Sunday, August 10, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

COLUMN: Vin Suprynowicz

Going after the double-dippers

Two weeks ago, we listed the first five. We now finish listing the 12 voter initiative referenda which need to be immediately approved by the voters of Nevada, to reverse (and inoculate the body politic against any repetition of) the cynical "Nevada Supreme Court" treason of July 10, in which our state constitution was gutted like a fish:

6) The state police shall immediately bring all Nevada's registered casino lobbyists before a grand jury to determine whether any of them influenced or elicited the actions of the high court, which unfolded during the period July 1 through July 10, and whether they conspired to overthrow the effect of the Gibbons Tax Restraint Initiative.

7) The Nevada budget as established in the year 2001 (not 2003) shall henceforth be considered the state's "base budget," and neither expenditures nor tax collections shall ever be allowed to grow above those levels, except by the combination of the official rate of inflation (less 1 percent) and the official rate of population growth (less 1 percent), since 2001, combined. Should the currency deflate, or the population drop, state taxes and expenditures must immediately drop equivalently -- plus 2 percent.

8) Since the Supreme Court did not like our requirement that two-thirds of both houses must approve any new taxes or tax hikes, the requirement henceforth is that any proposal for tax hikes or new taxes -- or for any new or increased state spending -- must be approved by 90 percent of the members who have been elected to each house of the Legislature. This clause shall take precedence over any other clause in the Nevada Constitution, and any official of the state of Nevada who refers to this as "a merely procedural requirement" shall forfeit his or her office immediately.

9) The voters hereby confirm, declare, clarify, and command that Article 3, Section 1 of the Nevada Constitution means what it damned well says, as understood from 1864 to 1964: No teacher or other employee retained or employed by a government school or college or university which receives substantial state money, no police officer or fireman -- no one who works for any other branch of government at any level or in any capacity, and thus views tax hikes as "revenue enhancements" -- shall be allowed to hold elected public office, and especially they are not to be allowed to hold seats in the Legislature. Any state attorney general who holds otherwise shall immediately forfeit his office. Nor shall any government entity or union or association of such government employees retain lobbyists to lobby the state Legislature.

10) Any rule, provision, decision or law which holds that candidates for any judgeship, or for the office of attorney general of the state of Nevada, must be a lawyer, is hereby repealed and declared null and void.

11) In fact, because of what their leading lights did on July 10, and further because as "officers of the court" they are barred by Article 3, Section 1 of the Nevada Constitution from holding any non-judiciary office, anyone who has ever practiced law, or who is a member of the Bar, is hereby barred from holding any public office in the state of Nevada.

12) One more? Oh, OK. Since it has been grossly misinterpreted by the court to require state support for literally hundreds of schools where only one was called for, Article Eleven, Section 2 of the Nevada Constitution, which states in part, "The legislature shall provide for a uniform system of common schools, by which a school shall be established and maintained in each school district at least six months of every year ... " is hereby repealed.

For starters.

"It's not as if the people of Nevada didn't know what they were doing when they voted overwhelmingly, twice, for the supermajority tax amendment," wrote The Wall Street Journal in its lead editorial of July 15. "Voters know that without some kind of discipline, politicians will always have a hard time saying no to intense spending lobbies. ... Other states -- Colorado, Arizona and Florida -- have similar tax or spending disciplines that require either supermajorities or voter approval. Not coincidentally, they are also the states that have generally weathered the economic slowdown of the past few years better than their peers. ...

"The states facing the worst budget shortfalls tend to be those either with no tax or spending limits or limits that they've weaseled out of," the Journal concluded. "It appears Gov. (Kenny) Guinn will now get his tax hike. But let's remember that in suing the state's legislators, he was in reality suing his own voters."

Meantime, indicating the kind of Intelligence Quotient Black Hole now apparently sucking up all the remaining cerebral neurons in Carson City, Assemblyman Harry Mortensen, D-Las Vegas, opined on July 13 he didn't care how all the new taxes might affect business: "If we have businesses that move here because of low taxes, maybe we don't want those businesses. Let's pass these taxes to help people, and not worry about the businesses."

In which case the best way to "help people," surely, would be to put them in a big boat and take them to Antarctica, where they could live the Life of Riley simply by enacting really high taxes on all the businesses that ... aren't there.

Right?

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Review-Journal and author of the books "Send in the Waco Killers" and "The Ballad of Carl Drega."