Editorial: Dialing Nevada for dollars

Saturday, Nov. 29, 1997 | 4 a.m.

That expression -- which means "don't be greedy" -- apparently doesn't apply to politicians who dip their paws into the Las Vegas honey jar.

Las Vegas is a favorite campaign fund-raising stop for cash-hungry federal elected officials. The coziness that results often benefits a handful of powerful business executives, but the state as a whole seldom reaps return favors.

This kind of greedy short-changing can happen to the general public in any state, but if you're looking for a recent Nevada example, you can find one just last week.

Last Sunday, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., was in Las Vegas raising money for the GOP, along with Sen. Mitch McConnell,R-Ky., and Sen. Bill Frist, R-Tenn.

What makes their presence at a fund-raiser here so galling is that all three support legislation to dump nuclear waste temporarily at the Nevada Test Site 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

And as the Senate's traffic cop, Lott figures to be instrumental next year in bringing a nuke bill up for a vote.

President Clinton has vowed to veto the measure, but a reworked version is expected to surface anyway after the House and Senate hammer out differences in the spring.

Lott, who has personally received at least $44,000 in campaign contributions from the Nuclear Energy Institute, can be expected to lead an effort to pass the bill.

That's why the Lott fund-raiser had more of an enemy-in-the-perimeter feeling than campaign visits from other national politicians.

Lott, McConnell and Frist certainly enjoyed the best that Nevada has to offer.

They flew to Las Vegas from Washington, D.C., on a private jet owned by Mirage Resorts Inc.

The casino company's chairman, Steve Wynn, hosted at a $5,000-per-person fund-raiser at his exclusive golf club, Shadow Creek.

The event, sponsored by the American Gaming Association, raised more than $100,000 for the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee.

The nuke waste issue was not on the evening's schedule. Special-interest groups such as the AGA focus on their own agenda, and they expect their invited political guests to follow the script. Lott is no exception. During a formal presentation, he told attendees that casino gambling has boosted the Mississippi economy. Lott made no mention of the nuke bill.

The gamers who attended the fund-raiser should have pressed Lott on it, however, because tourism will suffer if radioactive waste is stored here.

Years from now, if gamblers stop coming, the casino executives who were at the event will view it as a missed opportunity.

From Las Vegas, Lott flew on a jet owned by Harrah's hotel-casino to a fund-raiser in San Francisco.

Given the treatment Lott received here, it will be deeply troubling next year when he allows the nuke bill back onto the Senate floor for a vote.

On that day, many of us will think back to November 1997, when Lott was in town to feed at the Nevada trough.