Busy day here at Various Things & Stuff’s headquarters in a nondescript building somewhere near McCarran International Airport. So, let’s stick with Friday’s quick hits format, and cover as much ground as we can.

• U.S. Sen. John Kerry was one of those desperate souls trying to impress the liberal base of the Democratic Party with his resolve. Seriously. He advocated the futile gesture of filibustering the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court, over the objections of more sensible Democrats who saw all downside and no upside. (U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, who some say is the majority leader, said he opposed the filibuster but would vote against closing off debate, thus securing the worst of both worlds.)

“I reject those notions that there ought to somehow be some political calculus about the future … the choice is now,” Kerry said. But wasn’t a futile filibuster evidence of Kerry’s own future political calculus?

In any case, he lost, 72-25.

Our friend and colleague Hugh Jackson, publisher of the Las Vegas Gleaner blog, disagrees with us on this one, saying Kerry stood up for the half of the electorate that didn’t vote for Bush. That’s a legitimate point: Even lost causes need champions sometimes. But standing up and being effective, is still possible. On this one, the opportunity came not at vote time, but immediately after Alito was nominated. Alas, another opportunity lost.

• The Council for a Better Nevada continued to demonstrate its own hubris, with council chief Maureen Peckman rejecting even the pathetic attempt by new superintendent Walt Rulffes to give her what she wants by mimicking the ideas of council-backed would-be superintendent Eric Nadelstern of New York. (Rulffes said he, too, would try “autonomy zones” and smaller schools.)

“It’s the right concept. I don’t know if it’s the right people. You can’t consult your way to autonomy. You have to have people that have worked with it,” she said in the Review-Journal. Ah, gracious losers. There’s nothing like them.

For our part, we think Rulffes should tell the council to go have sexual relations with themselves, and chart his own course for the district. You can’t win following somebody else’s game plan; he should do what he thinks is right, and stand and fall on his own merits. It’s clear the business types aren’t going to be satisfied with anybody but their own man, so he’s got nothing to lose.

• Speaking of hubris, Impeached Controller Kathy Augustine continues to amaze with dispatches from her own world. “My name recognition is high,” she told the R-J. “I have some unfavorables, but I have done a lot of good things in this office. The press only concentrates on the negatives. I have to overcome that by focusing on the positives.”

Yes, that nasty press, focusing on the “negatives” that she’s done in office, say, using her taxpayer-financed equipment to run for re-election, resulting in an impeachment, conviction and censure. The press can be such nit-pickers.

Steady yourselves, readers, as we’re about to praise a Republican, one Paul Adams, chairman of the state GOP. Instead of shilling for Augustine as the best chance to win the office and helping her focus on the positives, Adams exhibits actual principle by saying the party specifically won’t endorse her, and go with lesser-known Mark DeStefano instead. A party hack wouldn’t make that choice, but instead grab for as much power as possible. Now, it’s doubtful Augustine could win, but Adams could have stayed out of the whole mess. Instead, he stood on principle, and we offer humble props to him for doing so.

• Quote of the weekend goes to Howard Rosenberg in the Las Vegas Sun, speaking about Chancellor Jim Rogers efforts to force UNLV President Carol Harter to quit. “The behavior I’m seeing is typical of Mussolini,” he said.

What? Rogers can make the trains run on time? Get him over to the Las Vegas Monorail, which had another minor problem on Friday.

But seriously, folks, Rosenberg — with one foot in the executive branch and one foot in the legislative as a regent — is closer to the classic definition of dictator than Rogers. The chancellor does exhibit a certain dictatorial temperament, however, which probably explains why KVBC Channel 3, one of the television stations he owns, went light on the Harter story over the weekend.

C’mon, Channel 3: Either declare your conflict of interest and do legitimate reporting, or abstain from covering anything to do with Rogers. Don’t go halfway.

Meanwhile, the Sun quoted Rogers saying he was nonplussed by the criticism levied at him by the media, and that anybody who tries to do something will get criticism.

Yes, chancellor, but just doing something is no guarantee you’re doing the right thing. We happen to think Nadelstern was the better of the two finalists. But the way the Council for a Better Nevada (which includes Rogers) handled the situation was most definitely wrong.

Never confuse motion with progress, the saying goes. To that, we add another: Never confuse moving with moving in the right direction.

Oh, for more regent quotables, check out my friend and colleague Jon Ralston’s blog, where he’s nabbed the letter penned by Regent Linda Howard to Rogers, calling him on some recent behaviors. We’re sure Rogers is holding back the tears.

• Speaking of the monorail, the R-J’s little Living section that couldn’t discovered that the train just isn’t for everyone. Does anybody else get the idea that Living writers are working off clips from two years ago to generate story ideas? The alternative — that this is the best they can do — is simply incomprehensible.

• And finally today, we at Various Things & Stuff on Friday linked to a post in Monday Morning Politics. That post accused Ralston of ignoring the back-room goings-on of Nevada politics, an accusation that we don’t think is fair. Much of what we — and the rest of the public — know about Nevada politics comes from Ralston’s work. Every journalist struggles with source relationships and maintaining access. The best way, in our view, to accomplish that is to tell the best obtainable version of the truth about everybody, declare conflicts when they arise and pull no punches when it comes to analysis. And, as a longtime reader of Ralston, we can say that he does all three, and that’s a big part of the reason that he’s got the access he’s got. Having said that, we still endorse Monday’s main point, which is that the state’s politics are all about the relationships formed, consummated and cultivated in back rooms, out of the public’s eye. If it’s the obligation of us in the media to explain to readers what’s really going on, we need to pay attention to such things. Closely.

