that would pick up cigarette butts in an effort to get rid of hazardous waste in city streets.

Rainer Huck, an ATV activist, had an asthma attack prior to the debate and was not able to attend but sent a proxy from his campaign in his place named Abi Olufeko.

Olufeko, on behalf of Huck’s campaign, was the only person on stage who said air quality is not a pressing issue facing the city. Self-driving cars will take care of any issues, he said.

“The Huck campaign believes this air quality situation is a misdirection for very serious issues, such as police brutality, such as crime and many other noninclusive issues that are facing Salt Lake City,” he said. “So when elected as mayor, I think that Dr. Huck is not going to pay much attention to this situation as he would the situation of police brutality and such things like that.”

Washington • President Trump chose the wrong backdrop for his attempt to make Independence Day all about himself. Standing beneath the majestic statue of Abraham Lincoln, occupying a space where great orators have stood, Trump looked and sounded quite small.

He gave a triumphalist speech, of course. “Our nation is stronger today than it ever was. It is its strongest now,” Trump claimed. He went on to give extended salutes to each of the nation’s armed services, punctuated by flyovers by Coast Guard, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Army aircraft and the singing of the corresponding anthems. Anyone who came to see an elaborate military pageant did not go home disappointed.

Trump declared that "we are one people chasing one dream and one magnificent destiny," but that misses the point. We are, in fact, a nation, bound together not by blood but by our creeds, our institutions and our laws. Trump treats the law like an inconvenience, an annoyance.

Missing, as Trump spoke in Lincoln's shadow, was any sense of humility as a vital aspect of American greatness. But you might have guessed that.

Since he visited French President Emmanuel Macron two years ago and witnessed the Bastille Day parade in Paris, Trump has wanted a big military extravaganza of his own. On Thursday, he got one — and, predictably, he put himself smack at the center of it.

All week, reporters and citizen-journalists spotted heavy-duty Defense Department hardware being trucked into town for Trump's martial-themed celebration of "your favorite president, me" — Bradley Fighting Vehicles, M1A2 Abrams tanks, an M88A2 Hercules recovery vehicle. The flyovers included a B-2 stealth bomber, two F-22 Raptors, two V-22 Ospreys, two F/A-18 Super Hornets, two F-35s, one of the planes used as Air Force One, the famed Blue Angels and various other military aircraft. All that was missing was a reviewing stand, like the one on Red Square where grim-faced Soviet leaders used to watch the tanks roll past.

Oh, wait, there was a reviewing stand of sorts — a closed-off VIP section near the Lincoln Memorial where Republican Party donors and bigwigs could sit up front, basking in the glow of their maximum leader. Democratic Party luminaries were not invited.

That is outrageous, of course, but not surprising. It was clear from the beginning that Independence Day meant nothing more to Trump than an opportunity to choreograph a made-for-television reelection event and give himself an obscenely expensive ego massage.

Presidents, as a rule, have treated the Fourth of July with special reverence because they understand that the day belongs to us, not to them. The few attempts by presidents to take partisan advantage of the holiday have not gone well.

In 1970, at the height of unrest over the Vietnam War, Independence Day was turned into something called "Honor America Day" — an extravaganza staged, like Trump's, at the Lincoln Memorial. President Richard M. Nixon videotaped a speech to be played at the event; even he had the good sense not to attend in person, instead decamping to his home in California.

That event, billed as apolitical and nonpartisan, turned out to be anything but. Evangelist Billy Graham led off by blasting opponents of the war as "a relatively small extremist element." Raucous, drum-beating protesters came out in force; some of them overturned a Good Humor truck, prompting riot police to move in. A few neo-Nazis showed up for good measure. The smell of tear gas hung in the air. Before going onstage, the program's host, comedian Bob Hope, reportedly surveyed the scene and quipped: "It looks like Vietnam, doesn't it?"

Actually, it looked like an America that didn't care to be told how to think about Independence Day.

That's what Thursday looked like, too. Protesters were not allowed to fly the now-famous "Baby Trump" balloon, so they inflated it and sat it on the Mall. MAGA hats and Trump T-shirts abounded. There was some friction between pro- and anti-Trump revelers, including a brief clash near the White House at the scene of a flag-burning whose organizers had been granted an official permit.

This is the most collective of our holidays, in that it celebrates our common heritage and enterprise, but it is also the most individual. It commemorates not a battle but a document, and each of us gets to decide what the Declaration of Independence means — what patriotism entails, what the flag represents, what the fireworks symbolize. Your view of what the Fourth of July means is every bit as valid as the president's. Mine is, too, and it excludes fighters and bombers over the Lincoln Memorial.

