Traversing through Red Rock Canyon from Pahrump to Las Vegas helps shorten the miles into the city. It is also picturesque and one of the more beautiful segments of the drive.

ProgressNow Nevada reports:

This week your Clark County Commissioners will be meeting to decide whether or not to allow a developer to come into Red Rock Canyon and build a housing development.

The plan calls for homes and retail outlets to be placed on the east side of Red Rock in the Blue Diamond area.

There are plenty of places left for new development in the valley. Red Rock is not one of them. Don’t let greedy developers destroy one of the great natural spaces in Nevada in the name of another housing development.

Take Action! Use the tool above to contact your county commissioner and tell them to reject this development deal!

On the ProgressNow site you will see a green button in the upper right corner of the page. It will permit you send a message to each of Clark County Commissioners that they should reject development plans for Red Rock.

Do it.

FactCheck.org writes:

We’ve seldom seen a piece of legislation so widely misrepresented, and misunderstood, as the new health care law. We stopped counting the number of articles and items we turned out on the subject after the total reached 100.

Some of that is understandable. The debate went on for more than a year, while the different House and Senate bills changed their shape constantly.  The final law was the product of an awkward two-step legislative dance that first enacted the Senate’s version, then quickly amended it with a reconciliation “fix.” No wonder people are confused.

And even now the misrepresentations continue. The new law is no longer a moving target, but some opponents persist in making false or exaggerated claims about it. Our inboxes are filled with messages asking about assertions that the new law:

• Requires patients to be implanted with microchips. (No, it doesn’t.)
• Cuts benefits for military families and retirees. (No. The TRICARE program isn’t affected.)
• Exempts Muslims from the requirement to obtain coverage. (Not specifically. It does have a religious exemption, but that is intended for Old Order Amish.)
• Allows insurance companies to continue denying coverage to children with preexisting conditions. (Insurance companies have agreed not to exploit a loophole that might have allowed this.)
• Will require 16,500 armed IRS agents to enforce. (No. Criminal penalties are waived.)
• Gives President Obama a Nazi-like “private army.” (No. It provides a reserve corps of doctors and other health workers for emergencies.)
• “Exempts” House and Senate members. (No. Their coverage may not be as good as before, in fact.)
• Covers erectile-dysfunction drugs for sex offenders. (Just as it was before the new law, those no longer in jail can buy any insurance plan they choose.)
• Provides federal funding for abortions. (Not directly. But neither side in the abortion debate is happy with the law.)

You can go to the FactCheck site and read their analysis of the points given above.

On Friday, April 16, 2010 I received the following email with the subject being “urgent please!” ostensibly from Don Rust:

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Hope you are doing well? I am writing to ask you to please loan me some money.I’m in UK right now for a program.Unfortunately someone made away  with my luggage at the hotel I checked in. I need you to assist me with $2,550 to settle my bills. Please kindly send it through Western Union with the details below. Receiver: Donald Rust Address: 46 Kempshott Road, London, SW16 5LQ Please remember to send me MTCN for easy pick-up. I will check my e-mail much later. Respectfully, Don

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I was puzzled and perplexed when I read it. I looked at the sending email address which was Don’s correct email address. I attempted to phone Don at home to inquire about him, but the line was busy. I doubted it was authentic, besides I didn’t have $2,550 to send anyway. Further, I don’t know what MTCN means.

So I ignored it.

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Then, today, April 18, 2010 I received the following email from Don:

On Friday afternoon our computer was hacked and our entire email contact list was exported and emails, which I’m sure you received, were sent to people  on the list as far away as Russia. I’m trying to work around this problem with AT&T plus Facebook.  My Facebook account is now blocked because of the email “money scam” problem and I’m waiting for Monday to attempt resolution of that issue.

Would you be kind enough to put information on your blog telling anyone who may have received these money scam emails the information I’ve provided regarding the email theft.

Your help will be greatly appreciated.

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A few weeks ago I had received another fake email presumably from Oscar Reconco. That email stated Oscar was in Africa and needed money urgently. I doubted its authenticity and ignored it.

I have no idea as to who or how their email address lists were hacked. It is somewhat curious that both Oscar and Don reside here in Pahrump.

Be that as it may this blog post is in response to Don’s request. Sorry he is having to deal with such a problem and I hope he gets it ironed out.

Is paying unemployment benefits a crime?

Senator Tom Coburn, Republican Senator of my native state of Oklahoma thinks that extending payment of unemployment benefits to the jobless amounts to a crime, unless money is found to pay for it.

He says, “It is theft,” because it is essentially stealing from future generations.

On the other hand, Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, thinks the real injustice is holding up badly needed help to the jobless. He says, “It is as if a tornado hit their home or a flood wiped out their community. It is an emergency, and we respond to emergencies with emergency spending.”

It is a classic display of a difference between the Libertarian, Republican and Democrat’s thinking.

Coburn, a fiscal conservative, is against spending money the federal government doesn’t have. Few of us would disagree with that. If you don’t have it, don’t spend it.

