Will Nevada Gamblers Colleges Be Next for a Bailout?

Nick Gillespie | November 18, 2008

From the indispensable Inside Higher Ed, a strong indication of where bailout-mania is heading (which is everywhere):

Which may be why [Jim] Rogers [chancellor of Nevada higher ed], in a speech at a news conference Monday, turned his attention to another potential source of funds: the U.S. treasury.

His message is simple: Nevadans pay $4 billion a year more in taxes than the state receives in federal payments of various sorts (it ranks 47th among the states in the latter, according to Rogers). At a time when the government is pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into efforts to help troubled institutions, notably Wall Street financial institutions and other banks, "It seems to me that the survival of Nevada's citizens' fundamental way of life is just as essential as the survival of big business pocketbooks."

More here.

In 2005, according to the Tax Foundation, Nevadans received 65 cents for every dollar they paid to the feds. That's no justification for a bailout, but it is nice to see educators in the ballpark when using any sort of figure.

Comments

Mark|11.18.08 @ 8:07AM|#

Where's my bailout? Sure, I won money investing in Obama and Democrat options on inTrade, but I lost $3.73 on an option where Bob Barr won 1% of the vote.

|11.18.08 @ 8:39AM|#

Seems more like an argument for secession than a bailout.

|11.18.08 @ 8:53AM|#

Let's just stop pussyfooting around and directly receive all our money from the feds. This "economy" and "free market" bullshit is all just smoke and mirrors anyway.

Abdul|11.18.08 @ 8:53AM|#

Nevada can get the money, and they get a chance to double it by putting it on "red" in one spin of the roulette wheel.

|11.18.08 @ 9:05AM|#

As somebody taking out college loans for grad school, I think the distinction between gamblers and college is even more blurred than even the article title would suggest :)

|11.18.08 @ 9:08AM|#

"It seems to me that the survival of Nevada's citizens' fundamental way of life is just as essential as the survival of big business pocketbooks."

WTF?

Kyle Jordan|11.18.08 @ 9:14AM|#

"Let's just stop pussyfooting around and directly receive all our money from the feds. This "economy" and "free market" bullshit is all just smoke and mirrors anyway."

Yeah really. Then I can use all the money they give me on guitars, comics, and porn because The One and his ilk will have also provided me with a place to live, health insurance, a green mass transit system fueled by the tears of hippies and emo kids who weep for our Mother Earth, the burden of having to work for what I want, and that pesky independent thought thing.

Fuck! There's times when reading Reason gives me hope and then there's times when reading Reason makes me want to punt toddlers.

BTW Epi, this post is sarcastic along side you. Not towards you.

|11.18.08 @ 9:21AM|#

"Let's just stop pussyfooting around and directly receive all our money from the feds. This "economy" and "free market" bullshit is all just smoke and mirrors anyway."

Now you're talking. When will we stop pussyfooting around? All they have to do is write everyone a check for $1,000,000.00 Then we'll all be rich! No more financial crisis!

|11.18.08 @ 9:24AM|#

BTW Epi, this post is sarcastic along side you. Not towards you.

Totally understood, dude.

a green mass transit system fueled by the tears of hippies and emo kids who weep for our Mother Earth

Emo kids only weep for themselves and the inner pain that causes them to cut themselves and wear mascara. Words hurt, Kyle. Worse than a blade.

The Democratic Republican|11.18.08 @ 9:26AM|#

I actually like this development. The more that the losers in the federal lottery start to complain, the more we will have to revisit and revise the whole shell game.

Kyle Jordan|11.18.08 @ 9:29AM|#

I really wish my hair and lawn were Emo. That way, they'd cut themselves...

|11.18.08 @ 9:42AM|#

Don't make fun of emo kids, they will totally pout all over you.

|11.18.08 @ 9:50AM|#

When did I (and so many others here) first predict that ther little piggies would all be fighting for a place at the public bailout teat?

Oh yeh, right after that incompetent boob Paulson proposed the MBS bailout.* Not the NYT, not the WaPo, just a bunch of irrelevant libertarians who somehow managed to cause this, the first recession in United States history.