It’s Friday, and there’s plenty going on. Let’s do some quick hits:

• UNLV President Carol Harter will be leaving the presidency soon, reports my friend and colleague Jon Ralston. Harter was never the favorite of university Chancellor Jim Rogers, so we’re not surprised. A little inside tidbit: When we last interviewed Harter one-on-one, we totally gave her an opportunity to criticize Rogers in confidence. She didn’t do it, speaking only positively about the man who would become, in some ways, her nemesis. Good luck, Madam President. You’ve got class.

• The anonymous blogger behind Monday Morning Politics is somebody with inside knowledge, that’s for sure. We recommend the item “Did anybody, anywhere, think “honest government” actually existed?” (Sure, Monday! It exists on The West Wing! Oh, wait, that show’s going off the air…)

Anyway, we think that there’s some validity to the criticism of the media leveled in this blog item; the true workings of government are hardly ever glimpsed in news pages or columns. We don’t know if the public would or could believe it if it were.

• Sacramento Bee columnist Marjie Lundstrom is striking back against the Nevada Development Authority’s new ad campaign, which is trying to recruit businesses from the Golden State with print ads and billboards in Sacramento, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and San Diego. Her column takes umbrage at being dissed by the likes of Nevada, which we can understand, hailing from the Golden State ourselves. (The Bee requires registration, but it’s quick and painless. Plus, we gave them a funny fake name. We used to work for the rival, now-defunct Sacramento Union newspaper years ago, and old rivalries run deep.)

We try not to take sides in these silly which-state-is-better battles. After all, trying to get somebody to move from San Francisco, Los Angeles or San Diego to Las Vegas (or, even less likely, Reno) is like trying to convince a Ferrari driver to trade you for your used Fiat. But we think Lundstrom would be even more surprised to find the Nevada Development Authority takes credit for bringing 1.7 billion new businesses to Nevada in the last fiscal year alone. Must be those oh-so-clever ads!

• President George W. Bush is refusing to release photographs of himself with guilty-pleading lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Bush is citing his executive authority as a reason to keep the photos secret, even though they were taken with a taxpayer-purchased camera by a taxpayer-paid photographer in a taxpayer-owned building. It’s not like they’re secret plans for the invasion of the next Muslim country that Vice President Dick Cheney gets a (metaphorical, we hope) hard-on for, is it? They’re just pictures.

“Having my picture taken with someone doesn’t mean I’m a friend with him or know him very well,” Bush said, trying desperately to distance himself from one of his fund-raising “Pioneers,” who ponied up at least $100,000 for the president.

So, Mr. President, if it’s no big deal, why not release the photos? Bad hair day?

• Finally, a bit of self-promotion: We at Various Things & Stuff will be guest-hosting tonight’s Extremely Totally Very Extra Special edition of Nevada Week in Review. It airs at 7:30 p.m. on KLVX Channel 10. During the show, we will be giving away new cars to all audience members, and Tom Cruise will be dropping by to leap over the table in a promotional stunt for May’s Mission Impossible 3. Or maybe we’ll just talk about stuff with a panel of local journalists. Probably that.

• Speaking of Channel 10, don’t forget that Saturday is the “Splendor in the Glass” wine and beer tasting event at the Las Vegas Hilton. As a big fan of wine and beer, we at Various Things & Stuff will be in attendance. Get your tickets at KLVX’s offices (they’re on Channel 10 Drive, near Flamingo Road and Eastern Avenue) or at any Lee’s Discount Liquor. Mmmmmm, Lee’s Discount Liquor.

The reactions to the Clark County School District’s unanimous selection of in-house candidate Walt Rulffes continue to pour in, and the business community is up to its green eyeshades in anger. In fact, the comments of some members of the Coalition for a Better Nevada are so intemperate as to cross the boundary between mere lameness into stupidity.

But more on that in a second.

Trustees, for their part, said they went with Rulffes, the district’s co-interim superintendent and former top moneyman, because they needed some consistent leadership for the 2007 Legislature, and for an upcoming $3.5 billion bond issue needed to build more schools. To which we say: Bull.

There was, and is, plenty of time for the district to do what it should have done, which is start the entire search anew. While the business types may be hyperbolic and harbor secret delusions of running the district, they’re not wrong when they say the district needs change, and the kind of change that can only come from outside leadership.

Having said that, however, coalition chief Maureen Peckman continues to demonstrate how ill-suited she is to the task of leading the business group. She said, in the Review-Journal, that the short contract approved for Rulffes through August 2007 would give the district a chance to choose a new leader, and that in the meantime, the coalition will try to meet weekly with Rulffes to get him to consider smaller schools and more autonomy. Put another way, she wants Rulffes to embrace the ideas of the business-backed candidate, who withdrew, Eric Nadelstern.

If we were Rulffes, after all the coalition did to keep him from becoming superintendent, we’d have a short, direct and eminently clear message for Peckman and her group. (Can you guess what it is? First one to answer gets bragging rights!)

But Peckman’s remarks probably should not be surprising, given that coalition creator (and university Chancellor) Jim Rogers was even more over-the-top in the Las Vegas Sun. “I think what it does is it puts the public at risk for two years,” Rogers said.

