MUTH'S TRUTHS 03/31/2016

Roberson, Nelson and Other Deceptive Politicians Deserve Tomato Showers

Chuck Muth

March 31, 2016

American truth-in-labeling laws are designed to protect consumers from deceptive advertising, scams and rip-offs.  Too bad we don’t have similar laws for political candidates.  Case in point…

Nevada State Sen. Michael “Tax Hike Mike” Roberson has been distributing a campaign flyer claiming he “permanently cut taxes for over 95 percent of Nevada’s businesses.”  But Riley Snyder of PolitiFact Nevada recently investigated the claim and concluded that Roberson – and others such as Assemblyman Erv Nelson who are making the same claim – is telling a whopper.

Riley noted that “No businesses saw their net tax bill decrease” and that “narrowly focusing on one tax change ignores many other tax increases passed by lawmakers.”  Riley’s conclusion:  “We rate this claim as False.”

Alas, that won’t stop Roberson, Nelson and others from making it.  Indeed, these people have proved, beyond doubt, that they will say anything to get elected and then do whatever they please once in office.

Roberson himself signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge promising his constituents that he “would oppose and vote against any and all efforts to increase taxes.”  He then went on to not only vote for the largest tax hike in Nevada history last session, but led the charge to do so!

For his part, Nelson told the Las Vegas Review-Journal in a pre-election interview in 2014 that he opposed the proposed margins tax because it “would cause economic havoc” and that he was against “renewing taxes which have sunsetted.” 

“Government should operate within its proper, limited scope and live within its current budgetary and tax scheme,” Nelson declared.

But once in office Nelson stuck a shiv in his constituents’ backs by voting for Gov. Brian Sandoval’s $1.4 billion tax hike which included – yep, a mutated version of the margins tax and over $600 million worth of tax hikes that were supposed to sunset.

How do these people sleep at night?

Columnist Steve Sebelius recently wrote that fibbing politicians such as Roberson and Nelson “should try something radical: tell voters the truth.”  Yeah, that would be radical!

Sebelius, though, supports the tax hike and thinks Roberson and Nelson should wear their broken promises like a badge of honor and tell folks that “you also voted for me because I said I would apply myself to fixing the problems that have plagued this state for decades.”

But here’s the problem with that: They didn’t.  They ran on an anti-tax platform. They said government needed to live within its means.  So they broke their word.  They lied.  It was deceptive advertising.  A scam.  A rip-off. 

These people shouldn’t be elected to higher office.  They should be locked in a stock on the public square where taxpayers can pelt them with tomatoes.  So let it be written; so let it be done.

(Mr. Muth is president of Citizen Outreach and publisher of NevadaNewsandViews.com.  You can reach him at ChuckMuth.com.)