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Penny PressNevada, USA Volume 8 Number 16 JANUARY 6, 2011

THE PENNY PRESS,JANUARY 6, 2011 PAGE 2

PennyPressLogotype Pointedlymad licensed from: Rich Gast

Credits:Publisher and Editor: Contributing Editors:Fred Weinberg Floyd Brown Al Thomas Doug French Chuck Muth John Getter Pat Choate Wyatt Cox

The Penny Press is published weekly by Ely Radio LLC All Contents © Penny Press 2011

Letters to the Editor are encouraged. They should be sent to our offices at 335 W. 4th Street Winnemucca, NV 891445 They can also be emailed to: [email protected] No unsigned or unverifiable letters will be printed.

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By GEOFFREY LAWRENCESpecial To The Penny Press

“This tax isn’t going to put any-one out of work!” lawmakers and pundits cried in 2009 as they debat-ed whether to double the state’s modified business tax. “It’s only

1.17 percent!”Yet, even “small” taxes impact

business.Sure, not all of the 24,790 indi-

viduals who are newly unemployed since the Nevada Legislature’s 2009 tax hikes took effect can directly attribute their joblessness to the new levies. As global tourism demand has

dwindled, so, too, have the revenues of Nevada’s staple industries and those of the stores and services that cater to those industries’ employees. This is a global recession rooted in systemic policy deficiencies.

But the state’s 2009 tax hikes have done no favors for Nevada businesses or their employees.

Among the first lessons one encounters in a microeconomics classroom is that firms operate based on marginal — not absolute — costs. More significantly, firms operate within the constraint of diminishing marginal returns for factor inputs versus consumers’ diminishing mar-ginal utility for the firm’s product.

That is to say that every unit of a firm’s product that has already been purchased by a consuming public satiates that public’s demand for the product to the point where additional

units are perceived to be of compara-tively less value and, therefore, only capable of fetching a progressively lower price. At the same time, each new employee hired by a firm, for a variety of reasons, is likely to pro-vide relatively less output per dollar of wages than the last employee.

Hence, there emerges, in every firm, an optimal production point where the amount of labor and capi-tal employed maximizes profits and beyond which the firm begins to suf-fer financial losses. This is the scale of production at which the most efficient firms operate. Savvy entre-preneurs spend considerable effort conducting market research analyses to determine where this optimal pro-duction point lies and, by extension, how much labor and capital should be employed to realize this given scale of production.

Even small changes in this deli-cate financial balance can be enough to distort the marginal calculations. Payroll taxes such as the MBT (a tax assessed as a percentage of a firm’s payroll) and the unemployment tax (which was just raised to 2 percent of payroll) as well as minimum-wage laws and health care mandates all artificially inflate labor costs and thus lower firms’ profit margins. In many cases, this leads to dismissal of some marginal workers as firms are forced to bring their scale of production into accord with the new, politically manipulated cost struc-ture.

An example: Acme Rockets, fac-ing a completely free market, might determine that demand for its prod-uct is such that profits will be maxi-mized by producing 600 rockets per year — the cost of producing a 601st

Penny PressWINNEMUCCA, NEVADA 16 PAGES VOLUME 8 NUMBER 16 JANUARY 6, 2011

Penny WisdomThe avoidance of taxes is the only intellectual pursuit that carries any reward. —John Maynard Keynes

The Conservative Weekly Voice Of Las Vegas

Inside:Why Don't We Give Bin Laden A Gaming LicenseSee Editorial Page 6

DAVID BOZEMAN PAGE 5FRED WEINBERG PAGE 6DOUG FRENCH PAGE 7AL THOMAS PAGE 10WYATT COX PAGE 11CHUCK MUTH PAGE 14PETS OF THE WEEK PAGE 15

It's The Margin, No Tax Is Without Consequence

Commentary

Continued on page4

rocket will begin to exceed the price at which it can be sold on the market. To do this, Acme must employ exactly 200 workers at the going market rate of $50,000 each — for a total payroll of $10,000,000. However, when Acme is confronted with Nevada’s MBT (1.17 percent) and unemployment tax (2 percent), it faces a new $317,000 liability to the state.

