@jakecigar,
While I appreciate the link to the blog, I had already read it before posting. My questions still remain as that post does not actually explain what the actual status of the library.
the blog post suggests that jQueryUI would be updated and shipped accordingly with jQueryMobile, but the lack of any updates to the jQueryUI library since that blog post in 2017 shows that is not actually the case. I would have expected to see updates, even minor, released as to support the blog posts intentions.