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.
Former New Mexico Independent contributor Heath Haussamen sums up the latest spat between GOP U.S. Senate candidates Lt. Gov John Sanchez and former Rep. Heather Wilson:
I wondered, if Sanchez is attacking Wilson for voting against Ryan’s 2007 amendment, does that mean he would have supported it?
Yes, Sanchez would have voted for the 2007 amendment if he had been in the U.S. House at the time, Casteel told NMPolitics.net. The amendment would have cut $279 billion in spending, most of it out of health-care entitlement programs such as Medicare and Medicaid. It also would have extended the Bush tax cuts.
OK. If Sanchez would have supported that 2007 amendment that slashed health-care programs and extended tax cuts, and that amendment was “similar” to this year’s proposal from Ryan, does that mean Sanchez supports the Ryan budget?
Casteel didn’t directly answer the question, instead leaving Sanchez in limbo by pointing to the candidate’s prior statement on the Ryan budget:
“I haven’t seen a perfect budget solution yet, but Paul Ryan’s is a very good start. We must rein in government spending. It is immoral to spend money we don’t have.”
That’s essentially what Wilson said in a previous interview with Haussamen that Rep. Ryan “has done a service to the nation by presenting substantive ideas.” So there’s no difference on what they say now. Like a lot of Republicans, both offer praise for the Ryan plan (look what happened when Newt Gingrich opposed the plan) but distance themselves from specific plan to convert Medicare to a voucher program.
