The Old Blog in the Desert

The Trials of Travelers in Silver Springs

Citizens of this grand and free republic, take heed!

The Nevada Department of Transportation, in its boundless wisdom and fatherly concern for your well-being, has decreed that the great thoroughfare known as U.S. 50 shall henceforth be a most deliberate and vexatious impediment. Beginning Wednesday, February 19, and extending through the merry days of March–or until the good Lord himself intervenes–all who dare traverse the stretch near the Lahontan River Campground shall find themselves at the mercy of a single-lane closure, a most industrious workforce, and a temporary signal of dubious reliability.

The bridge—now undergoing a reconstruction of such importance that even Julius Caesar would nod approvingly—shall be reduced to a solitary passage, with traffic alternating in a manner that will surely test the patience of even the most saintly among us. The stoppages shall persist through all hours of the day and night, a democratic inconvenience shared equally by all.

To further prolong the agony, a reduction in speed to a snail-like 25 miles per hour shall be imposed, lest some reckless soul attempt to escape too swiftly from this bureaucratic marvel. Thus, dear travelers, steel your nerves, pack provisions, and prepare for a journey of uncommon delay, all in the noble pursuit of progress.

A Comedy of Errors in Three Acts

Ah, my dear reader, let us wade through the murky waters of Nevada’s 2024 General Election lawsuit with a careful step, lest we slip upon the banana peels of bureaucratic folly and land squarely upon the hard pavement of misgovernance.

To commence, we gaze upon the grand spectacle of November 8, wherein Washoe and Clark Counties engaged in an arithmetic performance so bewildering that it would have made a Mississippi riverboat gambler blush. The tally of mailed ballots suffered a most curious evaporation—28,869 of them, to be precise—vanishing faster than a silver dollar in a con man’s hand.

With all the conviction of a schoolboy caught filching apples, the Secretary of State attributed this discrepancy to a “copy and paste” error by Clark County. Meanwhile, not to be outdone in the fine art of blame-shifting, Clark County declared the fault lay with the Secretary of State’s office. Thus, the affair was neatly settled, like a drunken brawl where both parties agreed it was the other fellow’s fault.

Then came November 11, a date destined to be remembered not for valor but for vexation, as the 41,489 counted mailed ballots, a most perplexing 39,935, had failed to mark a choice for President. Now, such restraint in voting would be commendable if we were discussing a church picnic’s potato sack race, but in a national election–it raises a question or two. Either the ballot scanning machines possessed the eyesight of a bat in daylight, or some unseen hand had meddled in the affairs of the Republic with the dexterity of a pickpocket at a county fair.

And then, as if to crown this majestic pyramid of confusion with a final absurdity, the Clark County Board of Commissioners, on November 15, declared all was well and certified the election results with the confidence of a man selling a wooden leg with a termite problem. But alas, the mirage did not last long, for by November 30, statistical analysis uncovered a curious symmetry betwixt votes for Trump and Harris, indicating that randomness—the very foundation of honest elections—had been cast aside like an old campaign poster. The ‘Cast Vote Record’ was molded into an unnatural shape, much like a fish tale that gets longer with each telling.

Now, the U.S. Constitution, in its wisdom, guarantees a Republican form of government, not a vaudeville act where votes appear and disappear with the caprice of a stage magician. The legitimacy of elections must rest upon a foundation as firm as the Rock of Gibraltar, not upon the shifting sands of bureaucratic incompetence and statistical curiosities. If the people of this Republic are to govern themselves, they must first trust that the vote they cast is the vote that counts, lest we find ourselves governed not by the will of the people but by the whims of those who count the ballots.

If you ever go to Virginia City’s Tahoe House and gander above the office door, you’ll see an antique shotgun. And if you asked who owned the piece, Shelly McGregor’s name would come up.

Should you ask, “Who is this McGregor woman?” a local might squint at you sideways and say, “Shelly? Oh, she’s the gal with the scattergun and the luck of a two-legged dog in a footrace.”

They’d mean it kindly, but facts are facts, and Shelly’s marksmanship—or lack thereof—is the stuff of legend.

Shelly didn’t own that scattergun for protection, per se. She owned it because it came down through her family like a stubborn curse, and it seemed a shame to waste a good heirloom—even if said heirloom had a habit of hitting everything except its intended target. “I don’t need to hit what I aim at,” Shelly declared. “I just need to scare it bad enough that it runs away!”

