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Constitutional provisions prohibit the Nevada Legislature from dictating how money in the Public Employees' Retirement System is invested. However, in the final days of the recent legislative session, state lawmakers passed a law attempting to do exactly that.

Last week the U.S. House of Representatives passed the 1,200-page Waxman-Markey "American Clean Energy and Security Act" to impose new taxes on energy use. The bill is a cap-and-trade scheme that would artificially limit the amount of carbon dioxide that can be emitted by energy users from the combustion of fossil fuels. The bill would essentially create an energy rationing scheme that would require energy producers to acquire costly ration coupons for each ton of carbon dioxide they emit.

Imagine if a Nevada business decided not to pay taxes. Supporters of big government would cry that it was "not paying its fair share," and state officials would swoop down upon on the firm like vultures to a carcass. The state would devour all it could and imprison the company's management for violating the law. But what happens when government ignores laws it creates?

This is a time of serious economic recession in Nevada. Out of every 100 workers in the Silver State, 11.3 are currently unemployed. Yet, the federal government appears to think that is not enough and is driving for a change that will wind up putting even more people out of work. In order to comply with a forthcoming hike in the federal minimum wage rate, the State of Nevada will raise its official minimum wage on July 1 from $5.85 to $6.55 for businesses that provide approved health benefits and from $6.85 to $7.55 for businesses that do not.

Government-run public education in America has long imposed on schools central bureaucracies that ration key resources, including teachers, textbooks and many more school supplies. Currently, Nevada is attempting to break away from this unworkable system, the primary source of the state's well-known K-12 problems. The new approach — most advanced in the Clark County School District — uses the "empowerment school" model, which creatively exploits the intelligence naturally operating within market processes.

Not so long ago the Clark County School District had students enrolling in droves. Families were swarming into the Las Vegas valley faster than communities could handle. And with 4.9 billion taxpayer dollars in its Capital Improvement Program (CIP), CCSD was franticly building schools — on every corner, it seemed. Today, however, the scenario is drastically different. Las Vegas has the highest foreclosure rate in the nation, unemployment in the state is 11 percent, student enrollment in the district has trickled to a mere .8 percent growth rate and the CIP is down to its last $171 million for new schools.

Economists frequently disagree with each other on nearly every issue. Often, it seems there are nearly as many economic paradigms as there are economists. Yet most economists can be characterized as belonging to one of the major schools of economic thought — whether Austrian, monetarist, Keynesian or Marxist. A recent article by Elliott Parker of the University of Nevada, Reno, in which he advocates for increases in state taxes and government spending, places him neatly in the Keynesian mold.

Arguments that the U.S. Constitution is a "living" document have always been intriguing. The expression "Living Constitution" has often been invoked to justify activist jurisprudence by alleging that the meanings of the Constitution's words change over time. Just coincidentally, the changes in meaning always appear to align precisely with the personal viewpoints that judicial activists want imposed on society — even when those viewpoints directly conflict with the Constitution's formerly established meaning.

Historically, they were called "public servants." In Nevada nowadays, however, government employees increasingly are the public's masters. The servant? Increasingly, it's you. Consider the state Assembly. Of the 28 Democrats making up the two-thirds majority that controls the Nevada Legislature's lower chamber, 20 are current or retired government employees — or make their living from tax dollars the government allocates to their non-profit corporations. That's over 70 percent.

Nevada is well known for entertainment, especially here in Las Vegas. Performing on the streets and in the resorts and concert halls are illusionists, magicians, conjurers and prestidigitators. But such artists of illusion work elsewhere, too. Government bureaucracies and legislatures are often favorite settings. There, on education issues, magic frequently occurs — as entire subgroups of underperforming students vanish right before our very eyes and bureaucratic sorcery produces wondrous improvements in reports of education quality. The power of illusion, whether you perform in Las Vegas or in a legislature, comes from misdirection.