Rep. Shelley Berkley responded to a barrage of political attacks on Las Vegas, however, let's keep it real, these attacks are against Sen. Harry Reid.
Then there is the old disdain for Las Vegas from the extreme conservative right.
Here is what Rep. Berkley released yesterday....
(March 4, 2009 -- Washington, D.C.) Congresswoman Shelley Berkley today responded to Congressional critics of Las Vegas and to lawmakers who have attacked funding for Nevada projects, including the proposed Mag-lev high speed train. Berkley delivered her comments in a speech from the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives. Her remarks are as follows:
Statement of Congresswoman Shelley Berkley
Mr. Speaker, I'm mad and I'm not going to take it anymore.
I've had enough of my colleagues bashing my district, my hometown, and the community I love, Las Vegas.
I've sat back as Las Vegas has been maligned, insulted, and lied about for the sole purpose of making political points.
I've been waiting for common sense to prevail. But I'm here to say that this nonsense, the bashing and lies about Las Vegas have got to end and they have got to end now.
It started with Senator McConnell's misguided attack on the stimulus bill by singling out a mob museum in Las Vegas as an earmark in the stimulus package.
There's only a couple of things wrong with that, there never was an earmark in the stimulus bill -- there are none -- and there certainly wasn’t one for a mob museum, there was never a mention of it in the stimulus package. The lies continue.
Then we found out about the Mag-lev train, countless republicans have misrepresented the $8 billion included in the stimulus bill as being an earmark for the Las Vegas-Anaheim Mag-lev route.
The only problem is even after it was pointed out that there is no earmark, that Las Vegas and California are going to have to compete with other projects, that this has been a project that's been in the works for 20 years and that it will bring thousands of visitors to the Las Vegas area and to the Southern California area, the lies continue.
The latest one was Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. He repeated the lie in his televised response to the President's remarks to Congress, claiming the bill included funding for a magnetic levitation line from Las Vegas to Disneyland.
And then it goes one worse. Trent Franks just mentioned there's a Mag-lev going from Disneyland to the Moonlight Bunny brothel. Now I grew up in Las Vegas and I've never heard of the Moonlight Bunny brothel, but I guarantee the Mag-lev train is not going there.
The latest whipping boy is in the omnibus bill -- Sustainable Las Vegas.
Just yesterday, Senator McCain took to the floor of the Senate to attack sustainable Las Vegas. What does sustainable Las Vegas mean? He yelled. Let me enlighten the senator, it's a University of Nevada education and research program on energy supply, water supply and air quality issues that are very important for the desert southwest for cities like Las Vegas and Phoenix and Tucson. But he knows that.
So why is it different than the hundreds of other programs given out to other universities in the United States? Including universities in Arizona? Because it has Las Vegas in its name.
And let me tell you about my hometown of Las Vegas -- it's a community of families looking for a better life; it's a community of schools and churches and mosques, a community of small businesses, working people and beautiful hotels.
That brings me to the most egregious affront to Las Vegas. Stop bad mouthing Las Vegas and stop telling businesses and major companies to stay away from Vegas.
You are hurting our economy, you're forcing major layoffs of employees in the hotel industry. Hundreds-of-thousands of Nevadans depend on the tourism and convention business for their livelihood.
Las Vegas has long been a city where serious business is conducted, where small and large conventions can be accommodated. When it comes to business meetings, Las Vegas is the best city on the planet. You still get the best bang for your buck. Great hotels, great convention facilities, great restaurants, great transportation and a great price.
When you bad mouth Las Vegas, you are hurting our major industry, you're hurting your fellow citizens by taking away their livelihood. You are taking food out of their children's mouths.
Las Vegas is having a very tough time right now. High mortgage foreclosure rate, high unemployment, high bankruptcy rate. We are hurting. Every attack on Las Vegas by my colleagues is a knife in the heart of my city.
So I implore my colleagues, stop bashing Las Vegas. Find some other whipping boy. We've had enough, we're not going to take it anymore. I yield back the balance of my time.
Showing posts with label Arizona. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Arizona. Show all posts
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Monday, June 2, 2008
Gas prices change family's fun
This first published May 29, 2008 in the Henderson Home News, a Community Newspapers of Nevada publication.
What used to be relatively cheap entertainment is no longer so.
For years, we have enjoyed less expensive gasoline in our Northwest Arizona getaway, primarily because there are fewer local taxes added on than in Clark County, which has plenty.
