We’ve read plenty of court rulings in our time, but the U.S. Supreme Court’s holding in the case of Deborah Morse et. al. v. Frederick is one for the record books. And by record books, we mean Hall of Ignominious Transgressions Against the Goddess Justice, which as you know is located in Philadelphia.

We dissent from the majority opinion, written by Justice John Roberts, point-by-point, below:

• While the watching of the torch was a school-sanctioned and school-supervised event, Frederick was not on school property when he unfurled his banner. In fact, he was on public property. No one could argue that he doesn’t have the right to broadcast his message on public property, but the majority imbues the "school-sanctioned" nature of the event with the ability to impose school policy outside the jurisdiction of the school, on public property. We don’t believe any school has such authority, and thus, this is grounds for rejecting the school’s claims.
  
• The majority gives great credence to the school’s policy (indeed, the national policy) that urges people — and especially young people — to avoid drugs. But then the court’s majority does a strange thing: It equates "BONG HiTS 4 JESUS" with advocating drug use. But we think the banner does no such thing. It doesn’t say "[TAKE] BONG HiTS 4 JESUS." In fact, on Page 7 of the majority’s opinion, the court constructs several meanings for the banner, all of which add words in brackets so to reach the conclusion that the sign encouraged drug use. If you have to add words to establish the advocacy, we’d suggest there was no advocacy in the first place.
  
• From Page 13: "Student speech celebrating illegal drug use at a school event, in the presence of school administrators and teachers, thus poses a particular challenge for school officials working to protect those entrusted to their care from the dangers of drug abuse." Here, the court ridiculously conflates a banner that mentions drug use with drug use itself. Do the justices really believe that kids will see a banner like this and immediately begin scrounging around for marijuana? Or, as the sensible dissent penned by Justice John Paul Stevens says, "Most students, however, do not shed their brains at the schoolhouse gate, and most students know dumb advocacy when they see it. The notion that the message on this banner would actually persuade the average student or even the dumbest one to change his or her behavior is most implausible." Go Stevens!
  
• The court’s majority rests its decision on the special nature of the school environment (even though this conduct was not committed on school grounds). "The danger here is far more serious and palpable. The particular concern to prevent student drug abuse at issue here, embodied in established school policy … extends well beyond an abstract desire to avoid controversy," the majority writes. But the "danger" here is nonexistent! First, Frederick was not advocating anything. Second, even if his banner could be read to be advocating drug use, it was unlikely to persuade anybody to use drugs. To use a word like "danger" is unnecessary fearmongering, perhaps the inevitable result of combining the two biggest foils for authoritarians in our society: the war on drugs, and "the children."
  
• Justice Clarence Thomas‘ dissent — which argues students don’t have free speech rights at all — was ridiculous, albeit well-reasoned, much more so than the incomprehensible concurring opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito and joined by Justice Anthony Kennedy.
• The correct answer to this case is simple: Frederick has the right to broadcast his message, as lame as it was, especially given that he was not on school grounds at the time he did it. His principal violated his First Amendment rights by confiscating his banner, and the suspension further exacerbated the violation. To give credence to the particular message on the banner — and contrast it with the policy of the school, which cannot apply off school grounds — is to establish a content-conscious standard of censorship of a message simply because the school disagrees with that message. In short, the majority erred seriously, and eroded a bit of the First Amendment in the process. Thank you very much, justices.
  

An Open Letter to Las Vegas City Manager Doug Selby

What did surprise us were these remarks:

"If we weren’t second-guessed every time we do something, we might be more inclined to release them. But we’re criticized, unfairly, I think, because a reporter sees it differently than the elected body."

As one of the reporters who often second-guesses the city on varied subjects, let me be the first to say: Welcome to America, dickhead! In this country, reporters have been second-guessing elected officials since before we were even a county and had elected officials! Surely, they taught you that in city manager school? It’s kind of our obligation.

Sorry we missed a couple days of blogging, readers. We were busy absorbing the local crimes that were committed by former Clark County Commissioner Erin Kenny and the distant crimes committed by the U.S. Supreme Court. (We’ll blog separately on those.)

We awoke to news that a well-off, white conservative has tremendous and far reaching influence in America, to the detriment of the country and good morals everywhere. And no, we’re not talking about the New York Times story on Rupert Murdoch!

No, we’re talking about the Washington Post’s four-part look at Vice President Dick Cheney, a shadowy figure in the administration who prefers to operate under a cloak of secrecy, influencing policy more than any other vice president in the history of America, and not in a good way. Oh, he also sleeps in a coffin. (That last part may not be true, but we’ve only read the first two installments of the series.)

