Monday, March 03, 2014

Misc.

If Governor Susana Martinez doesn't remind you of George Orwell's book, "1984", then you probably never read it.  She is trying to change history by rewriting what really happened in the just concluded legislative session by saying she supported a raise in the minimum wage.  Her "Big Brother" advisors from the right wing thought they could get away with it, but even the Albuquerque Journal cast a suspicious eye at that  assertion.  Not that anyone cares about her lying but it is nice to know she has not rewritten history to her advantage.

It looks like New Mexico is at the top of one list for the country.  That would be the number of nuts that we have.  The state's Pecan farmers harvested a record 75 million pounds of nuts this year as new orchards came on line.  It is a great cash crop that sells for almost $2 a pound.  Now, if you could remind those farmers of the amount of public money that went into building the irrigation works to help produce those nuts, that would be good.  And don't forget the Rural electrical projects of the 30's that brought power to these areas and the many types of subsidies that farmers receive in bad times.  Yes, they are hard workers and are efficient.  But everyone has helped with this success story.  I am hopeful that with these good prices and revenues that they have let their workers benefit.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for giving a plug to the Rural Electrification Administration, a wonderfully successful New Deal project. It provided, and still does, electricity to vast areas of the country the commercial power companies had no interest in because they couldn't make enough money in rural areas where the customers are spread out and lines have to be stretched long distances.

About the water, who's everybody looking to to do something about the coming drought? Not the pecan farmers. Not the Chamber of Commerce. Not the Albuquerque Journal.

The Santa Theresa port expansion seems to be a good thing, if you don't look at the wages the factory workers will be making. There will be some good jobs created in moving containers around and truck driving. Besides running down there to have her picture taken I don't know how much the current governor has had to do with that. In reading about it for the last 20 or 30 minutes it seems like it got going under Bruce King.