Thus, even in face of this relatively small change in cost structure, Acme’s managers are forced to recalculate the marginal profitability of each employee. In order to maintain labor costs, Acme would have to lay off seven workers and cut back production slightly.

In this example, Acme is not forced to close its doors, but it is clear that

Acme is forced to scale back production and lay off workers at the margin in response to even very small taxes.

Nevada lawmakers should heed this reality as they debate the impact of taxes in the future. While governments are obliged to levy taxes to finance their operations, it should be recognized that every tax destroys jobs and wealth. Therefore, to maximize community wealth and employment, taxa-tion’s burden should be kept to a minimum.Geoffrey Lawrence is a fiscal policy analyst at the Nevada Policy Research Institute. For more visit http://npri.org/.


Cut Taxes, Stop Killing BusinessContinued from page 3

Menthol Cigarettes And Your Liberty Up In Smoke

One takes scant pleasure in defending the tobacco industry, but the pertinent question, now more than ever, is how much latitude will a freedom-loving people grant its government to tax, regulate, demon-ize, harass and suck the life out of a sector of our economy that is still legal?

The FDA is currently consider-ing a ban on menthol cigarettes.

These cigarettes are usually deemed more dangerous, and the proposal to ban them recently drew protestors to Washington, D.C., with many indus-try employees in North Carolina worried about losing their jobs. The FDA is also considering new, more graphic warning labels for cigarette packs, including photos of diseased lungs, lips and even dead bodies. Speaking of which, you’re probably stumbling over corpses on sidewalks since, according to the surgeon gen-eral, exposure even to second-hand smoke can cause immediate disease, including heart attacks.

If the government believed that its concerns were valid about the public health of children and bystanders that they claim are sub-

ject to immediate disease and death — then why are they not arguing for an all-out cigarette ban? It sounds as if the cause of big government is better served by a living, breathing monolithic boogeyman worth bil-lions of dollars to sate the gluttonous appetites of public do-gooders?

The amount of revenue gener-ated by tobacco taxes at federal. state and local levels is practically incalculable. Anti-smoking advo-cates claim that making the habit more expensive actually discourages smoking and saves lives and billions in medical costs. Some even con-sider higher taxes a “user fee,” but, in fact, smokers, who typically die younger, are funding health care for older citizens, whose medical and personal care needs increase with the onset of old age. Government-funded health care? More like health care courtesy of your neighbor.

The anti-smoking crusade fuels what author Jacob Sullum called in 1998 “the tyranny of public health.” Stamping out what many consider a vile habit is worth any incursion of liberty and property. North Carolina, the heart of the tobacco belt, just last year banned smoking in bars and restaurants. Proponents argued that the state, which subsidizes the health care of many of its citizens, has a stake in regulating private, lawful activity in private, lawful establish-ments that allow their patrons to smoke. Sullum, whose book, For Your Own Good, details the hyste-

ria of the anti-tobacco movement quotes Surgeon General C. Everett Koop from 1996: “From my point of view, anything that stops smoking is good.”

Apparently, the tobacco settle-ments disbursed to the states in the late 1990s intended to reimburse money spent treating smoking-relat-ed illnesses and to discourage chil-dren from smoking was not spent as planned. Some reports indicate that no more than 3 percent went to the intended projects, with most dollars plugging “budgetary holes” (according to a medical news web-site) that occurred during the reces-sion. Americans used to support their government by purchasing savings bonds — today, a pack of Marlboros would be about as lucrative for the ever-expanding, ever-merciful state.

Banning menthol and mandat-ing graphic warning labels may well decrease consumption of cigarettes, but the Big Government mentality will never kill the golden goose. By stigmatizing a bad habit, do-gooders have granted themselves leverage to extract freedom and money from a health-conscious population. Public health is a noble cause, so we are to believe, but the health the current state is obsessing over is clearly its own. DAVID BOZEMANDavid Bozeman, former Libertarian Party Chairman, is a Liberty Features Syndicated writer.


