Will Las Vegas be next city on not-so-secret Secret Service list?

First it was Colombia. Now it's likely El Salvador. Can Las Vegas be far behind?

News that Secret Service agents partied with prostitutes on April 12 before a presidential visit to Colombia has made big headlines, and now there are reports of similar activity by federal agents during a trip to El Salvador.

Meanwhile, Colombia Minister of Foreign Affairs Maria Angela Holguin is defending Cartagena. Tell me if she doesn't sound a lot like a Las Vegas politician.

Holguin tells Colombia Reports, "I was very sad because the blame has been placed on Cartagena, a city that lives on tourism, a city that is so important in this area. We have become the culprit, the culprit is the Secret Service."

Forgive me, but I can't write the words "minister of foreign affairs" in this context without smiling.

Given what we're learning about the lack of mature decision-making at the Secret Service these days, what are the odds the visiting agents stayed in their hotel rooms and darned their socks while in Las Vegas?

Just wondering.

GSA REACTION: It's easy to be outraged over the waste associated with the General Services Administration's 2010 Western Regions conference at the M Resort. What's harder to come by are facts that advance the story.

Reader Jay Ketover reminds us that Congress seems duty-bound to spend even more tax dollars searching for answers in an election year.

"Has anyone bothered to add up how much all the hearings and investigations have cost?" he writes. "And I am sure that the Congressmen will be following up with their own trips to investigate."

UNION-STATION: The publicity war between Culinary Local 226 and Station Casinos continues. On Wednesday, the casino company took the union to school.

Earlier this year, the Clark County Education Association called for its members to link arms with the Culinary union and boycott Station Casinos properties. The Culinary and the local casino giant are locked in a protracted organizing battle, and it wasn't surprising to see the teachers' organization stand with another labor group. That's part of the public relations war.

Whether the teachers union feels a little awkward this week is unclear, but Station Casinos on Wednesday reminded the community of its alliance with the Clark County School District with a $66,000 donation to 11 at-risk elementary schools through its Smart Start program. School. Superintendent Dwight Jones was in attendance at a breakfast reception at Green Valley Ranch.

And the PR war continues.

COMEBACK KIDS: For decades, the annual returns to the ballpark of Vin Scully and Bob Blum to their respective homes in Los Angeles and Las Vegas have been the surest signs of spring I know. Dodgers announcer Scully is 84. The Las Vegas 51s' Blum is 91.

Both baseball men have been ailing lately, but fortunately the big league legend and triple-A treasure are coming off the disabled list for another season.

TORTOISE TALE: I see where first-grader Quinton Larry of Nate Mack Elementary won the 2012 Mojave Max Emergence Contest. The youngster picked the closest time that the tortoise would emerge from its den.

Not only did he score prizes, a party and a field trip for himself and his classmates, but I also hear the young prognosticator is now up for the sports book director's job at Bellagio.

Have an item for the Bard of the Boulevard? Email comments and contributions to Smith@reviewjournal.com or call 702-383-0295. He also blogs at lvrj.com/blogs/smith.