New Mexico — swing state

By Pat Rogers

MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL — New Mexico is in the front row of the Republican convention. Will Cavin, the Chaves County Republican Party chair, and Phil Archuletta, the New Mexico delegate with the most seniority, insist that the TV networks want them close to the cameras for ratings purposes. Stu Spillar, the history teacher from Hobbs, talks about New Mexico’s history of close elections and our “swing state” status.

No other state is bracketed by a neighbor president on one side and a presidential candidate on the other. Laura Bush dropped by the New Mexico delegation for lunch yesterday and invited her “New Mexico neighbors” to Crawford to visit anytime. No small state is so spoiled.

Yesterday we had breakfast with the Louisiana delegation. No, the grits did not have any green chile. The Louisiana/New Mexico breakfast had been planned for some time before Louisiana’s latest troubles. Almost all of that state’s delegation was in good spirits, with the good news from home of only (so far) two hurricane-related deaths. The scope of the evacuation is difficult to appreciate. The loading and transportation of more than the entire population of New Mexico occurred in just a few days.

Heather Wilson was the main speaker at the breakfast, along with Gov. Huntsman of Utah. Sen. Burr of North Carolina, co-chair of the platform committee, and Charlie Black, senior advisor to the McCain campaign, had comments as well. One of McCain’s POW comrades introduced a Medal of Honor winner.

Our Louisiana friends are serious political junkies. Several asked about Heather’s chances for a cabinet appointment.

The chairman of their delegation said his notes were prepared weeks ago and he wanted to thank New Mexico for “sending your New Mexico help” in the aftermath of Katrina. We all were aware that Darren White had spent weeks in Louisiana with other law enforcement officials from New Mexico, but we also found out that Heather’s husband, Reserve Colonel Jay Hone, was also deployed to that state in Katrina’s wake.

Heather is appearing almost hourly on national radio and TV (MSNBC, CNN, PBS and most importantly, of course, KOB).

I attended several events for the new national committee members. Hours of the minute details of federal law, about campaign restrictions. A collection of bad lawyer jokes kept going through my mind. Mike Duncan is the national chairman of the Republican National Committee and a former general counsel. He cautioned people that the job does not include booking Gov. Palin for campaign visits.

Rogers is the RNC’s national committeeman from New Mexico. He is blogging from this week’s convention.