Gibbons easy choice for award

When magazines bestow their person or sportsman of the year titles, it’s typically a gimmick to fill the pages at the end of the year and drum up some controversy.

But with deference to Time’s selection of Vlad Putin — the former KGB man who hopes to turn Russia back into a police state — persons of the year don’t have to always be recognized for their influence on the world’s stage.

In Nevada, for example, 2007 has brought us someone who on a near daily basis has triggered not only headlines and guffaws, but serious policy predicaments.

Drumroll please for my 2007 Person of the Year, Gov. Jim Gibbons.

You can’t possibly outdo a man who was so intent on wresting this honor from Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid’s hands that he pushed up the swearing-in process so he could take office at the stroke of midnight Jan. 1.

Right off the bat, Gibbons was pressing for notoriety — and deservedly so. In a clandestine ceremony more reminiscent of pagan rituals, Gibbons hurried his wife (“Any time Dawn”) and a Supreme Court justice to his side for a rapid swearing in a few days ahead of the official ceremony.

The stated reason: preserving the chain of command in a world made more dangerous by Islamic fundamentalists. The real reason: a hasty swearing in would allow him to beat the clock — er, the calendar — and render void the last appointments made by outgoing Gov. Kenny Guinn.

Thus Gibbons’ real New Year Baby was his pick for the Gaming Commission.

It’s hard to top a person of the year who jumps out so quickly. But Gibbons would not rest on his Jan. 1 laurels.

The governor proceeded with almost weekly gaffes only to be outdone by the first press release from his administration — one highlighting the Mrs. Armani inaugural ball gown.

Then there was Gibbons mistaking a Cabinet member’s nationality, failing to understand the budget or legislative process, and allowing his first lady to make a mockery of the mansion even without booze.

And remember that Gibbons hid a medical condition until his actual official second swearing-in — when his shaking hand was so noticeable we began to learn about his ailment.

You can argue appointments and medical conditions and understanding your personnel are not fair game for inspection. With that in mind, I’ll move on to some more of the Gibbons Greatest Hits.

The state of the state was a hoot, with Gibbons presenting a “bold” education experiment and then ducking out of the legislative chambers through a service exit to avoid media interested in details of the plan.

We waited for details because the governor was still learning them. Days after he presented the “bold” plan, he attended a community workshop on empowerment schools hoping to learn more about a reform on which he had just staked his budget and inaugural legislative session.

This would prove the beginning of a four-month period of indecision buoyed by last-minute actions, nearly all of which assisted his friends at The Venetian.

To understand just how impressive this Person of the Year Award is, consider Gibbons won without consideration of the ongoing probe by the FBI about whether the cruisin’ former congressman accepted bribes from a military contractor.

And he achieved the award without consideration of not-so-distant scandals involving an alleged sexual assault and plagiarism.

The sex assault case went nowhere, but we do know the Mormon was out drinking with a veritable stable of nice-looking, dirty-talking professionals. The alleged victim was just a cocktail waitress along for the conversation.

The plagiarism didn’t really affect him because it was a bad speech to begin with and the author, a fellow Republican official, was actually flattered her work could play outside of Alabama in the Dixie of the West.

But to truly win the award, Gibbons had to close the year as deftly as he began it. And, in true Gibbons’ fashion it takes a pending crisis to bring the worst out in him. Who knew Giuliani had a foil?

When Nevada needed a governor to steer it safely through an uncertain economic era, we instead got more indecision and outright flip-flopping.

Gibbons initially took K-12 education off the chopping block for budget cuts. Then, after a meeting with University System Chancellor Jim Rogers and his buddies at The Venetian, Gibbons put K-12 right back into the mix. He even got booed at a UNLV graduation.

A hoops game I could see, but commencement?

Gibbons is well deserving of Person of the Year. And he’s got three more chances for a repeat performance.

Contact Erin Neff at (702) 387-2906, or by e-mail at eneff@reviewjournal.com.