• The Muth Troop went camping this weekend at a government-run campground on the Colorado River. So naturally, no cell or Internet service was available. Which actually wasn’t a bad thing. Until waking up this morning to over 600 email messages that piled up since last Friday morning. But we’re back from the wild and ready to rock.
• First things first. I re-registered as a Republican this morning in order to vote in June 8 primary. To do so, I went to the Secretary of State’s webpage to complete the mail-in registration form. And while you can type in most of the information required and then print the completed form out, you cannot type in your name or driver license number. What’s up with that?
• The potential BIG NEWS this morning is an Associated Press report that Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio will announce today whether or not he’ll run this year for governor of Arizona. Either way, “America’s Toughest Sheriff” will be in Las Vegas on Friday to attend this month’s First Friday Happy Hour at Stoney’s Rockin’ Country.
• “Bartering, chickens and goats: these three words have put me at the epicenter of talk shows, late night TV and political commentary,” wrote Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sue Lowden in a guest column published in Politico on Friday. “The comment I made about bartering was not, and was never intended to be, a policy proposal. It was an example of how struggling families are working to pay for medical care in any way they can during these tough times.”
• Why couldn’t she have simply issued that short statement three weeks ago and avoided this whole mess?
• Some interesting results from Friday night’s straw poll of attendees at the Heidi Harris/KDWN debate in the GOP primary for the U.S. Senate race. The results from the 595 responses returned (out of 800 attendees): Sharron Angle 27.1%. Danny Tarkanian 24.9%. John Chachas 21.3%. Sue Lowden 16.1%. And Chad Christensen 10.6%.
• Can Team Lowden stop the bleeding and still pull this one out?
• Sam Shad of Nevada Newsmakers has sent the Patriot Majority PAC a ceases and desist letter over the group’s use of footage from Shad’s interview last month of Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sue Lowden without Shad’s permission. As Drudge is wont to say, “Developing…”
• Nevada Democrat state Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford has created a six-member legislative sub-committee to ostensibly take a look at spending and efficiency in state agencies. Fiscal conservatives smell a rat. Most likely, such a committee will end up reporting that, well, there just isn’t anything left to cut in the budget and the government is running just as efficiently as it possibly can. Surprise!
• Reinforcing such fears is the fact that of the six members appointed to the committee – Sens. Joyce Woodhouse, Bill Raggio and Valerie Wiener, along with Assembly members Marcus Conklin, Debbie Smith, and Pete Goicoechea – there’s not a single known fiscal conservative on the team. Talk about a stacked deck.
• Gov. Jim Gibbons noted on Friday that 27 of the 44 recommendations made by the Spending and Government Efficiency (SAGE) Commission have been or are in the process of being implemented. SAGE Commission Chairman Bruce James is scheduled to be the kick-off speaker at the May 22nd Conservative Leadership Conference at the M Resort in Las Vegas.
• California pollster Adam Probolsky reported last week that 44% of voters surveyed said knowing that a candidate was a recreational user of marijuana made no difference to them in their voting decision. Probably because stoned elected officials couldn’t possible screw up the California government any worse than the doobie-free morons that are there now.
• “Joe Brezny,” reported Jon Ralston in Friday’s Flash, “the longtime aide de camp to Bill Raggio, is leaving as executive director of the Senate GOP caucus to lobby with the Realtors. He will be deputy government affairs director.” Good luck, Joe.
• Ten of the seventeen candidates endorsed by the pro-business Keystone Corporation have yet to sign the Taxpayer Protection Pledge promising not only to oppose next year’s efforts to extend or make permanent the “sunsetted” business tax and fee hikes approved last year, but any effort to impose a “broad-based” net proceeds or business income tax, as well.
• The seven Keystone-endorsed GOP candidates who have signed the Tax Pledge are Assemblyman Ed Goedhart, Assemblyman John Hambrick, Assemblyman Richard McArthur, Tibi Ellis, Tyler Andrews, Randi Thompson and Pete Livermore.
• The ten Keystone-endorsed GOP state assembly candidates who have NOT yet taken a firm stand against any and all efforts to raise taxes next year if elected are: Josh Gust, Crescent Hardy, Mark Sherwood, Assemblyman Lynn Stewart, Assemblywoman Melissa Woodbury, Dan Hill, Jodi Stephens, Assemblyman Pete Goicoechea, Assemblyman Tom Grady and Kelly Kite.
• Oh, and John M. Beard, the Democrat candidate against incumbent Rep. Dina Titus, signed the Tax Pledge this morning. Seems some Democrats are more fiscally conservative champions of the taxpayer than some Republicans these days.
• Flint, Michigan, city officials “suspect arsonists with a political bent were trying to scare residents after nine vacant homes were torched over a 20-hour span. . . . The fires started Wednesday about 30 minutes after Flint Mayor Dayne Walling announced that 23 firefighters would no longer be on the job starting Thursday morning. . . . Mark Kovach, vice president of the firefighters’ union, said he is ‘appalled’ at suggestions that the fires could have been set for political gain.”
• Hey, isn’t this the script for “Backdraft”? And aren’t firefighters in Las Vegas being laid off this week because the firefighters’ union here has refused to grant the concessions necessary to avoid them? Uh-oh. Doesn’t Las Vegas have a lot of vacant buildings, too?
And finally, set your alarm clock for Wednesday morning at 7:00 am and wake up to Alan Stock and yours truly prognosticating and cogitating about Nevada politics on KXNT 840 AM. Then tune in the following day to Nevada Newsmakers where I’ll be slinging campaign karma with host Sam Shad.