Eugene Robinson’s email address is eugenerobinson@washpost.com.

By George, at least it wasn’t the Lakers.

As Kawhi Leonard dawdled, deciding whether to re-sign with Toronto (you know, where he just won a championship) or join the Lakers or the Clippers, all kinds of craziness had been breaking out throughout the league.

But a wave of insanity swelled even larger behind the scenes, darn-near unbeknownst to anyone on the outside.

Turned out, Leonard wasn’t dawdling at all, he was delaying. He was waiting, not only targeting the Clippers, but also pushing for Paul George to leave Russell Westbrook in Oklahoma City, asking him to request/demand a trade to the Clips, so he could line up alongside Kawhi.

The delay happened, and so did the deal.

The cost of George’s frack to Leonard’s frick for the Clippers is heavy, and under the circumstances, the Thunder did the best they could for giving up their star. OKC will get a fistful of first-round picks from the Clippers, as well as forward Danilo Gallinari, a player the Jazz had interest in, and guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.

The question that arises with this kind of move is one that has emerged before … Who exactly has the power in the modern NBA? It most definitely is the star player. Twice now, in dramatic recent moves, the Lakers got Anthony Davis because he wanted out of New Orleans, regardless of what the Pelicans wanted, and the Clippers get Leonard as a free agent and George, too, because George wanted to play with Kawhi on the Clips.

Earlier, George had forced his way out of Indiana and Jimmy Butler had forced his way out of Minnesota, with time remaining on their contracts. Leonard had done the same thing to San Antonio, ending up in Toronto.

Here’s the way it is: If a megastar demands that sort of scenario, teams are pretty much compelled to comply on account that no team can use a great player who doesn’t want to be there. There’s no future in it. So, teams try to get what they can and move on. Contracts are written, indeed, on flimsy paper.

Raptors fans are beside themselves, having been spun collectively into a kind of frenzy, having faced the prospects of losing their MVP and now actually losing him. They had gathered recently in a crowd outside the hotel where Leonard was meeting with team executives. Leonard had previously been offered free gourmet meals for the rest of his life by Toronto restaurants and a penthouse suite.

It wasn’t enough.

In L.A., billboards had popped up, put there by Clippers fans, attempting to lure Leonard back to his hometown. The Clippers claimed they knew nothing about the billboards. Already coach Doc Rivers had been fined $50,000 for tampering, after he made comments comparing Leonard to Michael Jordan.

Well. Leonard, signing a four-year, $142 million deal, is Rivers’ Jordan now.

Pity the poor Lakers.

Lakers fan Snoop Dogg, as well as a musician named Bazzi, each tried bringing Leonard to their team with a new song, singing to the tune of Michael Jackson’s Human Nature, “Kawhi, Kawhi, tell me that you’ll be a Laker. Kawhi, Kawhi, come back to L.A.”

He came to L.A., all right, but the other L.A.

That wasn’t the only craziness. Authentic cuckoo-for-Cocoa Puffs stuff was going on in front offices around the NBA, among people who compile players and teams for a living. They were more interested in Leonard’s decision than anyone else because it would severely affect their livelihoods.

If Leonard had chosen the Lakers, playing alongside LeBron James and Anthony Davis, that not only would have given the Lakers three of the top six or seven players in the entire NBA, it would upset a rare burgeoning balance of power in a league that rarely has real balance.

With the way the Warriors had dominated the top of the league, until a weird plague of injuries had struck them this postseason, and the way the Cavs and Heat and Lakers and Spurs and, long before that, the Bulls, and before that, the Pistons and Lakers and Celtics had controlled things, it seemed as though 2019-20 might be different. It might be a scramble to the top. For the first time in a long time, predicting who would hoist Larry O’Brien’s trophy next June would be an absolute crapshoot.

If Kawhi stayed in Toronto, there would have been six or seven teams in the West with a decent chance at ascending, and at least four in the East. Had Leonard joined in with the other two Lakers stars, it would simply be more of the same, just in different combination.

Now, as is, the Clippers will enjoy a lofty view.