This philosophy worked wonders until the day she decided to hone her skills.

It was a warm spring afternoon when Shelly set her sights on improving herself—or, at the very least, improving her chances of survival if a bear ever wandered too close to town. She tacked a paper bullseye to a venerable oak tree that had stood unbothered for a century and stepped back thirty paces.

Squinting one eye and then, inexplicably, closing the other, she muttered, “Here goes nothin’!” and pulled the trigger.

The oak tree stood unscathed, its bullseye still flapping mockingly in the breeze. But thirty feet to the left, and considering every life choice that had brought him to the unfortunate moment, stood a mule named Percival.

Percival, a mule of solid constitution and questionable judgment, had been nibbling sage shoots in blissful ignorance when Shelly’s buckshot re-routed his day and lifespan. With a mournful bray, Percival staggered, tottered, and then collapsed with the theatrical flair of an overworked actor in a fourth-rate tragedy.

Word spread faster than wildfire on a windy day, and it wasn’t long before Elias Bramble came stomping onto the scene. Elias was a wiry man with the disposition of a cactus and a shotgun slung over his shoulder that was considerably friendlier than he was.

“Shelly!” he hollered, his face redder than a boiled beet. “What in tarnation have you done to my mule?”

Shelly, to her credit, attempted a diplomatic approach. “Now, Elias, let’s not jump to conclusions. I was aiming at the bullseye, and your mule—well, he just sort of… volunteered.”

Elias squinted at her like he was calculating the odds of getting away with murder. “You call this a volunteer program, Shelly? Looks more like mule assassination to me!”

A heated debate ensued, where Elias made a compelling argument: You killed my mule, so you owe me a new one. Finding herself outmaneuvered in logic and firepower, Shelly eventually handed over a fistful of dollars in exchange for the late Percival.

Shelly had the mule dragged home, her wallet lighter, and her pride considerably bruised. She tried to make the best of it, telling a neighbor, “Well, it just goes to show—if you can’t hit what you aim at, you might as well hit somethin’ worth talkin’ about.”

What Could This Mean for Nevada?

Ain’t it a sight to behold? In the grand spectacle of the 2020 General Election in Arapahoe County, Colorado, where 354,267 ballots got cast, a peculiar thing happened—something so improbable, it might make even the most seasoned gambler pause his hand. A solid three percent of those votes, tallying up to 10,628 ballots, showed a voting pattern so synchronized between Republicans and Democrats that it would make you wonder if they were all reading from the same hymn book.

Now, it wasn’t just the usual partisan squabble on the ballot. No, sir. It was stranger as these two sworn enemies of the political landscape—those red and blue comrades—voted in perfect lockstep on Proposition B, a measure looking to do away with the Gallagher Amendment in Colorado’s state constitution. It’s curious, considering that these folks typically can’t agree on the color of the sky, let alone taxes.

And here’s where it gets downright uncanny. The correlation between the votes was a staggering 0.99—a statistical number so high, you’d think someone had been cooking the books. For you and me–it means they were just about as in sync as two folks singing a duet in perfect harmony, with barely a whisker’s difference in how they felt about the proposition.

It wasn’t a mere fluke of nature; it was more than 20 standard deviations from the norm. If it had been a poker hand, the odds of such a thing happening would’ve made a straight flush look like child’s play.

Now, despite the strange spectacle, Proposition B passed with a convincing 57 percent of the vote, and Arapahoe County played a mighty hand in securing that win. But hold on, this wasn’t just any old election.

Oh no, a whopping 46,062 votes seemed to have been moved around, shuffled in a way that would make a seasoned dealer proud, all to give the measure that final push. You won’t find this kind of thing happening in most places as Republicans and Democrats typically line up in opposing columns but voted together at 43 percent each in opposition to the measure, creating a voting pattern about as unusual as a hen laying a square egg.

Now, it ain’t just Arapahoe County that’s raising an eyebrow. This peculiar harmony in voting was spotted in other parts of the nation, too. In Nevada’s Washoe and Clark Counties during the 2024 General Election, synchronized voting was seen too. The ballot measures addressing things like ranked-choice voting and abortion access saw the same unusual pattern of Republicans and Democrats singing from the same sheet of music.

