Where I Stand -- Mike O'Callaghan: Old-time Nevadans recall a different Bobby Kennedy

LAST MONTH the national media was loaded with recollections about the life and death of Robert F. Kennedy. President John F. Kennedy's brother and attorney general was killed 30 years ago when campaigning to become president.

Family members recall him as a loving father, and politicians remember him as a man who didn't live long enough to reach his full potential. There's no doubt he was a dynamic individual who worked overtime as his brother's political hatchet man. Few, if any, Nevada old-timers will be able to remember him as a friend of the Silver State.

As attorney general he, along with FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, had a listening device in almost every Las Vegas casino and the offices of people doing business with the hotels. One casino executive was honored with a bug in his bedroom at home. In 1961, RFK planned a secret full-scale raid of every casino in Las Vegas and Reno. These plans upset both Nevada Attorney General Roger Foley and Gov. Grant Sawyer. Both men went immediately to Washington where they received anything but a warm reception from General Kennedy. President Kennedy's Oval Office was the next stop. The raids weren't carried out as planned.

Long after leaving office, in his book Hang Tough, Sawyer related his evaluation of RFK. "My relationship with Bobby Kennedy never improved. I hadn't particularly cared for him before this incident -- his arrogance and his cavalier attitude turned me off even during the 1960 campaign -- and after our confrontation I had no use for him at all. I didn't trust him, and I didn't support him later when he decided to run for president. ... I wouldn't have supported him under any conditions, even if it meant I had to support a Republican instead. (laughter) The thought that Bobby might become president of the United States was frightening. Anyone who would use and manipulate a federal agency the way he was attempting to was dangerous, and I put him in the same category as J. Edgar Hoover."

Sawyer wasn't the only Nevadan who came to resent the attitude of RFK. Sawyer, not long before his death, left behind words that fully explained some of the attitudes of those days and the uphill struggle Nevadans faced. "You had to experience the attitude of Easterners concerning Nevada. ... It was then almost endemic in the bureaucracy and the Washington establishment, and we are seeing it now with the nuclear dump issue when senators and congressmen refer to Nevada as a wasteland. It was that attitude that Bobby Kennedy projected: 'You are a bunch of peasants out there; you're all sort of sleazy. We here in the East, who know all, are going to come out there and set you right, whether you like it or not.' As a personal matter I was particularly offended, because I got the impression that Bobby looked upon me as someone who had just stepped out from behind a crap table; and he seemed to imply that I was connected with the mob, which really burned me up. I remember pounding the table and just feeling that I was making no progress with him at all."

Some attitudes sure have changed. Easterners and their politicians now come here with outstretched hands for campaign contributions. The problem is that many of them still want to leave behind their nuke waste after loading up their wallets.

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, Grant Sawyer was a strong voice carrying Nevada's opposition to becoming a nuke waste dump. Although he had been out of office for 30 years, his words were respected by leaders from both political parties. His voice is missed, but Nevadans at all levels continue to fight.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott refuses to allow the Senate to vote on the nomination of James C. Hormel for ambassador to Luxembourg. Hormel was approved last fall by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and now deserves to face the full Senate. He has the support of Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and former GOP Secretary of State George Shultz.

So what's holding up President Bill Clinton's nomination from receiving a thumbs-up or down from the full Senate? Has Lott opened a bad can of Spam made by Hormel meats? No, the meat-packing heir is an open homosexual and has funded some gay and lesbian activities. This doesn't seem to bother Luxembourg where his credentials as an ambassador will be greeted warmly.

Hormel was a dean at the University of Chicago Law School and is a respected lawyer in San Francisco. He has also served productively at the United Nations. Al Hunt, when answering critics of Hormel in the Wall Street Journal, noted that "Mr. Hormel has promised that not only does he have no intention of sexual proselytizing, but that he'll have his name removed from any fund-raising activities and, while ambassador, will contribute only to educational and cultural organizations. The only boards he would stay on would be Swarthmore College, his alma mater, and the San Francisco Symphony."

Despite all screaming by his supporters, the decent thing for Lott to do is bring the nomination to the floor for a vote. If he's approved, he may or may not turn out to be a good ambassador. If he doesn't pass the Senate vote, he will continue to remain a professional in San Francisco. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

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