“Truly Dually,” a musical about homeless veterans, played Sunday to a packed house at the West Las Vegas Library. The play was written by first time playwright and veteran social worker Michael Ullman.

The author’s training definitely surfaced in the script. Only a social worker would write a song about an evidence-based housing program for homeless people with disabilities. Or drop an upbeat dance number into the scene where a major character receives a dual diagnosis, the combination of mental illness and substance abuse that bedevils many homeless people and gives the play its name.

But I’m quibbling. The cast included seven residents of  local homeless shelters, several of them veterans. And all of them were great. Jeff Northrup, who played a would-be aristocrat with a drinking problem, deftly handled several pages of convoluted dialogue, even wringing some laughs out of the clunky language.

David Rath brought the subtlety with his depiction of a homeless man in psychological crisis. Rath, who struggles with mental illness and addiction disorders, spent the first half of the play in silence — managing to convey his pain by flexing his hands and tossing his head. It was a convincing depiction of a person paralyzed by depression, with no method required.

No review would be complete without mentioning Larry Cooks, a former marine with virtuoso pipes. After two solos in the first act, he was largely silent in the second. He seemed unwilling to leave the stage at curtain call, lingering at the lip while he sang a few final scales.

Then again, he might have been motivated by more than an impulse to cling to the spotlight. After all, where are these guys going to go when the house lights come on? “Housing First” may be a rousing musical number, but it isn’t a political reality — especially not in Las Vegas.

One of the revelations to be aired on ABC’s Nightline this evening is exactly how Doug Hampton discovered U.S. Sen. John Ensign was having an affair with Hampton’s wife, Cindy. It was around Christmas 2007, and Hampton found this text message from Ensign on his wife’s phone.

“How wonderful it is. Can’t believe it’s like a kid. Scared, but excited.”

That’s funny, because that’s exactly how we feel about seeing the show! And probably how many Nevada voters will feel about pondering who the replacement for Ensign might be. It’s wonderful! We’re scared (could get Gov. Jim Gibbons) but excited (could get somebody without marital problems!).

We didn’t have time to attend the anti-Harry Reid news conference call held this morning by former Gov. Bob List, not that his excellency or his peeps were good enough to let us know when it was being held. But if the report in the Las Vegas Sun is any indication, it may have been just as well.

List, now the Republican national committeeman for Nevada, attacked Reid after the Senate majority leader managed to hold his caucus together Saturday evening and garner the 60 votes needed to begin debate on the health-care reform bill in the Senate. A total of 39 Republicans voted against the motion.

List attacked Reid on several fronts, each more unbelievable than the last. We stress we are not making any of this up. (Hat tip to the Sun’s Washington D.C. scribe Lisa Mascaro for the quotage.)

“I think it’s incorrect to say these people don’t have health care,” List said during a conference call arranged by the Republican National Committee. “The public hospital treats anybody who walks in the door, in the emergency room, or claims an emergency or they need health care. So it’s a misnomer to say these people are without health care. They may be without insurance, many of them are.”

Excuse us, but are you fucking kidding? Did he actually say the poor have health care in the ER? The most expensive taxpayer-supported medicine there is, only available when you’re at death’s door? That’s his idea of health care? If we didn’t know better, we’d suspect that this “Bob List” character was really a Democratic plant designed to make all Republicans look like heartless assholes, telling the poor they’re on their own. But we do know better. List actually is a Republican telling the poor they’re on their own!

“It’s the wrong direction for the country and the wrong direction for Nevada, and Harry Reid is going to pay the price next year,” said the former governor, who is now an official with the Nevada Republican Party. “This is a clear abuse of power that Nevadans are not going to tolerate.”

Not to repeat ourselves, but are you fucking kidding? An abuse of power? Reid did what he does best, counting votes and securing commitments behind closed doors to reach his goal. That’s called using power, not abusing it. Did Tom DeLay abuse power when he brought “The Hammer” down on wayward Republicans? Or did he do his job, and collect votes? And since the majority — in America and in Nevada — approve of health care reform (and the public option) how can spurring a vote on it be “the wrong direction” for the country or Nevada?

