BARBWIRE by ANDREW BARBANO Pirate Laureate of the High Desert Outback of the American Dream

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Tinkle-down economics: testing Tesla's testes
Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-9-2014 Sparks Tribune
Updated 9-16-2014

This week, Nevada lawmakers will sacrifice their firstborns at the altar of alternative energy.

The demi-gods of corporate welfare have spoken and must be obeyed.

First, I'll genuflect, then all idols are fair game.

When Reno's Grand Sierra Resort opened in 1978 as the MGM Grand, it truly was the coming of a new, small city.

Northwestern Nevada became such a boomtown that people were living in tents on the river.

Tesla will complete the paving over of the little valley by the mucky Truckee, so get yours now, then get out to a more hospitable place that actually cares about frills like schools and health care.

Tesla's deal ties Chrysler for the biggest corporate welfare subsidy in automotive history.

At $1.3 billion, it almost triples the kickback Tesla boss Elon Musk required.

GSR employs about 2,500 today. Tesla dwarfs it at 6,500. The Renown medical octopus employs 5,569 and has become the area's largest private employer.

Thereby hangs a cautionary tale.

The 1995 Washoe County Grand Jury report on the theft of Washoe Medical Center is available only at NevadaLabor.com.

It details how control of information and fast-tracking resulted in the current ownership acquiring public assets worth up to $120 million for just $3 million (1985 dollars).

The bandidos who engineered the theft promised to pay for all future indigent care and cut health care costs, neither of which happened.

Corporations live forever, relentlessly rapacious. The mining industry underpaid its taxes for decades through creative deductions while Nevada regulators slept.

Assembly Speaker Marilyn Kirkpatrick, D-Las Vegas, is nobody's fool and has long been a critic of corporate welfare without oversight, followthrough and accountability.

But the formidable Madame Speaker plays against a stacked deck this week: typical legislative lack of time.

The entire gambling-industrial complex wants a one-day rubberstamping of everything the muskox in the china shop demands.

We had a one-day special session to repeal Nevada's usury law and allow the criminal Citibank to establish a credit card processing center in Gomorrah South.

Then Citi got a special zip code approved so that their return address read "The Lakes, Nevada."

There are advantages to doing business in a place with the morals of a cathouse even if you are ashamed of your neighborhood.

Tesla is coming to an industrial park named TRIC, managed by an anti-union affable pimp..er, businessman, as his Mustang Ranch predecessor Joe Conforte preferred to be labeled.

The devil is in the details and if the past is prologue, Nevada taxpayers will once again have their pockets vacuumed on the road to diversification Valhalla.

Good jobs at $25 an hour? In order to qualify for tax breaks under current law, Tesla has to pay at the state average wage, already at $20.62.

Nevada construction and industrial unions need to start organizing to organize the place.

Now.

As Frederick Douglass once memorably advised, "power concedes nothing without a demand."

So let's demand.

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)

WEB EXTRAS...

TOAST ALERT. Teachers' union gross profits tax petition supporters and opponents would do well to review the Barbwire of Feb. 28, 2013.

Passage of the tax initiative could easily lead to a successful court challenge that would at the same time blow out not only the revenue hike, but also term limits and the state's worst anti-union laws. Something for everybody.

ANTE INTO THE GAME: Support the new season of Barbwire.TV by putting your money where my mouth is.

PayPal monthly subscription software is now operational at the website.

A thousand thanks to those who already responded and keep sending show suggestions. Current frontrunners include (pardon the pun) wild mustangs as canned goods, education and  i-Guns with César Chávez in Nevada recently surging.

Now come queries about ballot questions. The Jan. 30 column brought a surge of inquiries about the Nevada State Education Association corporate tax petition on this November's ballot.

Stay tuned.

  Please forward additional ideas or vote on the above.

  I encourage you to donate to the cause at Barbwire.TV/

The medium that shapes public opinion needs at least one refuge where it is not filtered through the distorted green eye shades of prissy corporate accountants for whom profit is the only priority; where self-censorship is the journalist's normal work environment and where all sins of omission are tacitly encouraged and forgiven with the wave of a balance sheet.

This is important.

We've got a lot of work to do.

Get ahead of corporate-influenced news—>Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential.

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)

Andrew Barbano is a 45-year Nevadan, chair of the Nevada César Chávez Committee, producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration, first vice-president and political action chair of the Reno-Sparks NAACP, labor/consumer/civil rights advocate, member of Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO and editor of NevadaLabor.com and JoeNeal.org and DoctorLawyerWatch.com/ As always, his opinions are strictly his own. Check local listings for other Nevada cable systems. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since 1988.