It’s the nature of basketball that a player or two or three can make such a difference in who wins a championship. The sheer numbers in other sports make those endeavors more variable. But in the NBA, there has been a fruitlessness, at least a feeling of that, among teams who do things the right way, who draft smart, who develop players well, who make crafty trades to bolster their rosters. But then, all of that amounts to nothing in terms of an authentic shot at a title when a marquee club swoops in and signs a couple of stars, difference-makers, erasing any number of mistakes its management might have made in recent years, wiping out the efforts of so many other teams who have tried to build from the ground up.

That’s why Leonard’s decision was such a big deal, not because fans in Toronto wanted him, not because fans of both teams in Los Angeles wanted him, but because basketball executives and experts and fans everywhere else wanted him to stay a Raptor.

In that case, everyone would be back in the pool. Not everyone, but maybe 10 teams, including the Jazz.

Utah is in as good a shape as any of the others.

And the Jazz, just like teams in Denver and Houston and Portland and Milwaukee and Philly and Toronto, and more, had a chance at winning it all, without necessarily the extra boost the Raptors got this past postseason by way of a few timely twists and turns and blows to joints. The effects of the Warriors losing Klay Thompson for much of the coming season, and the departure of Kevin Durant, as he heals in Brooklyn, are obvious.

Now, the Jazz and the rest of the West and, ultimately, every other team faces a most formidable Clippers team, with the addition of the two-time Finals MVP and another of the league’s best players. Already, without either, the Clips had been a playoff team.

It’s still better than Leonard simply joining up with LeBron and Davis on the Lakers. But it creates, on this occasion conjured by the affected players themselves, a problem everyone else will have to battle, a problem the NBA has faced for decades — that imbalance of power. This time, tilted by stars coming to a franchise that for many years was a laughingstock.

The bad news is the sudden loss of a greater leveling of an environment that hasn’t been fairly competitive for too, too long.

The good news is the sudden emergence of an evil empire, formed in quiet conspiracy, teams like the Jazz can target and attack.

GORDON MONSON hosts “The Big Show” with Jake Scott weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone.

Los Angeles • A quake with a magnitude as large as 7.1 jolted much of California, cracked buildings, set fires, broke roads and caused several injuries, authorities and residents said.

The quake — preceded by Thursday’s 6.4-magnitude temblor in the Mojave Desert — was the largest Southern California temblor in at least 20 years and was followed by a series of large and small aftershocks.

It hit at 8:19 p.m. and was centered 11 miles from Ridgecrest in the same areas where the previous quake hit. But it was felt as far north as Sacramento, as far east as Las Vegas and as far south as Mexico.

Early magnitude estimates from the U.S. Geological Survey wavered between 6.9 and 7.1.

The area in and around Ridgecrest, already trying to recover from the previous temblor, took the brunt of damage.

Megan Person, director of communications for the Kern County Fire Department, said there were reports of multiple injuries and multiple fires, but she didn't have details.

The county opened an emergency shelter. Meanwhile, a rockslide closed State Route 178 in Kern River Canyon, where photos from witnesses also showed that a stretch of roadway had sunk.

San Bernardino County firefighters reported cracked buildings and one minor injury.

In downtown Los Angeles, 150 miles away, offices in skyscrapers rolled and rocked for at least 30 seconds.

Andrew Lippman, who lives in suburban South Pasadena, was sitting outside and reading the paper when Friday's quake hit.

“It just started getting stronger and stronger, and I looked into my house and the lamp started to sway. I could see power lines swaying,” he said. “This one seemed 45 [seconds]... I’m still straightening pictures.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom activated the state Office of Emergency Services operations center "to its highest level."

"The state is coordinating mutual aid to local first responders," he said.

Lucy Jones, a seismologist at the California Institute of Technology and a former science adviser at the Geological Survey, tweeted that Thursday’s earthquake was a “foreshock” and that Friday’s quake was on the same fault system as the earlier quake.

"You know we say we have a 1 in 20 chance that an earthquake will be followed by something bigger? This is that 1 in 20 time," she tweeted.

Firefighters around Southern California were mobilized to check for damage.

An NBA Summer League game in Las Vegas was stopped after the quake. Speakers over the court at the Thomas & Mack Center continued swaying more than 10 minutes after the quake.

In Los Angeles, the quake rattled Dodger Stadium in the fourth inning of the team's game against the San Diego Padres.

The quake on Friday night happened when Dodgers second baseman Enriquè Hernàndez was batting. It didn't appear to affect him or Padres pitcher Eric Lauer.

"Everyone was jumping over us to leave," said Daniel Earle, 52, of Playa del Rey, who was sitting with his wife in the stadium's reserve level.