Commentary: David Bozeman

The Penny Press Tips Its Cap To:The Federal Trade Commission for making the wring decision which will actually have the right effect. They banned up front fees from mortgage modification firms which, while it is a restraint of trade will force people who need a mortgage modification to hire a lawyer who can actually sue a lender to get their attention which seems to work best these days.

Governor Brian Sandoval who told the Las Vegas news media last week, "A tax has to be paid by somebody. There has never been a tax that wasn't collected by somebody, from a struggling family, from a business." That's something that a lot of elected officials never get. The other thing is that business taxes are NOT paid by business. They're paid by the customers.

The Penny Press Sends A Bronx Cheer And A Bouquet of Weeds To:The geniuses at NDOT, RTC (South) and the US Department of Transportation for building a bridge over the Hoover Dam and no connecting highway through Boulder City. What did they think would happen? That the traffic would disap-pear? Well, morons, it didn't. What you did was turn Boulder City upside down and you wonder why the public thinks government can't do anything right. www.pennypressnv.com

Back in the day, the Nevada Gaming Control Board took Frank Sinatra’s gaming license away from him for the Cal-Neva Lodge because of his alleged (and probably real but peripheral) connections with Sam Giancana.

There was a day when Las Vegas was heavily influenced by folks named Civila, Spilatro, Rosenthal, Siegel, Dalitz, Patriarca, Korshak, Costello, Lederer and, oh yes, the Teamsters’ Central States Pension Fund.

Harry Reid is reputed to have kicked all of those clowns out of Las Vegas in his years as the Chairman of the Gaming Commission.

Getting a gaming license these days involves hugely expen-sive investigations which place such licenses well out of reach of little guys. It can cost a half a million just for the investigation.

All of which begs several questions:

If MGM Resorts is such a great licensee, how come they are allowed to have an association in Macau with one Pansy Ho, whose father is arguably the Sam Giancana of China and who has admitted that her father financed her empire?

In supposedly mobbed up New Jersey, MGM was forced to sell half of a casino it didn’t even operate because of that association.

In Nevada, not so much.

And then there’s MGM’s association with Sheikh Rashid Bin Mohammed Al Maktoum, ruler of Dubai and 50% partner in City Center. He (or his company) also has an approval from the Gaming Commission to own up to 10% of MGM.

How does a guy who built a city in the Middle East with slave labor get a gaming license in Nevada where guys like Spilatro were chased out and ended up in shallow graves in Southern Indiana.

Finally (but certainly not least), there’s the latest gaming owner and operator in the strip, Deutchebank.

The bank which financed Auschwitz in World War II for one Adolf Hitler financed and then foreclosed on and now owns and runs a 3,000 room hotel on the strip.

If merely having financed Auschwitz was the only sin which the German bank engaged in during the last 65-years, that

might be one thing.

But two weeks ago, the Wall Street Journal reported that this fine, upstanding example of the banking industry paid the government of the United States about $536-million (that’s a half a BILLION dollars or about one eighth of what they say they have in the Cosmopolitan) to avoid criminal prosecution for touting illegal tax shelters.

But, by God they have a Nevada Gaming license.

Adolf would be so proud.

Now I know what you might be thinking.

This guy is still fighting World War Two. Or why shouldn’t we allow a casino company to take Arab money? Or, is it possible he’s biased because he’s Jewish?

Candidly, I do think that I wouldn’t personally patronize either City Center or the Cosmopolitan because of their financing for that reason. I grew up visiting relatives who had serial numbers tattooed on their forearms.

But what really makes me mad from a business perspective is the fact that these guys can get gaming licenses with very cursory investigations while a little guy who wants to get into the gaming business is going to be forced to undergo a protological exam before he is going to be granted a license to run the smallest of casinos. And many are simply turned down. Some because the gaming regulators don’t like their moral character. Imagine that.

Frankly, in a state which has a billion dollar budget gap, it sure seems like a misallocation of resources.

