Blow Out

The blow out was unstoppable for Mayor Berry.  The record low turnout assured it because Pete Dinelli just could not inspire anyone.  It came down to a nice guy vs. an angry guy and in today's politics nice seems more appealing.  No matter that the State and City's economy is in the sink with do nothing leadership, this is just the way politics works right now on the local level.  The positive outcome is a possible democratic majority on the city council after a probable run off election between Diane Gibson and Janice Arnold Jones.  That should be winnable for the democrats.  But congratulations to Mayor Berry and the winners.  Now do something real to produce jobs other than poor paying call centers.

On the national level of politics I am once again waiting for the federal workforce members who are sitting at home, due to one hundred Tea Party ass clowns, to rise up and cause a ruckus.  They won't get their wages on Monday.  That will trickle down.  Many people don't know it but there are a couple of thousand federal workers out at the Journal Center who are not frequenting the businesses and eateries around that area.  Those folks are already feeling a loss of revenue and sending home their own employees.  Will they feel the necessity to go down and pay Tea Party member Congressman Steve Pearce a visit?  He is getting a pay check and benefits and healthcare.  Does anyone have a manual on tar and feathering?

Election Day

There won't be many surprises in the Albuquerque city elections today.  If the polls are accurate, and the always are, then Mayor Berry gets another four years to sit in his office with little vision and no economic whiz kids helping him except for attracting phone center jobs.

I think one surprise could be in the offing and that is the city council race in the north valley between Roxanna Meyers and Isaac Benton.  I think this will be much closer than anyone thinks.  My usually strong democratic neighborhood is sporting a lot of yard signs for Roxanna.  More than two to one over her fence sitting opponent.  At the end of the day they are both good folks and when I go vote today I will have to decide at the last minute who to vote for.  I am leaning for Roxanna because she opposes strangling Rio Grande Blvd with a roundabout at Candelaria.  It is a waste of money and Benton still refuses to say what he wants to do.  Which means he is for it in my mind.  I just object to his refusal to say.

Overall, this is the most boring Mayor's race ever.

Storm Coming

As I sit in front of my financial software to balance my accounts I realize this morning that a reality moment is coming towards the likes of Tea Party darling Congressman Steve Pearce.  A week from today thousands of federal employees will not get a paycheck. (My wife Bobbi included).  We can weather this storm but I can assure you that many GS 5 to 9 level employees will be scrambling towards their credit cards to make up for short falls.  Sure, congress say they will get their back pay but that doesn't help pay the bills today.  Of course, Congress gets their checks on time so they wont experience this.

This whole federal government shut down is somewhat of a joke really.  It is aimed at just a few departments and programs.  Both Obama and Congress are just acting in a theater.  The real losers are  thousands of government employees in certain agencies.  Grist for the mill!  A real shut down would last only a few hours.  Send home the FAA controllers, close the sea ports, shut down the interstate highway system for lack of safety monitoring and the closures would last about an hour before the budget was worked out.  These things would affect the likes of the Koch brothers and the other right wing business men who cooked up this partial shutdown that hurts only some people.

This kind of drama will continue to play out  until big money is taken out of political campaigns.  And by that I mean corporate money.  

Class War

There shouldn't be any doubt that we are in a full scale class war in America.  The New York Times article this morning on the Koch brothers and their ilk should pretty much settle the question.  The rich and conservative minions who don't want the poor to have health care insurance have pretty much engineered the current debacle in Washington, DC.  They have poured hundreds of millions of dollars in an admittedly brilliant execution of their plan to bring us to this state of affairs.  They are aided and abetted by the likes of Fox News who have now convinced the uneducated that they will have micro devices planted in them by government doctors.(See Bill Maher's latest show.)

When will there be some backlash against these uncaring conservative billionaires?  Lets don't wait like the current politicians in Greece who are trying to deflect their image of incompetence to the Germans by asking for war reparations from 70 years ago.  It is a little late.  These worthless Greek pols weren't even alive back then, but this saber rattling has always been proved to deflect criticism.  Think bush/cheney in their run up to an unnecessary war in Iraq to hide their incompetence in ignoring terrorist threats.

Cop Out

Governor Susana Martinez finally said something about the federal government shutdown.  She scolded both parties for not working things out.  She took no position on the issues involved and said nothing that would damage her reputation as a Tea Party sweetheart.  She did not stand up for doing the right thing other than at least breaking her silence.

