Tax-fighting state Sen. Bob Beers is at it again, proposing a one-day special session of the Legislature to temporarily suspend the state’s share of the gas tax, 17.65 cents per gallon. With gas approaching (and exceeding) $3 per gallon, that could mean big bucks for drivers.

(For example, say you’ve got a 20-gallon tank and you’re driving on fumes. At $3 per gallon, that’s $60. Take away Nevada’s share of the gas tax, and you’re paying $2.82 per gallon, or a full-fill up cost of $56.47. What’s the big deal with $3.53? Well, if you fill up once per week, that’s $183.56 per year.)

Beers only proposes to suspend the state’s share of the gas tax for two months, until supply interruptions caused by Hurricane Katrina are fixed. We’re sure that oil companies wouldn’t extend the crisis in order to make bigger profits, too. That would be wrong.

So now that Beers has made his proposal, it’s time for another round of Nevada political theater: Follow the non-leader. (Remember when Beers proposed a car registration tax rebate of $100, and Gov. Kenny Guinn upped it to $300? Can you just see Guinn saying he’ll see Beers’ two months, and raise him another five?)

No, us, either. Guinn said through Deputy Chief of Staff Lisa Foster that he’ll call a special session if legislative leaders reach a consensus on a plan.

Ah, Beers may be just a candidate, but with his antics, he’s already the shadow governor. (Even onetime gubernatorial candidate Richard Perkins thinks the idea has merit, although he also wants an investigation into price gouging. Did we say “onetime candidate”? We meant “potential candidate.” Sorry about that.)

Oh, by the way, Beers’ plan will cost the state an estimated $42.6 million, money he says should be taken out of the state’s rainy day fund. “I think it’s a rainy day and I suspect the governor will think so, too,” Beers told the Review-Journal, his megaphone on issues great and small.

And when Beers says it’s raining, Guinn pulls out his umbrella.

Poor Republicans. It seems that inconsiderate bitch Mother Nature has fouled their plans to help the most needy citizens in America, the wealthy. GOP leaders in both House and Senate were all set to come to work this week and repeal the estate tax once and for all, cut entitlement programs, and get to work on private accounts in Social Security.

No more.

Although the consensus is that it simply wouldn’t look good to have a split screen with Republicans blowing legislative kisses to the wealthy as the poor and recently homeless of New Orleans mourned their dead, it was a hard decision for the Republicans. In fact, House Majority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Texas, was saying as late as Sunday that Republicans would push forward anyway, and that the hurricane relief “may mean we work on a Friday or two.”

By contrast, our own U.S. Sen. Harry Reid said that “tax breaks for millionaires” should be the last think on lawmakers’ minds, what with potentially thousands of dead people in the Big Easy. Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., saw the wisdom of Reid’s remarks and declared on Labor Day that the Senate Republicans would re-tool the agenda, put Katrina fallout first, and dump estate tax repeal.

Another potential Reid victory will come with an independent, 9/11-style panel to investigate why the federal government — especially the Federal Emergency Management Agency — failed so badly during the crisis. “Mark my words, it will happen,” Reid said Tuesday. We believe him.

Meanwhile, the costs to repair and rebuild New Orleans could be $150 billion, Reid says. Perhaps if the federal government had spent some cash to prepare for a disastrous, Category-5 hurricane like Katrina, taxpayers would have saved a little on the back end. That’s the kind of fiscal conservatism that never seems to register with the fiscal conservatives, however.