Columns

Do you remember the days when we had a year off between election campaigns? Even better, we had a year off from negative political advertising.
No more. Announcements for next year’s gubernatorial campaign began even before the 2012 elections. Governor Susana Martinez never quit fundraising. She just had a big fundraiser in Taos and Palm Desert, Calif., that made the news. It isn’t unusual for first-term governors to raise money year-round for four years.
Attorney General Gary King announced for governor long before the 2012 elections. He had been asked to make a politically controversial investigation and decision so felt he had to reveal his conflict.
Soon after the 2012 general election Sen. Linda Lopez, of Albuquerque, and Clovis Mayor Gayla Brumfield announced their Democratic candidacies for governor. There likely will be several more announcements shortly.
In fact, some possible candidates, such as Howie Morales, of Silver City have announced they may announce for governor.
Most confounding of all is a negative Republican campaign that has already begun against Democratic Sen. Tim Keller, of Albuquerque. Keller has been mentioned as a possible gubernatorial candidate but has not announced.

“Ya think, DiNozzo?” Gibbs responds on NCIS when Agent Dinozzo offers something totally obvious. Today’s question might better be, “Just what were they thinking?”
Two recent headlines create the suspicion that all may well not be right. For me, the stories generate wonder about the culture, the mindset of the Obama administration. Both touch New Mexico.
The old news is the Internal Revenue Service using tax rules to intimidate conservative advocacy organizations. IRS games with the Albuquerque Tea Party reportedly started in late 2011. The IRS sought all sorts of documents from the group, including emails between board members.
I have seen bureaucratic intimidation. A classic was the member of Albuquerque’s zoning board, the Environmental Planning Commission, instructing a developer to plant a tree in the front yard of every home in his subdivision. Other developers have muttered between their teeth about petty changes perpetually required that eventually destroy a project.

In a rare bipartisan moment, something significant happened last week in the United States Senate and New Mexico’s two senators, Tom Udall and Martin Heinrich, helped to make it happen by voting to end the chaos and misunderstanding surrounding the sales tax and online purchases.
And good for them and the 67 other senators who joined in bipartisan passage of the Marketplace Fairness Act.
One of the major fictions about commerce today is that Internet sales are immune from what we here in New Mexico call the gross-receipts tax, but is more commonly known elsewhere as the sales tax.
Yet, while the great bulk of online sales do go tax free, so to speak, others are in fact legally subject to the sales tax in New Mexico and other states with such a tax.
By law, any retailer with an outlet, store or office in a state where a consumer makes an online purchase is required to collect whatever rate the sales tax is levied. So if you live in New Mexico and purchase a coat from Eddie Bauer, you are obligated to pay the 5.125 to 8.6875 percent (depending on location) gross-receipts tax levied on that sale.
Why? Because Eddie Bauer has an outlet in New Mexico.

As long as we have been talking about Gov. Susana Martinez and former Gov. Garry Carruthers, we don’t want former Gov. Bill Richardson to feel left out.
While our current governor darts around the nation and world, our immediate past governor, Bill Richardson is doing much the same. He is serving on numerous boards, some of which he heads. He is speaking at prestigious universities.
He is writing a book, “How to Sweet Talk a Shark.” It tells of his experiences successfully negotiating with dictators.
Richardson said the secrets are to connect with them personally. Let them vent about how badly the United States has treated them. Find out what they really need, not what they say they need. And use humor.
Negotiating with dictators is dangerous business. Richardson was basically by himself with no protection other than his own wits. He always had quiet approval of the presidents he served and he was a U.S. official.
But it all was taking place on a back channel. Richardson was good at it and has lived to tell the story. The book comes out this fall, but he already is being interviewed on television and in newspapers.