It’s enough to make a fella wonder if there’s an algorithm behind all this, pulling the strings in ways that might fly under the radar of your average election auditor. Some are even talking about the possibility of widespread algorithmic election fraud—a notion so outlandish, you might think it belongs in the pages of a dime novel. But if these voting patterns are any indication, it’s a question worth asking.

As the good people look toward coming elections, you can bet the issue of election integrity and the role of programmable electronic systems will be at the forefront of many heated discussions. With all this new evidence, folks are starting to believe we don’t have a fair and transparent education system.

It’s well-established that some folks work themselves into an early grave to earn an honest living, while others—blessed with a more creative disposition—prefer to let Uncle Sam do the heavy lifting. Such was the case with one Candies Goode-McCoy of Las Vegas, whose knack for arithmetic, while impressive, appears to have been applied to the wrong ledger.

The Department of Justice reports that Ms. Goode-McCoy, in a display of boundless entrepreneurial spirit, conspired with like-minded individuals to defraud the government of nearly $100 million in COVID-19 tax credits. Between June 2022 and September 2023, she busied herself filing 1,200 fraudulent tax returns that even the most hardened scoundrels must have tipped their hats in admiration.

The IRS, ever a generous and trusting institution, unwittingly handed over $33 million before realizing that the arithmetic had taken on a fictitious quality.

For her trouble, Ms. Goode-McCoy stands accused of pocketing $1.3 million in fraudulent refunds, with an additional $800,000 for her expert services in creative bookkeeping. Unlike the common crook, who contents himself with a quick getaway, Ms. Goode-McCoy saw fit to reinvest her ill-gotten gains into the vital sectors of luxury automobiles, gambling, and vacations—thus ensuring the money continued to circulate, if only among the more disreputable elements of society.

Alas, her enterprise met an untimely end, and she now faces the unenviable prospect of explaining her financial strategies to a federal judge. At sentencing, she may expect to spend up to 10 years in government housing, where luxury accommodations are somewhat lacking. Fines will be imposed, though one suspects her ability to pay them will be hampered by her newfound career in license plate manufacturing.

It seems the Washoe County School District has found itself entangled in a peculiar scientific discovery—namely, that vibrations in the air arranged into words by the voice of one Vanessa Bowie-Middleton were of such an unsettling nature that they rendered some fine folks wholly unable to endure their workday in peace.

Ms. Bowie-Middleton, a kitchen worker of respectable standing, was informed in 2022 that her voice, being unmistakably her own, had the unfortunate effect of disturbing the delicate constitutions of educators at Bohach Elementary School. To rectify this shocking phenomenon, she was prohibited from using the cafeteria’s public address system or even verbally correcting wayward children, lest the fabric of pedagogical tranquility get torn asunder.

The restriction, curiously, applied only to her and not to any other cafeteria worker—an oversight one might have expected the district’s “investigators” to notice before they confidently declared there was “no evidence” of wrongdoing. After a generous seven-month interval—perhaps the precise length required to forget common sense—the district magnanimously allowed Ms. Bowie-Middleton to resume speaking as freely as any other lunchroom worker.

Faced with this absurdity, Ms. Bowie-Middleton pursued a federal discrimination lawsuit, which was resolved with a $60,000 settlement. Her attorney, Terri Keyser-Cooper, expressed astonishment that such an indignity was even possible in the year 2022, likening it to the sort of segregationist nonsense one might have assumed had been discarded alongside other relics of institutionalized lunacy.

For her part, Ms. Bowie-Middleton has taken her talents to Mendive Middle School, where one hopes her voice is received with no more astonishment than is ordinarily afforded to a person. Whether the afflicted ears of Bohach Elementary recovered from their ordeal remains unknown.

Well, folks, it seems the good citizens of Reno have once again found themselves in the dubious company of open murder, a crime which—despite its obvious unpleasantness—remains a reliable fixture in the annals of human folly.

At just about the time decent people were settling into their Sunday repose, Reno’s finest received summons to Harvard Way, near Vassar Avenue, on account of what was politely termed a “suspicious circumstance.” Now, “suspicious” is one of those words that can mean anything from a misplaced lawn ornament to something that sends a chill straight through the boots, and in this case, it was decidedly the latter.

Upon arrival, officers made the acquaintance of one Filipe Montoya, aged thirty, who, by all appearances, had business most serious on his mind. As it turns out, their conversation was rudely interrupted by the discovery of a woman, aged thirty-eight, who was in no condition to hold any conversation at all, being dead as a doornail within the premises.