"People were freaking out," he said. "There was a concession guy, and he actually was really cool because he was really calm. He's like, 'Relax. Tranquilo. Relax. Tranquilo,' and people were looking around."

"My wife was holding us, like squeezing. I'm surprised my arm is still here. She was squeezing into it so hard," Earle said.

Six Flags Magic Mountain in Santa Clarita said in a tweet Friday night it had stopped running rides in the earthquake's wake.

"The safety of our guests and employees is our top priority and as a precautionary measure, we are conducting an extensive visual, structural, and operational safety checks on all of the rides before re-opening," the park said on Twitter.

Disneyland had evacuated rides as the park conducted safety checks, the Hollywood Reporter wrote. The park's mobile app had marked all rides as "temporarily closed" on Friday night.

The quake came as communities in the Mojave Desert tallied damage and made emergency repairs to cracked roads and broken pipes from the earlier quake.

Hours earlier, seismologists had said that quake had been followed by more than 1,700 aftershocks and that they might continue for years.

Jones said aftershocks from the new main quake could occur for three years.

Earlier Friday, Los Angeles had revealed plans to lower slightly the threshold for public alerts from its earthquake early warning app. But officials said the change was in the works before the quake, which gave scientists at the California Institute of Technology's seismology lab 48 seconds of warning but did not trigger a public notification.

"Our goal is to alert people who might experience potentially damaging shaking, not just feel the shaking," said Robert de Groot, a spokesman for the USGS's ShakeAlert system, which is being developed for California, Oregon and Washington.

The West Coast ShakeAlert system has provided non-public earthquake notifications on a daily basis to many test users, including emergency agencies, industries, transportation systems and schools.

Late last year, the city of Los Angeles released a mobile app intended to provide ShakeAlert warnings for users within Los Angeles County.

The trigger threshold for LA's app required a magnitude 5 or greater and an estimate of level 4 on the separate Modified Mercali Intensity scale, the level at which there is potentially damaging shaking.

Although Thursday's quake was well above magnitude 5, the expected shaking for the Los Angeles area was level 3, de Groot said.

A revision of the magnitude threshold down to 4.5 was already underway, but the shaking intensity level would remain at 4. The rationale is to avoid numerous ShakeAlerts for small earthquakes that do not affect people.

"If people get saturated with these messages, it's going to make people not care as much," he said.

Construction of a network of seismic-monitoring stations for the West Coast is just over half complete, with most coverage in Southern California, San Francisco Bay Area and the Seattle-Tacoma area. Eventually, the system will send out alerts over the same system used for Amber Alerts to defined areas that are expected to be affected by a quake, de Groot said.

California is partnering with the federal government to build the statewide earthquake warning system, with the goal of turning it on by June 2021. The state has already spent at least $25 million building it, including installing hundreds of seismic stations throughout the state.

This year, Newsom said the state needed $16.3 million to finish the project, which included money for stations to monitor seismic activity, plus nearly $7 million for "outreach and education." The state Legislature approved the funding last month, and Newsom signed it into law.

___

Las Vegas • A person familiar with the negotiations says the Los Angeles Clippers will be landing Kawhi Leonard as a free agent after they acquire Paul George from the Oklahoma City Thunder in a massive trade for players and draft picks.

George will be traded for at least four first-round picks, according to the person who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity early Saturday because none of the moves have been finalized. And Leonard made his decision to sign with the Clippers after the team swung the deal to land George, the person said.

ESPN, which first reported the trade, also said the Thunder were getting Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Danilo Gallinari from the Clippers.

Leonard going to the Clippers means that for the first time, a reigning NBA Finals MVP will be changing teams before the following season. Leonard was also being pursued by the Los Angeles Lakers and the Toronto Raptors, the team he led to last season’s NBA title.

The most the Clippers can offer Leonard is $142 million over four years, which is the deal he is expected to sign. Players can sign with new teams as early as noon Eastern on Saturday.

“New adventure in OKC,” Gallinari tweeted.

Leonard is entering his ninth NBA season, is a three-time All-Star, a two-time champion and one of only three players in league history to win the NBA Finals MVP award with multiple franchises.

Notoriously a man of few words, at least publicly, Leonard is generally considered to be the best two-way player in the NBA — dominant on the offensive end, airtight on the defensive end.

His game-winning, four-bounce-off-the-rim jumper to beat the buzzer in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference semifinals against Philadelphia was perhaps the signature moment of this past season’s playoffs.

