Print edition for April 28, 2007

Little room for pork, fight expected for scraps: CARSON CITY - Higher education projects are usually magnets for legislative pork, but this year politicians will be hard-pressed to bring home the bacon.

GOP contenders tap their Nevada teams: Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani named Rep. Jon Porter chairman of his Nevada campaign Friday. He also announced the support of state Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio, who will serve as campaign co-chair.

No attaboys on taxes, but Rogers is all over it: Joe Schoenmann and Christina Littlefield; CARSON CITY - Maybe Nevadans don't mind a little more taxation.

Editorial: Minding their own business?: A story published Wednesday by The New York Times reports that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has eased regulations or their enforcement in many areas, including construction site safety, driving hours for long-haul truckers and logging safety.

Letter: Undefined war has indiscriminate goals: Based on reasons sold to the American people by this administration, we have already won the war in Iraq. Saddam is gone and dead, there are no weapons of mass destruction or chemical weapons. But in typical George Orwellian double speak, the reasons we went to war got changed to nation-building. Probably had something to do with the fact that the original reasons where lies.

Jeff Haney explains why the coming NFL draft doesn't matter much to those predicting victory totals for teams: With apologies to Calvin Johnson, JaMarcus Russell and especially Mel Kiper Jr., this weekend's NFL draft probably won't have much of an effect on how the 2007 pro football season plays out.

Letter: War being made into a political platform: Reid is making this war a political platform for his personal interests and those he supports. Instead he should support our winning that effort and world peace , and never forget 9/11.

Letter: NRA has leash tightly tied to politicians: Why? The National Rifle Association. The NRA, more than any other institution, has not only framed the national debate on gun control, but via its massive political clout, it also has exercised a virtual "veto" over this debate and over any political party or politician who chooses to endorse gun control.

Editorial: Prescription for conflicts: The survey was conducted by the Institute on Medicine as a Profession, a nonprofit physicians' research group, and is published in the most recent edition of The New England Journal of Medicine. It shows that about 80 percent of the doctors who responded had received gifts of food or drug samples from industry salespeople. Thirty-five percent of the doctors said medical manufacturers had reimbursed them for traveling to conventions or medical education programs, and 28 percent said they had been paid consulting fees for giving lectures or enrolling patients in clinical trials of new drugs or devices.

Vegas has arrived, so have the cardinals: Christina Littlefield, Las Vegas Sun; Any question about the ascendancy of Las Vegas from Sin City to upper - crust respectability was further answered Friday night.

Letter: Gonzales represents Bush team perfectly: The editorial completely missed the reason why the president's confidence in Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has grown. The president is obviously very proud and highly confident in Gonzales now, due to the fact that Gonzales did not testify to what he knew. The relief for some must have been great after the long day of testifying.

Governor, let us make fun of you: Joe Schoenmann, Las Vegas Sun; You can hear the lines now:

U.S. attorney 'puzzle pieces' withheld: WASHINGTON - The Justice Department is withholding 170 documents about the firing of U.S. attorneys, including at least four e-mails involving Sen. John Ensign and Nevada's dismissed attorney, Daniel Bogden, officials said Friday.

Editorial: Questionable political briefings: The Office of Special Counsel started its probe last month after investigators learned of a political briefing of senior General Services Administration officials in January. If investigators determine that the officials felt coerced into fashioning federal activities to favor Republican political candidates whose campaigns were faltering, then the briefings could be in violation of federal law, The Washington Post reported Thursday.

FLASHPOINT for Apr 28, 2007: Sometimes it's the little things - in this case, 10 acres, give or take. Local journalist Steve Friess was nosing around about CityCenter, the MGM Mirage megaproject. He thought it odd that the size was usually described in newspaper accounts as being 66 acres but that the project's own propaganda said it was 76. So what happened to the missing 10 acres? Friess asked MGM Mirage mouthpiece Alan Feldman, who gave this priceless answer: "Please use 76. There's some technical debate internally, but 76 is in use far and wide and it's not inaccurate." The ever-wry Friess, on his blog, ...