What, did the school board suddenly decide to ship nuclear waste through city streets? Let prisoners out of jail early, with a free Glock 17 and two extra magazines? Build open pits of hot liquid magma in the places where sidewalks used to be?

No, it didn’t, and the public is only “at risk” from third-degree burns caused by overheated rhetoric.

But wait, there’s more. “They [the district’s board of trustees] screwed this one up so bad I’m not sure anyone would feel comfortable applying,” Rogers added.

First, with a salary of almost $300,000, we’re sure there will be no shortage of applicants. Second, are we even sure the district screwed this one up? Nadelstern pulled his name out of the running after hearing some board members express a preference for his opponent. But it was Peckman who said in an e-mail that there were four votes in his favor.

How did she know, with three critical votes undecided, that Nadelstern would win, unless she or someone else had polled the members? And might that polling, leaked back to Nadelstern, have caused him to quit? Besides, a 4-3 vote is still a win, and Nadelstern is supposed to be a New Yorker: Deal with it, baby.

In any case, we’d argue the business community’s heavy-handed and downright outrageous behavior was at least as much a cause of the week’s events as was the school board members’ actions. (We still cannot determine what it is the board supposedly did wrong; some members simply preferred Rulffes, and had reasons to back up their views. The only “sin” was saying no to the handpicked candidate of the business crowd, which is no sin at all. Sure, we think Nadelstern would have made a great superintendent, but, in the end, it’s not our call, and it’s not the call of the business community. It’s the elected-by-the-people school board’s call.

So while we would have preferred to see the board look for a new candidate, we also have to acknowledge they acted within their authority and discretion in choosing Rulffes. We only hope his superintendency isn’t plagued by the spectacle created not by the board, but by Those Who Wish They Were The Board. Hey business: If you want to pick who the superintendent is, run for office. We’re sure Rogers has checks ready for you.

It seems the business community, which tried with unprecedented fervor to insert itself into the selection process for a new superintendent of the Clark County School District, is apoplectic over the withdrawal of New York educator Eric Nadelstern from consideration. It’s understandable: The ad hoc Citizens for a Better Nevada located, recruited and promoted Nadelstern’s candidacy, even going so far as to invite themselves along on a trip to New York where Clark County school trustees were checking his accomplishments.

But in the end, Nadelstern quit, and Citizens for a Better Nevada chief Maureen Peckman sent out an incredibly incendiary e-mail explaining that Nadelstern didn’t want to work for a divided board, and the district wasn’t ready for “true reform.” (The embarrassing e-mail, first unearthed by my friend and colleague Jon Ralston, was published today in the Las Vegas Sun.)

It’s ironic, too, since the true reform that we think the business community wants is a total takeover of the Clark County School District itself. How else to explain university Chancellor Jim Rogers’ outburst in today’s Review-Journal: “This is an outrage. This is a non-functional board, and something has to be done about it. … I don’t think they’ll ever fix the damage they’ve done,” he fumed.

Hold on there, Mr. Chancellor. And hold on, business leaders.

First, this is not the end of civilization as we know it. A candidate (who wasn’t even on the list produced by headhunters hired by the district) dropped out. From all appearances, he was a good candidate. But he’s not the only good candidate in the universe. The search may begin anew, and another slate of good candidates can and will be found.

Second, why cry over somebody else’s spilt milk? Neither the university system nor the business community is in charge of the Clark County School District. The people are. And in our little representative democracy, the people are represented by trustees, who stand for popular election. They run the district, and that includes choosing the superintendent. That may not sit well with the business types, but that’s our system. Deal with it.

Third, why not sit back and let the trustees do their jobs, instead of following them around the country trying to peer over their shoulders and hold their hands until they come to the “right” conclusion? Business people are citizens, and they have every right to suggest candidates, offer input and have their say. But they do not have the right to jam their favored candidate down our throats. They don’t own the school district, and with every heavy-handed action and shrill e-mail, they arouse suspicion that all they’re doing is simply trying to buy it.

Why should we be concerned about that? Because, at some point, the interests of educators and the interests of business diverge. Business wants good schools to attract more business, and produce more workers, skilled enough to fill the jobs that need to be done, but perhaps not skilled enough to demand higher wages or better working conditions. They see education as a means to an end, which is keeping our capitalist machine firing on all cylinders. But education is really an end in itself.

And that’s why, apart from private schools, education needs to remain a public construct. Because a well-educated population is an undeniable public good, not just another tool to help industry leaders make more money.

As far as we could tell (and we, unlike members of the Council for a Better Nevada, didn’t tag along on trustees’ New York trip) the board did nothing “outrageous.” They did what they were supposed to do, investigating a candidate, and voicing their views.

The Sun and the R-J both opined on their editorial pages today that the board should start a new search, rather than simply appointing interim Superintendent Walt Rulffes. We happen to think they’re right. But they should move forward with the business community’s input, not under it’s watchful eye. Every resident of Nevada — whether they have money or not, whether they own a business or not — has an interest in getting a good superintendent. Let’s let the people’s representatives — the board of trustees — do the job. Because to outsource control of the district to anybody else, no matter their intentions, would be the true outrage.

Boy, we bet the reporters at the Review-Journal’s Business section are red-faced today. Imagine, being scooped by their own colleagues at the Living section! But that’s surely what happened, as Living writer Sonja Padgett uncovered the brand-new phenomenon of slot clubs.

