New Mexico Mercury

Late last month, in response to a TV ad by Governor Martinez and an op-ed by a Republican legislator, both touting the Martinez administration’s performance in job creation, I wrote my own piece and the Albuquerque Journal published it.

As expected, Paul Gessing of the Rio Grande Foundation, responded to my column with a commentary of his own. Resorting to stereotyping labels and name-calling, Gessing tried to deflect my argument by . . . ignoring it and mislabeling it.

I guess when the facts aren’t on your side, you fall back on ideology and distortion.

So let’s revisit the issues and recap the argument.

Susana Martinez says that she’s a friend of small and medium-sized business because she once worked for her parents’ security guard company. That’s the claim in her TV ad. Based on that, she’s asking for a second term as governor.

My argument is based on facts. The facts say she has been a failure when it comes to jobs and economic development.

As I pointed out in my Journal column, New Mexico is one of only two states to lose jobs—actually lose jobs—in the middle of a national economic recovery.

The rest of the country is growing. New Mexico under Susana Martinez is stuck in an endless recession.

Other states are adding jobs. New Mexico under Susana Martinez is shedding jobs. That includes manufacturing jobs: under Susana Martinez, New Mexico has suffered 18 straight months of manufacturing job loss.

But the facts keep coming. Since I wrote that op-ed, the Brookings Institution announced that Albuquerque is in the middle of a double-dip recession. New Mexico’s largest city ranks dead last among the 100 largest U.S. metro areas when it comes to recovering from the recession.

Those are the facts.

Mr. Gessing doesn’t dispute the facts in his response—because he can’t.             

Instead he ignores the facts and argues semantics.

First, he says that I didn’t offer sound solutions to New Mexico’s economic disaster. That’s simply not true. In my Journal op-ed I sketched out specific options for a realistic economic recovery for New Mexico. In the course of my campaign for Governor I specified even more. In fact, I produced a comprehensive approach to job creation and economic development, drawing on my own background as an entrepreneur and businessman.

I pointed out a variety of ways that New Mexico could flourish: supporting our culture of entrepreneurship, tapping into new technology in such areas as biomedicine and water management, advancing farming and ranching, reimagining tourism, promoting arts and culture, and leveraging renewable energy such as wind, solar and geothermal resources. I said over and over that New Mexico’s economy is “hiding in plain sight”— we are fortunate to have not just one economy, but many economies, most of them small, nimble, agile, and local.

What is Mr. Gessing’s response?

He cherry-picks the issue of green jobs and renewable energy and says that the potential for that sector of the economy has been over-hyped. Then he goes on to accuse me of some sort of “typical, central-planning” approach to economic development that favors picking winners and losers for government support.

Frankly, this is utter nonsense.

I’m not advocating industrial policy at the level of state government and Mr. Gessing knows that. He’s simply using worn out rhetoric to play old political games. He chooses to ignore my background as editorial director of the Harvard Business Review and co-founder of Fast Company magazine, and instead play “label games”—he wants me to be a “liberal” and a “central planner”—which is some kind of code he uses to suggest I don’t understand or believe in capitalism.

Sorry, Mr. Gessing, that kind of name calling just won’t work.

What about the merits? What about the facts?

Let’s just take one part of the green jobs debate.

New Mexico ranks #2 in the country in solar potential. We’re #7 for inland wind potential and #13 for geothermal potential. Because solar energy is a distributed technology, wherever there are solar installations, there are construction jobs. Green jobs include green homes and office buildings. In New Mexico’s endless recession, building permits for green projects have continued to be issued; other construction projects are at a standstill. Mr. Gessing may continue to disparage sustainability as an economic advantage but the facts show that New Mexico has a chance to be the most sustainable state in the country—and to leverage that distinction into building the economy of the future.

Don’t take my word for it. Consider the investment wisdom of Warren Buffett who has publicly said that he’d like to double down on the $15 billion he has already invested in clean energy.

So who are you going to listen to? Warren Buffett? Or Paul Gessing?

Of course, investing like a Warren Buffett requires vision and a line of sight into the future. Unfortunately for New Mexico, Governor Martinez has her eyes firmly fixed on the past—and the narrow interests of her campaign contributors. She has ignored the promise of renewable energy, preferring to support the interests of the oil and gas industry—which financed her election in the first place. If you want to talk about playing favorites, Mr. Gessing, let’s talk about the favoritism that Governor Martinez has shown, based on campaign contributions, not job creation.

Mr. Gessing’s second response to my column: Government doesn’t create jobs—only the private sector does. This kind of sophistry is the second resort of people who can’t argue the facts. But even here, Mr. Gessing is flat out wrong.

First, in New Mexico government is a huge source of jobs. Right now, Susana Martinez has chosen not to fill more than 2,000 jobs in state government—simultaneously refusing employment to New Mexicans seeking jobs and denying services to New Mexicans who want state government to work.

