All publicity is good publicity, they said. Just spell the name right, they said.

Then Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman opens her mouth in the middle of the deadly coronavirus pandemic and canaries fly out and start circling her head on national television.

Suddenly, all publicity is no longer good publicity and the outside world spells Las Vegas l-a-u-g-h-i-n-g-s-t-o-c-k.

For weeks Las Vegans have been embarrassed and alarmed by Goodman’s increasingly irresponsible bleating in response to Gov. Steve Sisolak’s decision to order the closure of nonessential businesses and schools in response to the surge of COVID-19 cases in the state. The decision caused hardship for many thousands of Nevadans, but Sisolak – like all responsible governors with similarly affected states – put health and safety ahead of economic concerns.

This past week, Goodman cranked the crazy to 11 in interviews with MSNBC’s Katy Tur and CNN’s Anderson Cooper that made her sound daffy, ill-informed and at times cold-hearted. The lowlights have gone viral and generated scores of responses vilifying the mayor as a bonehead in the face of the facts and informed opinions of the scientific and medical experts.

Her interview with Cooper went on for 25 excruciating minutes. In that time, Goodman called the deaths of more than 150 Southern Nevadans “tragic,” but, hey, a mere drop in the bucket compared to the needs of 2.3 million residents in Clark County.

Goodman is so confident the virus is overblown that she offered the city of Las Vegas as a testing “control group.” And all this time I thought Stephen King’s “The Stand” was a novel. Who knew King was cribbing from Crazy Carolyn’s private notebooks?

When Goodman learned that, well, you just can’t volunteer residents as a glorified petri dish, she recalled replying, “Oh that’s too bad.” She elaborated, “Because I know when you have a disease, you have a placebo — that gets the water and the sugar — and then you get those who actually get the shot. We would love to be the placebo side so you have something to measure against.”

Save that quote for the political obituary.

Without prompting, Goodman interjected that she believed she had contracted the coronavirus in January. Talk about a pandemic conversation starter!

If true, it might make her one of the earliest cases in the country. If unverified, why would you blurt it out on national television? Unless, of course, you were trying to reassure an audience that the coronavirus is not worse than a common flu and there are plenty of cheap flights to Vegas available.

When Cooper tried to make it simpler by presenting her with a visual illustration of how easy the asymptomatic virus is to spread without strict social distancing – not exactly a Vegas strong suit – Goodman brushed it aside with, “This is not China.”

No, this was ignorance on display with a #VisitVegas hashtag. The interviews have been viewed millions of times on various platforms.

It’s just a rumor Goodman is promoting a variety of playful pandemic marketing slogans. Among them:

“What happens here … won’t spike a fever until you get back home.“

“Our dice are hotter than your forehead.”

And let’s not forget, “Come to Vegas and spread it around.”

The beatdown has continued in major media outlets across the planet. At a time mayors in other cities are making hard decisions and erring on the side of fact-based caution, Goodman continues to double down on her dangerously Trumpian talking points.

At one point, Goodman went from hand-wringing about reopening the economy to washing her hands of any responsibility for finding a way forward: “We’re in a crisis, health-wise, and so for a restaurant to be open or for a small boutique to be open, they better figure it out. That’s their job, that’s not the mayor’s job.”

No, that’s not the mayor’s job.

Las Vegans know the mayor’s job in a strong-manager form of government is to cut ribbons, promote city business and lead council meetings. It was at a recent council meeting that she called the governor’s pragmatic and responsible approach to the pandemic “total insanity.”

The response to her antics from across the state has been predictable. Political and business leaders, including the governor, Congresswoman Dina Titus, City Councilman Brian Knudsen, and County Commissioners Marilyn Kirkpatrick and Michael Naft showed admirable restraint in refuting the mayor’s misleading remarks. They tried to reassure the public that reopening the economy will be gradual and will be based on the facts, best health practices, and the opinions of the state’s medical and scientific experts – not Dr. Cuckoo Clock.

This is the same Goodman who, upon learning of the plan to close nonessential businesses due to the spreading pandemic, responded with an anecdote about her own health, bragging that after recovering from cancer she was stronger than “a pack of wolves.”

In the wake of her embarrassing remarks, other wolves are at her door. She drew fire from UNITE-HERE President D Taylor and Culinary Local 226 Secretary-Treasurer Gioconda Arguello Kline, righteously bristled at her flippant suggestion that service workers be used as pawns. As The Indy has reported, 11 union workers have died of COVID-19.

But just when you thought you’d heard the craziest coronavirus nonsense ever, Goodman was made to sound almost informed. President Trump on Thursday openly promoted outright quackery, suggesting medical experts should look into injecting bleach-based products in COVID-19 patients and, while they’re at it, also try treating them with ultraviolet light, too. It happens that those debunked treatments are being pimped by some of his loudest supporters.

So hang in there, Mayor Goodman. You may soon be in line for a Trump administration Cabinet post.

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