Apparently, it works like this: They give you a card, and you put it in a slot machine or video poker machine, and they keep track of how much you gamble. Then, the more you play, the more things they give you. Free buffets! Free trips to the coffee shop! Clothes! Hats! Even cash! Why, it’s the Discover card of gambling: It pays you, just for losing all your money in the slots!

We can’t understand how the normally reliable Business section staff missed this big story. We’d hate to be them today.

Speaking of Living, writer John Przybys (who we mistakenly guessed had penned the slot club expose; it’s right up his alley) actually had a good piece today. He wrote about the chance that Nevada Episcopal Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori may be elevated to be presiding bishop of the United States.

It was a solid, workmanlike piece that covered all the bases. For our money, we think the R-J should put Przybys on the news staff and have him cover religion full-time. It’s a fascinating subject, there are plenty of religion stories around town, he’s done a fairly good job writing about religion in the past and — best of all — he wouldn’t come up with what we can all agree are subpar ideas for the Living cover anymore. (Seriously, window washing? Fanatical football fans?)

C’mon, R-J. Do your readers a double service!

It turns out that moss has been growing under the computer here at Various Things & Stuff: The rolling stone cliche that we claimed today as the final word on the Rolling Stones Ticketgate mini-scandal was actually one of the first words, used by the journalist who broke the whole mess in the first place. Our friend and colleague Anjeanette Damon of the Reno Gazette-Journal used the phrase on her new blog, Inside Nevada Politics, as you can clearly see for yourself by following the link.

Our apologies for the mistake, and for not keeping up on Damon’s posts. Rest assured, she’s now bookmarked near the top of our daily reading, very near Maxim.

And Spyapalooza continues! Attorney General Alberto Gonzales went to Georgetown Law School to defend President George W. Bush’s decision to order the National Security Agency to tap the phones of Americans talking to suspected al Qaida members overseas, all without the bother of a getting a warrant. We’ve never been to law school, but we have seen lots of legal shows on TV, and thus we feel we’re as qualified as any of the G-town kids to comment on Gonzales’ comments.

First, he said, a 15-day “grace period” — in which the government can tap phones without warrants to its heart’s content, so long as officials seek a warrant thereafter — shows Congress knew it would be essential to be able to tap phones in wartime quickly, he said. (The law governing the wiretaps was passed after abuses of wiretapping by the intelligence community.)

He’s right about that. So why isn’t the administration taking advantage of this “grace period” and working within the law? An excellent question, if we do say so ourselves! And that leads us to…

The second point, which is that Gonzales said Bush administration officials went to Congress 1 1/2 years ago, seeking a law that would have allowed warrantless phone taps. Hmmm, interesting. If we were lawyers, we would at this point say:

• The fact that the administration went to Congress seeking a change in the law suggests that they knew, or suspected, that warrantless wiretaps were illegal. (Otherwise, why would you need to change existing law?) And remember, Bush and other top officials would later argue that they had the authority to do warantlesss taps all along. If they really believed that, they would have had no need to amend the law. Right?

• Plus, they did it anyway! Even while knowing (or at least suspecting) they lacked the legal authority for warrantless wiretapping, the Bush administration simply went ahead with the program. That means they were seeking legal authority to justify something that was already under way, under the well-known legal doctrine of “it’s easier to get forgiveness than permission.” But this makes Bush’s abdication of the Fourth Amendment even worse, given that it’s a knowing and willful violation.

By the way, the administration was rebuffed by senior members of Congress, who said they couldn’t get a bill passed that would allow warantless eavesdropping without compromising the effectiveness of the program. (That is no doubt due to the pesky Fourth Amendment, which clearly and unambiguously bans the Bush spy program.)

But notice what those members of Congress didn’t say. They didn’t say “What? Why, we already gave you that authority with our Sept. 11 resolution!” And that puts the lie to the another administration contention, that Congress intended to allow warantless wiretaps in its use-of-force resolution passed shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. If Congress had intended that, there would have been no reason for the administration to seek permission to justify the program, and, even if officials had sought such permission, if Congress had actually intended to give it, senior congressmen would have said so at the time.

Hey, we’re pretty good at this lawyer thing. Let’s try another.

Gonzales says that, although the administration uses a different standard to justify its wiretaps (they insist they have a “reasonable basis” to believe a person is connected with al Qaida, and thus is eligible for phone tapping) it’s pretty much the same thing as the Fourth Amendment’s “probable cause” standard.

Too easy, baby. If that’s true, then why not simply get the required warrants under the “probable cause” standard, thus avoiding doing violence to the Constitution? After all, the secret intelligence court almost never denies the government when it comes looking for a secret warrant. (We hear they’re thinking of putting in a drive-through window at the court where NSA, CIA and even FBI agents can get warrants, fries and a shake, all in under 60 seconds!)

What’s the real difference between Gonzales “reasonable basis” standard and the Constitution’s “probable cause” standard? Legally speaking, probable cause must be sworn to in front of a judge, while Gonzales’ version is never overseen by anyone but the spooks at Fort Meade (where the NSA is based). It lacks … oh, what’s the word? … checks and balances. Yeah, that’s it.

Anyway, we’ve had fun playing lawyer. Say, does anybody know how much tuition is at Boyd Law School? We hear they do a pretty good job over there, and working at a top firm in town is bound to pay more than what we get over here. Custom home, Porsche 911, private jet and Fiji vacations, here we come, baby!

