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.
Is it a coincidence that the NM GOP on Wednesday forwarded to reporters a story about how Republican gubernatorial candidate Susana Martinez carries a .45—the same day that Martinez campaign strategists were struggling to brush off the news that a Martinez employee forwarded a joke in which a “New Mexican girl” shoots an Arab and a Mexican with her .45?
“Yes, it is a coincidence,” NM GOP spokeswoman Janel Causey told The Independent Wednesday afternoon. “We try to send out our in-case-you-missed-its as fresh as we can.”
Still, the coincidence made some cringe.
“The question is: Are they meaning to say that she just carries a .45— or are they really meaning to say, on this day, with this news, she also would throw a glass up in the air?” state Sen. Cisco McSorley, D-Albuquerque, said.
The e-mail, for which Martinez said she reprimanded the prosecutor, was nothing new to Sen. McSorley.
“It’s not surprising. It is in accordance with all of the other bigoted e-mail I’m getting about immigration,” he said Wednesday afternoon.
“It seems that the tea party activists have now declared open season on people of color under the guise of immigration policy. The irony is that there is not one illegal immigrant that made the decision that led to the environmental catastrophe in the Gulf, not one illegal immigrant caused the collapse of the financial system, and there wasn’t one who caused the collapse of the housing market. And yet immigration is the issue that the tea party activists and the Republicans choose to focus on,” Sen. McSorley said.
But state Sen. Sue Wilson Beffort, R-Cedar Crest, declined to comment on the e-mail or Martinez’ .45, saying she’s tired of negative campaigning.
“I want to hear credentials and who’s going to lead the state in the right direction. We’ve got horrible problems in this state,” Beffort said, referring to a budget report she had just been reading.
On the subject of immigration in general, Beffort said: “I feel both candidates need to be impressing the public with their good ideas and their leadership skills. I don’t think there’s any easy solution to the immigration problem. I know we’ve got some dangerous situations that involve illegal immigrants, but I also know we have people who are coming in here to experience the American dream.”
Discussions of offensive e-mails and state employees watching porn on work computers distracts from the real issues in the campaign, Beffort said.
“The voters need to be ascertaining who will provide the proper administration with the right kind of hires to surround themselves with,” Beffort said, not speaking directly about Martinez and her embattled prosecutor.
“These are things that voters want to hear about. They want to sense a good, honest leader. I hope that we can not be distracted.”
