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The Albuquerque Journal today examined involvement by that city’s mayor, Martin Chávez, and his staffers in city council races. That included reporting on the situation I disclosed earlier this week related to a committee that attacked two councilors earlier this summer. Check it out by clicking here. Continue Reading
The legislative committee that oversees the state’s affordable housing system will meet Monday in Las Cruces. The Legislative Mortgage Finance Authority Act Oversight Committee will hear updates from the two regional housing authorities still operating after the rest of the system crumbled amid scandal last year, and will also learn about and tour affordable housing projects in Doña Ana County, according to the agenda. The meeting begins at 10 a.m. in the Barbara Hubbard Room at the Pan American Center on the New Mexico State University campus. It is open to the public. “During this meeting we will be continuing our review of the challenges and opportunities our state faces in the area of affordable housing, and this includes a review of the performance of our regional housing authorities,” said Sen. Nancy Rodriguez, D-Santa Fe and chair of the committee. Continue Reading
© 2007 Michael Swickard, Ph.D. Among the really great moments of our nation stands Dec. 8, 1941. On that Monday more young men volunteered to serve in our military than any other date. Each looked within and found a need to put country before self, even to the point of giving their lives. We remember Dec. Continue Reading
Gov. Bill Richardson ended the second quarter of the year statistically tied with John Edwards in New Hampshire polls and having raised $7 million to Edwards’ $9 million. Three months later, there are signs that some things have changed. Edwards has climbed a bit in the polls, but there are signs that the governor might raise more money during the fundraising quarter that ends Sunday. While both candidates were averaging about 9 percent in New Hampshire polls at the end of June, the newest poll, conducted by the University of New Hampshire for CNN, had Richardson at 6 percent and Edwards at 12 percent. For Richardson, that’s a drop of five points from the UNH July poll. Continue Reading
The New Mexico Supreme Court has rejected a petition for discipline of a judge tied to the state housing authority scandal because the requested punishment wasn’t harsh enough. In an order issued today, the high court rejected the Judicial Standards Commission’s petition for discipline, which sought a reprimand for Bernalillo County Metropolitan Court Judge Theresa Gomez and a requirement that she pay $17,000 in back rent to the Albuquerque-based Region III Housing Authority. The court suggested that Gomez be required to pay the back rent and be suspended for two weeks, but sent the matter to the commission for further consideration. The commission made the request earlier this month because Gomez lived rent-free, for 20 months, in a home owned by the housing authority, an organization whose mission is providing housing for low-income people. At the time, Gomez was making $93,000 per year. Continue Reading
Today on The Morning Show with Alan Riehl, I discussed Gov. Bill Richardson’s performance at Wednesday’s debate, the upcoming Las Cruces municipal election, U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici’s falling poll numbers and the allegations against U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce. You can listen to the 38-minute podcast by clicking here. Continue Reading
The Albuquerque Tribune published an article today about my Wednesday column that reported on e-mails and cell phone records suggesting the chief of staff to the Albuquerque mayor and others were involved in an assault in May on two city councilors. The column’s publication on this site and in the Trib marked the first time the documents were revealed publicly. In today’s article, the two councilors who were the primary targets of the May campaign accused Mayor Martin Chávez’s administration of violating ethics rules in orchestrating the attack. Read the article by clicking here. Continue Reading
An activist for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community has announced her candidacy for the New Mexico Senate seat currently held by Democrat John Grubesic of Santa Fe. Mekah Gordon, a Democrat, will be running against the senator in the June 2008 primary. Gordon wrote in a recent e-mail to supporters that, as the District 25 senator, she wants to work toward the establishment of a “harassment free, diverse and humanistic educational school system” and will also push for visual and performing arts education in all schools, civil rights and equality, low- and middle-income tax breaks and better health care for the elderly and veterans. “I have consistently maintained a well documented platform of sensitivity, diversity understanding, civil rights, compassion and mutual respect,” she wrote. “Believing in and supporting my candidacy for New Mexico state senator will reestablish honesty and truth in a political arena seemingly void of such characteristics.” Gordon is an artist who designs and crafts jewelry and is also a photographer and sculptor. Continue Reading
