I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
The Obama administration is now accepting public comments on a plan to ditch a Bush administration rule (pdf) that would have severely limited access to women’s reproductive health services.
Supporters said the rule was necessary to protect the religious and moral rights of health-care workers; opponents argued that existing laws already protect workers and that the rule was a parting gift to extremists of the religious right.
Just before leaving office, the Bush administration pushed through a last-minute rule that would make it much more difficult for women to get information about and access to birth control, abortion and sterilization. As NMI reported, the rule had been opposed by major health-care organizations, Democratic legislators and many state government health groups.
“We have laws in New Mexico that many states do not have, in terms of reproductive health and end-of-life care,” that would be thrown into legal confusion if the Bush rules were enacted, Jane Wishner, executive director of the Albuquerque-based Southwest Women’s Law Center told NMI last year. As Wishner wrote in an analysis of the rule:
The current draft regulation would substantially undermine New Mexico statutes that promote and protect patients’ ability to make their own health care decisions. One of the stated purposes of the draft regulation is to counter state laws, including specifically New Mexico’s Sexual Assault Survivors Emergency Care Act, that do not allow for the expansive refusals contained in the regulation. There are numerous statutes in New Mexico that could be affected by such a regulation.
Before he took office, Obama said he would move to rescind the rule if the Bush administration went ahead with it; since taking office he has acted quickly to reverse it.
Public comments are being accepted until April 9. Voice your opinion here: www.regulations.gov by clicking here.
Related stories on NewMexicoIndependent.com:
‘Conscience rule’ could impact rape victims, HIV patients
Overturning Bush’s ‘conscience rule’ could be a nightmare