And he just turned 28 last week — still very much in his prime.

So, too, is George.

The 29-year-old — who is owed roughly $105 million for the next three seasons — spent the last two years alongside Russell Westbrook in Oklahoma City. George averaged a career-best 28 points last season even while dealing with shoulder issues, and the Thunder couldn’t get out of the first round in either of those seasons.

Going to the Clippers and pairing with Leonard means he’ll have a real chance of being on a contender.

The Lakers didn’t wait long before starting to move on from their quest for Leonard. Danny Green announced that he is signing a two-year deal with the Lakers, meaning he, too, is leaving Toronto.

“Kawhi has made his decision. Seems like the announcement is out,” Green said in a video he posted to his social media accounts. “It’s time for me to make my announcement ... I will be teaming up with new teammates in LA, the Los Angeles Lakers.”

Green said he enjoyed Toronto and that it was unfortunate how free agency turned out for that city, the Raptors and for Canada.

“LA, here I come,” Green said.

Here comes Leonard — a Southern California native.

Leonard was, by far, the biggest name left on the free agent market. The other marquee names in this class like Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Klay Thompson and Kemba Walker all made their decisions known relatively quickly.

And like Durant, Irving and Walker, he’s changing addresses.

His lone season in Toronto was the best of his career, answering every question about his health after a leg issue limited him to only nine games with San Antonio in 2017-18. Leonard averaged a career-high 26.6 points in the regular season — and was even better in the playoffs, averaging 30.5 points for the Raptors in their run to the title.

“Last year, a lot of people were doubting me,” Leonard said after the NBA Finals. “They thought I was either faking an injury or didn’t want to play for a team. That was disappointing to me that that was out in the media, because I love the game of basketball.”

The Raptors took a major chance in acquiring Leonard last summer, since they weren’t on his original list of preferred teams when he told the Spurs that he wanted to be moved elsewhere after spending his first seven seasons with them and helping them win the 2014 NBA title. DeMar DeRozan was the biggest piece that Toronto gave up in that deal, with Raptors President Masai Ujiri making the biggest move of his career.

It delivered a title. But that wasn’t enough to make Leonard stay in Canada for the long haul.

“He’s the best two-way player in the NBA,” Ujiri said during the NBA Finals.

Leonard was simply dominant in the postseason, posting 14 games of 30 or more points. Only Michael Jordan, Hakeem Olajuwon and Kobe Bryant had postseasons with more 30-point games — Jordan had 16 of them in 1992, Olajuwon had 16 in 1995 and Bryant had 15 in 2009.

The Raptors made clear: They considered Leonard the top player in the game, and he performed at a level worthy of that moniker.

“Obviously, we have the best player in the league and the best player in these playoffs in Kawhi Leonard,” Raptors forward Pascal Siakam said after Toronto won the title.

They’ll have to defend the title without him.

It’s a massive blow to Toronto’s chances of back-to-back titles, and obviously puts a damper on the Lakers’ offseason quest as well — even though they will finalize a trade Saturday to bring in Anthony Davis from New Orleans and landed the sort of shooter than LeBron James craves by adding Green.

“I’m going to come out and play the right way,” Leonard said last month. “I’m not trying to make headlines.”

Try or not, he’s part of the summer’s biggest headline now.

And he may be about to make the Clippers contenders as well.

Youthful impulse is often what puts kids in treatment centers. But it’s also what turns their lives back around.

Sprinkled across Utah’s eye-catching mountains, peaceful valleys and sweeping plateaus are a series of inpatient wilderness therapy programs and residential treatment centers for adolescents and young adults. Their high success rate is attributed to many factors: the quality of the staff, the beauty and isolation of the surroundings and the local legislation that enables these centers to help so many. But, in my humble opinion, the biggest reason for their success isn’t the centers or the staff.

It’s the clients — the youth themselves.

As director of Project H.E.A.R.T. (Hebrew Education for At Risk Teens) for 27 years now, I visit many young people whose impulsive, poor choices brought them here. Oftentimes, they hadn’t realized the potential negative consequences of the choices they made. Their perception of risk and reward hasn’t yet matured; they leap before they look. In an instant, they can derail their lives.

But the capacity to swiftly change their lives is also what drives these same kids to recovery. Their capacity to swiftly and decisively alter their lives is what enables them to get back on track. The very traits that brought them here are the ones that take them back home, where they belong.

