Jon Ralston, Nevada’s #2 liberal blogger-without-a-TV-show, has taken to Twitter to do keyboard battle with citizens in the trenches pursuing recalls of certain elected state legislators, referring to them disparagingly as “clowns” and “serial failures.”
As is his wont, The Great Ralstonsky has apparently peered into the minds of the founders of Nevada’s Constitution and hath declarethed that mounting a recall against state legislators who refuse to openly oppose and commit to voting against a billion dollar tax hike that wasn’t announced until two months AFTER the election is “not what recalls are for.”
Ralston is the Humpty Dumpty of political punditry in Nevada. “Recalls” mean what Ralston says they mean; nothing more, nothing less.
Fortunately, what the Nevada Constitution says has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with Ralston’s opinion of what it means. It means what it says. In plain English.
“Recall of public officers: Procedure and limitations. Every public officer in the State of Nevada is subject, as herein provided, to recall from office by the registered voters of the state, or of the county, district, or municipality which he represents.”
Article 2, Section 9. You could look it up.
One last point on this…
Ralston is parroting a line that conservatives are pursuing recalls before legislators have cast even a single vote. But like most of Ralston’s pontificating when it comes to conservatives, he’s wrong.
The first vote cast – as in Congress – is for leadership. And both Assemblyman Chris Edwards and Assemblyman Stevie Silberkraus, who already have Recall Committees established against them, voted with the liberal wing of the Republican Assembly Caucus for Speaker-designate rather than with the conservatives.
Had they voted with the conservatives, conservative Assemblyman John Ellison would Speaker-designate today and conservative Assemblywoman Michele Fiore would be both the Majority Leader and the Chair of the Taxation Committee.
With that first vote, Edwards and Silberkraus both set the table for Gov. Brian Sandoval’s billion dollar tax hike. And that first vote alone is sufficient to warrant a recall before they do any further damage to our wallets and checking accounts!
BLAME BRIAN
Let’s be crystal clear on who is really responsible for all these recall efforts…
Gov. Brian Sandoval (R&R-Advertising).
Opponents of the recalls are arguing that no vote has been taken on the governor’s billion dollar tax plan; therefore, it’s premature to launch a recall based solely on the fact that elected legislators are refusing to come out with public statements in opposition.
That argument would have weight except for the fact that the governor didn’t tell voters and candidates that he intended to push for a billion dollar tax hike until two months AFTER the election.
Therefore, voters went to the polls without having all the information they needed about such a massive tax hike to make an informed decision.
If the governor had run on raising taxes a billion dollars, that issue would have been prominent in all legislative races, but especially GOP primary races.
But since the governor chose to keep his tax hike hidden until well after the ballots were cast, the ONLY option left to voters who oppose it is to either (a) force their legislator to take a clear position in opposition now, or (b) assume said legislator is in favor of the tax hike.
This is no time to be wishy-washy. And a recall is the only option voters and taxpayers been left with thanks to Sandoval “hiding the ball” (though it’s unclear if he deflated it first).
Seriously, if anyone’s to blame for all this recall stuff, it’s the governor and others who refused to level with the voters despite the fact that Sandoval had no real opponent – just like Gov. Kenny Guinn v. Joe Neal in 2002.
There is simply no electoral mandate for these tax hikes and we, the taxpayers, need to know where our legislators stand NOW, not after they’ve already voted with the governor to raise our taxes.
Indeed, you don’t exterminate termites AFTER they’ve destroyed your house! You get them BEFORE they have a chance to destroy your house.
What part of this is too deep for Ralston & Company to understand?
