Jon Ralston on elections and how they shouldn’t be a joke, but so often are during the campaign season in Nevada

Wednesday, May 10, 2006 | 7:28 a.m.

Politics can be funny. But it shouldn't be a joke.

With filing in its second week and the G-Sting trial mercifully concluded, the difference seems elusive.

The obvious evidence is the race for lieutenant governor, an inherently silly job that has now attracted two laughable contenders - casino trickster Bob Stupak and his erstwhile companion, ex-Las Vegas Councilwoman Janet Moncrief.

But the comical and pathetic entrance of a publicity-craving Stupak and a redemption-seeking Moncrief into a race for a job that probably shouldn't exist epitomizes an election cycle in which the quality of candidates is not strained and the quality of discourse is abysmal.

Want evidence?

Ex-Assemblywoman Dawn Gibbons, whose only qualification for the job is her last name and whose performance on the campaign trial verges on goofy, is the front-runner for her husband's congressional seat. Three term-limited constitutional officers, terrified by the horror of departing political life, are seeking other offices.

Secretary of State Dean Heller is running for Congress, Treasurer Brian Krolicki wants to be lieutenant governor and Controller Kathy Augustine covets the treasurer's post.

Failed politicians, relying on the electorate's short or nonexistent memory, are trying to revive their careers. Ex-Judge Don Chairez, who once ran for Congress and who was running this year for state Supreme Court, jumped into the attorney general's race because no one else did.

Ex-Assemblymen Lou Toomin and Merle Berman, hoping voters won't recall their undistinguished Carson City tenure and counting on voter ignorance of the job's importance, filed for public administrator.

Is any of this funny? No, but it is a joke.

Even worse - because the offices generally are more serious - is how unfunny the state's constitutional races are shaping up, with either the candidates or the rhetoric lacking.

It starts at the top with a race for governor that has been nearly bereft of substance and replete with disingenuousness.

On the GOP side, front-runner Jim Gibbons is hiding lest the seriousness of his foot-in-mouth disease become apparent to voters; state Sen. Bob Beers is consistent (no taxes, hardly any spending, Gibbons isn't worthy) if uninspiring; and Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt is trying to make it sound as if she were the governor's second in command when she barely commanded a second thought.

On the Democratic side, Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus intersperses boilerplate "policy" proposals with accusations that Henderson Mayor Jim Gibson is corrupt while Gibson intersperses boilerplate "policy" proposals with accusations that Titus is corrupt. By the way, both are for ethics reform, so long as you understand that they are doing so to highlight that the other is unethical.

Not since Webster and Clay have such oratorical heights been reached.

Yes, folks, that is a joke, too.

It doesn't get any better down the ticket as, with a handful of exceptions, the candidates are flawed or facile, with residency scammers, preternaturally ambitious pols and former elected officials and an ethically challenged one or two.

I know what you are thinking: Lighten up. Don't be so splenetic. You have to laugh at some of this stuff.

I try. I do. But when I think of things such as Acting Gov. Bob Stupak or Rep. Dawn Gibbons, I choke instead of chuckle.

Somehow this bad joke is fitting during a year in which the media has devoted more attention to the nonsuspense of whether Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman will run for governor or U.S. Senate. Too bad he will be irrelevant this year because Goodman would fit right in - he is a funny guy whose tenure has been a joke, proving that you can fool most of the people most of the time.

Unfortunately, too many thoughtful people fall prey to disillusionment, exacerbated by the G-Sting verdicts, and pay little attention. That gives louder voice to the ignoramus coalition, such as the fellow who called last week to let me know he was organizing a boycott of Cinco de Mayo activities to retaliate for the Day Without Immigrants march. And these folks on the ballot will exploit them for their benighted bliss, pandering on immigration, ethics reform and, of course, taxes.

Words, as Goodman has proved, no longer matter because no one - the media included - seems to care.

So if people want me to be outraged by Dario Herrera and Mary Kincaid-Chauncey, all I can do is laugh. With a few days left in filing and the worst yet to come, the joke is on us.