Normally, we at Various Things & Stuff are no not so big on the self-promotion. We figure the Ferrari model of advertising works best. That company makes such wonderful automobiles, word of mouth and exclusivity is all the advertising they need. (And while we are most definitely the Honda Civics of blogging, the idea works just as well.)

But we couldn’t help noticing our colleague Jeff Simpson’s column in the Las Vegas Sun this weekend, in which he relentlessly promoted his other gig, the executive editorship of In Business Las Vegas. There, Simpson touts the fact that his weekly business paper "…should be required reading for any businesswoman or businessman in greater Las Vegas."

Not only that, he challenges anyone to compare the valley’s weekly and monthly business publications.

And says that, "week in and week out, In Business Las Vegas presents more news and more useful information to Las Vegas businesses than any other paper or magazine."

Not to mention that "The look of IBLV is clearly the best in class as well. More and better photos and cleaner design make reading the paper as easy on the eyes as it is stimulating to the brain and, we hope, profitable to the bottom line."

"Check us out, compare us, and I know you’ll want to subscribe," he concludes.

OK, OK! We give up! We’ll buy a subscription so you can go to camp!

Only kidding. Partly.

Now, we can’t be totally sure, but we think this column may have been a subtle shot at the Las Vegas Business Press, which is a sister paper to CityLife. (We’re both owned by the soulless corporate entity known as Stephens Media LLC, which also publishes this blog, although we suspect they probably don’t know that. Nobody squeal, OK?)

The Business Press is actually the older of the two publications, and is now published in conjunction with the business section of the Review-Journal, another Stephens Media LLC cash cow. And while we must confess that we don’t keep extremely close tabs on all the capitalist media, we’re pretty sure the Business Press also has news and useful information, a good design, nice pictures and information that the running dogs can use to squeeze more green out of an unsuspecting populace. There’s also the annual Book of Lists, which is a book that contains many, many lists.

But let’s get back to the issue. Simpson has given us a great marketing idea, and we’re going to kick it off right now, with a little piece titled, "Why you MUST read this blog!" Here goes:

You see, every day our team of satirists, mockers, wiseasses and malcontents publishes a sarcasm-packed blog that should be required reading for anybody who is sitting at their computer, bored and has already checked out the better-read and more professional blogs, like DailyKOS, Huffington Post or Talking Points Memo. (And The Superficial. That’s a must read before us, too.)

Although we are hardly unbiased observers, we challenge anyone to compare the other blogs in Nevada to us. (Well, except for the Las Vegas Gleaner. That one is much better. Oh, and Scandalmonger. Lots of good stuff there. Don’t forget Inside Nevada Politics. Our friend Anjeanette Damon does a great job. And no, she’s not married to Ray Hagar, despite that cheesy picture. VegasPundit has many, many more documents than we do. But after all those, we’re No. 1!)

We pay particularly close attention to the local papers, and if you don’t do that regularly, you don’t know how tough a job that can be. But we maintain we have the best mockery in the market, considering all the material we have to work with.

Sure, we’re biased. And we’re proud of the work our talented staff does here every day. But more than that, we’re confident that Various Things & Stuff has evolved into a must-read daily blog for folks who absolutely refuse to take politics or anything else seriously.

Hey, did you know you can subscribe? All you have to do is look to the right, underneath that photo of us (WARNING! Do NOT look directly at the PHOTO! You could experience PAIN! Look UNDER the photo!) click on the link that says "e-mail alerts," and follow the directions.

After checking us out, we know you’ll want to subscribe. And if we get 100 subscribers a week, we will have 100 more subscribers than we had the previous week, so don’t hesitate!

Remember, you MUST read this blog!

We’re not going to grouse too much about the 5 percent raise given to Las Vegas City Manager Doug Selby last week (over his own objections, or so we’re told). The guy who runs the city probably should get $214,307, including longevity pay.

But we do wonder about some of the accolades tossed Selby’s way during the meeting where his salary bump (and $10,000 bonus) were approved.

"He’s one of the most decent, honest, kind, considerate, and dedicated persons I’ve worked with. You can’t put a price tag on that," said Mayor Oscar Goodman. (Um, actually, mayor, you can put a price tag on that. And you did. It’s $214,307, with a $10,000 bonus.)

"One word comes to mind for Mr. Selby, who is our leader, CEO, and that is ‘integrity,’" added Councilman Larry Brown.

Honest? Integrity? Isn’t this the city manager who was going to give golf course developer Bill Walters a huge gift of public funds, by removing a deed restriction on the Royal Links golf course and allowing him to build homes about 20 feet from the city’s sewage treatment plant in exchange for just a fraction of what the unrestricted land was worth? Why, yes, it is!

But why quibble over things that are in the past, or at least that are still under FBI scrutiny? Let’s look more recently than that.

It seems the Culinary Union Local 226 is suing the city over giving zoning approvals to REI Neon, the proponents of a multi-billion arena project downtown. According to the lawsuit, REI doesn’t have control of all the properties in the project zone, which REI denies. Still, the Culinary maintains, 25 properties — 20 percent of the project area — have not signed on with REI.

And the city of Las Vegas can’t say for sure, since its still reviewing the paperwork.

That’s right: The city, which gave zoning approvals and an exclusive negotiating right to REI June 20, isn’t 100 percent sure itself who controls all the properties in the area it gave REI rights to rezone.

Might that not be something the city would have wanted to find out before the vote?