What we’ve learned: Cheney, with little regard for domestic or international law, spearheaded programs like warantless wiretapping and torture of suspects captured in the war on terror, an agenda that has been refuted by the courts but subtly inserted into law and policy. Oh, and the fact that Cheney operates in almost total secrecy, refusing even to report what documents he’s classifying (including statements to be delivered to the press) because he claims he’s not part of the executive branch. Seriously, it’s so bad, even the Review-Journal gave him a gentle slap.

It’s well worth a read, and it lends plenty of credence to the efforts of Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich to impeach Cheney. Then again, Kucinich also wants to create a Department of Peace, so there’s that.

But wait, there’s more! A roundup of other stuff we’ve collected over the weekend:

» We got a curious e-mail from a public relations representative of the Henderson Chamber of Commerce today, insisting that "The Henderson Chamber of Commerce has remained an influential factor in Carson City by continuing to focus on issues relevant to Henderson businesses."

Really? Because we spent a few days up in Carson City, and we don’t remember the Henderson Chamber being influential at all. Maybe it was one of those behind-the-scenes things? (Seriously, we had to look up who their lobbyists were, and aside from veteran Renny Ashleman and Police Chief Richard Perkins, we didn’t notice any of them plying the halls or shouting out on bills.

[UPDATE: As if to further underscore our point, the city of Henderson wrote in this afternoon with a correction! Ashleman and Perkins were lobbyists for the city, not the chamber. And there is a difference, apparently. It turns out that Terry Graves is the chamber’s lone lobbyist, although a network of volunteers discusses the issues regularly. That must explain the stunning successes listed below. Please, continue.]

"Obviously, no new taxes are a good thing for business," said Charles Perry, who is identified in the news release as chairman of the Henderson chamber’s legislative committee. Oh, really, Charles? Is that why your counterpart at the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce — Tim Cashman — was practically begging Gov. Jim Gibbons to show some "leadership" in getting more money to build roads? Or does Henderson already have enough roads to keep goods and customers flowing to businesses?

In the end, of course, Gibbons did show leadership: By donning a red bandana over his nose and mouth and playing stickup with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, Clark County and car rental companies. Whew! It’s a good thing Henderson doesn’t have any casinos that got robbed so the various chamber could boast about protecting their members from big, bad taxes. Oh, wait…

There’s more! The release goes on to tout … new taxes! It seems one of the Henderson chamber’s "successes" was snagging $3.5 million for the Nevada State College (you know where that money comes from, don’t you, Henderson chamber?) as well as "…creating a new tax district which will accelerate campus development initiatives for Nevada State College. The approved bill enables the college and the city of Henderson to develop, in close partnership, its campus in an expedited manner."

So, no new taxes are a good thing for business, when they develop a school that produces future workers? Would that then not apply to taxes for other good things, like roads, police, sewers and a court system?

And Perry is proud to announce that the Henderson chamber was vocal about transportation. "From the beginning of the session, we kept reasserting that transportation was an issue that needed to be addressed," he says in the news release.

In fact, transportation was addressed … by people other than businesses, for whom no new taxes is a good thing, unless of course they are going to Nevada State College development. But other than car rental companies (and a small portion of county property taxes) no business will be participating in the solution to the traffic problems in Southern Nevada. (Oddly, Perry says that "providing transportation funds" was one of the chamber’s accomplishments. Is the chamber renting cars on the side?)

Hey! Now that we think of it, businesses don’t really contribute (tax-wise) to many problems. Sure they pay the payroll tax. And sales tax. And property taxes. And business license/incorporation fees. But there’s no corporate income tax in Nevada, the way there is in other states. Other than the mighty casino industry, that is. They pay on income.

Maybe the chamber is influential after all?

» Speaking of victories for business that we can agree with (which is a pretty short conversation, we admit) we were glad to see that a-hole judge from Washington D.C. take it in the shorts in his $54 million lawsuit against a dry cleaners that lost his pants. Now, he may be looking at having to pay court costs for Soo Chung, who owns Custom Cleaners in the capital city with her husband.

Roy Pearson, who actually works as an administrative law judge, sued the cleaners after they lost a pair of pants that Pearson wanted taken out. (Watch out, folks: Next up, he’ll sue McDonald’s for increasing his waistline, thus necessitating his trip to the cleaners!)

