Sunday, April 16, 2006 | 7:31 a.m.
When Bob Dole faced off against Bill Clinton for the presidency in 1996, a "Saturday Night Live" skit portrayed him to college students as the grumpy old man who would ruin their fun, while Clinton was the cool uncle who would buy them beer.
But now, the former senate majority leader is known more for his "prairie wit," according to a UNLV announcement advertising Dole's lecture Monday at 7:30 p.m. at Artemus Ham Concert Hall.
Dole served as the commentator for "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" during the 2000 election and has written two political humor books, "Great Presidential Wit: I Wish I Was in the Book" and "Great Political Wit: Laughing (Almost) All the Way to the White House."
The World War II veteran also teamed up with Clinton after the Sept. 11 attacks to co-chair the Families of Freedom Scholarship Fund for affected families.
Dole's lecture Monday will be on "Leadership and Values in the 21st Century." The speech is free and open to the public, but tickets are required. For more information, call the Performing Arts Center Box Office at (702) 895-2787.
Speaking of lectures, after the speech earlier this month by Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison at UNLV, Morrison, UNLV President Carol Harter and several other notable literati wandered over to the Gordon Biersch on Paradise Road for wine, martinis and conversation.
The cocktail hour included fellow Nobel Laureate and Nigerian author Wole Soyinka, Russell Banks (author of "Affliction" and "Sweet Hereafter") and Michael Ondaatje (author of "The English Patient"). No word on what they talked about.
A private dinner before the free Morrison lecture raised money for the North American Cities of Asylum, the national network that works to bring persecuted foreign writers to the United States so they can continue their work. The network is based in Las Vegas and will be part of the Black Mountain Institute at UNLV, a proposed think tank that will allow literati to take a stab at solving global issues.
UNLV students this next week will remember the soldiers who have died fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan this week by displaying 2,633 crosses across campus, one for every service member lost.
The crosses will be on display Monday through Friday, said Adrian Viesca, the student government director who organized the project.
"It's easy for many to forget that a war is still happening, and I hope the 2,633 student-made crosses will remind the campus and community that our soldiers are still dying in Iraq and Afghanistan," Viesca said in an e-mail.
There will be a memorial ceremony honoring the dead on Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. in front of the Flashlight on the north side of campus near Artemus Ham Concert Hall. Following the ceremony at 6:30 p.m., veterans from the ongoing war will share their experiences in the Moyer Student Union Ballroom.
Deputy Attorney General Scott Wasserman is trading work with state lawmakers for work with the state's Board of Regents.
A Board of Regents search committee selected Wasserman, a deputy attorney general working in Carson City, to serve as the regents' next secretary. The position oversees all regent business, including compiling the agenda materials and assisting during meetings.
The previous secretary, Fini Dobyns, resigned earlier this year to go back to her position as the assistant secretary. Dobyns was promoted to the top position last summer after Suzanne Ernst resigned as secretary to become a special assistant to Chancellor Jim Rogers.
After a year of 12-hour days working for the regents without an assistant, Dobyns said she decided the assistant position was a better fit for her where she could do more for higher education. She denied rumors - whispered even among regents - that they were just too much to handle without a buffer person in between.
Wasserman worked the last 18 years as the chief deputy legislative counsel for the Legislative Counsel Bureau.
During candidate interviews Friday in the search for the next UNR president, Regent Doug Hill asked in-state applicant Steve Wells, president of the Desert Research Institute, to describe his fundraising experience.
What was Wells' biggest gift? A $3 million check from Jim Rogers, Wells' current boss, multimillionaire media mogul and volunteer university system chancellor. Rogers donated the money for a building that houses DRI offices and laboratories in Las Vegas and the private atomic testing museum.
"I made the ask on that," Wells said.
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