An older individual with similar problematic behavior might take years to make a full recovery, with relapse possible at any unguarded moment. But young people are different. Time and again I’ve watched troubled youth completely turn their lives around in a matter of months. Their learned poor behavior can be re-channeled towards the good if they only find out how.

My mentor, The Rebbe — Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory — often spoke about the power of youth to effect change. In the 1960s, when America was in the throes of the counterculture movement, the Rebbe saw beyond the externals and recognized that the young people’s desire for change was fueled by a longing for authenticity. In the ideals of their elders they saw artifice and they were repulsed by it. And they were the ones who could effect real change. They wouldn’t be bogged down in a 9-5 routine, resigned to the status quo. They are like a gem in the rough, prior to it being polished thus allowing it radiate its fullest shine.

A rebellious young man once visited one of the Rebbe’s predecessors and his namesake, Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch (1789-1866). Enamored with his recently purchased racehorse, the young man extolled its qualities and how its speed shortened the traveling time between villages.

“But if you make a wrong turn, you’ll get lost that much quicker,” the Rebbe pointed out.

“True,” replied the young man, “but when I turn around, I’ll get back on the right path all the sooner.”

The teens I visit in Utah’s treatment centers are like that fast horse. They’re quick; impulsive. Had they been more deliberate, they likely wouldn’t have ended up where they were. But that same impulsiveness is their ticket home. They can get on the right path all the sooner.

The Rebbe’s 25th Yahrtzeit — anniversary of passing — will be marked July 6 by Jewish communities around the world. Fifty thousand people will visit the Ohel, the Rebbe’s resting place in Queens, (a place I was privileged to visit with our former governor, Jon M. Huntsman, now U.S. ambassador to Russia) and reflect upon his vision for a better world, as relevant now as ever. And here in Utah, we’ll reflect on the potential the Rebbe saw in even the most troubled of youth to be the catalyst for positive change. Please visit www.JewishUtah.com/3Tammuz

Rabbi Benny Zippel is the co-director of Chabad Lubavitch of Utah, a local Jewish organization, as well as the founder of Project H.E.A.R.T. (Hebrew Education for At-Risk Teens), which is dedicated to outreach to young people at risk. For more information, visit www.JewishUtah.com.

Research in psychology confirms that we humans imitate individuals we hold in esteem and who are successful on tasks we consider important. Behaviors that stand out and noticed are most likely to be imitated.

For many boys, and girls as well, NBA players meet these conditions. Whether they want to or not, these gifted athletes are social models influencing the development of their young admirers.

Generally, these celebrities enhance development of youth by modeling important elements of sportsmanship. These include working as a team, putting group success ahead of personal success, goal setting and achievement, control of emotions, rule-following behavior, sustained focus on a difficult task and coping with adversity and loss. Accolades to NBA athletes who model these important behaviors to youth.

However, a host of unsportsmanlike behaviors are also demonstrated by NBA athletes on the court. The primary recipients of these negative acts are the referees. For lack of a better term, I will call this collection of negative social behaviors “whining.”

Whining almost always involves communication through facial expression. This involves rolling eyes, grimacing and facial contortions that communicate disbelief and shock. Shrugging of the shoulders is often paired with a look of incredulity. Arguing the call of the ref is done in animated fashion with strong body movements communicating exasperation. The specific language remains unheard by the distant fan, but the words obviously are emotional and challenging to the authority of the offending referee.

A player at times makes the call as if helping the incompetent referee, and drops his jaw when the call goes in favor of the opposing team. A player might refuse to hand the ball to the ref when the whistle blows, putting it on the floor for the referee to retrieve. These acts of disrespect occur more than a few times. It is a litany sung intermittently across 48 minutes.

Whining threatens the integrity of NBA basketball but, more importantly, serves as a dysfunctional model for youth. Specifically, whining by anointed athletes legitimizes poor sportsmanship, draws attention away from play on the court, focuses attention on the individual rather than the team and moves professional basketball closer to the drama that is professional wrestling. But of greatest concern for society is the lack of respect demonstrated for authority. These athletes unwittingly encourage disrespect for authority by those young people who hold them in great esteem.

The solution seems obvious — enforce the rules that are already in place regarding abusive language and mocking referees. Perhaps clarifying these rules at the outset of each game would be helpful. Players, referees and coaches are allowed to freely communicate among each other. However, verbal and nonverbal instances of what has been defined as whining would be immediately penalized with a technical foul. As is now the case, two technicals would eliminate the player from the court.

Let’s encourage civility on the basketball court by more actively enforcing the rules that presently exist.

