NVLPC

Most reasonable people like a balance between security and freedom. I for one value my freedom and take responsibility for the security of myself and my family. I choose to live in a state that, at the present time at least, allows me to use the same tools for protection that criminals would use to rob or kill me.

Today the annual survey that rates the most dangerous and safest states published the results for 2006. Nevada was listed as number one again. I do not think that is necessarily a good thing. I also see that the states listed numbers 1, 2 and 3 (Nevada, Arizona and New Mexico) happen to be the fastest growing states in the nation right now. Things can’t be THAT bad if so many people are flocking to these supposedly crime ridden states.

People didn’t move to America from Europe because it was safer, but because there was more freedom. In American history, people didn’t move from the more civilized eastern states to the “wild west” frontier because it was safer.

In a strange way, I take the crime survey mentioned here as an informal indication that I am living in the right state. The most crime free place to live is an authoritarian police state. Police states have to build walls and fences to keep people from escaping. The United States which is described as an international pariah by many people internationally, and Senator John Kerry domestically, has to build walls on its borders to keep people from sneaking in.

The good news is that in the United States you are free to move to any state that you choose. The U.S. Census Bureau statistics show an overwhelming propensity for people to move from the safer states to the freer states in the nation. It looks like no matter how people vote in the ballot box, their feet vote for freedom over security.

Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have. – Harry Emerson Fosdick

Hat Tip: Senator Bob Beers

Nevada’s spending spree is on par with Illinois which is at the top of the spending heap. Read the Wall Street Journal article referenced by Senator Beers here.

If only legislators like Senator Dennis Nolan and Assemblyman John Marvel were as aggresive in getting Tax and Spending Control (TASC) on the ballot as they are about introducing new tax schemes.

National columnist and pundit George Will posted an article bringing attention to once “land of the free” Western States are unfortunately becoming more regulated like their socialist sister states.

A great quote from George Will’s article:

In Nevada, such regulation has arrived. So in Las Vegas, where almost nothing is illegal, it is illegal — unless you are licensed, or employed by someone licensed — to move, in the role of an interior designer, any piece of furniture, such as an armoire, more than 69 inches tall. A Nevada bureaucrat says that “placement of furniture” is an aspect of “space planning” and therefore is regulated — restricted to a “registered interior designer.”

Placing furniture without a license? Heaven forfend. Such regulations come with government rationing of the right to practice a profession. Who benefits? Creating artificial scarcity of services raises the prices of those entitled to perform the services. The pressure for government-created scarcity is intensifying because the general public — rank amateurs — are using the Internet to purchase things and advice, bypassing designers.

The dynamics on what makes Nevada one of the fastest growing states in the nation (we have been overtaken by Arizona for the number one position) is lower taxes and less government regulation.

Liberty minded individuals vote with their feet as they move in droves away from states with high taxes and “nanny state” level regulation. Unfortunately, when they reach their new found less regulated home, those same people vote at the ballot box to increase the very regulations from which they escaped!

What could be more socialistic than a state government enacting regulatory legislation that favors one group in an industry over another? I have for a very long time, favorably referred to Nevada as “The Last Free State”. Since Nevada now regulates who can decorate a house or move furniture, what could possibly be next, the regulation of cough syrup? Don’t laugh, it’s coming.

Aren’t you glad the Nevada Legislature only meets every other year?

There was an informative editorial in the Las Vegas Review Journal today that shows how ambiguous Senator Dennis Nolan’s Senate Bill 245 which would levy a fine on students who misbehave.

If SB245 if passed appears to be a Pandora’s Box of taxable activities and amounts.

Click here to read more.

Upon recently re-reading a quotation uttered by Barry Goldwater, my thought was that his quote is not nearly famous enough. In fact I think it has been purposely expunged from the memory of legislators at the state and federal levels.

The quotation is this:

“I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is “needed” before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible. And if I should later be attacked for neglecting my constituents “interests,” I shall reply that I was informed that their main interest is liberty and that in that cause I am doing the very best I can.”

