Opinion: Nev gov Gibbons sends 100s txt msgs 2 other womans cell, not wifes
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You know that unidentified estranged wife of a Reno doctor that the governor of Nevada is not having an affair with?
Well, during one month last year he exchanged 850 text messages with her phone from his official state phone, at 15 cents per.
It’s all part of an increasingly messy divorce after 22 years between the 63-year-old Gov. Jim Gibbons, a former military and commercial pilot, and his wife, Dawn, 54, who formerly ran two Las Vegas wedding chapels. She’s also served in the state legislature. Hey, it’s Nevada remember.
The Times’ Ashley Powers has all the background in her story here this morning.
Anyway, Dawn’s original divorce papers included references to her husband’s infatuation and infidelities with a marital intruder who was the estranged wife of a Reno doctor. (Are there any other kinds?)
Today, the Reno Gazette-Journal published Nevada....
...records showing that Gibbons used his state cellphone to send more than 850 text messages in one month to a cellphone owned by Kathy Karrasch, who happens to be the estranged wife of a Reno doctor.
Probably a coincidence. The governor says he and Karrasch are just longtime friends. Must be. On one day, the newspaper reported, the two cellphones exchanged 160 text messages between 8:30 in the morning and 11:45 p.m. That’s very friendly.
On another day, or night, they exchanged 91 messages between midnight and 2 a.m., which is something like one text message every 79 seconds. Talk about teenagers. Bet the governor’s fingers were really sore.
And their arms too from holding the phones to their ears during 42 lengthy conversations, mostly at night and on weekends. The calls to Karrasch’s phone abruptly ended 14 days into April last year, the Gazette-Journal reported.
The newspaper said the messages’ contents were not available, which may be just as well. Although it would be kinda neat to...No, they’re private communbications and we have no business even imagining the abbrvtions used.
The paper noted the governor had reimbursed the state for the calls’ costs.
The governor does not face pretty tolerant Nevada voters again until 2010. In the meantime Jim and Dawn have agreed to stop fighting over custody of the governor’s mansion and negotiate. (With a hat tip to the indefatiguable Jon Ralston.)
--Andrew Malcolm
Photo Credits: AP / Cathleen Allison; Nevada Office of the First Lady