Pearson argued that consumers might fall prey to signs like the ones the Chung family used to have in their store that read "Satisfaction Guaranteed." In fact, Pearson argued, his satisfaction was not guaranteed. (Although he initially demanded $1,150 to buy a new suit, he rejected offers to settle his litigation for $3,000, $4,600 and $12,000. Bet he wishes he accepted that amount now.)

Anyway, the judge’s order in the case didn’t include the one thing we at Various Things & Stuff were looking for: A directive that Pearson appear at the courthouse, pay the Chungs for their court costs and legal fees, and then be taken outside to be promptly shot.

Maybe the Republicans are right: We do need certain tort reforms.

» Experts hired by Warren Trepp to examine computers and servers used by Warren Trepp for a lawsuit involving Warren Trepp conclude that an e-mail suggesting that Warren Trepp proffered a bribe to then-U.S. Rep. Jim Gibbons were not, in fact, written by Warren Trepp, Warren Trepp’s lawyers say.

Why, that’s amazing!

» When he was a one-term lawmaker, Ron Knect had a habit of not getting a damn thing accomplished, outside of getting his name in the paper. It’s good to see that some things never change.

» What? You mean that, although the giving up of property tax dollars was discussed and approved, Clark County was sad because hardly anybody else was getting violated in the quest for transportation dollars? We’re with you, Clark County! Let’s tax all members of the Henderson Chamber for our roads!

But seriously, how ironic is it that two employees fired by former Clark County Manager Thom Reilly — Kelvin Atkinson and Kathy McClain — both of whom got their jobs back in appeals, got to vote to screw the county? Atkinson, in fact, was in charge of the bill that did it! Damn, the state’s totally ignorance of the separation of powers doctrine can be ironically funny sometimes!

» And finally today, although we at Various Things & Stuff don’t make endorsements, we totally want Republican Regent James Dean Leavitt to run against U.S. Sen. Harry Reid in 2010, as Leavitt is threatening to do. See, we want to test a theory about whether Reid could actually get more than the 61 percent of the vote he garnered back in 2004, when his opponent was gay-marriage banner Richard Ziser. With Leavitt on board, Reid could actually surpass 61, or so our theory goes. Want to test it, Republicans? Nominate Leavitt!

And we’re kind of sad to see Assembly Minority Leader Garn Mabey say he’s thinking of quitting. He wasn’t such a bad sort, after all was said and done, although that kind of talk coming from us will serve only to cement his lack of respect among the right-wing of his party. Which makes us wonder: Could the Republican Assembly caucus actually shrink? There’s only one way to find out, and we call it Assembly Minority Leader Ty Cobb! Do it, GOP. Do it! We dare you!

Before the weekend, before the beer and barbecue, before sports on TV, there must be, Quick Hits. Here we go!

Just a couple things, today, folks:

One of the reasons that we’ve been following the campaign of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney so closely is that we’re very curious how the Republican Party’s evangelical voters are going to feel about him. (Another reason is that we just can’t wait to see what position he takes next on the central moral questions of our day, like gay marriage, abortion and hunting!)

Anyway, religion has always been something that’s interested us, and given that Romney is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and most evangelicals are Protestants, we’ve anticipated a sectarian storm brewing. Will Protestants, most of whom consider Latter-day Saints, aka Mormons, to be cultists, reject Romney on that basis?

While reading the Las Vegas Gleaner today, we think we found one answer: Hell, yeah, they’ll reject him! Apparently, Republican U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback had to reprimand a staffer for raising the question of whether the "Jesus Christ" worshiped by Protestants and the "Jesus Christ" worshiped by Mormons is the same guy.

To which we respond: What’s the question? Of course they’re not!

We don’t want to get too deep into theology here, since we know if our readers wanted a sermon, they’d go to church, but just consider this: In Mormon theology, God the Father and God the Son (aka Jesus Christ) are two separate people. In Protestant theology (as well as Catholic, Eastern Orthodox and others) there is a Trinity, in which God the Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are all the same guy. You can read about it in the central statement of Christian belief, the Nicene Creed, if you’re so inclined.

And don’t forget that the Mormon church’s current President, Prophet, Seer and Revelator Gordon B. Hinckley said in 1998 that "The traditional Christ of whom they [people outside the church] speak is not the Christ of whom I speak. For the Christ of whom I speak has been revealed in this Dispensation of the Fullness of Times. He together with his father, appeared to the boy Joseph Smith in the year 1820, and when Joseph left the grove that day, he knew more of the nature of God than all the learned ministers of the gospel of the ages." Joseph Smith, of course, went on to write the Book of Mormon.

Open and shut case, no? (There’s plenty more, but that’s pretty much all we need for today’s lesson.)