* Remember when that was all that it was?

|11.18.08 @ 9:53AM|#

Emo kids only weep for themselves and the inner pain that causes them to cut themselves and wear mascara. Words hurt, Kyle. Worse than a blade.

Was the kid Lori Drew tormented an emo? Enquiring minds want to know.

|11.18.08 @ 10:04AM|#

Was the kid Lori Drew tormented an emo?

Never mind her, what about Barney Frank the Red Queen?

|11.18.08 @ 10:07AM|#

J sub D,

Wikipedia:

"Meier participated in a number of activities, including swimming, boating, fishing, and volleyball. She had been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and depression, and considered herself overweight."

Not emo: swimming, boating, fishing, and volleyball

Emo: attention deficit disorder, depression, overweight, imaginary internet boyfriend

Kind of a toss-up.

|11.18.08 @ 10:09AM|#

You forgot the most emo thing of all, NutraSweet: being so affected by words that you harm yourself.

|11.18.08 @ 10:09AM|#

Barney Frank lives as an openly gay man; a necessary condition of emo guys is that they must remain in the closet to fuel their torment and yet still "date" emo girls in order to fuel their torment.

Barney Frank =|= emo

Kyle Jordan|11.18.08 @ 10:12AM|#

"Not emo: swimming, boating, fishing, and volleyball

Emo: attention deficit disorder, depression, overweight, imaginary internet boyfriend

Kind of a toss-up."

InbetwEmo?

BDB|11.18.08 @ 10:13AM|#

I thought for a minute there was going to be a student loan bail out. I would have broken my monitor screen at that news.

|11.18.08 @ 10:17AM|#

being so affected by words that you harm yourself

Yes. That might tip the scales.

One of my students had a pale little emo kid stalker who would leave her terribly syntaxed poetry and long, rambling, tightly-paginated letters written on the back of wrapping paper. He even tried to get a job in the archives to be closer to her. When I finally got a look at him, he had long hair that he compulsively tucked behind his ear and couldn't look me in the eye for more than a second. We had a standing bet in the office that I could make him cry within 60 seconds. When he escalated (she found him sleeping outside her front door), I offer to talk him into committing suicide. She just called the campus cops instead. Too bad.

|11.18.08 @ 10:21AM|#

Your impulse for cruelty amuses me, NutraSweet. It reminds me of myself.

Making an emo cry is too easy. The challenge is to make them angry.

|11.18.08 @ 10:24AM|#

All you have to do is treat them like completely normal people. They are so desperate to be different, if they can't freak you out they get angry easy.

Their depressive flat effect always floats on an bloated, oily mix of hormones and wounded pride.

|11.18.08 @ 10:36AM|#

See, NutraSweet, now you've got me wanting to mess with an emo, yet there are none around. If I can find a mod that will have to do.

|11.18.08 @ 10:39AM|#

If I can find a mod that will have to do.

At least their women are better looking. And who doesn't love a mini-dress?

|11.18.08 @ 10:41AM|#

I thought for a minute there was going to be a student loan bail out. I would have broken my monitor screen at that news.

Likewise... after I set off some fireworks in the street like the Obama supports here did two weeks ago :)

|11.18.08 @ 10:44AM|#

It's Nevada; why don't they just cut cards, double-or-nothing, for the tuition check?

|11.18.08 @ 10:47AM|#

At least their women are better looking. And who doesn't love a mini-dress?

Rectangular glasses are the worst, dude. The worst.

|11.18.08 @ 10:55AM|#

Rectangular glasses are the worst, dude. The worst.

Way to make Sarah Palin cry. She's going to go bury herself in a bucket of moose blood and the read the hundreds of papers she reads daily.

Digital Cabinet|11.18.08 @ 11:26AM|#

What's the deal with New Mexico? It has been numero uno since 1981. And we keep hearing about Stevens and Young. What about Bingaman, Domenici, Wilson, Udall and Pearce?

Nigel Watt|11.18.08 @ 11:35AM|#

I receive zero cents on every dollar I send to the Feds. How 'bout that.

|11.18.08 @ 6:26PM|#

Nevadans pay $4 billion a year more in taxes than the state receives in federal payments of various sorts

Then Nevada's Congressional delegation should fight like starving pit bulls for tax cuts and against increased spending, no?