A busy 24 hours in Nevada politics

Let's see: Republicans in the legislature are whining, Sen Rhoades is going rogue, Chris G is running for mayor and apparently so is our current mayor Oscar Goodman's wife, Carolyn.

Steve Sebelius' has two blog entries over at Slash Politics on the Las Vegas mayoral race. This kind of stuff only happens in Vegas:

“The more I thought about it, the more there really was no question in my mind,” Carolyn Goodman said in a brief interview this morning.

“We woke up this morning, and Oscar said, ‘Don’t do it.’ And I said, ‘Interesting,’” Carolyn Goodman said. “And I said, ‘I’m doing it,’ so he said, ‘Go for it, girl.’”

[snip]

She joins Clark County Commissioners Larry Brown and Chris Giunchigliani as well as Las Vegas Councilman Steve Ross as the front runners in the race.

HPIC Jon Ralston posts a letter from the Republican leadership in the Nevada legislature. Seems like after nearly a full week of Nevadans sharing their budget cut horror stories, our friends on the right are crying uncle, and looking to make someone else the bad guy. Misery loves company.

And speaking of Ralston and #LVMayor, in a tweet he tags Chris G as a favorite, based on what, I have no idea. But it is peculiar considering three months ago he was calling out Chris G for mayor supporters as "suckers".


Andrew Davey, the Nevada Progressive, sees a possible breakthrough on the GOP side of the Nevada Legislature as Sen Rhoades shakes off the zombie Republican "noooo neeeww taxessss" trance:

Dean Rhoads, the state’s senior senator, became the first Republican lawmaker to publicly break with Gov. Brian Sandoval, saying he thinks the state will need to raise taxes to balance the budget.

Rhoads, who is serving his final year in the Legislature because of term limits, told the Sun that cuts in education and social services in Sandoval’s budget are too deep.

“There will have to be deep cuts like Sandoval proposed, and tax and fee increases,” Rhoads said Tuesday. “We’re going to have to do a combination.” [...]

If you care about Nevada politics, Desert Beacon is a daily must-read. This entry breaks down the logical fallacies in a letter penned by Republican leaders in the legislature:

In short, it is the Nevada Republican Party that is calling for the maintenance of the status quo. After all they have a budget proposal that "that forces government to get more out of less rather than one that increases spending, cripples our economy, kills job growth." This is little more than a succinct restatement of the mantras associated with the "Supply Side Hoax," or as George H.W. Bush liked to call it -- Voodoo Economics.

Justin McAffee of The Nevada View calls Nevada Republicans out for claiming (*cough*LYING*cough*) Nevadans pay high taxes:

As the 2011 Nevada Legislative Session begins next week, interest groups and politicians will be arguing over whether Nevada’s taxes are too low or too high. There is a strong segment of local conservatives and Republicans who think that Nevada’s taxes are too high. The evidence and consensus among academics and think tanks (liberal and conservative) say that Nevada’s taxes are among the lowest in the nation.

And, a blog post isn't complete without Nevada Scandalmongers's wonderful photoshops:


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Laura
laurakmmartin@gmail.com

State of the State Round Up

Last night was an experience. Nevadans had the misfortune of discovering our new governor is a mouth breathing zombie republican.

Here's some reaction from across Nevada:

Launce Rake of PLAN:

But of course, the governor eloquently spoke to the necessity of firing school teachers - he told us, among other things, that having fancy-pants college degrees aren't important here in the Silver State when teaching kids who probably won't graduate anyway - and kicking disabled people to the curb. But don't worry! While one might think that Sandoval's entire program consists of three words starting with "no" and ending with "taxes," one would be wrong.

Not one, but two great pieces from Desert Beacon

So, in the State of the State Address our new Governor wants to end a teacher tenure system the state doesn't have, wants to hold teachers and administrators "accountable" just like the way we do it in NRS 385 already, and wants more money for "merit" pay and private school vouchers even if Esmeralda, Eureka, Humboldt, Lander, Lincoln, Mineral, Pershing, Storey, and White Pine Counties wouldn't see any benefit? [DB]

Governor Sandoval gave an interesting State of the State speech...but a person would be excused from wondering what state he thought he was in?

and

In order for a voucher plan to be realistic there has to be a school available, with space available, with tuition rates such than a voucher would be generous enough to make the difference between private and public educational services. How generous would a voucher have to be? Las Vegas Day School charges $8,100 per year for grades K-8. The Meadows School charges $9,500 for K-5 instruction, $10,700 for instruction in grades 6-8, and $12,950 per year for grades 9-12. There is a $50 testing fee, and a waiting list. Bishop Gorman High School charges non-Catholic parents $6,550 per year, and Catholic parents $5,600 annually. Faith Lutheran charges $5,850 in annual tuition. [LHLV] Tuition at Bishop Manogue High School in Reno is $8,750 annually. There is a $450 parish affiliation discount. [BMHS] In other words, vouchers would be useful only to those parents who can already afford to pay most of the price tags referenced above.

Andrew Davey experienced some deja vu

I've seen this train leave the station so many times before in California. I've seen the devastating cuts that do nothing to help, and actually hurt economic recovery. I've seen the teabaggers (and their ideological predecessors) hold the budget hostage as they propose no realistic solutions. What I saw from Brian Sandoval in Carson City last night didn't seem all that different from what I experienced when Arnold Schwarzenegger ruled Sacramento. And I've seen far too many instances of legislators taking the easy road of toying with ridiculous budgetary gimmicks (moving money from this fund to that fund, calling taxes something else, playing games with bonds, stealing local funds to pay state bills, etc.) instead of solving the actual problems at hand. And funny enough, it's often the teabaggers here whining about "Nevada becoming California".

Sharron Angle pens a guest blog with this kids over at The Nevada View

Aristotle believed that some people are, by nature, meant to be slaves. It is the duty of the superior class of people (wealthy + white + Christian) to contain these other “heathen” people. So why waste money educating them? Just put them to work in our factories at extremely low wages, and America will regain its number one status in the world. It is the outsourcing of jobs to third world countries that has caused most of our problems. Blame unions and these lower class organizers who have a sense of entitlement who are to blame.

And lastly, Steve Sebelius' take. Possibly the last inclusion in the blog round up as he and Slash Politics move over to the RJ...and we all know how the RJ feels about sharing their content

That must be why Assembly Speaker John Oceguera‘s Democratic response seemed to contain more vision and more big-picture, long-range thinking than did the governor’s. It was Oceguera, not Sandoval, who said the state’s tax system obviously needs changing. It was Oceguera, not Sandoval, who reminded us we’ve already taken deep cuts. And it was Oceguera, not Sandoval, who noted the obvious: While money isn’t the only factor, you certainly can’t get to the top in education by funding at the bottom.

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Laura
laurakmmartin@gmail.com