With appreciation for the gravity of the matter, the Robbery/Homicide unit took the reins, deciding that no other villains were at large and that the general public could go about their business without fear of further interruption—at least for the time being. The departed’s identity remains under wraps, pending the usual courtesies of notification.

Meanwhile, those with any illuminating details about this lamentable episode are encouraged to relay their knowledge to the Reno Police Department at (775) 334-2677 or, for those who prefer to whisper such things, to Secret Witness at (775) 322-4900.

Behold the curious case of Nevada’s Senator Jacky Rosen, who, in her boundless wisdom and indefatigable compassion, has decided that schools, churches, and hospitals should be as sacred and untouchable as a Sunday preacher’s collection plate. In the spirit of grand legislative endeavors, she has joined forces with fellow lawmakers to introduce the Protecting Sensitive Locations Act, a bill designed to keep the long arm of immigration enforcement at bay in places where one might expect to find textbooks, pews, or stethoscopes rather than handcuffs.

“Why,” asks the good Senator, “should a respectable citizen be forced to contemplate the specter of deportation whilst reciting the Lord’s Prayer, bandaging a scraped knee, or attempting to decipher their child’s algebra homework?”

Respectable citizens don’t come to a country illegally or let their children worry about the long arm of the law.

She deems it “outrageous” that President Trump would dare disrupt the tranquil scenes of school drop-offs and Sunday sermons with the unpleasant business of enforcing immigration laws. Thus, with the noble stroke of a pen, she seeks to return when an individual could sit through a hospital waiting room’s ten-hour delay without the added inconvenience of federal agents in pursuit.

But let us not forget Nevada’s legislative minds, ever eager to take the cause of shielding illegal aliens from the terrifying prospect of border enforcement. Assemblywoman Cecelia González, perhaps inspired by the unshakable logic that laws shouldn’t get enforced whenever they cause discomfort, has put forth AB217, a bill so thoroughly padded with legal barricades that one wonders if Nevada schools will soon require a judge’s blessing for a janitor to change a lightbulb. This particular measure seeks to not only keep ICE from entering school grounds without a warrant but also makes it a crime for any school employee to so much as whisper a word of a student’s whereabouts to the authorities.

If there are worries that police might still have power in schools, the new bill makes it clear that students cannot get pepper sprayed or stunned. It seems that a troublemaker will get only stern looks and firm letters.

Meanwhile, the school districts, unions, and assorted guardians of education have taken it upon themselves to assure families that their private information shall remain as secure as the gambler’s last dollar in a casino. Letters of reassurance are issued, meetings convened, and declarations made that under no circumstances shall a school police officer, teacher, or administrator engage in the heinous act of acknowledging an immigration officer’s existence.

As Nevada’s lawmakers lay down the gauntlet against federal enforcement, will these measures provide the peace of mind they so earnestly promise, or will they merely serve as a temporary barricade against the realities of law and order?

Either way, one must admire the grand performance. If nothing else, it provides ample entertainment for those of us watching from the gallery.

How Not to Vacation

It is a well-known fact among seasoned explorers and armchair adventurers alike that when setting forth into the wild, one should carry a stout heart, a keen eye, and, if they possess a lick of sense, an understanding of the general principles of gravity. Alas, the hiker recently plucked from the rocky heights of Gateway Canyon seems to have lacked that last bit of wisdom and, as a result, found themselves perched upon a ledge, hollering their predicament to the heavens like a lonesome coyote with a sore throat.

Now, in the great outdoors, there are many ways to attract attention—some more dignified than others. A man might light a signal fire, wave a bright cloth, or, in particularly dire circumstances, compose a note of distress and entrust it to a passing eagle. But our intrepid vacationer took the more direct approach of bellowing at the top of their lungs until a kind passerby took notice and gave the matter to the ever-obliging authorities of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Search and Rescue.

Upon arrival, these rescuers quickly determined that climbing up to retrieve the hiker would be about as practical as convincing a cat to take a bath. The unfortunate soul was some 400 feet above the trail, clinging to his perch like a barnacle on a ship’s hull, and required a helicopter. Two officers, who undoubtedly spent their formative years ignoring their mothers’ warnings about playing on rooftops, were lowered into the precarious scene.