The Underbellyof the News—>Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential

Smoking Guns... Get ahead of corporate-influenced news—>Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential Taxpayers taken for Teslacide demo ride EXCLUSIVE! 1995 Washoe Med Grand Jury commentary The awful truth —> Evidence from the Barbwire archives Download the Grand Jury Report Labor Day 2014: Red, white and screwed Silver State Lining: Nevada union membership 10th-highest in the nation Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the Sparks Tribune / 8-28-2014 Union decline and rising inequality in two charts by Colin Gordon Economic Policy Institute / 6-5-2012 Labor Day: State of the Unions By Mark Robison / Reno Gazette-Journal / Sunday 9-1-2013 The above graph was used in journalist Mark Robison's extensive Hard Labor: Nevada unions tout role in helping workers, firms, economy (Sunday 2 Sept. 2012 Reno Gazette-Journal, page one, Reno Rebirth section of the print edition). Union men Jim Burrell, Paul McKenzie and Guy Louis Rocha did the movement proud. WOMEN AND UNIONS — ORPHAN MAJORITIES The Barbwire Labor Day column Reno Gazette-Journal / 9-3-2012 ...and more ammo... The hardest and fairest questions yet asked of proponents of the teachers gross profits tax initiative Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 7-10-2014 We Don't Need No Education The continuing Barbwire series Barbwire: Nevada not really a state No, we were not Battle Born in Kenya Top 10 reasons Nevada lives in the 19th Century Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 10-17-2013 Sparks Tribune Low-income penalty: Nevada socks it to the working poor BARBANO: Nevada is one big company town Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 10-10-2013 State of Health National health care comes up against a very sick state. WHAT'S IN IT FOR US? Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 10-10-2013 ...and more ammo yet IMF Head Says Inequality Threatens Democracy. Here Are 7 Charts Proving She’s Right. By Erika Eichelberger / Mother Jones/BillMoyers.com 5-30-2014 “The behavior of the financial sector has not changed fundamentally…since the crisis. The industry still prizes short-term profit.” The Post-Dated Recession: Pay me now or pay me later Barbwire by Barbano / Expanded from the 9-6-2012 Daily Sparks Tribune The Post-dated Recession By Joshua H. Silavent / Daily Sparks Tribune / 5-3-2011 Nevada Press Assn. Better Newspaper Contest HAT TRICK: Barbwire takes first place three years in a row. The winning entries Suing for Schools: The 20-year shuck Expanded from the 2-21-2010 Daily Sparks Tribune Click here to view the show on your desktop RED flags flying low over Sparks Expanded from the 1-10-2010 Daily Sparks Tribune The wrath of self-righteous racism Expanded from the 11-8-2009 Daily Sparks Tribune Government contacts Nev. congressional delegation Nevada Legislature State of Nevada Secretary of State Carson City Clark County City of Las Vegas Douglas County Reno City Council Sparks City Council Washoe County Commission Washoe Registrar of Voters The campaign against forcibly-paid newspaper obituaries And they wonder why the newspaper business is dying?   The Dean's List    The Dean of Reno Bloggers could very well be Andrew Barbano, self-described "fighter of public demons," who started putting his "Barbwire" columns online in 1996 and now runs 10 sites. RENO NEWS & REVIEW, 11-9-2006 The 2009 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners Tony the Tiger & the flaky NFL Barbwire / 11-30-2008 Deregulation is never having to say you're sorry Barbwire / 8-3-2008 Nevada: A good place to visit, but do you want to live here? Barbwire / 6-15-2008 The 2008 first-place Nevada Press Association award winners The price of a piece / 6-17-2007 Boxing Pandora /9-23-2007 The Lady in the Red Dress 10-28-2007 1997 Pulitzer Prize entries The life and times of Travus T. Hipp The best who ever was   Get ahead of corporate-influenced news—>Subscribe to Barbwire Confidential

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Copyright © 1982-2014 Andrew Barbano

Andrew Barbano is a 45-year Nevadan, editor of NevadaLabor.com and JoeNeal.org; and former chair of the City of Reno's Citizens Cable Compliance Committee, He is producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration and serves as first vice-president, political action chair and webmaster of the Reno-Sparks NAACP. As always, his opinions are strictly his own. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us.

Barbwire by Barbano moved to Nevada's Daily Sparks Tribune on Aug. 12, 1988, and has originated in them parts ever since.
Whom to blame: How a hall-of-famer's hunch birthed the Barbwire in August of 1987
Tempus fugit.

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