She says the Feds need to look at how the states balance their budget every year, thus proving to everyone she is a mile wide and an inch deep.  She truly doesn't understand the difference between the Fed's mandates and the State's responsibilities.  Otherwise she would not be uttering this populist nonsense.  We really have a governor with a mediocre knowledge of government.  

We Are Alone

No body has our back in local journalism. Thursday evenings  lead stories on the three local Albuquerque TV newscasts.....2 led with a story about a rabid bat and one about a crime scene with a reenactment by a so called reporter.  Lead stories on the thousands of local  laid off federal workers...none.  Will some one please give the news directors and anchors at these TV stations a mind meld with the departed spirit of Edward R. Murrow?  Damn.

Question

Has Mayor Berry or Governor Martinez place a call to Republican Tea Party Congressman Steve Pearce to let him know that New Mexico is suffering under the government shutdown?  Or are they putting their standing with the Tea Party before the welfare of their constituents?  Can't some reporter track them down for a one on one question and answer session?  Or is Journalism is dead in our state?  Along with reasonable political leadership?

Field to Table

They harvest the grapes at night so they will be less stressed in the cool air.

The crews work at a blistering pace in order to get payed by the ton of grapes harvested.  They can make up to $30 an hour each.

And then we get to enjoy the fruits of their work a few years later.

Underground

This is a new 1200 foot long tunnel for wine storage at the Halter Ranch Winery where we are holding our foundation meeting.  It is a good place to hide out from the Tea Party Taliban during our current crisis caused by a hundred or so congressmen and women who seem intent on destroying our economy.   

Winery View

We have a meeting of the Wyss Foundation tomorrow near Paso Robles at the Halter Ranch Vineyards.  The grapes are being harvested every other night and tomorrow we will go watch as tons of grapes are taken from the vines to make fine wine.

A Break

I am off to some beautiful wine country near Paso Robles, California for a few days for a board meeting.  Time to taste the new releases while there and forget about the Tea Party.  Then it is a quick trip back for a meeting of the Wilderness Society Governing Council in Santa Fe.  No golf for a week or so, but some highly gratifying work!

Invisible

The Governor and Mayor Berry are invisible right now, as is the legislature.  While the federal government prepares to shut down they seem to be hiding in a closet and afraid to say anything.  All of them should march on down to see Congressman Steve Pearce and give him a chewing out over his Tea Party appeasements in killing paychecks for thousands of federal workers in this state.  Those good paying federal jobs are the only thing keeping us afloat right now since neither the city or state, under poor leadership, are doing anything on the economic development front.

My lovely wife Bobbi left for her office at the Forest Service today where she has served as an engineer, environmental engineer and financial manager over the last 27 years.  Her agency will work for at least four more days on carry over funds from prior years.  Then she will get some time off if the  radical GOP doesn't admit there is nothing wrong with people having health insurance.  This whole episode will surely go down as one of the most senseless and stupid things to happen in our country's history.

On the bright side, things can only get better.  Right?

  

Walter and the GOP's Tea Party

Will they get away with it or will everything go down!

They will never soar like eagles, sadly.

Misc.

The Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce shows it's lack of vision in supporting development and testing of weapons over the generation and transfer of renewable energy.  It wants White Sands Missile Range to keep on trucking with their defense industry partners.  They are the Neanderthals who are trying to kill the long planned Sun Zia transmission line across the northern extension area of the range.  That area has people living in it.   This extension area is rarely used.  And these weapons that are being tested?  Who will they be used against to get the production line and profits fired up for the one per centers?

The Albuquerque Journal Editorial Board is substituting political science for earth science in saying the drought is not reason enough to curtail grazing on lands turning to desert.  The cry baby ranchers who are objecting to removing their cattle from ravaged lands are part of the right wing effort to blame government for everything and the Journal bought in.  As a matter of fact the Forest Service has real scientists working for it and they feel the resources will be ruined for decades if action isn't taken.  And the ranchers and Journal seem upset that the lease fees for this publicly owned land will stay in effect.  Those fees have not been raised in decades as a way for subsidizing and providing welfare to public land ranchers. 