Did the Gaming Commission send investigators to Dubai? Did they look at the slave labor issue? Why is Pansy Ho an acceptable business associate for MGM in Nevada but not New Jersey? How can a foreign bank essentially plead guilty to a Federal felony but still get a gaming license?

When are we going to license the Russian mob?

How about the Iranians?

Or Al Qaeda?

Or have we already?

FRED WEINBERG


OPINIONFrom The Publisher...Who Gets Nevada's Next Casino License? Al Qaeda?


Burns Diary Exposes Myth Of Fed Independence[Inside the Nixon Administration: The Secret Diary of Arthur Burns, 1969–1974 • By Arthur Burns • University Press of Kansas, 2010 • 144 pages]

The notion of central-bank independence is one of the great myths of the modern age. The perception is constantly floated and the words mouthed. Every president and potential presidential candidate swears the Fed’s inde-pendence is sacrosanct. Even before becoming president, Barack Obama spoke in reverence of Ben Bernanke’s operation. “Senator Obama made clear his respect for the independence of the Federal Reserve System and the special importance of its role during periods of economic uncertainty,” Obama’s Senate spokesman Michael Ortiz told Reuters in July of 2008.

In May the current Fed chair told a conference in Tokyo that he and other central bankers must be left alone to expertly guide their respective econo-mies; otherwise, Bernanke said, “political interference in monetary policy can generate undesirable boom-bust cycles that ultimately lead to both a less stable economy and higher inflation.”

For those who believe this sort of nonsense — or are under the impres-sion that political leaders and the posses surrounding them are wise, thoughtful, and have the best interests of the country at heart — a quick read through a small book should disabuse the most ardent democracy lover of these notions. Inside the Nixon Administration: The Secret Diary of Arthur Burns, 1969–1974 gives the reader a peek into the oval office and should give one pause.

But wait a minute; the Fed chairman doesn’t hang out at the White House. The president and the head central banker only run into one another on the Washington cocktail circuit, nodding politely but keeping a respect-able distance. Otherwise people would talk.

However, Arthur Burns spent lots of time with Richard Nixon and Nixon’s staff and advisors. After spending the better part of an especially trying day at the White House, he concluded his January 19, 1972, entry with “Vanity! What Vanity! Why do grown men act so foolishly?”

This from a guy who, when a German reporter asked how he could have pulled the trigger on a damaging monetary policy, said a Fed chairman has to do what the president demands or “the central bank would lose its inde-pendence.”

There are numerous entries in Burns’s diary that start with “President telephoned,” “The meeting at Camp David,” “President called and asked me to come over.” It’s a good thing the Eccles Building and the White House are just a few blocks apart.

Burns was close to Nixon, but even so, he seems sad in his initial entry that Nixon was triumphant on inauguration day rather than humbled by the challenge and responsibility. A few entries later Burns writes of going on TV to support the president’s domestic package, which inspired a call from a thankful Nixon who went on and on with Burns about the importance of loyalty. But when the president called a half hour later for no apparent rea-son, Burns wonders, “Had he been drinking?” Reminiscent of a poignant scene portrayed in the movie Frost/Nixon.

The diary really heats up with the entries from 1971, the pivotal year when the faintest remnants of the gold standard were extinguished. Writing about what was known as a Quadriad meeting (the “Troika” of the secretary of the Treasury, the CEA chairman, and the director of the Bureau of the Budget, together with the Fed chairman) on March 8, Burns observed, “The President looked wild; talked like a desperate man; fulminated with hatred

against the press; took some of us to task — apparently meaning me or [chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, Paul] McCraken or both — for not putting a gay and optimistic face on every piece of economic news, however discouraging; propounded the theory that confidence can be best generated by appearing confident and coloring, if need be, the news …”

Burns goes on to write that Nixon will do anything to get reelected and believed that despite the president’s harassing of the Fed, “I am still his best friend.” But a few lines later Burns writes that during that meeting at times he “felt that the President was going mad.”

A few days later, Burns asks for a private meeting with Nixon to lay out a number of points, one of which was “that there was never the slightest conflict between my doing what was right for the economy and my doing what served the political interests of RN.” Not exactly the definition of independence.

