New Mexico Mercury

El Machete: Sam Coronado

El Machete: Sam Coronado

Weekly Poem: Dad’s Visit

What did we do
to deserve this beauty -- our blooming cactus flowers, the emerald green shine of our chiles, the boys
and girls the backbones of our families, taking a stab
at adulthood in middle school?  In a city of strong kids, under a sky so wide and this blue,
it’s as though we’re being showered
with praise by a gorgeously generous god...

Runoff Rule a Major Factor in ABQ Special Election

I can only assume that both Janice Arnold-Jones and Bud Shaver each wish that they had never heard the other's name.

Everything that happened in Albuquerque's special election - and I do mean everything, especially the overwhelming defeat of the carpetbaggers' anti-women/anti-choice/and-science abortion ban - came down to the District 7 run-off. Without the less-than-50% runoff rule and the city council race that fell under those terms, the vote on the Albuquerque late-term abortion ban would have been a mail-in election only...

Tragedy and comedy on the Albuquerque stage

It may seem paradoxical but it often happens that traveling to distant places gives you a clearer understanding of home. Having just returned to New Mexico after three months in northern California, I have acquired a new and broader perspective on some aspects of New Mexico. One of them is the unusual theater scene in the Albuquerque area.

All this is by way of commenting on two Albuquerque plays I saw last weekend...

High Stakes, Low Turnout Elections

Local politics was overshadowed by non-stop Washington dramas this fall, but important trends emerged and decisions were made in New Mexico and the Paso del Norte borderland that will chart the identity and destiny of the region for years to come. Yet in various contests, it was a distinct minority of the electorate that shaped future courses...

Destruction of Public Education Continues Apace

Hanna the Great met with teachers in Albuquerque last week, and guess what, they didn’t like the new step toward privatizing New Mexico education one darn bit. I wonder why. Despite objections from educators, ed. administrators throughout the state, and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, PED says the student and teacher evaluation program is going forward at double speed. “We don’t give a tortilla for what you think.”...

El Machete: Off the Chain!

El Machete

CVNM’s 2013 Conservation Scorecard: Legislative actions to protect our water were the exception

Today, we unveiled the statewide 2013 Conservation Scorecard. The Scorecard reflects the deep disagreement over the management of our state’s scarce water supplies.

As our population grows and water supplies dwindle—exacerbated by the growing effects of climate change—we must work even harder to keep the water we have clean. Sadly, the votes tell the story: legislative actions to proactively protect our water were the exception, not the rule...

On the wild side

Some years ago my family, and a friend and I went for a long day hike to the high lakes around Truchas, Las Trampas and Santa Barbara in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains north of Santa Fe. At a gorgeous but icy mountain tarn more than 11,000 feet high, my quite large friend plunged into the clear turquoise water. His splash boomed through the thin air and created a wave that bounced off the far shore. He emerged shivering but with an ecstatic smile of pure triumph.

That incident occurred to me as I was reading a new book about the mountains of northern New Mexico, A Walk Around the Horizon by Tom Harmer (UNM Press, 208 pages, $24.95 in paperback)...

Weekly Poem: Letters From The Dark

One friend writes from prison,
as helpless as I am
to help him.

Another friend, dead, reveals
himself through words left behind, signs
of him I never noticed
when I thought I knew him...