The question now arises: Who cares? And the answer: The evangelicals and the Mormons, that’s who! For years, evangelicals have been taught (wrongly, we think) that the Bible is a pretty good basis for civil government, even in a pluralistic society. Don’t vote for people who have beliefs that differ from those in the Bible, they’re taught. No pro-choice candidates. No pro-gay-rights candidates. No atheists, if such a thing could be found in American politics. Catholics are suspect, even. Liberals especially so.

So how, against that backdrop, can evangelicals who make up a noisy if not terribly successful part of the Republican Party’s base embrace a candidate who is a member of a religion that differs on the central question, the nature of Jesus? (There’s myriad other differences, too.) That’s a fascinating question, especially given Romney’s "latter-day" turn toward much more conservative beliefs, given the most recent revelation that he wants to run for president.

At least it interests us. Sorry if we’re just ranting here. But we know that Brownback’s staffer is not the only person wondering about these things. Plenty other evangelicals are, too. And that’s going to have an impact at the ballot box, we think.

COMMENT FROM A READER: We were delighted to hear from our old friend Bob Leinbach, a hardworking and now retired county employee, in response to this post. For some reason, the Fort Knox-like security system wouldn’t allow him to post his remarks, so we take the unusual step of posting his comments for him right here:

"Now, for some of the column details: there should really be no question on the stand Romney has taken on gay marriage and abortion since he has declared his candidacy: he has stated his position clearly and without equivocation on numerous occasions (which I am certain you, Steve, have read for yourself);  Joseph Smith didn’t write the Book of Mormon, he translated it from the writings of inspired prophets who testified of Christ."

And our briefest of brief responses: Our intent, as always, was to provoke thought and debate, so to the extent we’ve done that, well, yay for us. We’re not sure who "well respects" Lou Sheldon, but it certainly isn’t us; we think he’s a hateful bigot, and claiming him to your side is actually a point in our favor. Then again, we don’t much care for Al Sharpton or his comments, either, some of which have even proven to be true. Romney may have been consistent in his stands since announcing for president, but he’s been anything but consistent before that. (And given that abortion is a fairly black-and-white issue, a change of heart on that one in the lead up to a presidential run should always be viewed with suspicion. And finally, not being a member of the LDS faith, we don’t believe Joseph Smith translated anything. We rather believe what UCLA history professor Fawn Brodie said in her classic and comprehensive biography of Smith, No Man Knows My History: Smith would have made a talented novelist.

How sad Richard Ziser must be. The poor bastard has only done one thing successfully in Nevada politics, and that was way back in 2000-2002, when he qualified the anti-gay marriage ban Question 2 into Nevada’s Constitution. Since then, however, he’s toiled in relative obscurity as head of Nevada Concerned Citizens. Sure, he ran for U.S. Senate that one time, but he lost to nobody in eight rural counties and he ended up giving perennial close-call U.S. Sen. Harry Reid his highest re-election percentage ever, 61 percent, in 2004.

How Ziser’s heart must have lept when he learned the presidents of all eight of Nevada’s institutions of higher learning were planning to go to the state’s public employee benefit board to get domestic partnership benefits for unmarried couples in order to attract better employees. (The matter had come up before the university system’s Board of Regents, but, given that it was a matter that required balls and didn’t involving pointless arguing amongst each other, it quickly fell by the wayside.)

Finally! Ziser’s chance at political relevance, fighting his favorite foe, gayness!

We think that’s probably why he gave it all away in his quote to the Review-Journal, which put the story on the front page, gayness not being something at all favored on Bonanza Road, either.

"If nobody’s watching, they’ll squeeze it on by," Ziser said. "They’re trying to backdoor something that goes against the public policy that’s already been established."

Yes, with all that hot squeezing and backdooring action going on, it’s a wonder anybody can concentrate, huh? But Ziser sure can, because the public policy that’s already been established was established by him, in the form of Question 2. Everybody remembers Question 2, right! It was big in the early 2000s!

(By the way, for those keeping score at home, Ziser is not only against gay people getting married, he’s against them having any of the benefits of marriage, including health benefits. He declined in 2002 to endorse a proposal to allow for gay people to visit loved ones in the hospital.
He once attacked a candidate for having voted to repeal the state’s sodomy law. As far as Ziser is concerned, he’s fine with gay people, so long as they aren’t gay.)

Anyway, give Ziser credit for consistency: He says he’s against the latest benefit proposal because he fears it will lead to children being taught that gay relationships are the same as straight relationships. And while we think that’s a perfectly reasonable thing to teach children, it seems it’s something that Ziser fears very, very much.