List may or may not know what we do: The only way Reid is going to pay a price next year is if he fails to get something passed at the end of this process. (We fear it will be a compromised, watered-down, shadow of what health care reform ought to be, but failing to pass anything at this point would be far worse.)

The former governor called the 2,074-page bill “so excessive, so liberal, so radical.” He said that Nevadans would support a more incremental approach to health care reform that includes some elements of the Democratic plan, such as the prohibition on insurance companies denying coverage for pre-existing conditions, but drops others, such as the proposed public option and penalties on those who do not carry insurance or businesses that fail to offer it.

OK, are we being punked? Is Ashton Kutcher standing outside our office door, about to pounce? Because this is getting ridiculous. Do you know what an “excessive, liberal, radical” bill would be? How about socialized medicine, the likes of which they have in Great Britain? Or a national single-payer system, such as the one in Canada? How about Medicare for all, in which we keep the private doctors and hospitals, but have the government pay the bills? Those would be radical reforms. Guess what? Not a single one of them was seriously considered in this debate. Instead, we started with a compromise, and it’s only gotten worse from there.

If List thinks a health-care bill with a public option (that includes a state opt-out, for God’s sake) is “so excessive, so liberal, so radical,” we better make sure he’s got good insurance himself, because if he ever sees real health care reform, the poor bastard will keel over of a heart attack!

Lawyers for Las Vegas surgeon Dr. Mark Kabins have been quietly spreading

the word that Kabins is not going to become a government witness and testify against all the other doctors and lawyers suspected of participating in the allegedly massive Medical Mafia scheme. Kabins has agreed to enter a plea, though for now the plea remains sealed. A hearing is set for this afternoon in federal court.

The fact that Kabins agreed to plea to anything sent shock waves through the Las Vegas medical and legal communities. Some of the law offices under federal scrutiny were said to be all but empty last week. As one wag speculated, maybe they’re all busy moving money out of safety deposit boxes to their offshore accounts.

It would be a bit unusual for federal prosecutors to allow Kabins to plead guilty but not require him to help in the prosecution of his alleged co-conspirators. The fact that the doctor would admit he was guilty will not look good when his two co-defendants (Noel Gage and Howard Awand) go to trial, nor does it make Kabins’ lawyers look all that reliable, since they boldly predicted a few months ago that their client would prevail in court because he has done absolutely nothing wrong.

Here’s another little tidbit to consider. Even if Kabins doesn’t become a government witness, the feds could soon have a new way to pressure alleged middleman Awand into cooperating. Awand and his wife Linda are scheduled to go to trial on very serious tax fraud charges. The trial is set for Dec. 7 and is described as an open and shut case for prosecutors.

Awand, who is not a doctor or a lawyer, was allegedly being paid for both medical and legal expertise he offered to the nearly two dozen lawyers and doctors in the Med Mafia web. I’ve seen stacks of e-mails Awand sent, giving orders to both doctors and lawyers, calling the shots in multimillion dollar personal injury cases. And for all of that, he was paid handsomely.

According to federal documents, Awand was pulling down an average of more than $80,000 per month during the heyday of the sweet little setup he is alleged to have established. Although it is presumably illegal for lawyers to split their fees with non-lawyers, the feds say all of the big personal injury lawyers in town were cutting checks for Howard. He, in turn, was very generous with five or more local judges.

If the predictions are true and prosecutors are successful in nailing Awand and his wife on very serious tax charges, then U.S. Attorney Dan Bogden might have a way to gain Awand’s cooperation in the other Medical Mafia trials still to come. And if the government can secure the testimony of both Awand and Kabins — whoa boy.

Lawyers for Awand filed papers late last week seeking yet another delay in the tax trial. If granted, it would be his fifth such delay. Federal prosecutors are expected to file a brief opposing another delay.

Overall, it should be a very interesting week for anyone who has followed the Medical Mafia saga over the past four to five years.