Carson City, the state capital

In the Nevada state assembly hall there hangs, behind the speaker's dais, a portrait of Abraham Lincoln. If you know as little about its history as I did before visiting this week, then you don't know that Lincoln managed to get Nevada certified as the nation's 36th state in 1864, as the Civil War was drawing to its inexorable conclusion, despite the fact that the territory did not meet the necessary population requirement. Lincoln did this for two reasons: in gratitude for the significant funding of the the war effort (see previous posting on Virginia City and the Comstock Lode) and also because he had to have Nevada's three votes in order to ratify the Emancipation Proclamation 13th Amendment.

The names of dozens of precious minerals and ores taken out from beneath the state's soil and mountains, and the scenes portraying their excavation and commercial employment, are displayed in a mural ribbon that adorns the top of each hallway in the old Capitol building. There don't seem to be any pictures of the thousands of abandoned mines that litter Nevada's landscape, still claiming lives of curiosity-seekers who venture in and are suffocated by methane (the least painless of the possible and various accidental deaths).

What also gets no tribute in art in the halls of government is the state's current revenue stream, gaming. There are casinos large and small, plush and dingy, within walking distance up and down the street from the Capitol, the state supreme court building and the state assembly. Max Baer, whose singular claim to fame was portraying the ignoramus Jethro Bodine, nephew of hayseed-turned-oil tycoon Jed Clampett in TV's "Beverly Hillbillies", is building an new casino on the outskirts of Carson City themed after the television show. It is to feature a two-hundred-foot oil derrick as landmark.

No word on whether the enterprise will include modern-day salutes to US soldiers killed in Bush's War for Oil, to the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi men, women, and children who have died in the bombings and violence, or even a nod to American petroleum consumption (say, a bigger-than-lifesize Hummer tearing up the suburban landscape). My guess is no.

Across the street from the Nugget Casino, where our tour bus dropped us yesterday afternoon (with free tickets for the evening buffet) is the Nevada state museum, housed in the old US Mint building. Did you know Carson City minted coinage for a few years in the 1960's? I didn't, but most numismatics know if you have a coin with "CC" near the president's head then you've got a rare and worthy collectible.

Much like the Texas Legislature, Nevada's 21 senators and 42 state assemblymen and women meet in the winter and spring of odd-numbered years, but Texans convene for 180 days while Nevadans gather for just 120. Like their Lone Star peers, they are paid small stipends and as such most of the members have comfortable incomes from primary employment and entrepreneurship. They also spend the first month reading proclamations and bestowing honoraria on constituents, semi-celebrities and causes, and the last month furiously writing, amending, and voting on thousands of pieces of legislation, leaving much of the work to die at the end of their session. They are also frequently summoned into special session to address unfinished business or pet concerns of the governor (and corporate lobbyists).

The speaker of the Nevada state assembly is a woman, as is the state's attorney general. Nevada, like so many other Western states, is purple and trending blue, in their case because of the economic growth from Californians fleeing high taxes and congestion, a burgeoning population of Latino immigrants, and the organization of the state's casino laborers. The influence of Nevada's early primary election day -- January 19, between the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary --was initially expected to have greater influence on the Democratic nominee's selection, but it appears that will be diminished because of the land rush by other states to move up their presidential primaries to Feb. 5th, creating a quasi-national primary on that day.

Today: a cruise across the lake to the North shore to see the old Cal-Neva resort hotel, where Frank and Dean and the rest of the Rat Pack palled around for a few years in the '60's, and the Thunderbird Lodge.

Virginia City and the Comstock Lode

The biggest problem in this grubstake paradise was the sticky blue-gray mud that clung to picks and shovels. When the mud was assayed, it proved to be silver ore worth over $2,000 a ton -- in 1859 dollars! Gold mixed with high quality silver ore was recovered in quantities large enough to catch the eye of President Abe Lincoln. He needed the gold and silver to keep the Union solvent during the Civil War. On October 31, 1864 Lincoln made Nevada a state although it did not contain enough people to constitutionally authorize statehood.