John Seaman is a retired school psychologist and retired adjunct professor of psychology at Salt Lake Community College.

Regarding Stuart C. Reid’s column in the June 30 Salt Lake Tribune about Barry Goldwater:

Goldwater said, “I was the first to go to him (Nixon) and told him to tell the truth, … and he didn’t do it. And the more it went on, the madder I got because the more he lied to the American people. He lied to me. He lied to his family. He lied to everybody. It made me realize that all Dick Nixon was interested in was Richard Milhous Nixon. He didn’t care about the country.”

Now, who does that bring to mind? Barry Goldwater, where are you now that we need you? How much longer are the American people going to put up with Donald Trump’s lies (now documented at more than 10,000), groping women and bragging about it. Oh, that’s right, “She is not my type.”

Joking with Vladimir Putin and always in the front line when pictures are taken, with that silly grin on his face.

Luana Chapman, Holladay

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With the forthcoming 2019 Salt Lake City elections, I feel it is important for all mayor and City Council candidates to understand the basis of Mayor Jackie Biskupski’s (and her administration’s) homeless programs. In September of 2016 I emailed a letter to the Salt Lake mayor that described the following.

From my experience of being homeless, I observed the following five reasons for being homeless: lost one’s job and then one’s home; just divorced and then lost one’s home; just out of jail with no job and no home; mental illness and unable to function well in society; just like being free with no responsibilities.

I proposed solving the homeless problem by addressing each of these problems. Hook into the Department of Workforce Services to help the jobless to get a job; do the same for the divorced, plus provide professional counseling to deal with divorce issues; provide social workers in the shelter building to address mental illness issues and job counseling; provide counselors to encourage the freedom-loving but lazy to decide to do something productive with their lives. This last category of homelessness is particularly difficult. Family members and religious leaders especially have a responsibility to help lost souls find a viable purpose for their lives.

Importantly, counseling at the homeless building should be provided to get each homeless person or family into an apartment or home. This is made easier if a job is obtained first.

To accomplish these goals requires changes in how the homeless shelter is structured and the functions that are provided. A homeless shelter must provide space for social workers, counselors and other personnel to address the client issues of finding a job, getting a second chance from jail or prison and dealing with mental illness issues. It must provide adequate and safe space for their belongings.

With these changes, the goal of each homeless shelter is to get people into homes. I initially set a goal of getting 20 people into homes each month from the shelters. If this was done, over a year 240 people would need apartments or residences (thus the need for low-cost housing). Over several years the homeless population should be seriously decreased. The homeless need the space and time to find the ways to get back into a home.

After discussing this with two of the mayor’s aides (Jennifer Seelig and Nate Garcia) in October of 2016, their thinking was similar to mine. Her administration went beyond my thinking and developed programs and plans to address each of the reasons for being homeless. For example, DWS personnel have been made available to shelter residents for finding jobs. Sessions were set up for having criminal records expunged if the offense was older than seven years. Housing for clients with mental illnesses have been developed.

Having seen the great need for low-cost housing, Biskupski has pushed hard to develop more low-cost housing. The new resource shelters have been developed to address all of these items. They are conceived as helping the homeless get into homes.

Rep. Ben McAdams helped considerably when he was the mayor of Salt Lake County, as have countless city and county employees. Former House Speaker Greg Hughes provided needed financial leadership, and many people contributed to developing the Rio Grande project. The fight against illegal drug use became a priority in conjunction with all of these plans and programs. It must be remembered that every employer only wants to hire drug free employees.

All these goals are perfectly logical given the five very serious reasons for becoming homeless. If the next Salt Lake City mayor and the City Council ignore these reasons and the solutions for addressing them, they are being both illogical and irrational and should not be trusted spending the city’s money. These are workable plans and programs and the next mayor and city councilmen need to continue them. Getting the homeless into homes results in a city and state that all Utah residents can be proud of.

Gary Leimback is a retired computer technical writer and Salt Lake City resident who now spends his time reading and writing philosophy.

The year 2020 will bring the discussion of abortion to the Utah Legislature. Republicans will introduce legislation to severely reduce elective abortions options even further. In hopes of avoiding disputes, state Sen. Dan McCay’s proposed ban would hold until the U.S. Supreme Court allows states to enact such laws. He believes it’s time to have this discussion, and as he’s put it, “close up the abortion shop”.

