Author Archives | Jim Baca
Jim Baca has a strong record of visionary service to New Mexico. He recently retired as the State of New Mexico's Natural Resource Trustee. He has served as Mayor of the City of Albuquerque, as well as two prior terms as New Mexico’s elected State Land Commissioner. He served as the Director of the National Bureau of Land Management, Department of the Interior in the first Clinton Administration. Jim Baca also serves on the Boards of numerous non profit organizations including The Wilderness Society and the Wyss Foundation and the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. Baca has run a successful public affairs consulting practice when not serving in public office.
Sit Her Down
It is amazing really, the fact that no one can manage to sit Governor Susana Martinez down for an interview on the dismal state of the economy in New Mexico. First off, is the media even trying to put her on the spot to answer for the out-migration of jobs and young people? All of this while the states around us continue to prosper. But, let’s say some are trying to pin her down and she is refusing to be held accountable. What does that say about the apparatus that surrounds her in an impenetrable wall of Spin?...
Continue reading...The Machine
07. May 2014
It is truly sad to see how the Albuquerque Journal has become part of the GOP machine. Today's editorial decrying the peaceful but noisy civil disobedience in the city council meeting Monday evening seems to forget the importance of such actions to this nation's history. Gee, remember the Tea Party? And all to protect the Mayor who was once again no where to be seen. And then the Journal puts in a snippet about how the adjourned meeting might have cost the city $200,000 in higher interest charges because some bonds were not purchased. How about the tens of millions of dollars that the city has paid out in lawsuits for the killing spree from APD?...
Continue reading...For Berry, nothing sticks
27. August 2013
Mayor Berry is Teflon, the Teflon being applied by the Albuquerque Journal. He says he has guided Albuquerque through tough economic times with a steady hand. The Journal doesn't really question his lack of action. Paul Heh, one of his opponents said it was 'bull shit' and pretty much lowered his expected vote from 5% to 2%. Pete Dinelli didn't get in any killer shots in this last debate. All of this is being fueled by incredible apathy on the part of the public who can't see that New Mexico and Albuquerque are falling further and further behind in economic growth compared to the other cities and states in the region...
Continue reading...Paranoia
06. August 2013
I see a plot in the New Mexico Medical Board's rule to make medicinal marijuana prescriptions hard to write for patients. This is nothing but big pharma applying pressure to the Docs to make it hard to prescribe the low cost and effective herb to patients that qualify. I mean if a few brownies take the place of outrageously expensive drugs then corporate profits will slide. How much longer do we need to put up with this corporate manipulation of everything in our lives? Am I being paranoid? Or is having the munchies a threat to our way of life?...
Continue reading...The other welfare: Oil and gas royalties
30. July 2013
It may come as a surprise to some that the royalty rate charged to companies extracting oil and gas from federal lands is the same today as it was in the 1920s, when Woodrow Wilson was president.
Oil and gas found on federal lands belong to the taxpayers, who should be fairly compensated for the extraction of public resources. Updating the federal rate to match state rates would ensure a fair return by closing a gap that costs taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars each year...
Continue reading...Death comes to The Range
24. July 2013
Every journalist in the state must see the death of their profession lurking over their shoulder. The demise of the Raton Range because of falling revenues, population, and readership was just a matter of time. Small newspapers are going fast around the country. Unless they are big enough to be bought by rightwing corporations headed by the likes of the Koch brothers, then there are no lifelines for them.
The Albuquerque Journal's ever diminishing content and ever increasing right-wing view of the world cannot be offset by doing their editorial cartoons in color...
Continue reading...
29. May 2014
1 Comment