Barry Goldwater

In recent weeks, I have had several email discussions with some Nevada State Legislators and repeatedly the legislators have attempted to justify their actions to increase taxes and spending as simply being “needed” or that their constituents “wanted” the increased spending. I would think that a legislator’s oath of office to support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the State of Nevada would be sufficient to override the inclination of legislators to curry favor by taking from each according to his abilities and giving to each according to his needs.

For too long, this Marxist justification (it was actually popularized by Karl Marx, check it out) has been used by legislators from both major political parties to curry favors from special interest groups and to buy votes from constituents.

Evidently a legislator’s oath of office is not enough. Perhaps it should be mandated that each legislator upon assuming office must recite the Barry Goldwater quote above just so that it is in the public record that they know the words.

The most disconcerting development is that an increasing number of Republicans have cast off the attempt to even appear as though they stand for limited government, restrained spending and lower taxes. Recently Assemblyman John Marvel seems to have made backsliding on promises not to increase taxes part of his platform. Senator Dennis Nolan smiles and smoothly explains that side-stepping the signature requirement to put a tax-hike on the ballot really IS good for the public. It is sad to say that both of the legislators above won their seats by claiming to be conservatives.

Richard Disney is scheduled to appear on Nevada Newsmakers hosted by Sam Shad as part of the Pundit Panel this Wednesday, March 21st, 2007.

Tune in to see the discussion about the latest Nevada controversy!

What is more worriesome, candidates that refuse to sign the Tax Payer Protection Pledge or candidates who sign it and then when elected raise taxes anyway? That is for you to decide.

It is very disconcerting that Assemblyman John Marvel has sponsored a bill to raise taxes in Washoe County at the request of local elected officials despite signing the Tax Pledge.

Wasn’t Assemblyman John Marvel the Republican who switched his vote over to support the largest tax increase in Nevada history during the 2003 legislative session?

Why do a growing number of Republicans like Senator Dennis Nolan and Assemblyman John Marvel think that introducing and voting for legislation that raises taxes a winning strategy? Is it because they think that the voters have no other option? It appears that voters are losing the option to choose a candidate that will stand for the principals of limited government.

The picture says a thousand words, but it isn’t the Conservative Right that would make Ronald Reagan cry today, it is those in the Republican Party at the local, national and state levels that have moved to the left by embracing more regulations, higher taxes and bigger government.

Time Magazine will most likely use this cover story to discourage conservatives and try to convince them that the conservative movement promoted by Reagan is over. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The fact is that whenever candidates convince their constituents that they will support lower taxes, less government regulation and family values, those candidates win…whether Republican or Democrat. The problem is that too many candidates from both major political parties sell themselves as conservatives and then end up converting to socialist policies upon entering government. No candidate that overtly supports a socialist agenda gets elected in this country. Socialists have learned to call their movement “progressive” and use words that confuse voters into thinking they are conservative or “moderate’.

Voters have become angry and frustrated mainly by Republicans who win on stated base Republican values and then initiate bills that raise taxes and increase government regulation. People who vote for Democrats figure their taxes will be raised (if they pay taxes) and that they will be more regulated or they just aren’t listening to stated Democrat aims.

This is such a great article, we are surprised it was printed in the Nevada Appeal.

Chuck Muth, the prolific blogger and emailer wrote a bang-up article for the Nevada Appeal. Here are a few of the many excellent quotes:

“Instead of asking for the moon … and getting it … the big-government crowd is being forced to live within its means. They are being forced to consider setting spending priorities. They are being forced to look for waste, fraud and abuse to cut. They are being forced to look for duplications in services to cut.”

“For example, maybe the $200 million tax subsidy going to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority now being used to print up glossy magazines and such could be better used to relieve traffic congestion for all the tourists already coming to town.”

Wow! Click here to read the rest of the article.

Over at the Washoe Republican blog, they have posted a message from Sharron Angle outlining with detail some upcoming proposed legislation. We agree.

Click here to read.