A rolling stone, they say, gathers no moss. And with that, we’ve used the sole remaining rolling stone-related reference in the media firestorm that has resulted from ex-Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa handing out tickets to a Rolling Stones concert — paid for by her client, mortgage company Ameriquest — to a handful of state lawmakers in November. (Ameriquest subsequently settled a predatory lending lawsuit out of court.)

We are pretty much the last people to weigh in on this bad boy (our friend and colleague Jon Ralston wrote about it today, our other friend (we’ve only two) Erin Neff wrote about it on Tuesday and Review-Journal scribe John L. Smith tackled it today. All had good things to say, and we especially agree with Smith, who said that anyone who failed to report the tickets should be bounced by voters.

Having said that, a few remarks:

• Ethics guru Craig Walton called it right in today’s Review-Journal: “Why do they [lawmakers] have to be told it’s wrong? Their duty is to the people who put them in office. Every candidate or incumbent should make a statement that our relationship with lobbyists will be at arm’s length. This practice of accepting gifts has to stop.”

As always, Walton hits the nail on the head. Accepting gifts is perfectly legal; lawmakers who accepted the tickets and declared them as gifts did NOT break any law. But it’s still a horribly unseemly practice. In politics, there is no such thing as a gift that does not come with strings attached.

But it’s not just politics. The R-J also carried a story today in which a group of doctors, writing in the Journal of the American Medical Association argues that doctors’ acceptance of gifts ranging from pens to expensive European vacations is compromising medical care, since physicians tend to use the generally more expensive drugs and equipment proffered by pharmaceutical and medical-equipment gift-givers.

Whenever a potential to compromise a core interest — the general public’s, or a medical patient’s — could be compromised, gifts should be routinely refused. Walton, as well as the concerned doctors, recommend a total ban, which is not an egregious standard. (We journalists are not allowed to accept gifts from news sources, either, lest it keep us from writing fairly about gift-givers.)

But Walton also highlights the other part of the problem, the sometimes corrosive effect certain relationships have on the system. All politics is about relationships, after all, especially here in Nevada. Gifts are merely a symptom of a larger problem, which is a system that can be gamed by a lobbyist who conjures campaign donations but later turns up to represent those donors, who, it turns out, are clients with needs. That’s why the politicians who can tell even their friends in the lobbyist corps “no” are rare people, much to be treasured.

• Perception, as always, is reality in politics. If the general public perceives their interests can never be heard above the din of concert tickets, fancy dinners, fine cigars, rounds of golf, private jet rides, and the host of other special favors lobbyists convey on behalf of their clients, they will never participate in the system. Why should they? Nobody earning $40,000 per year could ever compete with a huge corporation that can lavish $1 million on a lawmaker with a single fund-raiser.

But, as Ralston cogently noted, here’s the rub: You cannot lay the blame at the feet of lobbyists. They are hired to represent a narrow interest, and when they buy dinner, pay greens fees or help a lawmaker get elected, they are doing their job. Lawmakers are the ones who are supposed to put the public’s interest first, even if it runs counter to the interests of the very people who get them elected. (More than one political career has ended, however, because of a person voting his conscience.)

• The responses to the scandal have ranged from the ridiculous to the sublime. Assemblywoman Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, the future speaker, actually reimbursed Ameriquest before the matter came to light, consistent with her personal policy of not accepting gifts. (That’s a stance that could benefit all lawmakers.) Assemblywoman Francis Allen, R-Las Vegas, is donating the cost of the tickets to Centennial High School, but only after the scandal came to light. And state Sen. Bob Coffin, D-Las Vegas, says that because Ameriquest had no business before the Legislature in 2005, and may not in 2007, he’s not going to return anything.

And that’s fine; Coffin took the tickets and reported them, and it’s perfectly legal. But the standard he’s seemingly created — no gifts from people who do have business before the Legislature — reinforces the point that there’s no such thing as a real “gift” between special interests and politicians. Like the godfather, the day may come when the special interest will need the politician to do him a service.

Finally, we simply cannot withhold comment on the silliest response we’ve seen so far. Assemblyman Mo Denis, D-Las Vegas, took tickets not to the Stones, but to Luis Miguel at the Mandalay Bay.

“I didn’t know much about Luis Miguel. I had committed to Frankie Sue thinking they [the tickets] cost $20 to $30. As the only true Hispanic in the Legislature, I felt I had to attend a Hispanic concert,” he (really) told the R-J.

Where to begin? First, what difference does it make if he knew the artist or not? Would he take a gift from an unknown artist but reject one from a superstar? Second, what does it matter what the tickets cost, unless gifts really are given to buy favor. (For $20, you might get a nod in the hallway; $50 buys an e-mail, $1,000 is a phone call and, if you max out for $10,000, you can take me to dinner?)

As for that last line, we’ve got to believe the usually level-headed Denis was having a bad day. He’s the only true Hispanic? (Coffin, who claims Hispanic heritage, is certainly going to be miffed to hear that.) And that obligates him to attend? By that logic, we at Various Things & Stuff (who are part Italian, part German and part Irish) feel an ethnic compulsion to have lobbyists buy us beer at the Hofbrauhaus, dinner at Piero’s and after-dinner drinks up at J.C. Wooloughan’s at the JW Marriott. Puh-lease.

It’s Spyapalloza 2006, as members of President George W. Bush’s administration fan out to give maximum cover to the shredding of a little thing we like to call the Fourth Amendment.