Yes, Senator, it’s time. Tell us why some legislators believe 3+5 but not 5+3. Tell us how your experience and experiences of some of your colleagues as Realtors and homemakers qualify you to govern women’s bodies. Tell us why Utahns are continually imposed upon with others’ religious beliefs. Tell us why you believe there are differences in the life value of that fetus you are vigorously fighting for and that hungry child in the “detainment camp” along the border.

Perhaps it’s time to provide a better definition of what pro-life means. This is to set the record straight, and to have a platform we can build upon for this debate.

Pro-life means our deistic and super-naturalist Founding Fathers wanted to create a place where life could flourish without tyranny. It means we support life and being given the opportunity to live this reality to make it worthwhile. It means we embrace not just our families, but all Americans. It means we embrace the all human beings. Pro-life means we do not encourage war, shootings, terrorism, concentration camps or guns.

Pro-life means we not only listen for heartbeats of small fetuses, but also listen to the cries of children inhumanely locked in cages in unlivable conditions, sleeping on concrete floors in detainment centers along our Southern border. Pro-life means we help others being persecuted from their countries due to violence, poverty or dictators. Pro-life means being accepting of different sexual orientations and gender identifications. Pro-life means we will not fight for a child in the womb, then castigate it with expectations and shame for being different to us.

Pro-life means we will put down our guns for love and peace. It means we fight to give all Americans health care access. It means we find a middle ground politically to make America indeed great again. It means we stop looking at only half of the issue: if pro-life means no abortions, that definition also includes “no guns.” Pro-life is Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Mormon, Muslim; it has no perimeter or religion. And, to answer McCay, in regards to the difference in life value between the fetus and that hungry child at the detention camp. If you value the fetus, then you should value the child as well and help them as much as you are trying to help the fetus.

The truth is every woman has the right to make decisions for her body. The truth is these detainment camps are less than 1,000 miles south of us. This state is majority Mormon, then they should be able to empathize with being persecuted; it’s in their history. They should understand what it’s like to be imposed upon. Much like they believe no one can restrain their religious freedom, no one controls whether women can have abortions or not.

The future is here. Progress is irreversible. This battle will continue and will be won by my generation, or the next. The world is big enough for acceptance. It’s easy to have staunch opinions on issues we’ve never experienced firsthand. I hope these issues never knock on Sen. McCay’s door. But if they do, I will be there to fight for his family.

Olivia Jaramillo is legislative chair for House District 14 Democratic Party and the second vice chair for the Hispanic Democrats of Utah.

In his June 29 letter, Gene Sturyenegger says that leaders should be made accountable. I agree. And, yes, undocumented immigrants are violating the law.

There is another law that is violated every day: the habeas corpus law. This law applies to “persons” — that’s the word that appears in the law, not “citizens.” It applies to undocumented immigrants, because they are persons. It is based on two constitutional amendments, the Fifth Amendment (due process) and the 14th Amendment (equal protection of the laws).

Undocumented immigrants are guilty of a misdemeanor. This is in the category of jaywalking. It is not a felony, which includes such crimes as bank robbery. Sanctions for misdemeanors are fines, nothing more.

But our criminal-in-chief is breaking up families, putting them in jail and, worst of all, abusing children.

The party of Trump should be held accountable.

Leon Johnson, West Valley City

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I’ve been reading, with heartbreak, The Salt Lake Tribune’s coverage of MacKenzie Lueck’s murder. I have children and grandchildren and can’t begin to understand the depth of sorrow, pain and heartbreak the Lueck family is now suffering.

It’s unfortunate that, though the rate of women murdered in single victim/single offender incidents dropped by 31% from 1996 to 2013, the murder of women, gender-based violence and sexual assault are epidemic in the United States.

A study released by the Violence Policy Center in 2015 documented that, in 2013, 1,615 females were murdered by men in single victim/single offender incidents nationwide. Firearms — primarily handguns — were most commonly used. In 2017 there were 15,129 total murder victims, from all causes, in the United States, and 3,222 of those victims were female.

Regarding domestic violence in 2013, African American women had a higher rate than white women and Native American women had a rate of domestic violence more than double the rate experienced by women of other races.

According to the Indian Law Resource Center, greater than 4 in 5 American Indian and Native women of Alaska have experienced violence. The highest rate of forcible sexual assault is suffered by Alaskan Native women. It has also been reported that they experience domestic violence rates up to 10 times higher than those noted in the rest of the United States. As a consequence of single victim/single offender violence in the United States, women are dying violently each day.

Fares Arguello, Salt Lake City

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