Like most, I sit in front of my television and watch the Senate campaign advertisements come on the air. It seems that the back room deals required to obtain the nomination, the dollars required to run a campaign and the use of slander and/or other acts to embarrass a political rival has made politics a corrupt game.
The current state of Nevada is in such bad shape that comparisons to the Great Depression are justified. It has the highest foreclosure rate, the highest bankruptcy rate, the highest unemployment rate in the country and proportionally the highest state budget deficit.
Every time my door bell rings it's a kid fund-raising (three came to my door last week) asking for money to help their public school. I recognized the neighborhood kids and gave them some cash, but by the third round I said to the child who sold me flower bulbs last spring, “Sorry, but I pay my taxes.” Today's collectors are between the ages of 6-8, they don't give you a receipt and don't accept checks. I don't doubt that the funds are going to the school, but I refuse to keep opening my wallet to support bad judgment. When I was growing up, only Catholic school kids fund-raised; but at least you got an excellent chocolate bar filled with almonds in return.
In Las Vegas, everywhere you look you see schools that were built literally back to back. The Clark County school district borrowed money in the form of a bond issue and now they're panicking. You also see empty buildings, abandoned construction sites with mounds of dirt, unkempt houses with for sale signs, and apartment deals offering spectacular move-in deals. The office vacancy is twenty-four percent. The construction industry has nearly disappeared and there are sixty thousand housing units are on the market.
Sharron Angle, the Republican nominee is short in stature and short in experience. She calls for abolishing the Department of Education and the Environmental Protection Agency, privatizing Medicare, Social Security and the Veterans Administration. She's plain, and toothy, but her politics come across as extremist and unpolished. She's an amateur with a folksy, batty manner similar to Sarah Palin. She said that she would have voted against Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, as Obama's appointees to the Supreme Court, because neither of them understand the Constitution. I said she was batty.
Her opponent, the incumbent and Democratic candidate, Harry Reid, has a bonafide political career. He's a bland man, and looks like he came straight out of the woods. And his speech reflects it; he praised Obama for not speaking in negro dialect. He also said he didn't know how anyone of Hispanic heritage could be a Republican. Reid reacted to the bust by extending employment benefits, gave aid to schools and secured money for alternative energy projects in the desert. But like Obama, he was in office when the State's depression arrived and is blamed for the current economic cycle.
What happened in Nevada is a reflection of what happened to America; the bonds of society loosened, a casino mentality took over where credit flowed far too easily, as if inebriated everyone lost their wits, got into debt and when the growth stopped, everything crashed.
There's no getting around it, the only way to reduce the State deficit is to impose a tax on businesses. Whichever way this election unfolds let's hope it gets Nevada on track doing what the Senate is suppose to do; to take responsibility, fund education, transportation, medicaid, medicare and the Children's health insurance program, reduce the debt and enforce a national message to stop squandering money and lives on war!
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