Columnist Jon Ralston: The irony of this Legislature

Monday, July 21, 2003 | 8:12 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION

July 20, 2003

Jon Ralston hosts the news discussion program Face to Face on Las Vegas ONE and publishes the Ralston Report. He can be reached at (702) 870-7997 or at ralston@vegas.com.

HOW FITTING that a Legislature that began with irony shall end so -- if indeed it ever finally dissolves into its special place in Nevada history.

The Legislature commenced with a Republican governor, paradoxically hurt by Republican legislative gains, proposing a billion-dollar tax increase that Democrats had only conjured in their fondest imaginings and that was greeted by GOP lawmakers with the kind of faux shock Louis Renault would appreciate.

And now, as I pen this Saturday morning and lawmakers are desperately trying to not do their jobs and go home, irony has been piled upon irony. The greatest lawmaker has become the least, the minority has become the majority and the governor, who once mused about lawmakers becoming irrelevant, has become Claude Rains' other famous role: The Invisible Man.

Indeed, Kenny Guinn, pilloried by conservatives since he proposed his billion-dollar baby, has become the best friend the Republican Party could have dreamed of. The tax increase that once was anathema to the GOP die-hards has now become the path to legislative and perhaps -- are you listening Harry Reid? -- statewide dominance. All thanks to Guinn. Don't expect any thank-you cards, though, governor.

Think about where we are, folks: The budget impasse forced a governor who hates the Legislature to sue the Gang of 63, forcing the state's highest court to step in with a bizarre ruling that has elevated Rep. Jim Gibbons to iconic status (and better for him, increased viability against Sen. Reid) and allowed the GOP holdouts (The Mean Fifteen or Fearless Fifteen, depending on your perspective) to make a federal case out of it.

Just when you think the session couldn't be more upside-down -- the same folks who two years ago unanimously promised a broad-based business tax to fund education now are poised to enact no new business taxes and barely fund education -- another serpentine twist develops. Consider all the ironies:

The worst irony of all, the most depressing in a long line of disheartening developments is this: For those of us who (foolishly) hoped that Guinn had catalyzed a debate about the state's future and about how to ensure long-term fiscal stability instead have seen the window of opportunity shattered by cowardice, opportunism and sheer lunacy.

This is not just the end of the worst legislative performance in history; it is the beginning of the lowest common denominator becoming the highest voice of political discourse, thus sending a backward state even further back and ensuring that Nevada is secure in its position as a national laughingstock.com