It started this weekend, as CIA identity leaker and political guru Karl Rove took to the Republican National Committee to tell Republicans to, once again, run on the war on terror. And it continued on Monday, as the former chief of the National Security Agency, Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, assured America that the illicit, warantless National Security Agency spying on international phone calls of American citizens was “targeted and focused” and not a “drift net.”

Oh really? Later in a wire story — printed in today’s Review-Journal — Hayden admitted that going to a secret intelligence court after tapping somebody’s phone for 72 hours still required too much evidence to obtain a warrant. (And that court hands out warrants like big mortgage companies hand out Rolling Stones tickets, people!)

Translation: These guys are engaged in the biggest fishing expedition ever, and they don’t have anything in the way of probable cause. This makes the program all the more suspect, especially since they say they’re only tapping phones of people consider al Qaida suspects, but don’t tell us how they know those people are connected to the terrorist group.

Of course, Bush himself is leading from the front, telling another friendly crowd that Congress said it was OK for him to tap phones. (Congress said no such thing, which means he’s fibbing again.) He even sent his minions to brief Congress on the program, Bush said.

“If I wanted to break the law, why was I briefing Congress?” Bush asked, to laughter.

Hmmmm, maybe because the program was secret and the briefed members of Congress couldn’t discuss it publicly? And even if they wanted to, most are total pussies unwilling to challenge an administration hell-bent on returning to the glory days of the late, unlamented (except by Ann Coulter) Joseph McCarthy?

“I’m mindful of your civil liberties, so I had all kinds of lawyers review the process,” Bush said.

Another misleading remark: Bush had only one kind of lawyer review his program: His own appointees! Folks like White House Counsel Harriet Miers and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. The odds that they were going to tell the president no? Zilch. And the white paper put out by the Justice Department justifying the program Jan. 19 was more of the same.

Bush is mindful of our civil liberties in the same way that most of us are mindful of the speed limit. We know it exists, we know it’s the law and we know we should follow it, but we never do. Only constitutional government isn’t threatened when we drive too fast.

Our favorite quote, however, has to be from Vice President Dick Cheney, who said that if the NSA spying program had been in place prior to Sept. 11, 2001, we may have detected the hijackings.

Memo to the veep: We did detect the hijackings. The FBI and CIA knew bits and pieces of the plot. And the much-vaunted NSA intercepted a warning that wasn’t translated until Sept. 12. If we’d had a more efficient, more coordinated government before Sept. 11, we could have prevented the attacks without threatening constitutional principles that the administration somehow seems to believe are optional.

They’re wrong. And each day that feckless Democrats allow Bush to continue to violate his oath of office without demanding an impeachment is another day they are accessories after the fact.

“If you are going to run for Congress, it is about you and your life and achievements and career. The only reason anybody knows who she [former U.S. Sen. Harry Reid Press Secretary Tessa Hafen] is, is because she works for Harry Reid. He will be an issue in the campaign but I would imagine a lot more early than late.”

— Mike Slanker, campaign consultant to U.S. Rep. Jon Porter in a Review-Journal story today announcing Hafen’s potential run for Porter’s seat.

This seems to be a double-edged sword: Run against Reid to beat Hafen and you risk angering Reid even more (and he’s already monumentally pissed at Porter). The more you bash, the more engaged he gets, the more money he helps Hafen raise. And given that Porter works for some really nasty people, too — we mean the House Republican leadership, not the insurance industry — the employer comparison is a tough sell, too.

We’re ready for the campaign to start, but apparently Hafen isn’t. She told us on Monday that she hadn’t made up her mind, but the R-J reported a potential campaign kickoff Feb. 20, which is a lot more early than late.

We know we’re late in posting today, so let’s do some quick hits from the weekend papers.

• The “Big Six” gambling companies may report a nearly 100 percent increase in profits in 2005, for a grand total of $1.7 billion, thanks to mergers, big convention business and the opening of Wynn Las Vegas.

What’s that thing our friend and colleague Hugh Jackson, who now publishes the Las Vegas Gleaner blog used to say? Now, clearly, is no time to raise the gambling tax?

• Karl Rove, the evil mastermind that brought us such hits as the George W. Bush presidency and George W. Bush II: The Reckoning, is telling Republicans to run on the war on terror, and remind everybody that Democrats are pussies.

“Republicans have a post-9/11 view of the world. And Democrats have a pre-9/11 view of the world,” Rove told the Republican National Committee. “That doesn’t make them unpatriotic, not at all. But it does make them wrong: deeply and profoundly and consistently wrong.”

Yes, in the post-9/11 view of the world, it’s OK to rely on intelligence that you know, or have reason to know, is bad. It’s OK to secretly spy on Americans without getting the constitutionally required warrant. It’s OK to suggest — until recently — that anybody who speaks in dissent is helping the terrorists. It’s OK to give myriad and false reasons for invading another country. It’s OK to leak the names of CIA officers in order to embarrass your political enemies. It’s OK to hand out tax breaks to huge corporations and tax cuts to the richest of the rich. It’s OK to corporatize the government to the greatest extent possible. And it’s OK to spend like drunken sailors while doing it.

Rove is right: The Republicans sure do have a post-9/11 view of the world.

But his view is consistent. Back in 2002, Rove recommended that Republicans use the war on terror to hold on to their seats, because Republicans are traditionally seen as better on defense than Democrats. We’d sure like to see that stereotype confirmed on a Fox News broadcast if it actually was the Democrats who invaded Iraq, sending too few troops with too little armor and too little planning. That would be some fine post-9/11 programming, baby.

