Finally, we’ve found someone to take custody of the custodians!

Sparks (Nev.) City Council member Michael Carrigan voted in 2005 to approve a casino project being promoted by his campaign manager, after he was advised by the Sparks city attorney’s office that he could satisfy state ethics law by simply disclosing the relationship prior to the vote.

But the Nevada Commission on Ethics censured Mr. Carrigan for failing to abstain, and the U.S. Supreme Court Monday upheld the ethics commission’s actions -- without making it clear just how much prophylactic power the threat of such a “censure” is supposed to have.

If such arm-waving is as lacking in substance as I suspect (“This is going on your permanent record, Riff Randell!”) maybe this one’s just a big “ho-hum.” But reading former R-J editor Tom Mitchell’s blog on the decision) -- I was moved to comment:

No one seems to have asked how far the executive branch, in the form of an “Ethics Commission,” can go to impact “divisions” of the Legislature under the broad oversight power now apparently endorsed by the (unanimous!) court.

What would prevent the Ethics Commission from simplifying things by now issuing a list of mandatory legislative “abstentions” prior to each session: “On any vote concerning budgets, the following legislators shall not vote because either they or their spouses draw government paychecks; on any vote concerning funding of the state retirement system, the following legislators shall not vote because either they or their spouses draw government retirement checks ...”

So far, I imagine many voters are shouting “Yay!”

But they wouldn’t stop there, would they? “On any vote impacting labor unions, the following members or employees of labor unions, including public-school teachers, who sit in the Legislature shall not be allowed to vote ...

“On any matter involving funding the public schools, the following beneficiaries who accept free tax-paid ‘welfare’ schooling for their own children and who sit in the Legislature shall not be allowed to vote ...

“On any vote raising taxes on PRIVATE employers, the following legislators shall not vote because said vote would impact THEIR businesses or employers” ... leaving such matters to be decided by the government employees in the Legislature ONLY.

I doubt we’d have to search long to find important matters that come before our state legislators from time to time, on which a now re-energized Ethics Commission might rule three dozen members ineligible to vote based on palpable conflicts of interest, leaving such matters to be decided by six retired ranchers from Austin, Spring Creek, and Eureka.

Feel “well represented,” now?

The “Progressive” solution? Why, the Permanent Legislature should be made up of an unsullied class of “pure” academic minds who have never been “conflicted” by exposure to the real commercial world in any way. In fact, their entire sustenance should be provided them in the equivalent of sacred caves, so they wouldn’t even feel a “conflict” in voting for measures which would triple the price of groceries and gasoline and haircuts, since they would never be allowed out into the real world to personally BUY groceries and gasoline and haircuts, all of which would be provided FOR them!

Or have I just described the U.S. Congress and White House?