Here in New Mexico, our economy benefits enormously from the labs and military installations that have historically provided jobs and technology. Government is also a source of jobs when it comes to needed infrastructure investment and public works. When it comes to education—a key variable in creating the economy of the future—government employs teachers and school workers. Unfortunately, Governor Martinez’s ideological attack on public education and her attempt to privatize our schools has driven many of our best teachers out of the profession—a double cost to New Mexico.

It’s fair to debate whether we want to encourage more private sector jobs and reduce our state’s dependence on the public sector—but it’s simply ludicrous to say that in New Mexico, the government doesn’t create jobs.

Second, as she has proved as governor, Susana Martinez has the unique capacity to destroy jobs. Her unconscionable deal to wipe out New Mexico’s behavioral health providers and outsource the jobs to an Arizona firm before any audits were ever conducted is a classic example of a politician paying off campaign debts at the expense of New Mexico’s workers.

An equally egregious example is what Governor Martinez did to the film and entertainment industry shortly after she took office. That industry is a perfect fit for New Mexico’s economic eco-system: the jobs pay good wages and benefits, young people are attracted to the industry and can easily see themselves working in it in the future, it doesn’t use water or other scarce natural resources, and it fits the creative culture of our state.

But it was a Bill Richardson program, so Governor Martinez simply undermined it. After knee-capping the program, which had put New Mexico at the top of the country in the industry, she even sent out a letter to her supporters, boasting that she’d “taught those Hollywood liberals a lesson.”

But she was wrong. The only people who were penalized by her punitive politics were the New Mexico workers who built sets, drove trucks, did the catering, rented the rooms and provided other goods and services to the movie and TV folks who were coming here to spend their money.

Third, and most importantly, government acts as a partner, guide and enabler in much of the job creation and economic development that goes on in states all across the country—with the notable exception of New Mexico. Mr. Gessing may have missed this part of American economic history, but the fact is that since the end of the Great Depression, the economy in this country has been and still is a “mixed economy.” Of course, it isn’t run by the government. And nobody thinks it should be. But it isn’t some version of free market capitalism that exists only in economic textbooks and ideologically driven think tanks.

It’s a mix of public and private interactions. In states where there is an experienced business leader or someone with vision as governor, you see job creation and economic growth. In states where there is a former DA in the governor’s office, you see stagnation and incompetence.

State government, historically, has played vital roles in shaping opportunity. In North Carolina, for instance, decades ago, then-Governor Terry Sanford and his team saw the enormous economic benefits that could come from tapping into the knowledge base in the universities in the Raleigh-Durham area. Partnering with the private sector, Governor Sanford helped pioneer what became known as The Research Triangle, an early version of government and the private sector working collaboratively to create a thriving base for jobs. Today in Boulder, Colorado, smart government investments in the University of Colorado coupled with an active and engaged entrepreneurial community have made that city a hotbed for startups, innovation and high-paying jobs. It’s also a community that’s lured away many of New Mexico’s bright young entrepreneurs who can’t find a future here in our state.

There’s a name for that kind of strategic economic development: we call it leadership. And leadership is what Governor Martinez has failed to show in her time in office. It’s why New Mexico is falling farther and farther behind in jobs.

Finally, Mr. Gessing’s last defense of Governor Martinez is that she is “merely the Governor, not the queen or dictator.”

That last line of defense demonstrates how bankrupt Mr. Gessing’s argument really is. His last excuse is, “Don’t blame poor Susana. She’s not really in charge of anything.”

That is utter nonsense.

We have every right and every reason to hold Susana Martinez accountable for her performance as Governor. We do it when it comes to her record in the environment, her record in education, her record in behavioral health—and most certainly her record in jobs and economic development.

We do it the way we assess leaders in the private sector or in non-profits. We look at who she has appointed to her cabinet in economic development: in this case, her cabinet secretary has been named in a whistleblower lawsuit for sweetheart deals and cronyism. We look at who has benefited while she’s been in office: oil and gas interests, campaign contributors, companies and individuals who will finance her personal aspirations to get on the Republican national ticket. And we look at her record in job creation: we are one of only two states that have actually lost jobs. That’s her record.

She lacks the vision, the experience, the initiative, the economic relationships, the strategic ability to get New Mexico’s economy moving again. Her one and only idea—to cut taxes for out-of-state corporations—hasn’t worked and won’t work. It isn’t a strategy. It’s a simplistic, outdated race to the bottom that shows how little imagination, creativity or functional knowledge she has about the realities of economic development.

Mr. Gessing knows this. He’s far too knowledgeable and experienced not to see the facts as facts.

The truth is, as a hard-core Republican, Mr. Gessing is bound by politics and ideology to ignore reality. Instead, he falls back on name-calling, semantics, sophistry and weak excuses to change the focus of the debate from Governor Martinez’s utter failure in job creation and economic development. It’s an old trick: When you can’t win on the facts, try to change the subject.

What do you say, Mr. Gessing: would you care to debate Governor Martinez’s economic performance in public? You can defend her record and the current lack of jobs in our state. I’ll describe a comprehensive strategy to build on New Mexico’s strengths to put our state back to work and create a bright future. I’m ready whenever you are.