New Mexico Mercury

The Brave New World of New Mexico Education

The very first thing we need to do is privatize public education. We have to act with haste. Thankfully, there’s a model we can follow. We’ve privatized our prisons, and just look at all the money we shook out for the tax payers even though, for some reason, it costs us more to run the prisons now than when the government managed the penal system, but never mind that. Facts are not important. Kids are...

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.”...

The Winnie and Skandy Show

It’s one of those moments when I feel I should take off my hat, bow my head, kneel down, and give thanks that indeed I live in New Mexico, where the bracing and slightly bitter essence of horseshit can suddenly waft through nuestro Burqueville.

I strongly believe anyone who doesn’t like the clean, strong smell of horseshit is a degenerate.  With great joy  therefore have I  just learned APS Superintendent Winnie Brooks has made livestock references about NM’s uncrowned Queen of Education Hanna Skandera...

Ignorance by Design

We know for sure education consists of giving tests to children in order to prepare them for the rigors of life in this complex era. The undesignated Queen of Education in New Mexico, Hanna La Skandera wants to come up with a single test that might not only be the summative evaluation of each and every kid, no matter what age, no matter what cultural background, no matter what language, no matter what economic status, no matter what family situation. Don’t worry about a thing.  The Great Exam will take care of everything that’s anything worth knowing...

The Anti-abortion Theocrats

Those kind and good people who want to ban abortion after twenty weeks really, behind the masks and shadow-dancing fetuses, are arguing for the establishment of a theocracy where God’s Law determines public policy.

They talk with great conviction about the sanctity of life and they say the aborted child-to-be feels pain. For example, let’s imagine the late-term fetus that has no brain, or no lungs, or no heart. Further, let’s imagine the mother-not-to-be and her doctor. If abortion is no longer an option, is it better to let this woman who bears such a child die in agony? Does this woman and how she wants to decide count for nothing?...

Republicans Trash Municipal Voting Rights

Some time before the recent municipal election the University of New Mexico contacted the city to see if, as usual, there would be a polling place at UNM, something which has happened during the 2007 election, the 2009 election, and the 2012 election. The University never heard back and there was no polling place to serve students and faculty.

A couple of nights ago your non-partisan city council decided to disenfranchise thousands of Albuquerque voters who have regularly polled at the campus. This is the same non-partisan council controlled by Republicans that created the new gerrymandered Council District Two...

Let’s Put God in the Driver’s Seat - The Upcoming Abortion Rights Vote

It’s always super nice when the divinity comes down out of the sky and tells us what to do, especially when we’re trying to think out thorny ethics issues like abortion.

Some folks yell at everybody else saying they are screeching with God’s voice. They want to see us ban late-term abortion.  If you disagree, they will hit you with everything they’ve got...

Susana Backpeddles

A Few short months ago Gov. Susana Martinez was hobnobbing with the Koch brothers out at Tamaya. This was a Tea Party love fest where Vice-Presidential-Hopeful Sooz was shmoozing and political french kissing the likes of Paul Ryan and Eric Cantor, architects of the current exceptionally smart government shutdown pulled by Republicans in the House.

Anyone who thinks the Democrats or Obama orchestrated this ill-conceived and silly catastrophe, hasn’t been paying attention for the past thirty or so years since Ronnie Reagan said in 1981 that government wasn’t the solution but it sure was the problem...

A Fresh Face: District Two Update

Guess who’s been rubbing elbows with David Koch at the lil ‘ol Country Club? And guess who got the royal nod from the National Association of Industrial and Office Parks (NAIOP): the Commerical Real Estate Development Association? The lengthy name alone shows just how important these folks really are! For instance, the New Mexico branch is currently headed up by Bruce Beebe, Wells Fargo VP for regional business banking.
Mercury readers, on Nov. 29 last year then pres. of the New Mexico NAIOP, Dale Dekker, wrote a letter endorsing this mystery person to run for city council in District 2 as a pro-business candidate.  If you guessed this mystery person is good ol’ Uberprogressive, District 2 candidate Rox Meyers, you were right! ...

She Shoulda Said It Better

In her gold necklace, and $3000 red dress, the neatly coiffed New Mexico Secretary  of Human Services, Sidonie Squier knows a thing or two about hunger and poverty. Obviously, from her getup, we know Squier knows the feeling when the growling stomach bumps up against the spine, the hands tremble uncontrollably and thinking is a dull haze. Obviously, Squier knows the dread of staring into your own child’s eyes and seeking an apology, some remorse, some explanation because there is nothing to eat in the house..