The author demonstrates that the two unexpected results in the local Universe: anomalous intrinsic (V--I)(sub 0) colors of RR Lyrae stars and clump giants in the Galactic center, and very short distances to Magellanic Clouds inferred from clump giants, can be at least partially resolved with a modified coefficient of selective extinction A(sub V)/E(V--I). With this modification, the author found a new clump-giant distance modulus to the Large Magellanic Cloud, (mu)(sub LMC) = 18.27 (+-) 0.07, which is 0.09 larger than the Udalski (1998b) result. When distance estimates from the red clump, RR Lyrae stars and the eclipsing binary HV2274 are combined, one obtains (mu)(sub LMC) = 18.31 (+-) 0.04 (internal).