This was true until this past Memorial Day weekend, when the gouging began. The week before, I had checked our only local gasoline retailer in Arizona, and the price was $3.67 per gallon. Imagine my shock over the weekend when I went to fill two 5-gallon gas containers and the price had jumped to $4.19 per gallon. Heck, that’s 10 cents more than the notoriously high-priced Chevron station across from the Hacienda Hotel between Boulder City and the Hoover Dam.
That is a 52-cent jump in price with no explanation. It is taking advantage of unsuspecting visitors and tourists, who quickly realize the nearest pump is at least 30 miles away.
It has always been my habit to spend money at the combination gas station-grocery store to help the local economy by purchasing odds and ends like milk, eggs, bread and filling up with gas before heading home. Although I’m miffed about the weekend price hike, I’ll probably continue to add to the local economy. After all, they bake the best bread around. But I’ll think twice about purchasing gas before heading home.
The days of tossing $25 into the boat tank for a day’s worth of fun whipping the kids around on a towable are quickly fading, along with $20 to spend a day quad riding. The challenge for me isn’t in the price of gas so much as it is the challenge of planning our excursions with better purpose.
This concept makes my bride giddy with excitement, because for her this is an opportunity for families to get back together to spend quality time with each other. This may include shorter boat rides and more family games on the beach or shorter distances on the quads with longer hikes and picnics while out exploring.
Her excitement over quality family time has been resonating with me lately, causing me to rethink how we’ve spent time with our children. Although it has always been our intention to engage our children, it seems I have spent plenty of time entertaining them probably more than I should have.
For example, we have a vacation home with a boat and a few quads. Granted the boat is small and 13 years old, but it has provided us special opportunities to engage our children by experiencing nature in ways not available to most Americans.
Are our children any worse off being entertained? I would say probably not.
The real question is would they be better off without the material stuff and spending more time playing board games?
Maybe so. Or maybe a modified combination would be better to build interpersonal communication skills.
Suppose for a moment that gas is $8 per gallon, you live in an urban city, work within a mile of home, you have no big toys and no car. How concerned are you about the price of gas?
Now suppose for a moment that gas is $8 per gallon and your situation is the same as today. How concerned are you?
It’s not out of the question to consider these situations, because gas is $8.93 per gallon in Germany. Why could it not happen here?
What adjustments would you make to your lifestyle? How would you entertain your children? Would you use the opportunity to engage your children? These are all interesting questions to ponder if you have a moment.
As the economy slumps and the price gougers gouge, look for opportunities to endure by bringing family and friends closer together. Throw a simple barbecue, listen to music and play a few games.
Why wait for the price of gas to go up in order to engage your family in healthy communication and board games?
My bride loves board games. I’m less than enthusiastic about them but willing to play.
So what about you?
Tim O’Callaghan, co-publisher of the Home News, can be reached at 990-2656 or tim.oc@vegas.com. He writes a regular blog at tocomv.blogspot.com.
What used to be relatively cheap entertainment is no longer so.
For years, we have enjoyed less expensive gasoline in our Northwest Arizona getaway, primarily because there are fewer local taxes added on than in Clark County, which has plenty.
This was true until this past Memorial Day weekend, when the gouging began. The week before, I had checked our only local gasoline retailer in Arizona, and the price was $3.67 per gallon. Imagine my shock over the weekend when I went to fill two 5-gallon gas containers and the price had jumped to $4.19 per gallon. Heck, that’s 10 cents more than the notoriously high-priced Chevron station across from the Hacienda Hotel between Boulder City and the Hoover Dam.
That is a 52-cent jump in price with no explanation. It is taking advantage of unsuspecting visitors and tourists, who quickly realize the nearest pump is at least 30 miles away.
It has always been my habit to spend money at the combination gas station-grocery store to help the local economy by purchasing odds and ends like milk, eggs, bread and filling up with gas before heading home. Although I’m miffed about the weekend price hike, I’ll probably continue to add to the local economy. After all, they bake the best bread around. But I’ll think twice about purchasing gas before heading home.
The days of tossing $25 into the boat tank for a day’s worth of fun whipping the kids around on a towable are quickly fading, along with $20 to spend a day quad riding. The challenge for me isn’t in the price of gas so much as it is the challenge of planning our excursions with better purpose.
This concept makes my bride giddy with excitement, because for her this is an opportunity for families to get back together to spend quality time with each other. This may include shorter boat rides and more family games on the beach or shorter distances on the quads with longer hikes and picnics while out exploring.
Her excitement over quality family time has been resonating with me lately, causing me to rethink how we’ve spent time with our children. Although it has always been our intention to engage our children, it seems I have spent plenty of time entertaining them probably more than I should have.
