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.
Republican congressional leaders made noise Wednesday about targeting the nation’s new federal health care law after winning control of the U.S. House of Representatives and adding a few more Republicans to the U.S. Senate on Tuesday, the Washington Post reports.
It’s no secret that the GOP made repealing the law one of the battle cries of the 2010 midterm congressional elections, a position that helped fueled what the Post called the largest Republican sweep in nearly half a century.
But the GOP has few easy paths to repealing the health care law, the Associated Press writes in an analysis published earlier this morning.
Some of the law’s provisions are popular, making it more difficult to undo them, the AP writes. Also, Republicans aren’t yet on the same page on a strategy to take on the law it appears.
Here’s an excerpt from the AP story:
Mindful that some of the new benefits are popular, House Republican leader John Boehner has stressed that a “replace” measure preserving some aspects of Obama’s overhaul would go with legislation to repeal it. But not all his followers agree. Some conservatives want a straight vote on repeal that would leave the “replace” part for later.
Then there’s the political reality. The GOP controls one chamber of Congress, not both. Democrats still retain control of the U.S. Senate. Also President Obama has the veto pen, meaning he can effectively cancel legislation he doesn’t like.
What ultimately the GOP will do, and how the president and the Senate respond, will make for interesting political theater over the next several months.
But the battle over the federal health care law isn’t going to be fought only in Washington. The states have a major role to play as provisions of the year-old law roll out over the next three years.
Here in New Mexico it’s unclear how the next governor, Republican Susana Martinez, will affect the political debate here, if at all. Outgoing Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson has been supportive of the roll out of the new federal law, with its hoped-for goal of reducing the number of uninsured people in the state. New Mexico has one of the largest rates of uninsured in the nation.
Also in another development Tuesday, some states elected opponents of the nation’s health care law to the post of Insurance Commissioner. In many states the insurance commissioner is one of point people in the ongoing conversation between local officials and the federal government about the new health care law. In many states the insurance commissioner also will be responsible for implementing rules that are part of the new law.
New Mexico doesn’t elect its insurance commissioner. That person is appointed. But watching how other states respond to federal rules given new leadership in the insurance commissioner’s office could provide a tip off on how this wide-ranging, complex battle will play out both in and away from Washington.
