The poll that pushed the political boundaries

By J. Patrick Coolican

Sunday, Feb. 21, 2010 | 2 a.m.

Nevadans are meek, brutalized into submission by the Great Recession and a political culture dominated by powerful interests.

So it’s almost shocking when someone stands up and says, “No more.”

That’s what the teachers union has been doing the past two weeks since Gov. Jim Gibbons’ State of the State address and the Democrats’ response, if it could be called that.

In Gibbons’ address, in which he said he would call legislators to Carson City to deal with an $887 million budget hole, he told Nevadans to “quit whining” about education funding in a state that ranks near the bottom in per-pupil spending.

In reply, Democrats said they would not raise taxes, which inevitably meant they would agree to deep cuts in education in a state with one of the highest dropout rates and lowest rates of college degrees in the nation.

But something strange happened: Rather than go along with their Democratic minders, the teachers said, “Enough.”

Lynn Warne, Nevada State Education Association president, attacked the Democrats for cowardice.

Then she went into the field with a poll, which turned out to be quite revealing.

Sure, the union paid for it, so it’s reasonable to question whether it merely wanted a stovepipe job — determine the answers you want and then go get them.

With respect to candidates and races, it comports with all existing polling. Gibbons has low approval ratings. Former federal Judge Brian Sandoval, a Republican, beats Clark County Commission Chairman Rory Reid, the likely Democratic nominee, in the race for governor.

But where it’s revealing is in destroying the conventional wisdom that raising taxes is political suicide, while cutting education budgets is somehow risk free.

For one thing, despite our mediocre schools, people love teachers, who have a 77 percent approval rating. And, they are absolutely opposed to cutting teacher salaries, with 83 percent against.

Wait, you say. It’s easy to tell a pollster you love teachers and don’t want to cut their salaries. So what?

Well, when asked as an alternative to cutting $300 million from schools, if they favor taxing corporations on their gross earnings, 65 percent say they either favor strongly or are in favor, although not strongly.

The gaming and mining companies are another favorite target for tax increases.

When Democrats cower in fear of raising taxes, they’re forgetting an important rule in Nevada politics: Voters have never had a problem taxing someone else, especially if they know where the money is going, i.e., schools.

The teachers union, once one of the most powerful institutions in Nevada politics, has become known for fecklessness, weak leadership and a failure to recruit members.

But lo and behold, after the poll, it acted again, this time buying $200,000 worth of TV ads to hammer it home.

Is it working?

Possibly.

The conversation seems to have shifted, with gaming and mining companies “at the table,” which is the euphemism used in Carson City when the Legislature comes hat in hand.

Revealingly, the companies are not going after the teachers. They have seen the polling and done their own. Attack teachers? That’s political suicide. They’re attacking other business interests, protesting the unfairness of singling out just two industries.

And, when Gibbons’ proclamation called for $35 million in cuts in education, on top of the 10 percent in all agencies including schools and universities, Democratic legislators attacked the extra cuts.

In the end, education is going to get cut, and pretty severely. But the teachers have shown the value of making your case and doing it with relish, even when it feels safer to sit down and shut up.

Democrats: Take notice.

Sun reporter David McGrath Schwartz contributed to this report from Carson City.