And while we’re on the subject, let’s talk about another REI project in Northville, Mich., in which the company and the township are on the verge of suing each other over the lack of progress. Since the Las Vegas project is bigger, this is a little fact that calls into question REI’s ability to pull off the project in Las Vegas, which even Goodman calls a long shot.

But the question was never asked, the Las Vegas Sun reports, because the committee that reviewed the bids never even knew about it.

Now, none of this may be Selby’s fault. But do you recall how publicly and pathetically he whined before the REI vote when he was asked to release the proposals to the public?

"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," Selby said.

Well, is it any wonder the city is second-guessed when it totally fails to do simple due diligence? And then makes important decisions based on a lack of information? Isn’t Selby’s job, at least in part, to make sure the council has these facts? Wouldn’t that be a mark of honesty and integrity?

Anyway, screw it: For $214,307, taxpayers should be able to second-guess Selby — and everybody else at City Hall — to their heart’s content. In fact, it looks like it might be a pretty damn good idea.

» And speaking of Las Vegas City Hall: We get that the recently concluded World Market Center furniture fest 2007 or whatever brought a lot of people — and a lot of their money — to Las Vegas. We know that city of Las Vegas officials use those numbers to justify the $10 million in tax rebates from the city that the for-profit, going concern will reap over the next two decades. (And if you think it’s going to stop at $10 million, we’ve got some land to sell you near Apex.)

But here’s our question: What do the taxpayers of the city of Las Vegas specifically get out of this deal? After all, they’re the ones who are foregoing the $10 million that would otherwise come into their redevelopment agency coffers.

Consider: Only two of the 21 "host" hotels are actually in the city — the Golden Nugget and the Four Queens. The vast majority are outside the city, in Clark County.

Consider: We’re told that the furniture convention drops $90 million in non-gaming economic impact, and that 35,000 direct or indirect jobs will be created because the World Market Center is here, rather than in another city. OK, fine. But how much of that $90 million accrues inside the city limits of the city of Las Vegas? And how many of those jobs will be based in the city of Las Vegas, or go to Las Vegas residents (say, maybe, the ones who live in the traditionally depressed area just north of downtown)?

It could be this is a really good deal for the city. Or it could be the city’s taxpayers are pumping money and jobs into Clark County. And before you say, "we’re all in this together," let us say this: If that were really true, Clark County would also be subsidizing the World Market Center.

» And still speaking of Las Vegas City Hall … our mad props to Assistant City Attorney Bill Henry, who neatly summarized the entire issue surrounding the 109-foot flagpole at the Tobin Hummer dealership in Las Vegas. While car mogul Dan Tobin’s attorney, David Chesnoff, prattled on and called witnesses to testify about how patriotic Tobin is — an issue that simply could not be less relevant — Henry discussed the applicable law.

And then he played a videotape of a previous council meeting in which Tobin promised he would take down the flagpole if neighbors objected. They did, and he didn’t. Instead, he hired Gentile Chesnoff to try to ram the issue down neighbor’s throats under the ridiculous guise of patriotism. (It looks more like flagophilia to us, but we’re not in possession of the appropriate degree to make a medically sound diagnosis.)

It’s this simple: Tobin lied. And whether he gets to keep his flag up or not, whether he’s successful in his appeals or not, that one, simple fact won’t change.

» You know, we’ve never worked as political consultants, so we’re not entirely sure how that business operates. But we think it works like this: If a candidate votes against a bill that would do something good, then he can credibly be said to favor the bad thing the bill was aimed at fixing, no?

Under that standard, our own U.S. Sen. John Ensign favors allowing poor children to go without health insurance, thus increasing the chance that they’ll get sick and possibly die. That’s an odd stance for a pro-life person to take, isn’t it? If only those poor kids hadn’t made the mistake of actually being born, might they have earned Ensign’s compassion?

Now, Ensign can say (as he does in the story linked above) that he’s against the bill because it engages in "budget gimmicks." But at the end of the day, the bill would have extended health care coverage to poor, sick children. So Ensign’s hatred of "budget gimmicks" (not to mention demon "socialized medicine") is more important than the health and possibly lives of poor kids?

And while we’re at it, it seems Ensign is also in favor of getting gifts from lobbyists, including travel, and he stood up against taking pensions away from corrupt lawmakers. Moreover, it seems he doesn’t want congressional earmarks to be publicized at least 48 hours before they’re voted upon.

That seems strangely wrong to us. Anybody else?

Hey, maybe if this blogging thing doesn’t work out, we can always go into political consulting.

» Speaking of being pro-life, apparently Mitt Romney is steamed at fellow GOP presidential candidate U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback, because Brownback robo-dialed Iowa voters to remind them that Romney used to be in favor of abortion rights before he was against them.

"It’s truthful," Brownback said. Indeed, it is. It’s an entirely truthful statement about a core moral issue, and it’s 100 percent fair game in, say, a race for the White House. (Don’t get us wrong; we think both Brownback and Romney are mistaken on this, and many other, issues.)

"I get tired of people that [sic] are holier-than-thou because they’ve been pro-life longer than I have," Romney lamely responded.

No, no. If Brownback said that he was going to heaven because he’s an evangelical Christian and Romney’s not going to heaven because he’s a Mormon, that would be holier-than-thou. Reminding voters that a supposedly conservative Republican and lifelong Mormon (they’re known as being pro-life, those Mormons) used to defy both his political party and his religion by holding a contrary view? That’s what’s called "politics."

Deal with it, Mitt.