Wonder why.

» So U.S. Sen. John Ensign announced the Nevada U.S. attorney’s office will be able to hire seven lawyers and six support personnel. These aren’t new positions, mind you, just jobs that have gone unfilled thanks to budget cuts. With these hirings, the Nevada office should be up to full strength. (Oh, except for the top guy; the U.S. attorney’s job has been filled by an acting attorney since poor Dan Bogden got dumped by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and the George W. Bush administration.)

So now we know! Now we know why Ensign has been holding his tongue while tons of other people have called for the clearly incompetent Gonzales to quit. Ensign was holding out for some money from Main Justice! But our junior senator sure scored…

…actually, now that we think of it, he didn’t score jack. These were jobs that already existed. And while it’s probably better that they’re filled, we still have a constitution-ignoring, lying political hack as the head of the Department of Justice! And by keeping silent in exchange for the money to fill these jobs, Ensign has made himself into something of a political whore. A high-priced, classy one, of course, but a whore nonetheless.

Too harsh? Not at all. Ensign told the Review-Journal for a story that "Enough people were calling for his resignation. I wanted to make sure that instead of playing politics, we were solving a problem and that I think that is what we have done."

Isn’t it cute how Ensign thinks that not calling for Gonzales’ resignation in order to get him to dole out more money to Nevada isn’t itself playing politics? It’s almost as cute as his use of the royal "we" all the time. Hell, the guy is as cute as a box of kittens! (Don’t tell Ziser. He’s got enough on his mind without thinking about that.)

Although Ensign has called on the Justice Department to "restore" Bogden’s tattered reputation, officials have done nothing. And while Ensign is preparing a list of nominees for the U.S. attorney’s job in Nevada for the White House, Bogden’s name will not appear thereon. Why not? (After all, wouldn’t getting his job back be a great way to restore his rep?)

Ensign has said it’s not possible, according to a story in the the Las Vegas Sun.

Well, thank God Ensign’s not playing politics, huh?

» And finally today, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney announced that two longtime Republican political operatives in Nevada are signing on to his presidential campaign. Joe Brezney, the former executive director of the Senate Republican Caucus, will be state director. And political consultant Ryan Erwin, who has headed up the Nevada and California Republican parties, will be senior adviser.

The move shows Romney is serious about locking up top GOP talent in Nevada, and with former Erwin partner Mike Slanker back in Washington, D.C. to run the National Republican Senatorial Committee and GOP major domo Sig Rogich already attached to U.S. Sen. John McCain, Romney scored with these two appointments. There are only a couple of GOP consultants left, people, and they’re going fast!

UPDATE: Upon reflection, we believe we were too hard on the Review-Journal in this post, when we implied the paper dislikes gays. An alert reader called us to note that the R-J editorialized against Ziser’s anti-gay marriage Question 2 amendment (both times it was on the ballot). The paper also urged the repeal of the state’s sodomy law, and cheered the U.S. Supreme Court in its repeal of sodomy laws elsewhere. It’s all consistent with the paper’s libertarian editorial philosophy, which is of the live-and-let-live variety. If anything, the R-J is neutral on gays, editorializing that they should be treated no differently than anybody else.

We made it back from our sojourn to Portland, Ore. (on the Alaska Airlines plane with the chattiest captain we’ve ever had; yeah, buddy, we know there’s turbulence — now get off the P.A. and fly the damn plane already!). And we see we missed a couple things while we were gone. So let’s catch up with some Quick Hits, eh?

PORTLAND, Ore. — We forgot to tell you, readers: We’ll be taking a brief break from blogging to attend a convention here in the City of Roses. We’re here for the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies 30th annual shindig in our capacity as editor of CityLife.

So far, we’ve learned from a couple of activists and a Portland city commissioner that people who live in Oregon are unique and special, primarily because they live in Oregon. But seriously, folks, in this state, you can ask a doctor to help you “die with dignity,” get free rent for 18 months from the city as a way out of homelessness and, with the proper documentation, smoke a lot of pot to relieve the symptoms of your illness.

In short, it’s a progressive paradise, with a real, live light rail system, a civic-minded populace that’s highly educated and literate and the biggest bookstore in the land.

Man, do we have culture shock!

We’ll post again should anything noteworthy happen, but failing that, we’ll be back with all-new posts next week.

You know, we may have been a bit hasty when we dismissed Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean’s call for the Democratic Party to reach out to evangelical Christians yesterday. After re-reading parts of his speech, we thought it might deserve a bit more extensive treatment. And by "treatment," we mean "mocking."