The resulting boom turned "Ol' Virginny Town" into Virginia City, the most important settlement between Denver and San Francisco; and the grubby prospectors into instant millionaires who built mansions, imported furniture and fashions from Europe and the Orient, and financed the Civil War. With the gold and silver came the building of the Virginia & Truckee Railroad, which ran from Reno to Carson City to Virginia City and later to Minden. The investments made in mining on the Comstock Lode in the 1860's, 1870's and 1880's fueled the building of San Francisco. William Ralston and Charles Crocker, founders of the Bank of California, made their money in Virginia City. Names like Leland Stanford, George Hearst, John Mackay, William Flood and many others made their fortunes in Comstock mining.

At the peak of its glory, Virginia City was a boisterous town with something going on 24 hours a day both above and below ground for its nearly 30,000 residents. There were visiting celebrities, Shakespeare plays, opium dens, newspapers, competing fire companies, fraternal organizations, at least five police precincts, a thriving red-light district, and the first Miner's Union in the U.S. The International Hotel was six stories high and boasted the West's first elevator, called a "rising room".

Mark Twain got his start as a writer at the local newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise. Here's one of his articles, entitled "Dead Indian Found in Water Tank", and also excerpted, the Stockbroker's Prayer:

Our father Mammon, who art in the Comstock, bully is thy name; let thy dividends come, and stock go up, in California as in Washoe. Give us this day our daily commissions; forgive us our swindles as we hope to get even on those who have swindled us. Unlead us not into temptation of promising wildcat; deliver us from lawsuits; for thine is the main Comstock, the black sulphurets and the wire silver, from wallrock to wallrock, you bet!

More as I can get to it, mostly about Nevada.

See you from Tahoe tonight

Highs in the 70's, lows in the 30's. Humidity twenty-something percent.

Don't let any hurricanes pass through while we're away.

Do something nice for a stranger today

Just because:

On Sept. 11, Jacob Sundberg of San Antonio has pledged to make eye contact and smile at everyone he meets. Kaitlin Ulrich will bring goody baskets to the police and fire departments in and around Philadelphia. And 100 volunteers from New York –- 9/11 firefighters and family members among them –- are going to Groesbeck, Texas, to rebuild a house destroyed by a tornado last December.

This is a minute sampling of the hundreds of thousands of people who have pledged to memorialize those killed on 9/11 by doing something good for others.

The heroic acts of all those killed trying to save others that September morning has spawned a growing grass-roots movement. The goal is to ensure that future generations remember not just the horror of the attacks, but also the extraordinary outpouring of humanity during the days, weeks, and months that followed.

"It was the worst possible day imaginable, and in some ways, a remarkable day, too, in the way in which people responded," says David Paine, cofounder of myGoodDeed.org. "We need to rekindle the way we came together in the spirit of 9/11: It would be almost as much a tragedy to lose that lesson.

No more snark today. Must go out and find a Good Samaritan opportunity.

Won't you join me?

Poll dancing

(No Hillary cleavage humor, please.)

John Edwards won Texas. Those results mirror high-profile national online polling among the Democratic netroots. And that's beginning to translate into polling strength offline as well.

Four months before the first votes get cast -- be they in Iowa or New Hampshire or somewhere else -- the front-running Clinton may have already peaked. If Biden and Dodd were to withdraw tomorrow, could she count on their supporters joining her? Maybe. What about Bill Richardson? When he finally concedes (all due respect to mi hermano Stace) he's almost certainly going to endorse her, and not just because he wants to be her running mate.

A more intriguing question is: what if Clinton does get the nod and then Dennis Kucinich -- or better yet, Edwards -- runs as an independent? A Green, perhaps?

With Frederick of Hollywood assuming a lead among the fractured Republicans jostling to bear the elephantine standard, is a challenge from the far right in the offing (Tancreepo or Dunkin' Hunter on a rabid-base issue like immigration)?

Or better yet: what about a challenge from the left of the right -- Ron Paul running as a Libertarian? Remember he has previously been their presidential nominee once before.

