Print edition for April 16, 2007

John Katsilometes talks entertainment and charity with Penn Jillette, who lives up to his role as the nonsilent member of Penn & Teller: Characteristically, the vocal half of Penn & Teller, who have been performing at the Rio for a little more than six years, was fast to share his opinions.

Letter: Nevada in for 4 years of poor leadership: In a state where dishonest elected officials seem to be the norm, our current governor fits right in.

Park's future mired in present: The question of what to do with Huntridge Circle Park has plagued Las Vegas officials since the park was closed in November after one homeless man stabbed another to death there.

FBI taking a harder look at public corruption: Sam Skolnik; In recent years the Las Vegas office of the FBI brought us the dazzling spectacle of a quartet of Clark County commissioners who bribed and money-grubbed their way into local infamy.

Letter: Imus takes heat for culture of decadence: The people who write, record and publish this dreadful form of entertainment must share the blame, along with the entertainment outlets that specialize in promoting and exclusively playing these recordings.

Editorial: Healing a hospital: The Independent Review Group is a panel that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates appointed in February to investigate problems that had been reported in a series of stories in The Washington Post.

FLASHPOINT for Apr 16, 2007: The AP's Kathleen Hennessey recently summed up the Gib- bons administration in 800 words for a national audience. Let's see what I can do in one-sixth the space: Misleading midnight swearing-in. Dramatic change in budget. Small fingerprints on budget. Not empowered about empowerment. No way to all-day. Transportation problem? What transportation problem? Let's study it. Don't know her name but she's from India. FBI investigation into coziness with contractor. State probe into secret legal defense fund. First lady as assemblywoman promoted contractor and got paid for it. Twenty-nine percent like him. Democrats pay reporters to write bad stories about me. ...

Herbst family looks south: By Liz Benston; Thirty years ago the Herbst family, busily running its chain of gas stations, considered buying the three casinos in Primm, the desert burg that greets Southern Californians crossing into Nevada. They thought about it for about as long as it took to drive past the place.

Letter: Vonnegut genuinely was a moral compass: He was an author who understood who we are as a society and expressed his pure humanism and worry for where we are headed through beautiful, biting dark comedy and satire. His works contained an unshakable morality that has opened my eyes and shaped my life more than anyone else has, and he deserves every praise that can be given.

Letter: Draft is a necessary evil of going to war: Once an enemy has been engaged by our best and brightest, including our National Guard units, there must be automatic triggers that ensure these fighting men and women have adequate resources and frontline relief.

Q+A: Rick Dees: Jerry Fink, Las Vegas Sun; Rick Dees took to broadcasting like, well, a disco duck to the dance floor.

In a perfect world: By Joe Schoenmann; In a perfect world, Las Vegas schools would be 13 kids to a classroom with textbooks the same in Summerlin as any school in the 'hood.Interstate 15 would be but one possible way home - and you'd take it only because you absentmindedly forgot to take the light rail, which spans the valley like webbing, to work.

There are a lot of happy Jacks in this Johnson family: Jack Johnson Sr. had been recuperating well at his Spanish Trail home for two months from a mild heart attack.

Letter: Freedom of speech applies to Imus, too: That said, CBS joined the other chicken, NBC, and fired Imus. They claim that their employees were so upset that they just had to do it - sounds like Chicken Little got loose in the halls to me.

Editorial: American 'justice' in Iraq: Bilal Hussein, an Iraqi citizen born and raised in Fallujah, Iraq, was hired by AP in 2004 as a translator and driver. A graduate of the Baghdad Institute of Technology, he quickly made the transition to photographer.

Editorial: Energy drink's bad taste: The Food and Drug Administration announced Wednesday that it had warned Redux that the company was illegally marketing the beverage as both a street drug alternative and a dietary supplement, the Associated Press reported. Redux brazenly referred to its product as "Speed in a Can," "Liquid Cocaine" and "Cocaine - Instant Rush."

United they stand on education in Nevada: By Christina Littlefield, Emily Richmond; Even as they plead for the same sparse funds, Nevada's school superintendents and the university system chancellor have arrived in Carson City this budget season arm in arm, promoting public education as a continuum from kindergarten through graduate school.