In his speech, ironically rendered at the Washoe County Democratic Party’s annual Jefferson-Jackson Dinner, Dean said there was a "generational change" going on in Christianity that has begun to emphasize social responsibility over social conservatism.

"I haven’t seen gay marriage in the Bible once," Dean said. "But I’ve seen a lot about helping people who are poor and including people and not leaving anybody behind. Those are core values of the Democratic Party and they also are core values of an awful lot of evangelicals."

OK, let us stop him right there.

The problem — well, one of the many problems — of Christian fundamentalists is their selective reading of the Bible. They take a single passage and run with it, decreeing that God hates gays, or that he wants abortion outlawed, or that he simply insists on a balanced budget. Well, Dean does the exact same thing here.

Dean may not have seen it, but it’s undeniable that both the Torah and the letters of St. Paul condemn gayness, or at the very least, gay conduct. "Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind: it is an abomination," says Leviticus 18:22. A couple of chapters later, we’re told "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them." (Leviticus 20:13).

Perhaps Dean didn’t read Leviticus? But that’s OK; the fundamentalists didn’t read it closely, either, otherwise they’d be recommending capital punishment for sodomy. And adultery. And a bunch of other things, from the ridiculous to the sublime.

Maybe Dean’s more of a New Testament guy? How about the letter of St. Paul to the Romans? In Chapter 1:26-27, Paul laments, "For this cause, God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature. And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one towards another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meet."

Yeah, we’re thinking God’s not a big fan of gay marriage. But that’s hardly the point.

In denying the proscriptions against gay conduct, but embracing the myriad passages that enjoined the Jews, and later the Christians, to love one another, take care of the poor, and oppressed, and widows, Dean commits the same sin as the fundamentalists. If you’re going to appeal to the Bible for your political ideas, you’ve got to take all of it, or none of it. You can’t simply say that God didn’t mean it when he condemned gays (not to mention adulterers and incorrigible children) to death, but he really did mean it when he said look out for the poor. It’s ridiculous.

We understand Dean’s desire to reach out to more voters, which is why he’s saying nice things about Christians these days after having once denounced the Republican Party as a "white Christian party." In the 2006 elections, he told Washoe County Democrats, "we reached out to folks and will continue to reach out to people who we had written off before, to our detriment. One of those groups of people is evangelical Christians."

Fine, and well and good. But we find it hard to understand how Dean’s "reaching out" includes totally mischaracterizing the Bible. Don’t you think the Christians will see through this little trick, and conclude you only care about their votes, and not their values? Or does Dean really think they are stupid?

He continued to cite the example of Christian author Rick Warren, pastor of a Southern California megachurch who is "setting aside those things that divide us" and doing things "that bring people together — things that really are in the Bible." You know, like fighting poverty, global warming, and the bloodshed in Darfur.

Truth be told, there’s nothing about global warming in the Bible — its authors didn’t even know they lived on a globe. But there’s plenty about bloodshed in there, especially in the historical books of what Christians call the Old Testament, much of it instigated and ordered by God himself.

Clearly, Dean hasn’t read much of the Bible at all. If he did, he’d realize the God depicted therein would be against the murder of innocents in Darfur, but he would be just as against gay marriage. He’d want his creatures to be good stewards of the earth, but he’d also want them to refrain from adultery, on pain of death. And he’d be somewhat irked to find that his servants were "setting aside those things that divide us," assuming those things come from his holy and inspired book, regardless of the crying need to remove the War Party from the White House come 2008.

Dean doesn’t understand this, and clearly doesn’t care to understand it. His goal is not embracing Christians or Christianity, but victory. He lamented that Roman Catholic U.S. Sen. John Kerry mustered but 19 percent of the evangelical vote in 2004, but noted that evangelical ex-President Bill Clinton used to garner 33 percent. "If we get back to 33 percent, we are going to start winning states again like Arkansas and Louisiana and we are on the way to the presidency. There is no reason not to include everybody," he said.

Well, that’s not entirely true. In fact, it would be a fine idea to exclude those who want the Bible to be the basis of our government. There are many reasons for this, but the first and most reasonable is this: The Bible was never supposed to be the basis for any government, ever, and each time it’s been tried, oppression, corruption and misery surely follow. When it comes to forming civil societies, the Enlightenment, human reason and common sense are much better building blocks. Our own Declaration of Independence and Constitution, based squarely on those principles, have proven a stable basis for government for 231 years, next month.