Nixon had a preference for yes-men, which Burns realized in the sum-mer of 1971 just days before the gold window was shut, writing, “What sur-prised me was not the President’s inner thoughts, but the contempt — which he articulated so fully — for other men who had minds of their own and a sense of conscience besides.”

The Fed chair writes more than once that he did not favor closing the gold window, but that ultimately it had to be closed because the government was incapable of action and leadership. But, of course, Burns and company were implementing Nixon’s New Economic Policy, which involved plenty of heavy-handed government action: a wage-and-price freeze, a 10 percent surcharge on imports, an investment tax credit of 10 percent, and a “tempo-rary” closing of the gold window that became very permanent.

Burns wrote that he “assured the President that I would support his new program fully,” notwithstanding his reservations about the gold suspension. However, Nixon’s preoccupation with the upcoming election frightened Burns, who wrote that he was “losing faith” in the president.

Burns has little good to say about many of Nixon’s operatives. And he is especially hard on Paul Volcker, who is most often revered for later taming the inflation spurred by the policies of Nixon and the Burns Fed. Instead of being portrayed as a tower of strength, Volcker is described by Burns as unmanly; “an indecisive man, full of flaws, and anxieties.”

Burns had been plucked from the faculty at Columbia University by Dwight D. Eisenhower to be chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors. This appointment launched Burns’s career in government and fortunately cleared the way for the acceptance of Murray Rothbard’s PhD thesis The Panic of 1819, which Burns had blocked, despite having known Rothbard since he was a child and being asked by David Rothbard to look out for his son.

Burns’s diary is page after page of political dirty dealing, lying, and backstabbing. Nixon went so far as to plant negative press about Burns and threatened to expand the Fed’s Board of Governors to dilute the chairman’s influence, all to bring Burns in line with the president’s economic meddling. None of that seems necessary; Burns’s diary would indicate that the presi-dent had him at hello.

No doubt a well-worn path still exists between the Eccles Building and the White House. But the myth continues. Economist Mark Zandi told CNBC’s Lori Ann LaRocco recently, “I think the worst thing that could happen is if the Fed was politicized. An a-political Federal Reserve is a cor-nerstone of our financial system and broader economy. So nothing is more important than maintaining the Fed’s independence. And the fact that its wrapped in the political process is just disturbing and disconcerting.”

Mr. Zandi, the USS Fed Independence sailed a long time ago

DOUG FRENCH

Commentary: Doug French


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Commentary: Albert ThomasBuying An Investment House

The basic rule of thumb that is quoted by most real estate people is you must buy the house for 70% of the retail value.

It is my rule of thumb, and I am not a real estate professional, is you must buy it for 50% of the retail value or LESS. I know people who do this on a regular basis.

Where do you find these deals? They are listed on the MLS. This can usually be accessed on the computer by going to your county name/MLS.com. There the price range, number of bedrooms, bath, garage, pool, etc. can be entered in the appropriate boxes and, click, a list of homes will appear.

As an investor there are two boxes to be filled in. One is ‘foreclosure’ and the second is ‘bank owned’. These sellers are motivated and will almost always sell for less than the listed price.

The first offer should be no more than 25% of the listed price. That offer is made through the listing real estate broker. The more contingencies in the offer the less chance the offer will be accepted. If a cash offer can be made it has a very good chance of a counter offer at a much lower price, especially if it is bank owned property.

If you can’t steal it don’t buy it.Banks don’t want to own real estate. They are in the money business not

the property business. Every bank has a Real Estate Division. I don’t know of any who will sell directly to an individual. They must list with a broker.

Find out who is their preferred REO realtor and contact him.People think if the price is cheap the broker won’t care about selling as

the commission will be small. Wrong. Banks make special commissions on cheap properties, even those selling for less than $25,000, so the broker is motivated to help the investor get the deal done.

The investor must do his due diligence on the property. Does it need repair and what will it cost to put it in rentable or resalable condition? Instead of using a home inspector have a certified contractor go through the house to give an estimate of cost and time to get the job done.

