Benito Aragon

Atop their dusty perch, the Albuquerque Journal’s editorial board adjusted their monocles last week, put on their flag attire, and took a stab at defining patriotism.  The piece was entitled, “Why celebrate the Fourth? Try asking a Guatemalan.”  While the piece neither quoted, referenced, or made any attempt to include the voice of an actual Guatemalan, it did spew forth a surreal, Bush-esque view of American Exceptionalism that equates to ‘Shut up and wave the flag'…

This week we have lots of coverage of the APD march to end police brutality that happened this past Saturday in Albuquerque. Martinez and King both make gaffes in the early stages of the governor's race. Also, concern, funding and the future of WIPP. In NM Twittersphere we curate the firehose of information coming through on Twitter where you can see media, links to informative articles, and viewpoints that happened through the week… 

A glowing Susana Martinez stood at the side of Chris Christie this week as the scandal ridden governor of New Jersey stopped in Roswell to assist Martinez with her re-election bid. Christie has been recently implicated in wreaking havoc on the citizens of his state while enacting political payback and is currently involved in a brewing public pension scandal whereas he raided teacher’s and other public worker’s pension funds to balance his state budget, while giving away $1.5 billion in corporate welfare to corporations like Pearson.  Surely noteworthy to most New Mexicans, yet the story by local news outlets covering Christie’s visit centered around the two’s “unique chemistry” and the already tired speculation of the pair running on a presidential ticket in 2016…

You have to give it the corporate elite in this country for their crafty effectiveness in convincing a large percentage of the working poor and the debt-ridden middle class to parrot economic talking points that work in direct opposition to their best interest.  A marketing coup made possible with the support of much of the mainstream media establishment at the national and local level.

Winthrop Quigley gives us the latest supporting example this week in an Albuquerque Journal column, “Minimum wage hike won’t fix income inequality”…