NSA Wired

Last year I lost about 30 pounds on weight watchers.  I gained back about seven after my knee replacement surgery.  I am trying to lose that plus another 15.  My wife Bobbi recently got one of these gadgets that my daughter refers to as a 'body bug'.  You wear it on your arm and it measures how many calories, steps, exercise and hours of good sleep you get.  It also ties in with your smart phone and you enter the amount of food you ingest  and it lets you know if you are losing weight everyday.  She is losing weight.  So, I bought one in my latest battle with fat.  This is a 50 year war and I aim to win it.  I wonder if the NSA is tracking my food through my cell phone?  If they are I hope they send some encouragement to me.  That feed back is important you know.  I mean it would be one positive thing for all the taxes we send them.

Misc.

Senator Ted Cruz still reminds me of Senator Joe McCarthy from the 50's.  I think Cruz is capable of harming a lot of people and he needs to be watched carefully.  I have no doubt he will end up a joke in our history, as did "Tail Gunner" Joe, but lets make it that way ASAP.

The Journal's stories on the economic development plans of the Mayoral candidates in Albuquerque this morning kind of shows how bereft they all are when it comes to economic development.  The have all fallen back on the same old stuff, which is okay, but there is no breakout vision being shown by any of them.

Boring---Boring

I remember when I was Mayor and all of the political districts nationwide were being reapportioned in 2001.  I was trying to make sure that there was no gerrymandering of city council districts and vetoed several proposals sent to me by the city council.  It was all insider stuff of council members trying to rig districts either for democrats or republicans, but mostly for themselves.

After my second veto the Albuquerque Journal, through its great editorial cartoonist John Trevor as I recall, opined that this was all very boring and who cared!  (Trevor has since turned sharply to the right wing.)

Anyway, it might be boring stuff but right now the gerrymandering of the republican party and tea party have set up a situation in which our congress wants to destroy our democratic institutions.  They want to shut down government, suppress voters, starve children, and make sure that poor people have no access to health care.  All because the news media sees reapportionment as boring?  Or are they in on it because their corporate American owners have ordered the lack of reporting on reapportionment processes?

Right now we are stuck until the next go-round for reapportionment in about 8 years.  They only thing to do is go into the tea party districts and raise hell with the voters and let them know they are ignoring their own interests.

Day After

I did not watch the Mayoral debate on Sunday evening.  I didn't even realize there was one scheduled.  We were at a dinner party and the subject never came up.  The debate really didn't change anything in what is going to be a walk over for Mayor Berry.

It shouldn't be a walkover though.  This morning's front page story on the state of Albuquerque's economy and job situation should be a wake up call for everyone, but the public is so apathetic that they cant see new leadership is needed on the state and local political scene.  The reason why this apathy is so rampant is easy for me to see.  It comes about from the power of American corporate money's interference in our democracy.  These one per centers just dump money into tricky media and effectively convince the voter that unions and minimum wage hikes are the root of all of our problems.  Even to the point of taking away food stamps from the many children who live below the poverty level.

Frankly, I often think of the great scenes in the Frankenstein movies when the villagers with pitchforks and torches go after the folks in the castle on the hill.  Would that it could happen on Wall Street and the nation's corporate HQs.

Finally, this is a good read.

Storm Over ABQ

We had a great ringside seat to the terrific storm that rolled up from the south this evening.
This was taken from our friend's house in the very northwest part of Rio Rancho.

Who's Who

Just as the Albuquerque Journal endorses Isaac Benton, democrat, for the City Council seat in the North Valley we now find out that his opponent Roxanna Meyers is more liberal than he is.  According to her.  We got our hands on a mailer that was obviously intended to hit young voters in which she criticizes Benton for not attending the Los Ranchos Gay Pride Parade, nor the Gay Pride festival and Expo New Mexico, nor did he attend the annual JCC awards Dinner in which a gay activist was honored.  She goes on to tout her efforts as councillor to get the APD to hire more gay officers and to have the Convention and Visitors Bureau market that city as Gay friendly.

She has a good in with the Pope these days.

And there was another funny thing in this race today.  Jerry Ginsburg, a democrat supporter, and a guy who is spending $40,000 on Meyer's behalf, sent out a missive on our neighborhood list serve saying he has found a pit bull near his home.  Some people would describe him as a pit bull for his unflinching support of Meyers.