Here is a short list of expenses. 1 to 2% for closing costs; 2 to 5% if there is to be a loan; 2 to 15% for interest, insurance, utilities, taxes until the home is sold; 2 to 8% for closing costs and broker commission when sold.

If the investor has a source for the cash to do the deal some of these costs will not appear or be less. The lower price homes will turn over quicker and will also rent for more positive cash flow.

The due diligence will have checked out recent homes in the neighbor-hood for both sales and rentals prices.

The more that can be chopped off the listing price the more profit in the deal. AL THOMASAl Thomas’ new book, “If It Doesn’t Go Up, Don’t Buy It!”, 3rd edition, has helped thousands of people make money and keep their profits with his simple 2-step method. The method made 10% during 2008. Read the first chapter at www.mutualfundmagic.com and discover why he’s the man that Wall Street does not want you to know.

Ousted Commissioners Go Gentle Into That Good Night

ELY—The White Pine County Commission met one final time last Thursday to clean up some dribs and drabs of leftovers prior to the new County Commissioners being sworn in on January 3rd.

Two items were of the utmost importance and justified. The commis-sion needed to get a grant application to NDOT approved so our local bus service would continue, and the board approved the next step in an ongoing audit of missing funds from the 2006-07 fiscal year. A couple of non-con-troversial items involving CDBG grant funding were also on the agenda and handled.

The sticking point came when the Commission, once again, tried to approve advisory board appointments that the commission tabled at their final regular meeting.

Incoming commissioner John Lampros accepted the explanation for the need for the meeting, but not for trying to do an end run in bringing this item back after the commission had voted to let the new commissioners handle it. Commissioners Richard Carney and Gary Perea agreed with Lampros that the appointments should be held over until the January commission meetings.

There was a dissenting voice, though. Outgoing commissioner RaLeene Makley said the retiring commission

worked well with the appointments made by their predecessors and thinks they should be able to go on with business. But then, Makley repeated the words that probably cost her the election: “I guess I don’t understand,” she said.

Funny, but I recall Makley telling Lampros that he didn’t understand why the building of a $2.4 million emergency response center in a location that was effectively cut off from a big portion of the county, built at a time of great economic distress and approved before the ink was even dry on the orders releasing White Pine County from state economic oversight. As we wrote back in February:

White Pine County’s decision to forge on in building a 2.5 million dol-lar emergency response complex has a number of residents seeing red. Red

ink, that is.The county just emerged from financial oversight from the state after

going broke, and now the county wants to encumber residents with this huge burden.

Is the complex needed? Probably.Is it needed now? Probably not.The “damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead” attitude of the county, par-

ticularly the arrogant county finance director Charles Rodewald, will cost the county some money. The City of Ely is seriously considering exiting its interlocal government agreement with the county after the squabbles over fire coverage at the county airport. The dissolution of the interlocal agree-ment would bring back the Ely Police Department. Given that the city is now $180k in the hole due to the same income declines that the State faces, can they afford it?

But then, can any governmental entity in the state afford what it needs to do, never mind what it wants to do?

But the voters understood, giving Lampros, running on the Independent American Party ticket, 47 percent of the vote. Republican rancher Bill Ward finished second with 33 percwnt of the vote.

Makley could only come up with 20 percent of the vote. I guess four out of five voters didn’t get it either. Come to think of it,

maybe they did. You see, Makley was on that interlocal agreement committee that got

itself sanctioned by the Attorney Generals office for meeting in private session in violation of Nevada Open Meetings Laws. Both the City and County’s attorneys were warned not to do any private sessions during nego-tiations. The City tried to warn the County not to do it, but the County went ahead and met in private. It’s never been disclosed whether it was retiring District Attorney Richard Sears who failed to notify the commission or whether the directive was ignored by Makely and the commissioners.

