Nevada usually tops the bad lists and craters on the good ones. That frequent criticism is not only true, but also understated.
When we’re really embarrassed, we just invent a list.
You’ve probably heard politicians or economic development boosters smugly assert that “Las Vegas has more churches per capita,” a frequent trope whenever anyone questions our morality.
I once tried to find out “more churches per capita than where?” No one could complete the non-comparison. It was just bogus PR spin from tourism promotional types trying to paint Gomorrah South as a family attraction.
I guess the point is we’re better than nothing.
We just cannot avoid trying to portray ourselves and something we ain’t.
Last week, I saw a news report about the mass exodus of Californians heading to Texas, Florida, Idaho and “no-tax Nevada.”
Huh?
Fun spin but a full-blown lie. Nevada may not officially have a state income tax but we make up for it with hidden levies, often called “fees,” and high sales taxes which brutalize those of lower income. Such grinding policies spawn paucity and poverty, leaving schools, health care, parks, roads, first responders and so many other community needs to go begging.
We cannot be far from disc jockeys again sponsoring “fill your favorite pot hole” contests.
I got my first Nevada drivers license in 1969 in a 12-wide mobile home out in a barren Las Vegas field. All I had to do was turn in my fancy full-color laminated California i.d. for a hand-typed piece of heavy paper. No test, no nothing. I dared ask why.
“We’ve grown so fast that we haven’t enacted laws that have been on the books in other states for decades,” responded a wise but harried DMV lady.
At a 1981 legislative hearing, the immortal Sen. Ken Redelsperger, R-Pahrump, accidentally uttered unchallengeable wisdom for the ages: “We don’t want to be the first to do something.”
Not to worry.
For longer than I can remember, I have advised that if you have substantial income, especially without children, you will do real good in these parts. If you don’t fit that description and belong to the lower 80 percent, especially with kids, go somewhere else.
Which brings me to the unchallengeable wisdom of a now world-famous everyman named Adam Steelmon who has paid for a Nevada vanity auto license plate for two decades. It reads “GOBK2CA” (Go back to California).
He should get a medal for truth in advertising as his story has gone viral, another public relations coup for the Silver State.
Alas and alack, this poor lout has seen his license plate revoked by DMV censors working for Miss Priscilla Goodbody (see below). Mr. Steelmon has appealed his case.
He told media types that he has only received one negative comment in all those years. Law enforcement officers from Nevada to Texas have pulled him over to say they like his plate.
Unfortunately, as a carpenter from Galilee once opined, a prophet is without honor in his own country.
Legendary Tonight Show host Johnny Carson termed network censors as “Miss Priscilla Goodbody,” a proper puritan appellation if ever there was one. She has apparently expanded her enterprise to upgrade Nevada’s moral climate.
Carson liked to ridicule the fact that people in commercials could hold up a beer but could not be shown drinking it on camera. Although that’s now permissible in this increasingly libertine age, beer advertisers still stick to the old Television Code prohibition.
I remember one spot wherein NBA hall-of-famer Bill Russell held up a brew followed by a thunderous lightning strike. The camera then returned to a smiling Russell holding a less-than full glass. He would still go thirsty today.
So Mr. Steelmon must defend his creativity before our righteous protectors of the public welfare. At least he’s been paying good money to the state for the privilege, which is more than I can say for Nevada’s ever-expanding list of corporate welfare queens who are lightly taxed when taxed at all.
So you be the judge. Is “GOBK2CA” any more lewd and lascivious than BUTY, BANGLA, DOBY, DRTBAGG, 69DROP, DOUCME, KRACKO or RNECK, all of which Ms. Goodbody OK’d?
She approved BUCK UP despite objections. The Reno Rodeo Assn. might agree, given their recent “Buckin’ Good Time” ad campaign. How RNECK.
Somebody even complained about AFM, probably an application from a member of the American Federation of Musicians union. At least that one survived.
ADVICE TO FUTURE APPLICANTS: Avoid the letter “F” no matter what. Ditto anything remotely drug-related, including marijuana, legal or not.
However, KGRAM somehow got thru the dirty minded and drug-phobic process.
Must have caught Ms. Goodbody in a rare good mood. Perhaps she’s lightening up in her old age. Or perhaps lighting up?
GET USED TO IT. License plate abbreviations have become epidemic in the cyberworld of LOL, BFF and OMG. So what does it matter that legions of school kids from LA to New York City can’t read?
I can’t communicate on a glorified postage stamp-sized TV screen. I’m still hung up on an archaic form called complete sentences. People who think like me are dinosaurs.
Given the evidence on the record, we are going back to the future. Text and license plate abbreviations are already obsolete as we increasingly use the latter day equivalent of Egyptian hieroglyphics. Only today, we call them emojis.
Who needs words when you can just look at the pictures?
All I can add is WTF!
Stay safe, get vaxxed and pray for those cruelly afflicted by the cruelly small minds on this small planet.
Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno.
Andrew Quarantino Barbáno is a 54-year Nevadan and editor of NevadaLabor.com/ Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Tribune since 1988. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us
Leave a Reply