Columnist Jon Ralston: Guinn is taking easy way out

Friday, Jan. 14, 2005 | 4:49 a.m.

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.

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January 15 - 16, 2005

"For now is the time for courage, and a time for leadership. The popularity of my proposal is less important to me than the rightness of our course."

-- Gov. Kenny Guinn,

State of the State,

Jan. 20, 2003

SO IT SEEMS the lesson the governor has learned from two years ago is that if right and unpopular don't work, let's see what happens with wrong and popular.

The searing experience of proposing that billion-dollar baby, delivered late and by a painful C (as in Carson City)-section, has transmogrified Kenny Guinn from Man of Vision to Man of Politics. The chief executive who appeared before the Legislature two years ago and eloquently and bravely talked about the state's problems and the difficult path to be followed has become a chastened, broken man seeking the path of least resistance as he fades into obscurity and tosses pennies at the populace on the way out.

The governor who told us of the wrong road -- "short-sighted and paved with irresponsibility" -- now has put the state back on that road, trying with his $300 million motor vehicle fee rebate to buy back conservative cronies who will never trust him and abandoning the principles he worked so hard to articulate and so fecklessly to sell.

The enduring shibboleth about Guinn -- the nice-guy governor whose heart is true -- no longer matters. Guinn became, much to the consternation of his supporters and others, an Invisible Man by the end of Legislatures '03 and now he has made a decision not to rematerialize for his final session.

Before all the anti-tax folks and conservatives start using this screed as an emetic, I assure you this has less to do with my oft-stated belief that the state needs to fix its tax structure and spend more money on education, health care and the social safety net. No matter where you place yourself in the political spectrum, the governor's inconsistency should be troublesome.

(The real surplus is much greater than $300 million. Do the math -- they are filling the rainy day fund, plugging holes created by one-time expenditures, pouring sales taxes back into the budget because the counties don't need the state portion and putting in raises for state employees. As one Guinnite put it, the administration fears that if the public were to realize how staggering the amount of extra money is, "they really would show up with pitchforks.")

Since when is it conservative to throw a relative pittance at the hoi polloi and hope it sates them? It's a sop for saps. If Guinn wants to show he is a real Republican, why not simply repeal that awful melange of taxes that was enacted last year to prove his bona fides.

The dirty little secret is that the new taxes have come in about as expected and the windfall is from gaming and sales taxes. So say the right was right, that the state can continue to thrive on gaming and sales taxes, that the good times will continue to roll.

Or, perhaps, the governor should hearken back to what he told us in 2003, when he lamented:

"Nevada ranks near the bottom in per pupil spending on education, and spends less per capita on Medicaid than any other state. If those two areas don't concern you, take a look at where Nevada ranks in high school dropout rates, teenage pregnancy, and children living in poverty."

The message from the 2005 version of Kenny Guinn is that these problems -- and there were others he talked about -- no longer exist. Surely, a state awash in money could do more than just remain on the treadmill and keep up with growth -- which is all that tax increase did in 2003.

Full-day kindergarten. Health insurance for needy children and seniors. More roads. An infusion of cash for the strapped higher and lower education systems. Hello, Kenny Guinn of 2003. Can you hear me?

Yes, the state has an embarrassment of riches -- for now. But the solution is nothing short of an embarrassment for a governor who made the case for a state in desperate straits and now appears to have lost whatever philosophical moorings he once had.

Of course, it's too late now. In his zeal to play one upmanship with his bete noire, state Sen. Bob Beers, who first proposed the auto fee giveback, the governor cannot very well pull an Emily Litella.

The more imminent danger is what this bodes for the The Great Tax Debate of '05 -- aka what to do about rising property taxes. This phenomenon, like the budget windfall, is an aberration. But lawmakers and Guinn are likely to appease the angry horde with a superficial, short-term fix, analogous to the Guinn tax rebate, that could inflict long-term damage.

Property taxes are the one stable, reliable source of revenue that affects every level of government in Nevada. If relief is needed, what hope do we have that, as with the rebate plan, an evanescent gift will substitute for lasting policy?

Two years ago, The Man of Vision told us there were "two roads to the future. Tonight is the time for choosing our path. One choice may be easy to make, but hard to endure."

In 2005, The Man of Politics is telling us that he is making the easy choice because it will be easier for him to endure. That $300 million is the price of Kenny Guinn's legacy. But how much, in the long run, will it cost the state?