Spin Cycle

vision for the middle class and he seems very honest.”
Even this town of 30,000 known mostly for legal prostitution is abuzz over today’s caucuses, which have thrust Nevada into the political spotlight like never before.
Usually, Nevada caucuses so late in the season that politicians rarely bother to campaign here. But since Senate majority leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, moved up the caucus date to make his state the third party contest, nearly every candidate has come courting – even in Pahrump, where signs for Ron Paul, Obama, Clinton, John Edwards and others dot the desert landscape.
Indeed, the last time Pahrump created such a commotion was a couple of years ago, when the infamous ex-Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss opened a laundry-mat here called Dirty Laundry, while she awaits a license to open the state’s first legal male brothel.
"Small-town Nevada is not used to this much political attention,” said Carl Tobias, a political expert on Nevada at the University of Richmond, Va.,
Or, as retired engineer and California transplant Robert Halliday, 72, said as he folded clothes at Dirty Laundry, “All these viper politicians are coming to town just to mess things up.”
Halliday’s attitude is common here, perhaps explaining why only 9,000 voters turned out to caucus in 2004. Because the vast majority of Nevadans are recent arrivals – an estimated 5,000 people move in each week – they aren’t necessarily inclined to turn out to invest in a candidate, particularly at 11 a.m. on a Saturday morning, as caucus rules require.
Moreover, anti-government sentiment runs high towns like Pahrump, an hour’s drive from the capital-playland of Las Vegas through desert, a rocky mountain pass bearing “watch for wild horses and burros” warnings, past elk jerky stands and a shop advertising, “SHOOT A MACHINE GUN!!”
With four-fifths of land owned by the federal government, ranchers and miners are constantly clashing with residents, Tobias said. Morever, the huge growth rate translates into resentment that government hasn’t delivered new roads, schools and other services fast enough.
And then there is the immigration issue; the fastest growing population segment besides retirees is Hispanics, who account for nearly one in every four residents.
On the street yesterday morning, a half-dozen white residents paraded with signs reading “Stop Gun Control,” “Secure the Border” and “Vote to Deport Illegals.” Pahrump two years ago passed a law barring all aid to undocumented workers and banning the flying of any flag besides the U.S. Stars-and-Stripes. The law has since been overturned, but that doesn’t deter protester Scott DiBenedetto.
“Our so-called government does nothing but cater to these illegals,” said DiBenedetto, 37, a shaggy-haired, blond casino cook who is boycotting the caucuses because he doesn’t consider any candidate sufficiently strong on border control—even those who promise to deport as many of the 12 million undocumented immigrants as they can.
Even some residents who care about the process weren’t sure they’d caucus today.
“I want to caucus but I’m just not sure I’ll make it,” said Wheeler, the bartender. “I would have to be there at eleven. And at ten-thirty, I have a facial.”