Regarding the closed thread about his stake conference speech in Vegas.

Seems his whole MO is that there's "evidence" for the church that there's no other explanation for.

Besides being based on both false premises and logical fallacy, he's basically admitting he has his own "shelf" as we say. That is, his own doubts are propped up by a testimony of experiences that he doesn't recognize an alternative explanation for. If/when he does recognize that there are alternative explanations, he may be the apostle who "falls from faith".
The church regime is better off with liars, frankly, than a true believer. At least liars know to stay away from the subject of it being a lie, if they can. Holland appears to be hitting it head on.

He cites the Book of Mormon as evidence in itself...and I agree. I realized the Book of Mormon wasn't true all by myself, without any "anti". I knew it was false by what it says...I didn't know about the poor character of Joseph Smith, DNA, anachronisms, pre-Columbian studies, linguistic analysis and author-attribution studies, and deliberate changes in meaning of the text of the BoM and DC. All I knew was that the book looked more and more mean, unfair, contrived, sexist, racist, and genocidal. It made me feel bad.
So, if it makes him feel good, I understand why he'd believe it. But I am under NO obligation to follow that book because its own existence is "evidence" of its truthfulness. This is transparent circular reasoning.

Same with the other miracles from the bible. The bible is mean, unfair, mistaken, unethical, immoral, inhumane, etc., and I am under NO obligation to believe that the healings of Jesus or his apostles ever happened. They are not "evidence", they are stories. The existence of a story is in no way evidence that it's true, which is simple circular reasoning. If it makes him feel good then I understand, psychologically, why he wants it to be true...but the stories DON'T make me feel good so I don't have to rationalize that.

Indeed, the very practice of god teasing mankind with arbitrary miracles to conjure faith is bogus. It reminds me of Tim Minchin's song "Thank You God" where he mocks a Christian's testimony that he healed his mom's cataracts. The point is, even IF it were true, it only demonstrates god's capricious, arbitrary attitude.

This also indicates that effort is being placed on retaining rather than recruiting, which we have known for years...But this is also a tide change as now we are seeing LDS Inc, really, giving up all offense and only playing defense.

They cannot compete with Google.

They continue to make the worst possible decisions...and when they are playing defense...turning out 18 year olds was a really, really, bad and desperate idea.

They are doing everything they can to keep their base which keep sending them money.

They will retain many of their most loyal. People raised in the covenant have a lot to lose by snipping the tentacles of family and business/employment relationships ingrained in LDSdom.

However, there will be a tipping point at one point in time. I am thinking it will be right around the time of the IRS raids on the COB. Sooner or later, this thing will come to a head.

I think the tipping point is close, if not already reached. I live in the south part of the Salt Lake valley, my entire city used to be very LDS, and it still is but there are plenty of no-mos and ex-mos around me too even here. The abundance of people who aren't mormon, especially those who left mormonism makes it easier for others to leave, and each person that leaves makes it easier for the next person in their inner circle to do so. Its a compund effect. If your boss is a no-mo, and half your co-workers and family are ex-mos, its pretty easy to bail. That situation is reality for more and more people in Utah every day.

Every time I see Holland flapping his jowls, I think of the book "People of the Lie" by M. Scott Peck. He has written a whole book showing that the more evil a person is, the more holy they appear. He concludes that the best liars have to first lie and convince themselves of their righteousness--and they get very good at it. I wish that Mr. Peck could meet Mr. Holland! He is a whole book in and of himself! The greatest Person of the Lie, I have encountered, a self-righteous rapist of young minds!

It is one thing to say there is a whole range of phenomena on life that one doesn't understand. Even saying that understanding those things is part of a spiritual journey or quest.

It is quite another to say that because there are these things we experience that are not explained, that one must give up their ability to think and follow some would be prophet--no matter what! Just because one has feelings, impressions, aspirations, hopes etc. that defy rational explanation, it does not mean that a person should to turn over the keys to the LDS, Church and its leaders.

Ignorance or feelings are not sufficient for putting on the line that Mormonism asks. Especially, when so much contrary evidence is at hand indicating that its claims are not just dubious, but false.

Agreed. Additionally, when the Church blatantly lies and contradicts its own teachings, that's pretty clear solid evidence that the Church is not what it claims to be. The Church's clear, proveable dishonesty cannot be chalked up to "phenomena that we don't understand." The evidence is there. Numerous lies and omissions about its own doctrine and history. Assuming God exists, God is not a liar. So God's church would not be either.