For example, we have a vacation home with a boat and a few quads. Granted the boat is small and 13 years old, but it has provided us special opportunities to engage our children by experiencing nature in ways not available to most Americans.
Are our children any worse off being entertained? I would say probably not.
The real question is would they be better off without the material stuff and spending more time playing board games?
Maybe so. Or maybe a modified combination would be better to build interpersonal communication skills.
Suppose for a moment that gas is $8 per gallon, you live in an urban city, work within a mile of home, you have no big toys and no car. How concerned are you about the price of gas?
Now suppose for a moment that gas is $8 per gallon and your situation is the same as today. How concerned are you?
It’s not out of the question to consider these situations, because gas is $8.93 per gallon in Germany. Why could it not happen here?
What adjustments would you make to your lifestyle? How would you entertain your children? Would you use the opportunity to engage your children? These are all interesting questions to ponder if you have a moment.
As the economy slumps and the price gougers gouge, look for opportunities to endure by bringing family and friends closer together. Throw a simple barbecue, listen to music and play a few games.
Why wait for the price of gas to go up in order to engage your family in healthy communication and board games?
My bride loves board games. I’m less than enthusiastic about them but willing to play.
So what about you?
Tim O’Callaghan, co-publisher of the Home News, can be reached at 990-2656 or tim.oc@vegas.com. He writes a regular blog at tocomv.blogspot.com.
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Immigration laws require reform
This first published January 3, 2008 in the Henderson Home News, a Community Newspapers of Nevada publication.
MEADVIEW, Ariz. – It is the day after Christmas, and because of holiday deadlines, I find myself writing the first column of 2008. Although it is a week before my topic of this column actually begins to play itself out, what a perfect time to get the fireworks going. What better topic to light things up than immigration?
The New York Times crafted an interesting editorial Dec. 18, titled “Blazing Arizona” outlining possible complications of Arizona’s Fair and Legal Employment Act, a two-strike law, suspending a business’s license on the first offense and revoking it on the second for knowingly employing undocumented workers.
The Times editorial reinforces what I have been saying for the past two years about immigration reform.
“We have always said that workplace laws should be enforced vigorously – as part of a comprehensive, nationwide immigration system that doesn’t just punish, but tries to actually solve the problems that foster and sustain the breaking of immigration laws. The boosters of the Arizona law, including the Minutemen border vigilantes who have made 'January First!’ an anti-immigrant rallying cry, have a much narrower goal: the biggest purge of illegal immigrants in the Southwest since the federal government’s Operation Wetback in 1954”, the Times said.
If for just a moment the American public could set aside their fear and anger to simply evaluate the economics involved in immigration – illegal or legal for that matter – they may reconsider their positions on it. Most of us are either unaware or just don’t care about how undocumented workers or illegal immigrants have become integral weaves in the fabric of the U.S. economy.
The Times points out what could be in store for Arizona. “If that happens,
the immigrants will take a big chunk of Arizona’s growth and economic
vitality with them – and not necessarily back across the international
border.
The collateral damage will be severe, as citizens and legal immigrants are also thrown out of work, as businesses struggle to find workers in a state with a 3.3 percent unemployment rate and as sleazy employers move more workers off the books, the better to abuse and exploit them. And the national problem of undocumented immigration will be no closer to a
solution.
“There are many compassion-and-common-sense criticisms of Arizona’s Fair and Legal Employment Act: stories about families torn apart, breadwinners deported and citizen children on public assistance. They make little headway with the law-and-order crowd. Nor does the fact that many hard-line defenders of workplace enforcement show a lopsided devotion to federal laws; they seldom complain when employers abuse undocumented immigrants and steal their wages, even though those violations worsen job conditions and pay for American workers, too.”
Harsh words for Arizona employers, but let’s not poke a stick in the eye of the Grand Canyon State, because so many employers in the Silver State are just as guilty.
With the failure of Congress to pass legitimate immigration reform, the decline in the number of American workers because of retirement and an aging population, the U.S. economy is facing great economic hardships due to worker shortages.
Then again, perhaps this is just an unnecessary concern, given so many American jobs being outsourced to other countries, the U.S. dependency on cheap goods from China and the exploitation of developing countries. Let’s pile on the concern by kicking 12 million undocumented workers out of the country, and don’t forget millions of American children who would be separated from their parents.
Yes, American children born in this country with all of its undeniable rights under the law. Do you really think undocumented immigrants are going to haul their legitimate American children back over the border and overseas?
