Vol. 37 No. 4
Mid Legislative Update
What did NOT Pass the Legislature is
Just as Telling as What DID Pass
Hope springs eternal, however with the Nevada Legislature that hope may be misplaced. Critical bills to protect Nevadans’ basic constitutional liberties died in committee on the April 15th deadline often without a hearing.
Note: the April 15th deadline was the deadline for all bills to be passed out of the committee in the Senate or Assembly where the bill originated. They still have to be passed out of the originating house by April 26th. Then they have to go to the other house and be passed again. After that they must be signed by the Governor before they become law. SB indicates a Senate Bill, AB indicates an Assembly Bill.
SB310/AB411 the Freedom of Choice in Health Care provided that the Legislature would not enact any legislation requiring a person to participate in any health care system or plan that imposed a fine or penalty (Obamacare) or for obtaining or declining health care in a particular system or plan. In other words…our Nevada Legislature, like the U.S. Congress, is complicit in violating our constitutional rights and forcing us to participate in Obamacare. States all over the nation have told the Feds “no way” to implementing Obamacare, but in Nevada, the Harry Reid lapdogs are in charge. The Republicans made a valiant effort but freedom was not to be enthroned as a foundational principle by the Democrats at the Legislature. Instead, they choose to pass special rights for people with “gender identity” issues in SB180, SB310 and SB368. But no protections for the vast majority of Nevadans!
Then of course there is the school choice issue which went down in flames when SB366, SJR10, AJR8 and AB367 died. We wouldn’t want to give parents a choice to remove their children from the failing government schools, or to spend half as much money to give them a real education and teach them to read. Why that’s heresy! The stranglehold of the teacher’s union (NSEA) is strangling the life out of our children for the sake of union dues and power. Educating children be dammed!
However, they thoughtfully passed onto Ways and Means AB314 “comprehensive sex education” sponsored by the infamous Planned Parenthood, the number one abortion providers in the nation. Maybe their income is down? “Comprehensive” is the key word. Just check with SIECUS the national leader in learning how-to-do-it-all-sex-ed. Don’t all parents want their children, without their consent, to learn and experience the freedom of sexual perversions, the option of abortion, combined with graphic and explicit instructions on how to use contraceptives, taught in the classroom in violation of the parents own beliefs? Just check out SIECUS for some stunning examples. http://www.siecus.org/_data/global/images/guidelines.pdf
And then there’s the Tenth Amendment Resolutions SJR6 & AJR4 deader than a door nail. Why would Nevada’s Legislators, burdened with horrendous unfunded federal mandates and unconstitutional programs, straining to pay the bills with only 13% of Nevada’s lands taxable to the state (the rest under usurped control by the feds) want to reaffirm the Tenth Amendment? A sacrilege for sure to the left wing orthodoxy dedicated to continual violation of the U.S. Constitution!
The Tenth Amendment is the key to restoring our liberties which hang in the balance between Washington and the States. The Tenth Amendment states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Those few words are very threatening to the power hungry…they mean there are limits on what the federal government can do and what they can mandate the states to do. Unfortunately, abiding by the Constitution is not high on the priorities of the liberal majority in Carson City. I must say however that the Assembly made up for not passing the Tenth Amendment by passing AB334. It exempts from the limitation of the Executive Budget any expenditure for an unfunded federal mandate. Really? I guess if we close our eyes and make three wishes somebody else will pay for it. Why don’t we just refuse to expend any money on unconstitutional unfunded federal mandates? On darn, that would mean we’d be in keeping with the Tenth Amendment.
But the Assembly and Senate found enough votes to pass AJR7 and SJR14, a constitutional amendment to create an intermediate appellate court…Come to think of it didn’t the people just vote that down in 2010? My… what short memories those elected officials have! I guess they are waiting for us to change our minds!
The Assembly also favored us with the passage of two constitutional amendments, AJR2 for annual sessions and AJR5* allowing the Legislature to call special sessions, which already passed last session and could be on the November 2012 ballot. That’s what we need, Legislators spending more time dreaming up hundreds of bills that nobody but them wants. Of course, AB187, which would cut in half the number of bills that Legislators and others can request, never got a hearing. Figure that!
Our Legislators proved we are not as smart as Arizona! Not a single bill dealing in any way with the flood of illegals in this state came out of committee. They all died on the altar of democrat vote pandering. AB208 which made English the official language, AB430 and SB380 requiring verification of immigration status upon arrest, requiring public employers to use E-Verify to determine legal status and much more. AB435 requiring proof of identity to vote, SB161 required driver’s license test to be administered in English, SB178 no driver’s licenses for illegals or Millennium Scholarships, and prohibiting illegals from voting, etc.
AB289 the dietetics bill and SB412 the regulation of complementary integrative medicine both assault the individuals freedom of choice in alternative and optional health choices. Both bills have passed out of their respective committees with amendments, but the battle is not over yet.
The State Treasurer’s State Stimulus bill SB64 has been rerefered to Senate Finance. Under the bill the State Treasurer would deposit $20,000,000 million into banks and credit unions at 2% below market and then they would loan the money out giving preference to “politically correct” businesses run by women, minorities and veterans. It’s just good old fashioned reverse discrimination at its finest. (see enclosed alert).
However, ALL is not DOOM and GLOOM. The Senate saw fit to let die, perhaps the most dangerous bill this session, SB344 which would have circumvented the U.S. Constitution and the Electoral College substituting a so-called National Popular Vote, which would only benefit large population states. Twenty-five Nevadans testified against National Popular Vote while only one California carpet bagger testified in favor of it. That’s got to be a popular plan, following California into the abyss!
