The Mormon Nation

A nation is a community of people who share a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent, or history.  For example, the Navajo Nation or Cherokee Nation.  A state refers to the government.  A nation-state is the government for a nation, for example Albania or Estonia.  Most states are multi-ethnic.

I argue that the Mormons are an emerging nation.  They have a President, Thomas Monson.  The President ("Pope") is selected by the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles ("College of Cardinals"), making this a theocracy, like the Roman Catholic Church. As an emerging nation, if it contains to increase in power and size, it will want its own sovereign territory at some point.

The Church owns several for-profit companies (which pay tax), such as Property Reserve, Inc. which develops commercial real estate such as the City Creek Center, an upscale mall in downtown Salt Lake City costing $2 billion.  Deseret Management Corporation (DMC) has over 2,000 employees. Through Hawaii Reserves (a subsidiary of DMC), it owns the Laie Shopping Center and other properties on Oahu island, Hawaii.  Through AgReserves, it owns over 1 million acres of farmland in the US.  A recent study claims that the church owns over $40 billion of assets, including  $6 billion of stocks and bonds, and has $8 billion of tithe revenue per year.

"The LDS Church’s legions of missionaries and volunteers don’t merely spread the Mormon message around the world; they’re also vital to the church’s businesses."  Some of the "missionaries" are like unpaid interns, doing work like data entry. They learn foreign languages, which are later useful in business.

The Church has 139 temples throughout the world (with another 15 under construction) which act as embassies.

There are 5 Mormon Senators (Harry Reid, D-NV; Orrin Hatch, R-UT; Mike Crapo, R-ID; Mike Lee, R-UT; and Tom Udall, D-NM).  There are also 9 Mormon Representatives, and 1 governor, Gary Herbert of Utah.
 
Ok, so what is the big deal?  JFK was a Catholic, Romney is a Mormon.  He isn't going to try to force everyone to becoming Mormon.  The difference is that JFK was only a member of the church, not part of the church hierarchy.  His only involvement was really going to Mass once in a while.  Whereas Romney is a very prominent church leader.  A vote for Romney is a vote to increase the influence and power of the Mormon church.  Is that better than the alternative?