Yet, what do you do if you are faced with an emergency? Borrow the money or not?

Look at New Orleans following hurricane Katrina. That was an emergency of major proportions. Thousands were homeless. Scores of people were drowning. Relief had to be provided. What could the Louisiana state and federal government do? Decline assistance on the ground they didn’t have nor could find the money to come to the aid of the citizens of Louisiana? New Orleans has a heavy population of the poor. Why spend money you have to borrow helping them? Are they worth helping?

Wouldn’t that be just another display of some kind of wealth redistribution from the wealthy to the poor by the government? Is that the Libertarian way? The Republican way? The Democratic way? The Tea Party way?

Now put yourself in the place of one of those unfortunate souls in New Orleans? Odds are you’d do whatever you had to do to escape the agony of your predicament.

So, would Senator Coburn maintain his position of refusing financial aid to Louisiana and the gulf coast if the money had to be borrowed? I don’t know.

Is governmental response coming to the aid of people caught in such turmoil a socialist act? Is it defensible in a capitalistic economic system? Certainly there is no profit to be gained. Who is to make the decision?

If you are jobless, through no fault of your own, your kids sitting at the bare dinner table, the electric bill is overdue—VEA is threatening to cut off your power, the mortgage payment or rent is due and the mortgagor is on the verge of foreclosing on your home, the landlord on eviction. You can only find five dollars in your pocket and no income. What do you do?

Do you head to the unemployment office to pick up your unemployment check—to be told your benefit had expired? Then go off to the welfare department, hat in hand, seeking welfare assistance?

Would it concern you that you might be taking money from the wealthy by doing so, or increasing a debt your descendants may wind up paying for? Or that you were taking assistance from a government being criticized as being socialist?

Is that what a self-professed Christian nation would do?

What if you knew that Business Insider, a financial management resource center, found that in 2007 the top 1 percent owned over a third of the nation’s wealth while the bottom 50 percent had a measly 2.5 percent and that you are taking some of the wealth of that top 1 percent?

Would you take that unemployment and welfare help if you were a Libertarian, Republican, Democrat, or member of the Tea Party? Of course you would.

The upcoming 2010 election in Nye County and particularly in Pahrump is getting well underway.

Candidates have been kicking off their campaigns—with their new websites:

Laurayne Murray, pictured left, is running for Nye County Commissioner for District 5.

She has gone online with her campaign website you can find by clicking  here. She maintains a Facebook page here.

Carolene Endersby, right, running for Pahrump Town Board has  also initiated her campaign website which you can see here. She also has a presence on Facebook here.

Tom Waters, left, also running for Pahrump Town Board, has his campaign website here and is on Facebook here.

I am fortunate to know all three of these candidates. They are friendly, personable, well educated, experienced in diverse ways, level headed, and outstandingly well qualified to fill the offices for which they seek election. I intend to vote for each of them.

I am confident that once you visit their websites you will concur in my judgment. So go to their sites and read all about them. See if you don’t agree with me.

Like anyone running for election the three of them need your help and support to get elected. So when you get to their sites drop them an e-mail and offer to assist them in getting elected. Also, when they are appearing at the various meet and greets, candidate’s forums, or other such events, go see them in person and talk with them. None of three bite. You’ll wind up being their admiring friend.

Then drop me a comment and tell me what you think of them.

Mark your calendars!

Laurayne Murray, candidate for Nye County Commissioner – District V; and Carolene Endersby, and Dr. Tom Waters, candidates for Pahrump Town Board are kicking off their campaigns next week.

A good chance for you voters to get to personally meet all three all at once and get some personal one on one time with each of them.

Citizens of Pahrump will be treated to a free showing of Michael Moore’s new documentary Capitalism: A Love Story.

Capitalism: A Love Story is a 2009 American documentary film directed, written by and starring Michael Moore. The film centers on the financial crisis of 2007–2010 and the recovery stimulus, while putting forward an indictment of the current economic order in the United States and capitalism in general.

Topics covered include Wall Street‘s “casino mentality”, for-profit prisons, Goldman Sachs‘ influence in Washington, DC, the poverty-level wages of many airline pilots, the large wave of home foreclosures, and the consequences of “runaway greed.”

The film also features a religious component where Moore examines whether or not capitalism is a sin and if Jesus would be a capitalist.

When and where is it showing for free in Pahrump?

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When: Sunday, March 28, 2010
Time: 2:00 p.m.
Where: Salvation Army, 721 S. Buol Road, Pahrump, NV
Admission: Free
RSVP: Val Von Holt at (775) 751-1776

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The Moore film has won awards at the Venice Film Festival,  the “Leoncino d’Oro” (“Little Golden Lion”) award for his documentary, and he also received the festival’s Open Prize. The documentary was also nominated for the festival’s Golden Lion award.

The film runs for 127 minutes. I’ve seen it twice. I can tell you that if you are into politics at all you will find the film enlightening and it will hold your undivided attention. Be sure to go to the bathroom before the film starts.

A tip of my hat to Val Von Holt and Margery Kay Hanson for putting all this together.