Congress passes Obama’s budget blueprint

WASHINGTON — The House and Senate last week passed far-reaching budget bills, the first step toward tackling President Barack Obama’s policy goals on energy, taxes, health care and education.

THIS WEEK

MONDAY

Top News

Dozens of young boys might have fallen victim to a longtime Boulder City teacher and coach who has been charged with 72 child pornography-related counts, Boulder City Police Chief Thomas Finn said Friday.

Judge imposes $350,000 in fines in eTreppid civil case

RENO — A federal judge has imposed $350,000 in sanctions and fees on lawyers for former eTreppid software designer Dennis Montgomery, saying they manipulated his civil case in an effort to undermine court orders.

Few voters expected on Tuesday

Early voting is up in Henderson and North Las Vegas, the two Southern Nevada cities that have mayoral races on the ballot.

In brief

NORTH LAS VEGAS

A diminishing supply of grains of salt

Don’t count Max Chipman among the masses who believe the state is broke and on the verge of becoming an unregulated wasteland.

An American in London

Some on the right can be counted on to rush to superficial and overheated labeling. That often works for the right.

Benchmarks for bonuses, salaries

I suspect you are well aware of the big brouhaha concerning the bonuses AIG paid to company executives.

Numbers? We’ll get around to it

Whether you accepted a target date of April 1 or April 2, majority Democrats in Carson City vowed that by the end of last week we’d have some firm numbers, telling us how much they plan to spend in their 2009-2010 Nevada state budget, and by how much they propose to jack up taxes to raise all the added loot they seek.

Harry Reid: Too big to fail

Do you think South Dakotans in 2004 felt like Nevadans feel in 2009? You know, in a Tom Daschle/Harry Reid sort of way.

Voters never smile upon tax hikes

Less than two decades ago, a relatively unknown state assemblyman named Jim Gibbons authored a simple, one-paragraph tax restraint initiative. His proposal required that any and all tax increases gain a two-thirds supermajority vote of the Legislature in order to pass. Gibbons eventually gathered enough signatures to place this proposal on the statewide ballot, and in the consecutive elections of 1994 and 1996, three of every four voters in Nevada elected to place this amendment in our state’s constitution.

Stopping ‘common citizens’ from having guns

John Browning’s Model 1911 pistol, an engineering wonder for its day, still serves as a design platform for much modern pistolsmithing. Old examples, especially with military markings, are now highly prized on the collector market, where they can bring hundreds or even thousands of dollars each.

Public financing

The “campaign finance” reformers are back.

Twitter review of zombie shooting ‘Dead Rising’

Twitter.com consumes American lives by asking us every day, “What are you doing?” We type answers all day long in 140 characters or less. “I just woke up. … I just drove to work. … I am going to lunch.” See how Twitter is a leash on our friends?

THE WATER COOLER

Here are a few things from news, entertainment and popular culture that we’ve been talking about lately.

OUTDOOR BRIEFS

NORTHERN MOCKINGBIRDS

OUT THERE

HIKES

Spring a great time of year to visit Valley of Fire

Cheerful golden sun rays nod their welcome to Valley of Fire State Park. These handsome relatives of sunflowers steal the wildflower show this spring, their exuberance drawing attention away from many other varieties. When visiting the park this month, take note of some of the lesser blooms, such as white-flowered gravel ghost, orange globe mallow, pale yellow primrose, pinkish-white dune primrose, lavender Mojave aster and tiny white rock aster. Several varieties of cactus finish up the spring show as hot summer days approach.

Sportswriter takes to the road with girls volleyball team

Editor’s Note: The following journal was taken while Jonathan C. Oglesby was embedded as a sports columnist on the Moapa Valley girls volleyball bus, on a trip to the Nevada State Volleyball Championship in Reno.

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