Gov. Bill Richardson’s performance at Wednesday’s Democratic presidential candidate debate was overshadowed by the assertions of others that some of his claims were unrealistic and disingenuous. To top it off, it was John Edwards, not Richardson, who most convincingly set himself apart from the frontrunners on the issue of troop withdrawal from Iraq. The night started off well for Richardson because the moderator of the MSNBC debate, Tim Russert, asked the frontrunners whether they would promise that, if they were elected, there would be no American troops in Iraq by the end of their first term in January 2013. The question appeared to be driven by Richardson’s recent attacks on the frontrunners for rejecting his plan for the withdrawal of all American troops, including residual troops, in a matter of months. Richardson has repeatedly said Edwards, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton aren’t being honest with the American people when they say they would end the war but also plan to leave some troops in Iraq. Continue Reading
The day after a new poll showed U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici’s approval rating falling to 41 percent, Bill Richardson’s presidential campaign made its strongest statement yet that the governor isn’t interested in running against the state’s senior senator next year. “The governor is running to be the next president of the U.S.,” spokesman Pahl Shipley wrote today in an e-mail. “With Congress, been there, done that. Not interested.” Richardson spent 14 years in the U.S. House of Representatives. Shipley’s comments come the day after the new SurveyUSA poll had the GOP senator’s support dropping 11 points since August and below 50 percent for the first time in the history of the poll that began in May 2005. Continue Reading
Gov. Bill Richardson could make an appointment to the New Mexico Supreme Court as early as mid-October, a spokesman said today. By law, the governor has to make the appointment within 30 days of being notified of the recommendations of the judicial nominating commission that met Monday. The notification was probably not made until Tuesday, which would give the governor until Oct. 24 to make the appointment. “The governor will be carefully considering all the nominees and has 30 days to make the appointment per the Constitution,” spokesman Gilbert Gallegos said, adding that the appointment could come in mid-October. Continue Reading
By Whitney Cheshire The debate over children’s health insurance shows us that Heather Wilson is still very much Heather Wilson. Late Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would greatly improve access to health insurance for our country’s poorest kids. It was the latest vote on the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), and it went down as most people expected – sort of. The SCHIP debate The program to provide health insurance for low-income kids was instituted nationally in 1996 by Republicans. At the time, Wilson, who is now the GOP representative from Albuquerque, was cabinet secretary for the state’s Children, Youth, and Families Department. Continue Reading
By Carter Bundy Got shares? Most of us do. If you don’t have a 401(k), you might have an IRA. You might be lucky enough to work for a company that chips in for your nest egg. So if half of us or more own huge, publicly-traded companies, how do we keep getting ripped off by Enron, Worldcom, Exxon-Mobil and Home Depot? Continue Reading
In comments published in the Albuquerque Tribune on May 30, Barry Bitzer, chief of staff to Mayor Martin Chávez, denied any involvement by the mayor or himself in a campaign against two city councilors who opposed a Chávez tax-cut proposal. Instead, Bitzer called the Committee for Responsible Budgets’ campaign, which included radio advertisements and robocalls attacking conservatives Brad Winter and Don Harris, “a grassroots movement.” City e-mail and phone records suggest otherwise. The ads and robocalls began shortly after the committee was formed on May 24, three days after the council’s vote against the tax cut. But Bitzer and two others close to the mayor possessed scripts for the ads and robocalls on May 20, the day before the council vote and four days before the committee was formed. Documents obtained from the city through a records request show that Bitzer sent the scripts that day, by e-mail, to Mark Fleisher, a Democratic operative who works for the mayor’s gubernatorial exploratory committee, and Greg Payne, the city’s transit director. Continue Reading
U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici’s approval rating has fallen 11 points in the last month, and it’s now below the 50-percent mark for the first time. The newest SurveyUSA poll, released today, is bad news for a GOP senator who keeps ending up on lists of endangered incumbents even though he hasn’t yet drawn a high-profile Democratic challenger. Domenici’s support is at 41 percent, down from 52 percent in August, and he’s increasingly looking vulnerable. “The people of New Mexico are clearly unhappy that Pete Domenici is more loyal to George Bush and his failed policies than to the families of New Mexico,” state Democratic Party Chairman Brian S. Colón said in a news release. “This poll confirms that Domenici is in serious danger of losing his job when New Mexicans go to the polls next year.” It’s also an indication that national groups that have attacked Domenici for failing to support an immediate withdrawal from Iraq and new renewable energy standards are having an effect. Continue Reading