This appears to be a Catch-22, damned-if-you-do-and-damned-if-you-don’t situation that should be addressed with compassion and dignity while protecting an already shaky economy.
By the time you read this column, whatever is going to happen here in Arizona will already be taking shape and could very well grade the path for future immigration and the U.S. economy.
The Times editorial ended with a thought-provoking statement: “As Arizona exacts its punishment on the undocumented workers who have made it so prosperous, it runs the risk of proving itself tough but not smart.” Even though a majority of the New York Times editorial is here, I suggest you take some time to read it in its entirety.
Instead of “Blazing Arizona” we could end up “Raising Arizona.” Ah, nothing like starting the new year off with a bang.
Tim O’Callaghan, co-publisher of the News, can be reached at 990-2656 or
tim.oc@vegas.com.
MEADVIEW, Ariz. – It is the day after Christmas, and because of holiday deadlines, I find myself writing the first column of 2008. Although it is a week before my topic of this column actually begins to play itself out, what a perfect time to get the fireworks going. What better topic to light things up than immigration?
The New York Times crafted an interesting editorial Dec. 18, titled “Blazing Arizona” outlining possible complications of Arizona’s Fair and Legal Employment Act, a two-strike law, suspending a business’s license on the first offense and revoking it on the second for knowingly employing undocumented workers.
The Times editorial reinforces what I have been saying for the past two years about immigration reform.
“We have always said that workplace laws should be enforced vigorously – as part of a comprehensive, nationwide immigration system that doesn’t just punish, but tries to actually solve the problems that foster and sustain the breaking of immigration laws. The boosters of the Arizona law, including the Minutemen border vigilantes who have made 'January First!’ an anti-immigrant rallying cry, have a much narrower goal: the biggest purge of illegal immigrants in the Southwest since the federal government’s Operation Wetback in 1954”, the Times said.
If for just a moment the American public could set aside their fear and anger to simply evaluate the economics involved in immigration – illegal or legal for that matter – they may reconsider their positions on it. Most of us are either unaware or just don’t care about how undocumented workers or illegal immigrants have become integral weaves in the fabric of the U.S. economy.
The Times points out what could be in store for Arizona. “If that happens,
the immigrants will take a big chunk of Arizona’s growth and economic
vitality with them – and not necessarily back across the international
border.
The collateral damage will be severe, as citizens and legal immigrants are also thrown out of work, as businesses struggle to find workers in a state with a 3.3 percent unemployment rate and as sleazy employers move more workers off the books, the better to abuse and exploit them. And the national problem of undocumented immigration will be no closer to a
solution.
“There are many compassion-and-common-sense criticisms of Arizona’s Fair and Legal Employment Act: stories about families torn apart, breadwinners deported and citizen children on public assistance. They make little headway with the law-and-order crowd. Nor does the fact that many hard-line defenders of workplace enforcement show a lopsided devotion to federal laws; they seldom complain when employers abuse undocumented immigrants and steal their wages, even though those violations worsen job conditions and pay for American workers, too.”
Harsh words for Arizona employers, but let’s not poke a stick in the eye of the Grand Canyon State, because so many employers in the Silver State are just as guilty.
With the failure of Congress to pass legitimate immigration reform, the decline in the number of American workers because of retirement and an aging population, the U.S. economy is facing great economic hardships due to worker shortages.
Then again, perhaps this is just an unnecessary concern, given so many American jobs being outsourced to other countries, the U.S. dependency on cheap goods from China and the exploitation of developing countries. Let’s pile on the concern by kicking 12 million undocumented workers out of the country, and don’t forget millions of American children who would be separated from their parents.
Yes, American children born in this country with all of its undeniable rights under the law. Do you really think undocumented immigrants are going to haul their legitimate American children back over the border and overseas?
This appears to be a Catch-22, damned-if-you-do-and-damned-if-you-don’t situation that should be addressed with compassion and dignity while protecting an already shaky economy.
By the time you read this column, whatever is going to happen here in Arizona will already be taking shape and could very well grade the path for future immigration and the U.S. economy.
The Times editorial ended with a thought-provoking statement: “As Arizona exacts its punishment on the undocumented workers who have made it so prosperous, it runs the risk of proving itself tough but not smart.” Even though a majority of the New York Times editorial is here, I suggest you take some time to read it in its entirety.
Instead of “Blazing Arizona” we could end up “Raising Arizona.” Ah, nothing like starting the new year off with a bang.
Tim O’Callaghan, co-publisher of the News, can be reached at 990-2656 or
tim.oc@vegas.com.
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