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Columns

  • Political misfortune

    With the massacre in Tucson we’ve discovered that progressives have something akin to a pathological disorder when it comes to evaluating free speech. Particularly speech that doesn’t paint progressives in glowing terms, it appears.  
    Everyone from the Democratic Tucson sheriff to liberals Keith Olbermann, Paul Krugman and Katie Couric to the New York Times accused Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin of all but pulling the trigger. Basically.   

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  • Compromise is progress

    In 2010, a year that was bottom-heavy with bad news, we saw major progress in the stormy world of water.
    Three landmark cases that defied resolution and guaranteed lawyers’ job security were settled, and our congressional delegation, led by Sen. Jeff Bingaman, managed to wring funding from Congress.
    We also marked progress on the Rio Grande and in Ruidoso.

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  • Tool helps small business tap global markets

    Technology and energy products, chili peppers, nuts, dairy goods and other farm products have topped the list of New Mexico’s exports for the past few years, but the state has a vast untapped potential to sell more of its goods and services well beyond our nation’s boundaries.

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  • Birthright all wrong

    The first week of the year started off with a bang.  Well, more of a loud laugh.  The new majority in the House decided to demonstrate that they are “dedicated to our Constitution and the principles for which it stands” and hence used a couple hours to read the U.S. Constitution.  

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  • Small scale bold changes appear

    Consider this column a memo to New Mexico’s new public education boss, Hanna Skandera.
    When thinking about system change, don’t think about reform. The trap is that words mean something. “Reform,” by definition, accepts the current system and proposes betterment by tweaking.
    Mere “reform” of our public schools won’t get the job done, Ms. Skandera.

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  • Gov’s prosecutorial roots surface

    During the recent campaign, New Mexicans heard a great deal from their Republican and Democratic gubernatorial candidates, Susana Martinez and Diane Denish, about the proposals they would submit to the 2011 legislature for dealing with the state’s wickedly unbalanced budget.
    Those proposals, with variations on themes, boiled down to promises neither to hike taxes nor to cut spending on education and Medicaid. Hardly anyone versed in the realities of New Mexico’s budget woes considered the candidates’ budget balancing notions in the least plausible.  

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  • Freedom not protected

    Americans take religious liberty for granted. Unfortunately, this most fundamental freedom is not protected in many countries around the world.
    Religious liberty is the proverbial canary in the mine. If a state won’t respect this most basic freedom of conscience, it isn’t likely to respect people’s lives and dignity in any context.
    There is more than enough bad news to fill the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom’s latest annual report. Worst of all were the conditions in 13 “countries of particular concern.”

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  • Dear citizens and Los Alamos County employees ...

    Over the course of my career in city management, I have observed many changes in how municipal government has improved and evolved.
    Also during this time in public service, I have faced many challenges and feel that in all aspects I was able to contribute toward making a positive difference in the outcomes of those challenges faced by the communities that I served.  

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  • The Municipal Building Initiative — a Primer

    Now that the judge has approved the settlement we reached with the county council halting an election on the question posed in a petition regarding the location of the new municipal building, we feel an obligation to explain our position to Los Alamos.  

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  • Techno-terror bites

    A tsunami is an onslaught of waves generated in any large body of water by an earthquake, volcanic eruption, or some other cataclysmic disturbance.  Drop a large enough object into the Atlantic Ocean and you would generate a tsunami (maybe we could toss Washington D.C. in just to test this out?).

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