What if our choices in November of 2008 were, say, Clinton/Richardson, Edwards/Kucinich, Thompson/Tommy Franks and Ron Paul/Michael Badnarik (the 2004 Lib nominee)?

Could we all get a little excited about an election like that?

Noriega, Ratcliffe, blogs and politics

Geez I hate having to skip a good blogswarm.

RG Ratcliffe wrote this, and several of my blog brethren responded to it (some of us pretty irritated, some of us less so). A couple on our side even shot their pots at us (but one of them apologized for reacting in haste).

Then Rick Noriega got on the phone with us -- not me, again -- and also got online over here and explained the context of the remarks. And apologized for making them.

Oh, and RG responded to our response. All the while -- over the past 36 hours or so -- I was busy with business and preparing for our fall vacation. So all I managed to do was dash off a note to the Noriega campaign Sunday afternoon, to which I received an almost immediate and satisfactory response. So I missed the whole thing, dammit.

But I do have time for a condensed version of the brouhaha, so here's the abridged Ratcliffe:

I allowed my good name and respected reputation to be used like a dishrag by an operative of the Mikal Watts campaign, but if I were to admit that, then I would lose the remaining shredded tatters of my credibility .... therefore, I'll laugh the whole thing off by accusing bloggers of being thin-skinned while reframing my article as a service to the readers of the the Chronic and the Express-Snooze, which are legion compared to those DFHs who blog in their underwear.

Oh yes, and also in dedicated service to the unwashed masses who haven't yet grasped the intricacies of the "Internets" and how it is used for political organizing.

Don't be prickly about the criticism, RG. It's just part of the game.

The Weekly Wrangle

Time for another edition of the Texas Progressive Alliance's Blog Round Up, brought to us once again by Vince from Capitol Annex.

Do You Ever Feel Like Cassandra? Gary Denton at Easter Lemming Liberal News is beginning to feel like Cassandra again over Iran: condemned to know the future but unable to convince others to prevent it.

Port Arthur gets shipped several hundred thousand gallons of a waste byproduct of the chemical nerve agent VX for incineration, and PDiddie at Brains and Eggs reveals that neither a federal judge nor the TCEQ nor Rick Perry did anything to stop it.

Over at Three Wise Men, Nat-Wu notes that whether or homosexuality is a choice or not, everyone deserves the same rights.

Blogging at the University of North Texas Democrats' site, Adam Silva of Three Wise Men notes that pundits are over-analyzing polls in the 2008 presidential race.

Hal at Half Empty blogs about some hot water Mikal Watts got into over a letter he wrote to another attorney talking about contributions to judges.

Stace Medellin at Dos Centavos reports on a recent Democratic event held in Kingwood. Along with several candidates running in the 2007 Houston city council election, the event attracted several judicial office-seekers running in 2008, including Texas Supreme Court Place 8 candidate Judge Susan Criss.

In one of his information-packed open threads on Texas Kaos, lightseeker notes that T Boone Pickens is stacking the deck in Roberts County to suck up water rights.

McBlogger has an update on the toll roads in the Austin area and urges those on CAMPO to think about what they are doing carefully, advising them to not burden taxpayers with the most expensive method of financing road construction.

WCNews at Eye on Williamson wonders if the "conservative" WCGOP and Craddick are going soft. Will they let Rep. Mike Krusee go without a primary challenge from the right, in Will Craddick Let Krusee Go Unpunished?

At Bluedaze, TXsharon tell us about yet Another Republican Sexual Pervert.

Off the Kuff takes a look at the upcoming battle for Harris County DA between incumbent Chuck Rosenthal and former HPD Chief C.O. Bradford.

Bradley Bowen of North Texas Liberal tells us about the excitement at a Hillary Clinton event in DC -- the crowd was moved and motivated.

Could Be True at South Texas Chisme notes that a polluting refiner gets only a teeny, teeny, tiny slap on wrist. Oh, why did they even bother. Just taking the time of a minimum wage clerk to file the darn thing would cost more than the fine does.

Vince at Capitol Annex discusses the race of a "Craddick D" down in HD-40 (Aaron Pena) and offers his opinions on the blogging legislator's chances in a contested primary.