{"id":4123,"date":"2009-01-12T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-01-12T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/01\/nyt-explores-guvs-dealings-nms-lack-of-ethics-laws\/"},"modified":"2009-01-12T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2009-01-12T06:00:00","slug":"nyt-explores-guvs-dealings-nms-lack-of-ethics-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/01\/nyt-explores-guvs-dealings-nms-lack-of-ethics-laws\/","title":{"rendered":"NYT explores guv’s dealings, NM’s lack of ethics laws"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the Wild West,\u201d state Sen. Dede Feldman<\/a> says about New Mexico being one of only a handful of states without campaign contribution limits and an ethics commission.<\/p>\n

Thus begins an in-depth look at New Mexico\u2019s lack of ethics laws that ran in today\u2019s New York Times. It comes in the face of a federal grand jury investigation into allegations of pay-to-play in Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s<\/a> administration. You can read the article by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince taking office in 2003, Mr. Richardson has been dogged by accusations that big contributors to his campaign received favors from the state — patronage jobs, infrastructure projects, contracts, approvals from state boards. Those accusations, never proved, have not hurt Mr. Richardson\u2019s popularity,\u201d the article states. \u201cBut now the governor, who has promoted campaign-finance limits in recent years, finds himself on the defensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The money line in the article, I think, comes in the context of Richardson maintaining that campaign contributions don\u2019t influence his decisions.<\/p>\n

\u201cYet in an interview on NBC in 2007, Mr. Richardson acknowledged that giving money to a politician gives the donor \u2018a little bit of an edge,\u2019 the article states.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t give any extra access to somebody that contributes,\u201d Richardson said in that 2007 interview. \u201cBut I\u2019ll remember that person, and I\u2019ll say: \u2018Jeez, that guy helped me. Maybe I can help them.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Does that quote help put the current situation in context? I\u2019ll let you decide. But the article is really worth your time. Take a few minutes to read it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThis is the Wild West,\u201d state Sen. Dede Feldman says about New Mexico being one of only a handful of states without campaign contribution limits and an ethics commission. Thus begins an in-depth look at New Mexico\u2019s lack of ethics laws that ran in today\u2019s New York Times. It comes in the face of a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4123\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}