Las Vegas Weekly

Arizona, mon amour

Illustration: Ryan Olbrysh

For years, Nevada conservatives have crabbed about our neighbor to the west, California, for its political and cultural seepage—a supposed love of taxes, regulation and nonconflict granola that’s ruining our state, too. Now, local righties can look east for a development that might help mitigate the Californication: possibly constitutional immigration reform! Now that’s something they can get behind! And—except for an oddly ambivalent Gov. Gibbons—behind it they are. Senate candidate Chad Christensen, seeing a chance to address a question of vital public interest—Chad who?—quickly went over the top, calling for a special legislative session to create a Nevada law just like it. Sue Lowden isn’t sure it’s constitutional, but she’s down with it anyway. And with the primary a month away and Lowden ahead in the polls, Danny Tarkanian has glommed onto this thing with super-glom. Sure, they may have to bend a little logic to get around the law’s thornier aspects (the law “will actually reduce the likelihood of racial profiling,” says Senate candidate Sharron Angle), and risk the possibility that some outraged Hispanic voters will surge into the waiting arms of Harry Reid. The important thing is that hailing the law scores points with the GOP fringe, which is becoming the GOP center, and which will apparently suspend its distrust of expanded Big Brotherly powers just this once.