SB247 School Based Health Clinics bit the dust. The complete amendment to the bill would have eliminated parental consent, while providing for abortion counseling and referral, distributing contraceptive devices and abortifacients (drugs the cause abortions), while setting up shop rent free at the schools 24-7. Of course, no one had any liability if anything went wrong. Wow! That was special interests with their hands in the cookie jar!
SB235 which made not wearing a Seat Belt a primary offense, so cops could stop you at any time for any reason, lost in Committee. This bill is all about getting federal funds, not about safety. Nevada already has one of the highest seat belt compliance rates in the nation at 93.6%.
AB34 allowing the cops to use cameras for giving traffic tickets died in committee. Our liberties are continually under assault at the Legislature. Not much thought by the sponsor of this bill for the right to confront your accuser or the Fourth Amendment right not to be spied upon by the government.
Another great victory was the death of AB54 which gave unelected appointed people the power to impose taxes in “medical districts”. This bill applied to Clark County, but last session there was one designed for the rural counties including Carson, Lyon, Storey and Douglas. What is scary is that the concept of unelected unaccountable people raising taxes really seems to fly in the face of that somewhat quaint idea, “No taxation without representation.” I’m glad we didn’t have to start a revolution over that one!
One really bright spot was the plethora of gun rights bills this session finding broad support after the term limited Assemblyman Bernie Anderson was no longer able to block them. However, there was some glory hogging by Speaker Ocegura’s AB282, who absconded with and combined into his own bill, the good ideas of Republican Assemblymen Hickey AB205, Goedhart AB231 and Senator’s Lee and Settelmeyer’s SB126, which had already passed the Senate. All these bills improved laws for concealed carry. AB143 by Bobzien got out of the starting gate early and passed. SB175 by Gustavson and Settelmeyer, protecting the confidentiality of information on concealed carry holders, passed the Senate. SB231 by Lee, which would allow qualified CCW holders to carry on college campuses, passed committee.
SB176 by Gustavson and AB231 by Goedhart would have recognized our natural right to keep and bear arms by repealing CCW laws and instituting a Vermont style law allowing any law abiding citizen to carry concealed did not get a hearing. It’s taken nearly two decades of incremental steps to achieve positive laws for CCW laws. Persistence and patience have been the key. Perhaps in the future the right to keep and bear arms will actually become the law instead of just a revered constitutional principle.
Many people will be happy to learn that AB108, which allowed people to register to vote on Election Day, died a quiet death in the Assembly Legislative Operations and Elections Committee, in spite of the fact that the sponsor was Committee Chairman Segerblom. Nobody was ready for that radical step and there were great concerns over potential fraud, which were not addressed in the bill. You can bet it will be back next session.
Remarkably, after years of trying, the motor cycle helmet freedom bill SB177 passed out of committee under duress. The whole Senate is divided on the subject, but as the testimony clearly showed it will bring in millions of new dollars into the economy and as data shows in other states, it is not a safety issue. We shall see if the Senate has the courage to give people the freedom to be responsible for themselves.
Another little known bill was one redefining “terrorism” AB462. The same issue came up in 2003 after 9/11. The problem with this deja’ vous bill is that it defined an act of terrorism as including the “use or attempted use…of coercion…to influence the policy of a governmental entity.” Isn’t that what active citizens and lobbyist do everyday at the Legislature? Are will all potential terrorists? I testified in tandem with the ACLU against this bill as I had in 2003. Thankfully, for freedoms sake, it died in committee.
The Secretary of State’s Anti-Democratic Election Suppression bills AB81 and AB82 did pass committee, however the most egregious portions of the bills were amended out. AB81 increased the filing fees for candidates running for election in some cases by 600%, increasing filing for US Senate from $500 to $3000. The Secretary of State, Ross Miller, felt that only “credible” candidates should be able to run for office. As I see it, that would leave only the incumbents and “anointed” candidates, chosen by the “powers that be,” able to run for office. Maybe that’s why I called them the SOS’s Anti-Democratic Election Suppression Bills.
The real action on the Tax bills is yet to come, but AB336 an income tax on business failed. That’s good. We want businesses to create more private sector jobs, not be used to create more tax-user jobs for government. AB446 a brand new tax on services in this state received a waiver, so it bypassed the dead line to surface as things really heat up. SJR7 a constitutional amendment to limit property taxes had a nice hearing, but the Legislature cannot hear the people, so it died in committee without a vote. There will be a lot more posturing about taxes, but Governor Sandoval has said NO new Taxes and we are counting on him holding the line.
Some of the Governor’s Education reform bills are exempt from the deadline and have been rerefered to Ways and Means. This includes AB554 which would give parents an idea of the performance of a school through the assignment of a letter grade, provide for public school choice through open enrollment, prohibit social promotion and provide for remedial intensive reading instruction for children who can’t pass the third grade. AB557 provides for a pilot program for performance or merit pay for teachers. Isn’t performance pay what everyone in the private sector faces every day? Do your job and keep your job. Do your job well and be rewarded for your successful performance. Goodness, with all the fuss we might be lead to think that teachers are above being graded on their performance like the rest of us.
The people’s right to petition escaped further decimation when Senator Rhoads’ bill, originally designating “petition districts” as the 42 Assembly Districts, could not meet Constitutional muster, because it was so burdensome as to be impossible. Now, SB133 has been amended with “petition district” equaling Congressional Districts which is very reasonable. We can be thankful to the ACLU for their help on this one!
With over 1,061 bills plus resolutions to consider, this is a tell tale view into the machinations of the democrat controlled legislature. Wasn’t it Mark Twain who said, “No one is safe when the Legislature is in session.”
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