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Columns

  • More money, less result

    During her campaign, Gov. Susana Martinez said that she would not cut education. Based on revised budget numbers that were released immediately after she was elected, that went out the window. Now, Martinez is proposing very modest cuts of 1.5 percent for K-12.

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  • Let the good times roll

    We’re out of the woods. We’re out of the dark. We’re into the light.
    Nope, we’re not in Kansas anymore. However, there is a Wizard of Oz-like feel to remarks made by Mark C. Snead, an energy economist from the Denver office of our Federal Reserve Bank.
    Speaking to the CFA Society of New Mexico, Snead reportedly said New Mexico and other oil and gas producing states were on the verge of good times.  

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  • Perhaps U.S. is lagging

    The pubic is bombarded with news reports saying that young people in the U.S. aren’t learning enough about science, especially compared to kids in Asia.
    I’m not sure that’s true, because I work at a large university where I see very able American students starting to excel in their scientific careers, and I hear back from them as they flourish in later years.   
    But perhaps we really are falling behind. After all, everyone says so.
    How would we start to investigate that possibility?

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  • Tax considerations for the self-employed

    Self-employment has its appeal, especially when businesses aren’t creating jobs fast enough for the nation’s unemployed.

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  • Review is dismal flop

    Oh, dear. Sunset review is back again – another great idea that may not work so well in New Mexico.
    Sunset review is legislative code language for kicking the can down the road.      If it worked, we would not today have the proliferation of boards and commissions that some folks consider irrelevant and excessive. They would have been sunsetted — that is, closed — in prior legislative sessions.

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  • Udall's big day in DC

    Sen. Tom Udall has had his big day in Congress – at least for now. New Mexico’s freshman Democratic senator and a number of colleagues elected in the big Democratic years of 2006 and 2008 became dissatisfied about the Senate’s slow pace a year or so ago.
    Udall, his cousin Rep. Mark Udall of Colorado, and a few others with experience in the U.S. House of Representatives, were accustomed to a much quicker pace of work, with bills rammed through by strong leaders such as Nancy Pelosi, Tom DeLay and Newt Gingrich.

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  • Valentine's Day isn't the only time for us to appreciate others

    Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, reminding us to celebrate the ones we love. But most of us need more than one day a year to remember to honor and cherish those dear to us.
    I was telling my husband off in my head the other day. You know the way you vent your frustration with the virtual argument you can win, rather than with the actual one you probably won’t, when I suddenly realized that, what I was saying to him, equally applied to me.  

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  • How’s that working for ya?

    Do you ever wonder why children don’t routinely stick their hands in fire?  
    Maybe it’s because they did it before and it hurt?  They learned not to do it again.  This is what psychologists call “one trial learning.”

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  • Help shape the future of Los Alamos County

    Los Alamos County has been working toward creating a more sustainable community for several years.  
    It is time for us to take a step back, analyze our progress and reexamine our plans for the future.  
    Previous columns have touched on some of the actions taken, and now it is time for you, as an educated and motivated citizen, to take an active role in shaping our community’s future.     
    Creating a sustainable Los Alamos County is going to require participation and ingenuity from you.  

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  • This state is a mess

    You’ve got to hand it to Rep. Joseph Cervantes, Las Cruces Democrat. He pursues lonely quests, an admirable trait so long as he doesn’t go too far along the fantasy paths of Don Quixote, the protagonist of the first modern novel, written by a namesake, Miguel de Cervantes.
    But read Don Quixote (and I have). You will find that the good Don’s efforts, some addled, some not, pursued truth, justice and the American way, as Superman might put it.

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