That’s why we didn’t watch that CNN forum recently in which the Democrats talked about faith. We knew we’d never hear one of them tell their cable news interlocuters that his faith was a private matter, between him and God, and moreover, that it didn’t matter. "I’m not running to be your pastor, your priest or your pope," we’d have lusted to hear one of them say. "I’m running to be your president. And whether you worship God or disbelieve in him, it doesn’t matter ultimately, because I will administer the country for the benefit of all our citizens, evangelical, agnostic and atheist alike."

We knew we’d be disappointed, as much as we are with Dean’s remarks, and his lack of historical knowledge, or even irony. Recall that he made his remarks at a dinner named in part for Thomas Jefferson, who co-wrote the Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom, which stipulated the perfectly sensible separation between church and state.

The next time Dean’s at DNC headquarters in Washington, D.C., he should take a stroll down to Jefferson’s memorial. There, inscribed, is this famous quote: "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man."

Read it, Howard. Learn it. Live it.

We apologize to you readers for neglecting this very revelatory story from Tuesday’s Las Vegas Sun. In it, we learn that Dr. Raj Chanderraj of the Nevada Heart and Vascular Center wrote a $5,000 check to former Clark County Commissioner Lynette Boggs, just two days after she voted to award a $5 million UMC contract to his practice.

That’s "to Lynette Boggs." Not to her campaign.

[UPDATE: We’ve since confirmed that the name of Boggs’ campaign account — "Friends for Lynette" — would not be easily confused with the candidate’s name, at the time, "Lynette Boggs McDonald." So writing a check for one when you meant to write it for the other would be almost impossible. Especially if, say, you were a smart person, the kind who might, say, be a heart doctor.]

The money was deposited into Boggs’ personal bank account, and was not accounted for on a campaign finance document filed the following month. And it never appeared in her campaign finance documents, until the existence of the money became public and Boggs filed an amended campaign form in April.

The vote that Boggs cast was somewhat controversial, given that the Nevada Heart Center, which had the UMC contract previously, was bidding $4 million for the work, or $1 million less than Chanderraj’s group.

Now, a cynic might suggest that Boggs’ vote was somehow connected to the donation, what in Latin is dubbed a "quid pro quo." The "quid," a $5 million contract; the "quo," a relatively paltry $5,000, which we cannot help but point out is a mere .001 percent of $5 million. We would never suggest such a connection, of course. But a cynic might.

Why? Because the money was deposited into a personal account, which is a mistake not easily made in politics. Chanderraj attorney Stan Perry tells the Sun his client intended the donation to help Boggs retire debt from her unsuccessful re-election campaign against Susan Brager. But why not make out the check to Boggs’ campaign account then?

And let’s not forget that this was not exactly the first questionable connection that Chanderraj had to the contract vote. Former Commissioner Yvonne Atkinson Gates suddenly discovered (after the vote) that Chanderraj was a potential client of her private custom home-building business. Gates asked for the matter to be reconsidered, which it was, with her abstaining from voting. The result was the same.

So does Nevada Heart Center have a case to ask the commission to re-open the bidding for the UMC job? Ironically, it doesn’t appear so. While Boggs participated (rather passionately) in awarding the contract to Chanderraj’s group in December, she was gone from the commission in early February, when the second vote was held. And since Gates, the only other commissioner whose vote might be impeached by the conflict, specifically abstained the second time around, it appears the ratification was done by commissioners without ties to Chanderraj.

But it sure is interesting, isn’t it?

In a bit of what some might call karma, Boggs is now facing felony charges of allegedly lying on her declaration of candidacy about whether she really lived in her district, and for paying a nanny with campaign funds. She is scheduled for a preliminary hearing Aug. 14. Gates, meanwhile, is under investigation for allegedly using her campaign money to enrich family members.

So, U.S. Sen. John Ensign gets out-and-out lied to by a high-ranking member of the Department of Justice, regarding the unjustified termination of former Nevada U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden. He gets very angry about it, and his anger is reported up the chain of command at Main Justice. Ensign demands that Bogden’s "reputation" be "restored." (That hasn’t happened yet, if it ever will.) And in the months since, we’ve learn that Attorney General of the United States Alberto Gonzales either didn’t know what the hell was happening in his own department (bad) or did know, and is fibbing about it (worse).

So what happens when Ensign is given a chance to weigh in on whether he has confidence in Gonzales to lead the department? He votes to block the no-confidence vote!

We just don’t get it.

