MUTH’S TRUTHS

A close advisor of Gov. Jim Gibbons argued with me last week that as long as the people get to vote on a tax hike, what’s the difference whether government officials put the tax hike on the ballot or if tax-hike proponents have to go out and collect signatures from ordinary Nevada citizens to put the measure on the ballot?

The difference is the extraordinary money, influence and power the government has at its disposal to manipulate the debate on public policy decisions, especially when it comes to taxes and spending. The government has official propaganda machines ready to crank out press releases, op/eds and taxpayer-funded advertising blitzes to sway public opinion. Elected officials and government bureaucrats can get their side of the story out into the general population through the mainstream media pretty much at will…and at virtually no cost. At least not to them; taxpayers pick up the tab.

And if the government wants more money, it’s gotten its public manipulation strategy down to a science. It’ll lay off street cops rather than meter maids, because it knows THAT is how to influence voters to cough up more dough.

It’s instructive to note that Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley warned just a week ago that the current budget situation was going to hurt children (of course) because, according to her, we won’t be able to afford art classes in the public schools. Yet somehow we can still afford to fund the completely non-essential (if not completely useless) Nevada Arts Council. Go figure.

This point was further driven home yesterday when former Nevada state Treasurer Bob Seale sent a letter to Vicki Mayes, the city manager for Boulder City, requesting “all information regarding the nature and amount of all expenditures with public funds made in connection with the City’s participation in challenging the initiative petitions known as the Education Enhancement Act and the Funding Nevada’s Priorities Act.” A similar letter was sent to other municipalities, as well.

Those two initiatives, if placed on the ballot and passed by voters, would re-direct existing (and growing) tax dollars presently going to subsidize the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA) to education and other infrastructure needs, such as transportation and public safety. Proponents went out and gathered in the neighborhood of a quarter million citizen signatures, combined, in order to place these two initiatives on the ballot in November.

CITIZEN signatures.

But local governments such as Boulder City expended cartloads of taxpayer dollars to fight these two initiatives in court in an effort to thwart the will of the people and retain control over the entire existing LVCVA slush fund. So Mr. Seale wants an accounting of exactly how much was paid, and to whom, for “attorneys fees, court costs, fees for experts and consultants, travel costs and all other costs” associated with the legal challenge.

You see, the ordinary citizen and taxpayer doesn’t have a prayer against the well-funded, well-oiled communications machines governments control. The government has an unfair advantage over the people when it comes to these kinds of public policy fights. Hell, in Clark County the government even has its own full-blown television station!

If the government gets to put tax hikes on the ballot, the government will unleash the full force of its propaganda network - including elected officials and government agents on their soapboxes - to “sell” voters on the “merits” of the tax hike. How does the “little guy” fight against that?

In 1994, now-Gov. Jim Gibbons had to collect tens of thousands of citizen signatures to place his Tax Restraint Initiative on the ballot. In 2006, state Sen. Bob Beers had to collect tens of thousands of citizen signatures to place his Tax and Spending Control Initiative on the ballot. And this year, former state Controller Steve Martin had to collect tens of thousands of citizen signatures to place his Taxpayers’ Protection Act on the ballot.

It simply shouldn’t be easier to put tax hike initiatives on the ballot than it is to put tax restraint initiatives on the ballot.

So yes, there is a HUGE difference between the Legislature or county commissions putting a tax hike “advisory question” on the ballot and forcing the pro-tax crowd to go out and collect citizen signatures from voters just like Jim Gibbons, Bob Beers, Bob Seale and Steve Martin have done to restrain taxes in the past.

And this is why anyone who has signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge and then signs a bill to raise taxes rather than forcing the other side to go out and collect signatures to put the tax hike directly on the ballot would be breaking the promise he made to the voters who elected him, “advisory question” or not.

It’s just that simple. And it’s not debatable.

Posted on May 24th, 2008 by Chuck Muth
Filed under: Nevada