• First things first. Congratulations to Nevada GOP Communications Director Ciara Turns, who is now Mrs. Ciara Mathews after marrying last week Andy Mathews, Communications Director for the Nevada Policy Research Institute. Let’s hope the new conservative power couple makes lots and lots of little conservative comunicators in the years ahead. We’re gonna need ‘em!
• Also, congratulations to Las Vegas Sun reporter Patrick Coolican who will shortly be leaving our little patch of dry paradise for a new gig at LA Weekly in Venice Beach, California. Have a Corona for us, Patrick. All the best!
• And while we’re in three-cheers mode, congrats to SAGE Commission Chairman (and 2010 CLC speaker) Bruce James who, we were just informed, was elected this morning Chairman of the Board of Regents of the United States National Library of Medicine in Washington, DC.
• John McCormack of The Weekly Standard noted yesterday that Meg Whitman’s lead in the California GOP gubernatorial primary over opponent Steve Poizner was once 50 points. Three weeks ago it was 22 points. And today, according to ABC’s SurveyUSA poll, it’s down to…2 points.
• What’s changed? Meg Whitman, a John McCain ally, came out against the anti-illegal alien law in Arizona while Poizner, “after initially expressing concerns about the immigration law,” now backs it completely “and has been hammering Whitman on the issue lately.”
• Hmm, I wonder how that issue is gonna play here in Nevada.
• Speaking of gubernatorial races, Nevada GOP Gov. Jim Gibbons won’t debate Republican opponents Brian Sandoval and Mike Montandon on Jon Ralston’s Face-to-Face program. Sandoval says he won’t debate Montandon without Gibbons being there. And Montandon says he’ll debate each or both of them anytime anywhere.
• Seems to me that if Gibbons isn’t willing to defend his four years in office, he doesn’t deserve another four. And if Sandoval isn’t willing to take hard questions from Republicans in the primary, even if just from Montandon without Gibbons being on the stage, he doesn’t deserve being trusted with the next four years. Mayor Mike is looking better and better every day.
• By the way, that Democrat-backed group which is going after Sandoval has a new TV ad up on driver’s licenses for illegal aliens, claiming Sandoval is flip-flopping and trying to have it both ways on the issue. How sad is it that Democrats are doing the work for conservatives in this Republican primary race? Are we in a parallel universe or something?
• In response to the new ad, the Sandoval campaign released this statement yesterday: “This morning, Rory Reid’s shadow campaign — funded by Washington Democrats — began running a new attack ad against me. Just like their last one, this new ad is also a lie. The ad attempts to say that I flip-flopped on drivers licenses for undocumented workers. The truth is, I oppose drivers’ licenses for undocumented workers.”
• Alas, that statement itself raises red flags for conservatives who know that “undocumented workers” in the lingo of the left. They’re not undocumented workers; they’re illegal aliens. And using the softened, misleading language embraced by open-border liberals doesn’t exactly give conservatives a reason to believe Sandoval on this issue.
• Meanwhile, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Danny Tarkanian, armed with a new endorsement by half of the Minutemen co-founders (the other is backing Sharron Angle), has a new immigration ad up himself in which, according to Republican candidate Sue Lowden, Tarkanian says it’s time to “start directing federal law enforcement officers to begin pulling kids out of schools and loading them into vans to get them out of the country.”
• Maybe Tark’s ad should be called, “Trail of Tears II: The Next Generation.”
• By the way, a free Reno town hall meeting headlined “Can Nevada Afford Illegal Immigration any Longer?” will be held on Thursday, May 20th, 2:00-4:00 PM at the McKinley Arts and Culture Center, 925 Riverside Drive. The event is being sponsored by the Committee for Entitlement Reform.
• The keynote address will be given by Dr. Steven A. Camarota, Director of Research, Center for Immigration Studies. Also speaking will be Bob Fulkerson of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada and Assembly District 25 candidate, Pat Hickey. Ross Mitchell, KOH Radio Morning Talk Show Host, will MC and moderate the discussions. For more information, contact the Committee on Entitlement Reform at cernevada@gmail.com or (775) 762-8006.
• Back to politics: GOP U.S. Senate candidate Chad Christensen released a pretty cool “Dump Reid” YouTube video yesterday. It’s not going to catapult him to the Republican nomination, but it again raises the “what if?” question: What if Chad Christensen had shown this kind of leadership and creativity during his years in the state Legislature against the likes of Barbara Buckley and Dina Titus and Steven Horsford? How different those sessions would have been!
• The onslaught of TV ads against Lowden by both Reid & Company and Tarkanian appear to be taking a toll on the frontrunner. A new poll shows Reid beating Lowden for the first time in the campaign. Then again, Tark is no longer beating Reid either. The two are tied at 37-37 percent.
• This is going to be a LONG three weeks until primary day.
• Oh, by the way, rather than simply opening up collective bargaining sessions with government employee unions to public scrutiny, shouldn’t we also require voter approval of all collective bargaining agreements? After all, the union members who will be getting the loot and bennies get to vote on whether or not to accept the negotiated agreement; why shouldn’t the taxpayers who will have to foot the bill get the same courtesy?
• “For the sixth consecutive year, the state Board of Examiners has approved selling $3 million in general obligation bonds to finance conversion or restoration of historic buildings,” reported Cy Ryan in the Las Vegas Sun yesterday. Ryan notes that $220,00 will be used to convert an old post office building into a mob museum, while “Clark County Parks and Recreation Department will receive $150,000 for restoring the railroad cottage; Mesquite gets $40,000 for work on the high school gym and $75,000 is set aside for the Neon Museum at the La Concha Motel lobby.”
• Um, aren’t we still in The Great Recession? Is this the kind of “essential” government spending we keep hearing about that taxpayers simply can’t do without, necessitating tax hikes? Is this the kind of spending that candidates who refuse to sign the Taxpayer Protection Pledge want to be able to keep voting for? Inquiring minds wanna know.
• Speaking of the Tax Pledge, here’s an interesting dynamic shaping up in the Capital Senate District. The front-runner, Assemblyman James Settelmeyer – who signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge while in the Assembly – has NOT signed the Pledge again for his Senate run, while his primary opponent, Steve Yeater has. Also the Independent American candidate who will be on the general election ballot in November, Cody Quirk, has signed the Pledge, while the Democrat candidate has not.
• Is Assemblyman Settelmeyer going soft on tax hikes, or is he wavering because of pressure from special interest donors and lobbyists? Inquiring minds wanna know.
• And finally, author James David Manning, PhD, says “white folk” have reached their limit with our “long-legged half-breed” president and ain’t gonna take it anymore, including riots in the streets – a message delivered in a manner you have to see to believe. Click HERE
