Quarantine

This column was written before C. de Baca resigned earlier today.

By Carter Bundy

Fernando C. de Baca has been in New Mexico many decades longer than I’ve been alive, much less lived here. In early 2002, shortly after AFSCME successfully gutted Jeb Bush’s plan to turn Florida’s government into a patronage system, I chose to move to New Mexico instead of taking a job in Maine, or staying in Florida, or moving back to D.C., Virginia, New York or the West Coast.

Some of the major factors in my move were the sunshine, unparalleled moderate, four-season climate, the gorgeous mountains and the chance to play a role in an exciting gubernatorial race.

When I got here, all those things were as I’d hoped and more. But I found out there was something unique about New Mexico, unlike anywhere else in America. And I loved it.

More than diverse

New Mexico is not only diverse, but there’s a genuinely cool vibe about the diversity. Everyone riffs off everyone else’s culture. It wasn’t just the long-standing and clichéd tri-cultural environment. It was Asian American, African American, Italian American, all kinds of mixed-race and cross-cultural families, 10th generation and new immigrants, and, of course, the three largest commonly-identified cultures: Native, Hispanic and Anglo (each of which contains dozens of origins as well).

Heck, the state salute — does any other state even have one? — is entirely premised on united cultures living in perfect friendship.

Somehow race is virtually never an issue here. Sure, there were a few Hispanics and Native Americans who got into a legitimate disagreement about the statue of Don Juan de Oñate. Normally, though, no one even thinks much of race here, at least not compared to the rest of America. New Mexico is the model for everything that America should become in terms of diversity as other states join us in becoming majority minority.

It’s not like LA, with resentments that seem to simmer just under the surface. It’s not like some East Coast megalopolises, where ethnic neighborhoods seem fairly homogenous.

New Mexico is the real deal — it’s the real American melting pot. When my friends back East or in California ask why I like it so much, I try to explain the diversity and the coolness of it all. But even bringing it up seems so un-New Mexican, because embracing diversity is not conscious the way it might be in, say, the Bay Area. It’s nothing intentional. It just is.

That’s what makes C. de Baca’s outrageous comments so crappy — he (temporarily) shattered the “just is” of New Mexico’s melting pot. And no, not even my Republican friends are buying his excuse that he meant to talk about long-ago generations, or that the BBC reporter took his quote out of context.

Mr. C. de Baca, I respect that you and your family have been here far longer than I have. But I’ve seen enough of New Mexico to know that you don’t speak for it or any significant number of European-Americans, at least not the areas in the Rio Grande corridor that I’ve come to know well.

For being a true melting pot, New Mexico ranks number one in America. Whoever is in second place is pretty far behind.

Politics aside

The politics of it all seems to be a wash. On the Republican side, the candidates are smart enough to distance themselves, but the Bernalillo County GOP leadership rallied around C. de Baca. Each speaks for itself.

In obvious ways, this controversy hurts the GOP, but in another way, every day Republicans succeed in making the discussion about race instead of economics or Iraq, it hurts Dems.

I almost didn’t write this column because this really is one of those times where even addressing it at all gives it more attention and value than it’s worth. And I’m probably not doing much to help the candidates or causes I believe in, and I’m even contributing to the distraction.

But New Mexico has a long history of people coming here to avoid diseases like tuberculosis. After living here for a few years, I’ve come to realize that racism, even for the vast majority of New Mexican Republicans, is a disease generally reserved for the distant past or for other parts of the country.

C. de Baca and the Bernalillo County Republican Party Executive Board aren’t merely being racist, they’re attacking a core value of a state that many of us love precisely for that core value. That value is worth defending even if it’s a distraction.

To Mr. C. de Baca and the Bernalillo County Republican Party Executive Board: New Mexico is the future of America. You are a sad part of the past. You don’t represent this great state, and you don’t even deserve to bask in its rich, multicultural heritage, much less its current beautiful tapestry. Please, keep your disease to yourselves.

Bundy is the political and legislative director for AFSCME in New Mexico. The opinions in his column are personal and do not necessarily reflect any official AFSCME position. You can learn more about him by clicking here. Contact him at carterbundy@yahoo.com.