Reporters’ notebook

DAVID RIGGLEMAN, THE CITY OF LAS VEGAS' COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR, pulled off a brilliant (though probably unintentional) summation of the mayor's State of the City address during the setup for the event Tuesday.

City staff walked through a dress rehearsal before the live broadcast started, and sound check duties fell to Riggleman.

"Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah," he said into the microphone. "And now we look to the future."

Amen.

ALAN CHOATE

OVERHEARD ON THE SCANNER: "The guy with the mohawk has pierced ears. The guy with the really long hair had really bad teeth. His top teeth are missing. They're both homeless, so they should be easy to spot."

HILLARY CLINTON CAMPAIGN WORKERS found a tough nut to crack in North Las Vegas resident Lucille Piper. When a group of Clinton supporters knocked on her door, the retired AT&T employee from New York told them she planned to support Barack Obama in Saturday's caucus because she was looking for a change.

She did leave the door open just a crack for a change of heart, however. After listing Obama's virtues and Clinton's shortcomings, Piper said, "But then I voted for Ross Perot, so don't pay me no attention."

HENRY BREAN

OVERHEARD ON THE SCANNER: "We need to get someone over here to get this cameraman out of here. He's not with any media, and he's yelling obscenities at us now."

UNIVERSITY SYSTEM CHANCELLOR JIM ROGERS rubs many people the wrong way, including some members of the Board of Regents who named him to the job.

So during Monday's special meeting to confront cuts to the system's budget, Regent James Dean Leavitt had to catch himself after agreeing with Rogers on several issues.

"I don't want the chancellor thinking that I like him," Leavitt joked.

"Get that in the record," Regent Steve Sisolak said.

LAWRENCE MOWER

AS THE REGENTS AND OTHER UNIVERSITY SYSTEM OFFICIALS tried to find ways to cut their budget during the meeting, Sisolak wanted to know how much the system spends sending out cards.

Sisolak said he received about a dozen "Christmas cards" from the universities, colleges and various departments and programs.

UNLV President David Ashley, however, had to interrupt him to make a clarification.

"I would point out those are 'holiday cards,'" Ashley said.

LAWRENCE MOWER

OVERHEARD ON THE SCANNER: "It sounds violent. The p.r. (person reporting) was hit with a wooden duck."

WITH ALL THE MEDIA ATTENTION FOCUSED ON NEVADA, you had to know this was coming. In response to repeated mispronunciations of the Silver State's name, proud Nevadan Pam Gang sent the following to MSNBC:

"I am a lifelong resident of the wonderful Silver State of Nevada, and an active member of my political party. I have avidly followed your coverage of the recent Iowa Caucus and New Hampshire Primary, and find I can no longer suffer the ignorance of your so-called educated politicos and pundits mispronouncing the name of my beloved home state. Listen up. It is pronounced 'Ne-VADD-Ah', NOT 'Ne-VODD-Ah'. There is no 'O' in our state's name. Get with it!! The Nevada Primaries are a week and a half away and by golly, I don't want to watch that Saturday's coverage and cringe as numerous talking heads mangle the name of a state that any reasonably experienced newscaster should know how to pronounce!

"Please pass this along to your broadcasters at your earliest convenience. The citizens of the Great State of Nevada greatly appreciate your attention to this urgent plea."

IT GETS TO BE TRICKY DEFENDING THE FIRST AMENDMENT SOMETIMES. One minute you're a free speech advocate, and the next you're trampling on someone's rights.

Take Wednesday's Las Vegas City Council meeting, for example. Everyone was mired in a lengthy technical discussion of new billboard regulations when Roussan Joshua Collins -- he's the guy with the "sexual sin" sign who stakes out the Fremont Street Experience -- wanted to know what was going to be on the billboards.

State law, he insisted, requires people to be moral.

"You can't just have naked lady billboards," he said. "I don't care who's putting them up. Free speech is to submit to godly principles."

Not so, responded Mayor Oscar Goodman. The billboards can't be obscene, but because of the First Amendment, anything short of that "is a go."

A few minutes later, though, it was Goodman playing speech police when Collins wanted to speak on the issue for a second time -- generally a no-no during public hearings.

Collins spoke anyway: "You say we have free speech, but I've been arrested for preaching here in Vegas!"

"Please sit down," Goodman said, wearily.

ALAN CHOATE