Nevada First: Empty Wallets. Let’s turn the clock back to May 2000. The good ol’ days. The Boy Band craze was on it’s way out. No one knew what a hanging chad was. And a barrel of crude oil cost $27.39. Fast forward to 2008 - instead of *NSYNC we have the Jonas Brothers. HBO’s “Recount” er, recounts, those crazy weeks when hanging chads got the media coverage Star Jones craves for. And oil costs over $125 a barrel. Nevadans are paying $3,000 dollars more a year for gas than they were 7 years ago. Where’s that money coming from?

The Bush administration’s oil-friendly policies amount to the one of the greatest shakedowns of American families in our nation’s history. And as the Washington Post/ABC News poll released this week shows, Americans are looking to Democrats (by 21 points) to fix the disastrous policies of the Bush administration. Exhibit A as to why there are 50,000 new active Democratic voters in Nevada.

Up From Searchlight. Newsweek sits down with Senator Reid to discuss his new book, The Good Fight (currently the best selling book about Nevada on Amazon.com). Read it for exclusive dating advice from the Majority Leader.

Must Reid: Stop-This. This LA Times piece from last Friday gave the Weekly Reid serious agita. The President promised to minimize the number of troops affected by the stop-loss policy (read: back-door draft) that keeps troops in uniform well past the time their service should end. With the announcement of the surge, there's been a 43% increase in the number of soldiers who've seen their tours extended. To make matters worse, the Army Times reported last week that the program will continue until the fall of 2009.

Not even divine intervention. Mere days after the Supreme Court handed the Right a huge victory in their effort to disenfranchise as many voters as possible (and reminded us once again that John McCain is no maverick), 12 Roman Catholic nuns were denied their right to vote because they lacked photo ID. None of them drive. One is 98.

The Samuel Gompers Seal of Approval. The Weekly Reid’s been harping on the Bush Republican’s war on the middle class for months now. What’s the best ticket to the middle class? The right to bargain collectively. This week, the Senate takes up the Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act. Want fair wages for the men and women on the front lines of protecting our families? This is the bill for you! Want to strengthen the ties of our first responders to their communities? This bill does just that! Now, if we can just put the L back in the NLRB…

Reid’s Watching: Webb 2.0. Lots of people in DC and the blogosphere have been comparing Kay Hagan’s challenge to Elizabeth Dole in North Carolina to the now famous Jim Webb/George Allen battle in ’06. Well, on the heels of the new Rasmussen poll, perhaps this race should be upgraded from “Sleeper” to “One to Watch.” Kay Hagan 48% Elizabeth Dole 47%. One (sarcastic) caveat: Liddy Dole is a GREAT campaigner. Expect Hagan’s margin to widen as North Carolinians remember they sent Dole to Washington once before.

Whose side is he on? Jeff Merkley - Speaker of the Oregon House and architect of their new majority - is ready to take on Bush Republican Gordon Smith in November. And Gordon Smith is already preparing to take on Jeff Merkley. In a rare move, Sen. Smith is running negative ads against Merkley before the Democratic primary has played itself out. Some argue Smith’s trying to help Jeff’s opponent (who is losing to both Smith and Jeff pretty convincingly now). The Weekly Reid thinks he feels the weight of the Bush Republican water he’s been carrying for the last eight years.