How about that USA Today story on UNLV athletics/academics today? Is Mike Hamrick showing his face this evening?

Lenny - the official crowd numbers have always been exaggerated at UNLV. Not all the season ticket holders show up. My guess is now, instead of 8,000 people coming with 9,500 tickets sold, there's 10,000 people coming, with 11,500 tickets sold. (In its box scores, the LA Times, for example, lists "Tickets sold" instead of "Attendance," which helps with the confusion.)

So what's wrong with making the trails accessible to all?

Gold Butte needs a paved road, a campground, a picnic area, a boat launch, a visitors center, a bridge over Lake Mead and a ranger station.

We can't keep closing off great recreation areas around Las Vegas and putting "young fit white folks only" signs on the boundaries.

The problem isn't the general wilderness designation -- again, much of this land is hard to get to anyway. Odds were slim any of us were ever going to see it.

The problem is -- no new roads. No improved roads. No better access for anyone other than the owner of a sturdy 4WD. Gold Butte is on my long list of places that I started to go to, only to get turned around because I wasn't confident my 2WD pickup could handle it. I'd love to go out there some day. But under this plan, I never will.

Who, exactly, are they preserving this land for? As Nielsen said -- young people willing to hike across miles of desert.

And the rest of us get another day at Red Rock.