Our good friend, Eddie Floyd

We are the last people on the planet to call for a positive election. The primary way voters can find out the truth about candidates—who has had nasty business dealings, or who has been unmannerly toward seniors, or who has proven they can’t handle money—is for candidates to bring this information out about their opponents. Yes, you’ll likely read it on Facebook, or see it in a commercial on local television, or hear it on the radio, or read it here in your local newspaper, but it almost always starts with the competitor.

There’s a big difference between that and the situation where candidates hide knowledge they have about their opponent in order to have a “clean” race. There’s a big difference between that and a politician who falsely attacks the character of another candidate for political gain.

Campaigns are supposed to be rough and tumble, and anything that might illuminate one or the other’s personality is fair game.

This campaign has been extremely dirty—even in the local races. Let’s get one thing straight: These people are our neighbors and friends. These races are fundamentally grasps at the power to make change, and so the stakes are high, but these people will still be your neighbors and friends when the dust settles on Nov. 7.

So when we hear that Neoma Jardon’s signs are getting vandalized, it concerns this editorial staff. But we see from the evidence of our senses that she is no greater victim than any other, and even her supporters especially have shown that they’re willing to do whatever it takes to win this election.

That jury is out. But the evidence is a little clearer in another race. It starts with the words: “I’m Shelley Berkley, and I approve this message.” In this television ad, Berkley seeks to tar Dean Heller’s character by associating him with conservative radio host Eddie Floyd, a convicted money launderer. Floyd is the first to admit he screwed up, he’s willing to talk about why he pled to the crimes he did, and in any case, he paid his debt to society. For a memory refresher, check out our story from May 4, 2006, “The Importance of Being Ernest”: www.newsreview.com/reno/importance-of-being-earnest/content?oid=56716.

It’s pretty tough to argue that Floyd did not have many people of conservative bent on his show: Jim Gibbons, Geno Martini, Bob Cashell, Dick Gammick, U.S. Drug Czar John Walters, and then-Washoe County Sheriff Dennis Balaam were among his guests.

Look, we have a hard time trying to find nice things to say about Dean Heller—he immediately turned intransigent right when he got to Washington, D.C. But if the worst thing that Berkley can say about his character is he once palled around with a conservative radio host, maybe his character isn’t so low.

But if hanging around convicted felons is an indictment that should preclude someone from representing the fine citizens of Northern Nevada in Washington, D.C., maybe Ms. Shelley Berkley—she of the current ethics complaint—can explain what she was doing recording an interview on Eddie Floyd’s radio show on Sept. 7—mere days before her attack ad hit the airwaves.