Editorial: Campaign takes an ugly turn

Sunday, July 9, 2000 | 10:52 a.m.

It's been often said that politics isn't tiddlywinks, but a union-backed political mailer will make even some of the most jaded political junkies blanch. The mailer in question excoriates County Commissioner Mary Kincaid for voting against the creation of a new children's hospital in Clark County. There's nothing wrong with a vigorous debate over the merits of a children's hospital, but this mailer is a cheap shot.

The facts take a back seat in this missive. Instead, the piece from the Service Trades Council of Southern Nevada preys on one of a parent's worst fears, which is what would they do if their child had a serious illness. So there are a number of black and white images of children in the mailer: One appears to be a burn victim, another is standing with the aid of leg braces, and a couple of other children are either connected to a ventilator or to tubes. The campaign piece also ends with a color photo of Kincaid's opponent, North Las Vegas City Councilwoman Stephanie Smith, and this blurb: "Stephanie Smith will build the children's hospital. Mary Kincaid won't."

The problem, though, is that advocates of a children's hospital never demonstrated the need for a county-run, 152-bed hospital whose costs were estimated to be $80 million. And what the mailer conveniently omits is that there already are pediatric wings at the county-operated University Medical Center and at the privately run Sunrise Hospital. Indeed, that was why it was important that Kincaid and other commissioners voted to establish a county task force to first assess whether such an expensive facility was warranted.

So to imply that a vote against a children's hospital was a vote against children isn't true. Simply attaching the word "children" to an issue isn't reason enough to open the taxpayer spigot for such an expensive project. And it sure isn't promising that such a serious issue is being exploited this way. This certainly is the lowest of the low -- and to think that the 2000 campaign has only just begun.