I guess Makley will have all the time in the world to try and understand now. WYATT COX


Commentary: Wyatt Cox

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Commentary: Chuck MuthTop Ten Nevada Conservatives In 2010

As the year winds to a close, here are my picks for 2010’s Top 10 Nevada Conservatives. (Sorry, Angle-ophiles, you don’t blow $27 million and a slam-dunk shot to take out Harry Reid and make this list.)

#10: Sen. Mike McGinness. No, he’s no fire-breathing movement con-servative, but he did challenge and dethrone tax-hiking moderate Senate Minority Leader Bill Raggio.

#9: Frank Ricotta. An early tea party organizer, Ricotta is now the Clark County GOP chairman and moving the organization in the “right” direc-tion.

#8: Victor Joecks. The deputy communications director for the Nevada Policy Research Institute turns complicated public policy issues into enter-taining, easy-to-understand blog posts and columns.

#7: Mark Ciavola. If it wasn’t for Ciavola’s voice from Right Pride, a conservative organization of gay Republicans, Republicans in Nevada wouldn’t have had hardly any voice at all in Nevada politics this year.

#6: Ciara Matthews. As the campaign’s deputy communications direc-tor, Matthews was one of the few bright lights in the Angle debacle. In public appearances against Reid’s spokesmodel, she kicked butt.

#5: Adam Stryker. A well-like political activist, Stryker is the new Nevada state director for the conservative Americans for Prosperity organi-zation.

#4: Joe Heck. He knocked off liberal Rep. Dina Titus in November. ‘Nuff said.

#3: Debbie Landis. Founder and leader of Action is Brewing, the most

organized, visible and active of the tea party organizations in Nevada.#2: Bob Irwin. Ran against and scared the tar out of Democrat Assembly

Speaker-in-Waiting John Oceguera despite impossible odds.#1: Elizabeth Halseth. She’s young. She’s attractive. She’s intelligent.

She has a B-E-A-utiful family. She’s also a fire-breathing conservative. In fact, almost as soon as she publicly announced her campaign for the state assembly in the fall of 2009, she emailed me a photo of herself signing the Taxpayer Protection Pledge in her kitchen.

Then on the last day of filing, when the conservative GOP challenger to liberal Republican state Sen. Dennis Nolan dropped out, Halseth withdrew from her assembly race and filed for the state senate seat against Nolan rather than letting him go unchallenged.

No shrinking violet, Halseth aggressively went after Nolan in the pri-mary and beat the longtime veteran. Alas, the conventional wisdom was that while a staunch conservative could beat a liberal Republican in the GOP primary, she couldn’t win against the well-established, well-liked, well-respected, well-funded Democrat opponent in this Democrat-majority district.

Elizabeth kicked his...er, donkey.If she gets some good direction and takes some good advice, Halseth

has the potential to become a young Nevada version of Congresswoman Michele Bachmann. And that’s certainly something for conservatives here to cheer and celebrate as we usher in the New Year.

Congratulations to State Sen. Elizabeth Halseth, our Conservative of the Year for 2010. CHUCK MUTHChuck Muth is president of Citizen Outreach, a non-profit public policy grassroots advocacy organization. He may be reached at [email protected].


Pet Of The WeekAdopt This Pet !

Sage was found wandering in the desert. This sweet, abandoned Doberman deserves a better life! She is a mature red and tan lady about 8 years old, but active, playful, full of life and wanting desperately to have a family. She is very social and gets along well with other dogs. She is spayed, up to date on all of her shots and microchipped. If you are interested in giving Sage a forever home, fill out an application.

Star is a black and tan Doberman estimated to be about 1 year old. The high-energy cropped and docked female is very affectionate with people, good with children and gets along with other middle-sized to large female and male dogs but might need some special introductions with smaller canine companions. And this tall and slender beauty also prefers not to be around our

SAGECall

702-672-7204

STARCall

702-672-7204

702-418-0433


Real Estate GuideNorthern Nevada January 2011

Winnemucca • Battle Mountain • Lovelock • Surrounding Areas

NOW AVAILABLE FREE ON NEWSSTANDS

press 1 press 1-6-11.pdf · the penny press,january 6, 2011 page 2 penny press logotype...

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