By the grace of modern engineering and no small amount of patience, the rescuers employed a device known as a “lezard”—which, contrary to what the name suggests, is not a reptilian creature with an unusual work ethic, but rather a technical rescue lanyard designed for precisely these sorts of misadventures. With this contraption, they managed to hoist the hiker up and away from his predicament, depositing him safely at a nearby fire station, where he was greeted with expressions ranging from sympathy to quiet exasperation.

Gateway Canyon, for those unfamiliar, lies a mere twenty miles west of Las Vegas, proving that while Lady Luck may be generous at the gaming tables, she has no patience for those who gamble against common sense in the great outdoors. One can only hope that our daring wanderer has learned a valuable lesson—that when venturing into the wild, it is wise to respect both the land and one’s limitations, lest one’s vacation become a spectacle requiring helicopters and highly trained professionals to correct.

Or at Least Until Supper

The good people of Nevada have seen many strange sights at the State Capitol, but yesterday’s gathering was one for the books. A motley collection of the disgruntled and the overenthusiastic converged upon Carson Street, waving signs, shouting slogans, and generally conducting themselves in a manner best described as a cross between a political uprising and a particularly unruly family reunion.

The occasion? A “National Day of Protest,” which, if we are to believe its architects, was meant to “reject fascism,” “defend equality,” and “resist executive overreach.” It remains unclear how these noble goals translated into midday loitering and minor traffic disruptions, but that is the beauty of democracy: one need not be effective so long as one is loud.

It was not their first attempt at such an endeavor. A previous installment occurred on February 5, when crowds gathered nationwide to express their discontent with various executive orders. That protest, while spirited, was modest compared to yesterday’s gathering, which stretched from Musser Street to the edge of the Capitol complex, proving that, at the very least, a grievance has a remarkable power of multiplication.

The “50501 Movement,” as it calls itself (for reasons best known to its founders), boasts of being a decentralized grassroots effort born on the internet—Reddit, to be precise, which explains much. According to its website, the movement is a response to the “plutocratic allies” of the Trump administration. This writer is uncertain how many of these protesters could define “plutocratic,” but their commitment to the cause was evident, if not always coherent.

Law enforcement, perhaps recalling the previous protest’s excitement—where one motorist allegedly solved his political disagreements with the business end of a firearm—maintained a hearty presence. Officers on foot, in cars, motorcycles, and even dirt bikes roamed the perimeter, prepared for any escalation beyond the usual grumbling and sign-waving. Fortunately, no incidents aside from a semi-truck forced to a screeching halt—an unfortunate byproduct of enthusiastic civic engagement mixing with inattentive traffic management, were reported.

Curiously absent from the affair were counter-protesters on foot, though several motorists made their opinions known with flags and impromptu window signage. Pro-Trump banners and Confederate flags made their rounds, drawing the obligatory chorus of boos from the assembled activists.

But here is the rub–while these fervent agitators stood shoulder to shoulder decrying various injustices, there was not a word—nay, not even a whisper—about the nine million dollars that vanished under Nevada’s Attorney General’s nose, nor the hundreds of millions that mysteriously evaporated during the COVID-era spending spree. Nobody mentioned the teachers’ unions, which have created a troubling mix of inefficiency and despair in Nevada’s education system. No, dear reader, the righteous indignation of the day was reserved for D.O.G.E., which is drawing reparations from an ill-willed bureaucracy.

It is known as a “useful idiot”—a term not coined by me but rather by those who have studied the curious phenomenon of people passionately demanding solutions to problems they barely understand. And so, with grand pronouncements and self-satisfied rhetoric, they marched, wholly convinced of their virtue, blissfully unaware of the richer pickings for outrage that lay just beyond their protest signs.

The next event in the 50501 playbook is February 28, where participants are encouraged to refrain from spending money—a noble sacrifice, provided it does not interfere with their morning lattes. It will be followed by an Amazon boycott and, in March, a call for a nationwide workforce strike. One can only hope these revolutionaries have informed their employers, lest they discover too late that striking is most effective when one has a job to return to.

By 4 p.m., the crowds had mostly dispersed, leaving only a handful of stalwarts clinging to their signs and convictions. And so ended another chapter in the ongoing saga of American political theater—equal parts earnestness and absurdity, with a healthy dose of irony for those wise enough to recognize it.