• Well, our choice for Miss America, Dustin-Leigh Konzelman, didn’t win, although she did make it to the finals on the strength of her fiddle playing. Miss Oklahoma Jennifer Berry won the title. Dustin-Leigh was robbed, we say! Yucca Mountain-loving Miss Nevada, Crystal Wosik, didn’t win, either. That’s probably because saying “take one for the team” when you’re asked about deaths from nuclear waste-related accidents is the wrong-ass answer in a beauty pageant. Stick with “world peace,” we say.

• According to the Las Vegas Sun, the shadow government, er, make that, members of the Council for a Better Nevada will follow Clark County School Board trustees this week while they visit New York to check the credentials of superintendent candidate Eric Nadelstern. The group of private business leaders wasn’t exactly invited by the district, but hey, they have a vested interest since they’re the ones who found Nadelstern and encouraged him to apply.

We have to say we’re skeptical of business types when they get too involved with schools. And that’s especially true when the district, as the Review-Journal notes, is a $4.5 billion business with plenty of contracts to put out to bid. Are we ready for a public-private experiment with public schools?

• If you haven’t read it, check out my friend and colleague Jon Ralston’s Sunday column in the Las Vegas Sun. Ralston details how corporate types — the very ones that are trying to pick the next superintendent — circumvent campaign contribution limits in order to buy a lawmaker or two. The most surprising thing? It was a Democrat who made it all nice and legal.

• U.S. Sen. Harry Reid offending Italians? It’s true: Reid said something nasty about U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, whose ancestry apparently is Italian. “Having Sen. Santorum talk about reform is like having John Gotti talk about doing something about organized crime,” Reid said.

Something called the Columbus Citizens Foundation of New York responded angrily, via President Louis Tallarini. “Sen. Reid’s callous comments is shocking, unjust and inappropriate since it invokes the specter of organized crime in a criticism of an Italian-American. On behalf of the Columbus Citizens Foundation and the estimated 26 million Italian-American citizens of this country, we demand an apology from Sen. Reid,” Tallarini said, according to the Review-Journal.

Now, we at Various Things & Stuff are part Italian, and we don’t think Reid’s comment was that bad. Implying that Santorum has mob connections is the nicest thing you could say about the self-righteous, pompous, theocrat from Pennsylvania.

But what is the world coming to? Will we not be able to make jokes about Irish people drinking? About German people trying to take over the world? About white people eating white bread, cheese and mayo? About Swedes … doing Swedish things? (Before you ask, we’re all of the above, and thus we’re allowed to make jokes about those ethnic and racial groups.)

Reid’s analogy wasn’t offensive. Maybe that’s why he hasn’t apologized. And why he shouldn’t.

It looks like U.S. Rep. Jon Porter may have a viable Democratic foe after all. Tessa Hafen, longtime press secretary to U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, quit her job late Friday evening and is planning to move back to Nevada. Although Hafen told us at Various Things & Stuff this morning that she hasn’t made up her mind about challenging Porter, it looks to us like it’s a go.

It’s a big move for Hafen, who grew up in Nevada and still has relatives everywhere, including her father, Henderson City Councilman (and potential future mayor) Andy Hafen. And she’s got her ex-boss, Reid, in her corner, and Reid hasn’t been a fan of Porter for at least a few years. If Reid actually shows up for this race, it could certainly be a contest.

But make no mistake: It won’t be easy. Porter’s 3rd Congressional District is almost evenly split in voter registration — 145,267 Democrats to 145,296 Republicans with 54,214 “non-partisans,” according to the latest figures from the secretary of state’s office. But those Republicans tend to turn out and vote more, which gives Porter a slight advantage.

Also there’s Porter’s campaign consultants, November Inc., headed by the formidable Mike Slanker, who vivisected ex-Assemblyman David Goldwater and ex-casino executive Tom Gallagher with equal skill in 2004. Slanker knows how to run campaigns, and we predict his lines of attack will be thus, with mitigating factors in parenthesis:

• She’s too young. (Then again, Porter was a wee lad when he first got elected to the Boulder City Council long ago.)

• She’s too connected to Reid. (Then again, Porter is too connected to ex-Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Who do you think will have more negative impact with voters?)

• She’s a Washington insider carpetbagging her way to Nevada to run against Porter, probably at Reid’s behest. (Then again, Hafen did grow up in Nevada and didn’t Porter once move to challenge U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley?)

On issues of ethics and morality, which entombed long-ago Porter foe (and current federal indictee) Dario Herrera, Hafen is clean. And since she isn’t wealthy with vacation homes spread around the country, it’s unlikely the Gallagher attack will work on her, either.

Insiders are also counting on the ethical scandals plaguing the Republican Congress to help Hafen. Porter himself has not been found to have done anything even remotely unethical, thus far, so a direct attack is unlikely. But he has sucked up like few others to the Republican leaders who are now under suspicion. It’s not a bad strategy for a new guy looking to advance to a committee where he can send some pork back to his home state. It is a bad strategy when it turns out some of the guys you’re sucking up to sold their offices, or at least sublet them cheaply, in order to raise money and stay in power.

As a result, look for Porter to continue pounding the reform drum that saw him attack Reid and Berkley recently, calling on them to return money from disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Thus far, he’s misstepped — the guy he’s backing to be the new majority leader, U.S. Rep. John Boehner, has thus far also refused to return Abramoff money and differs with Porter on key issues like stem cell research. But he’ll be talking like a first-time challenger soon, you just watch.

