Smoothing the switch to solar

Poor California billionaires. Rare does a week go by without some U.S. news outlet running a breathless story about all the dreamy California billionaires bringing their wealth and fame and egos and Trumpy politics and the rest of their creepy billionaire tropes to humble Nevada, so yay.

The underlying and all-important message of that fashionable journalistic genre is that while Nevada likes to pretend its motto is "Battle Born," its real motto is "We don't have an income tax." In ghastly California, by contrast, there is a ballot proposal to — gasp! — target billionaires for an extra tax that only applies to them. Little wonder they're fleeing, and taking their billions with them, right? So states be warned: Billionaires should be idolized, not taxed. That's they way Nevada does it!

But what if the billionaires aren't really moving from California?

California's much-despised (by billionaires and, evidently, the media) proposed one-time tax on billionaires has a clause by which to escape the tax, fleeing billionaires will have to actually prove they have fled, the Financial Times recently reported. California state officials will be checking not just the billionaires' legacy Cali property ownership but also stuff like where their kids go to school, where their doctors are (probably not Nevada tbh), even where their pets' vets are.

“Sending your assistant to get a driving licence in Nevada, spending Christmas at your home in Miami and writing a mean tweet about California are only moves on paper," a law professor who helped craft the proposed billionaire tax quipped to the FT.

Whether the tax passes, or whether billionaires can escape it even if they didn't really move, remains to be seen. But the issue reminded me (so I'll remind you) that notwithstanding all those spellbound news stories about California's purported horribleness and Nevada's purported wonderfulness, on a percentage basis, more Nevadans move to California than the other way around.

IN NEVADA CURRENT

Nevada has long been among the nation's leaders when it comes to installation of solar energy, because duh. Trump, however, prefers energy sources that are just like him: filthy and hazardous. So the regime blocked community solar funding last year. Meanwhile, converting to solar can seem like a bit of a project, and while there are savings over time there are also up-front costs. Clark County is hooking up with some nonprofits to help smooth the switch. Leilah Ortega reports: Clark County, nonprofits launch effort to ease conversion to solar

"As we mourn the long history of Jewish forced migrations and persecution, we will mourn Guerrero’s death and the countless other migration injustices endured by so many Nevadans and people across the U.S. An attack on the rights, dignity, and the lives of immigrants is an attack on us all." A pair of UNLV academics, one a philosopher and the other the director of the Immigration Clinic, co-author this commentary: As Jewish Nevadans, Tisha B’Av calls us to remember. Recent events call us to act.

From the D.C. bureau:

Trump still coming up with more tariffs, orders new ones on Canada. This dude's affordability agenda sucks.

Trump administration should preserve Reflecting Pool evidence, judge says. Swampy Trump.

Good Luck