It seems to us that if somebody lies to you, regardless of whether or not you are a U.S. senator, there’s a credibility gap. And it seems even more clear to us that Gonzales’ performance in the hearings called to discuss the U.S. attorney firings (Bogden was just one of several) was that of a bumbling, hair-splitting, partisan weasel. And we’re not even considering his support for the concept of torture or his infamous statement that habeus corpus is not an individual right, which technically should get him tossed out of the bar.

But Ensign casts a vote that seems to say he has confidence in Gonzales? What gives?

Ensign spokesman Tory Mazzola told us today that the senator didn’t view the vote as an endorsement of the AG, but merely as a statement against a Democratic trick. "Sen. Ensign saw this as a political stunt on behalf of the Democrats," Mazzola said. "Sen. Ensign is committed to working for positive change" in the Justice Department, he added.

And by "positive change" does he mean he’s "positive" it’s time to "change" attorneys general?

Hell to the no! While Ensign "has expressed his concerns" about the department, "right now [he’s] focused on positive changes in the Department of Justice," including getting more resources for Nevada’s U.S. attorney’s office and revamping the review process for U.S. attorneys nationwide. And, Mazzola said, Ensign is not working either publicly or privately to get somebody else in Gonzales’ job.

Now, granted the person who actually lied to Ensign — Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty — has resigned from the department, along with a number of others. That’s got to ease things a bit. But the guy at the top — who either knew about the lie or didn’t know what the hell was happening in one of the most important cabinet jobs in Washington — remains at his post.

And Ensign let it happen. Despite being lied to, despite having his one request of the Justice Department (the restoration of Bogden’s rep) go thus-far unfulfilled, despite ample evidence that Gonzales is simply unqualified to be the nation’s top law enforcement officer, Ensign chose party and politics over principle. Or perhaps we’ve miscast that: For Ensign, party and politics are the highest principle.

And he says it’s the Democrats engaging in political stunts? Even if that’s true, and there probably is some truth to it, it’s manifest to anybody who cares that Gonzales is a dangerous ideologue who is unqualified for his job!

Anyway, it’s open season now. As if the GOP apparatus didn’t know before, it’s perfectly OK to lie to Ensign, to ignore his requests and to pretty much treat him like a congressional doormat. You’ve got his vote, right there in your pocket next to whatever self-respect he had left.  

» That announcement from the Hillary Clinton for president campaign that we posted earlier is a non-surprising surprise. State Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus is a natural to endorse Clinton and work on her campaign, even if Titus is more brash, more liberal and more willing to say what she really thinks instead of couching things in poll-tested, bite-sized, 100-calorie-pack Campaign Utter-bites®.

One thing we hope Titus tells Clinton is this: When it comes to the general election (assuming, of course, that Clinton can stop the powerhouse that is our favored candidate, U.S. Sen. Joe Biden), ignore the freaking rural parts of Nevada! Titus knows more than many others that the Republican rurals are tough for a Democrat, especially a female Democrat. Winning Nevada is all about boosting turnout in Clark County and the urban parts of Washoe County. While making a beauty pass or two through the rest of the state doesn’t hurt, time would be much better spent firing up Democrats in places where, frankly, there are Democrats.

Our colleague, Hugh Jackson, of the Las Vegas Gleaner tried to stir up a little trouble on the conference call announcing the Titus endorsement, asking the state senator whether her endorsement of Clinton represented a betrayal of those who wanted to take their party back from the triangulated, conservative Democrats that have been in charge since Clinton’s husband took the White House. Titus said she united all sorts of Democrats in her 2006 campaign for governor (except for the Republican Democrats, who had their own primary candidate) and that Clinton would do the same in 2008.

We’re not totally sure about that. From what we can see, the caucus is still a wide-open field, with plenty of high-profile Democrats in Nevada backing a wide variety of candidates. (Well, OK, maybe we can rule out Mike Gravel. But Dennis Kucinich still has a shot, baby!)

» Strong in the Force is Howard Dean. But not this strong.

» So, on Monday we gently poked fun at our good friends over at the Review-Journal’s business section for running a fictional headline over a hypothetical story. An alert reader was reminded that the newspaper had done this sort of thing before, asking readers in 2005 to cower in fear of a flu outbreak that never happened.

Apparently, reality is just too boring…

State Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus has signed up on the Hillary Clinton for president campaign, and will co-chair the campaign’s "Women of the West" program. Clinton senior adviser Ann Lewis calls the move "synergy" and calls Titus’ grassroots campaign program in 2006 a "role model."

Now that we’ve shaken off the slumber that always follows a legislative session as surely as  night follows day, it’s time to get back into the blogging groove. So let’s do some Quick Hits to get caught up, shall we? Here we go!