As far as we at Various Things & Stuff are concerned, we love it. Much like a blowout football game, a one-sided political contest is a sad affair. Things are much better when there’s some competition, and, regardless of anything else, Hafen will surely bring that to a bid against Porter.

Although U.S. Sen. Harry Reid’s “war room” has gotten a lot of press, we at Various Things & Stuff have never been too impressed with the operation. The “war room” was more like a “strongly worded warning room,” issuing usually tepid slaps at Republicans while forced to broadcast an equally tepid message from the Democrats, “America can do better.” At times, Reid himself has been more forceful than the man in charge of the “war room,” Jim Manley.

That’s why we’re confused about Reid’s letter of apology to 33 Republicans who were named in a “war room” attack piece that listed them and their contributions from disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who has pleaded guilty to offering bribes to members of Congress.

What’s the big deal, we wondered? After all, everything in the document was true. Abramoff did give money to those 33 senators and those senators did accept it. Fair game, right?

Not according to Reid, who said in his apology letter the document “went too far, and I want to convey to you my personal regrets.” Manley fell on his sword and said he’d authorized the attack and Reid never saw it before it was released.

What gives? Why is Reid pussyfooting around, when Republicans are giving him rough treatment in lengthy attack documents of their own? Why show weakness in the face of Majority Leader Bill Frist setting up a “war room” of his own? (And you know the Republicans aren’t going to pull their punches.)

Oh, wait. You mean that U.S. Sen. John Ensign was one of the 33 senators attacked? Oh, that can’t be good. Reid loves Ensign, with a love that defies political differences. Reid, according to the above-linked story in the Review-Journal, even called Ensign to apologize.

Well, Jim Manley, learn what many before you, including attorney Ed Bernstein now understand so well: Reid will brook no criticism of the perfectly coifed Ensign. Better get back to America doing better, or whatever that slogan is.

What’s this? Miss Nevada favors Yucca Mountain?

According to the Review-Journal, Miss Nevada Crystal Wosik, 23, of Las Vegas is in favor of the government’s plan to build a nuclear waste repository just 90 miles north of Sin City. It will be the best-built dump anywhere, she says.

But, judges asked her, what about the potential for people to die? “We just have to take one for the team,” she replied.

Now is usually the time we’d say something funny about Miss America contestants being stupid, or marveling that they still do the Miss America Pageant, or wondering if Wosik is aiming for a job in the Bush administration, given her perfect balance of good lucks and total disrespect for (post-womb) human life. Instead, we’ll just let her have her say. After all, we’re totally rooting for Miss California, Dustin-Leigh Konzelman, who’s platform is the importance of character education. And nobody with good character would say we’ve got to “take one for the team” by sacrificing the residents of her home state.

Go, Dustin, go!

My friend and colleague Jon Ralston has already done a superb job in his FLASH newsletter eviscerating Mayor Oscar Goodman’s unwarranted attacks on Attorney General George Chanos at Wednesday’s City Council meeting. But we can’t resist a few follow-up remarks.

For those who remain blissfully unaware of the goings-on at the council meeting, Goodman ripped into Chanos, who has launched an investigation into the council’s unforgivable giveaway of taxpayer dollars to golf course developer Bill Walters out at the Royal Links site. Chanos stepped aside from the probe and hired an outside law firm because of his involvement in the sale of land near Charleston Boulevard and Interstate 15 for the construction of a pair of high-rise condos.

According to the Review-Journal, it seems the mayor didn’t take kindly to Chanos substituting his judgment for that of the City Council’s, although clearly somebody needs to substitute their judgment for that of the council’s. (And to be perfectly fair about this, Chanos is totally righteous in investigating the deal, which is manifestly wrong for the taxpayers.)

In reply, Goodman ripped the land deal in which Chanos is involved, and implied the attorney general was corrupt since he put in only $100 and will get 50 percent of millions of dollars in profits. (Chanos called the charge “ridiculous,” and we have to agree: The deal — consummated before he was even appointed attorney general — is an entirely private transaction. If Chanos’ business partners think his “sweat equity” in the deal is worth 50 percent, then it is.)

“I find it very interesting that we are being inquired into about whether we accepted a proprietary amount of money,” Goodman said. “The person who talks about the smell test, puts up $100 … [and] he gets 50 percent of the profits. That’s what you get with a smell test.”

Smell this, mayor: It’s not like Chanos is giving away millions of tax dollars to a politically connected developer, who Goodman seems preternaturally willing to defend, despite the obvious flaws in the deal. And now, his mysterious fealty to Walters has led him to attack Chanos, first by delaying the vote on his land deal and then by publicly impugning his integrity.

“We were concerned because [of the investigation] because we were between a rock and a hard spot. If we voted in favor, we’d be accused by some smarty pants that we were trying to gain some favor from the attorney general. If we were voting against it, we would be accused of having a bias.”

Well, call us Mr. Smarty Pants, but it seems the council, and especially the mayor, does have a bias: in favor of giving Walters a sweetheart deal at Royal Links, and against anybody who questions that sweetheart deal.

Goodman said recently that he didn’t want any more “clouds” over the council; but by behaving the way he did Wednesday, he’s done the Pathetic Rain Dance of Shame. Don’t expect to see the sun shine on Stewart Avenue for at least a few months, folks.