More 30-second chunks of politics on the way in CD1

After an independent expenditure group began airing radio ads attacking Democratic candidate Martin Heinrich, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) is ready to step in to attempt to counter the ads.

The DCCC is ready to air radio ads starting Friday in the 10 districts nationwide where Freedom's Watch began airing radio ads attacking Democratic candidates -- including New Mexico's 1st Congressional District.

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Peeling back the earth

An underground mine north of Taos may become an open pit

After years of underground mining at a molybdenum deposit north of Taos, the mine owners are considering peeling back the earth and making it an open-pit mine, The Taos News reported this week.

Officials with Chevron Mining say they hope to decide soon on the future of the mine a few miles east of Questa. Molybdenum, which is used to strengthen steel, has been mined there since the 1920s, according to the environmental and social justice group Amigos Bravos. Open-pit mining was conducted from 1965 to 1983, when operations went underground. The mine's owner, Molycorp, was purchased by Chevron Mining in 2005.

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Pearce continues hammering Udall on energy

Republican Senate candidate Steve Pearce’s new radio ad continues his campaign’s hammering of Democratic opponent Tom Udall on energy issues.

“It’s time our government stood up for working families, reduce our energy costs by building nuclear power plants and drilling for oil on land and offshore,” Pearce says in the ad, which you can listen to by clicking here. “The far left environmentalists are not going to like this and maybe it’s not politically correct, but nuclear energy is a sure way to America’s energy independence. Nuclear power can make America free from Middle Eastern oil cartels.”

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Ad watch: DCCC ready to defend Heinrich

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Food rolls out to flood victims

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TODAY'S TOP STORIES: Wait is longer at ABQ emergency rooms

Waiting time for emergency rooms in Albuquerque are up to four hours, the Albuquerque Journal reports today.

Acknowledging political reality, Gov. Bill Richardson has scaled down his health care priorities for the special session that starts Aug. 15, the Journal reports. Instead of universal health coverage, Richardson's focus will be on the state's children.

Developers are talking about rental properties and neighborhood services near a planned Rail Runner Express train stop, the Santa Fe New Mexican reports.

The Federal Aviation Administration will conduct the last of scheduled public hearings on the potential environmental impact of the spaceport today in Las Cruces, the Las Cruces Sun-News reports. The hearings are scheduled for 2 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. at the Dona Ana County Government Center, 845 N. Motel Blvd., in Las Cruces.

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The 1960s rears its ugly head ... again

Tell us what you think of Pearce's ad and his reasons for running it

Steve Pearce is defending his ad that links Tom Udall to 1960s protestors and on Wednesday he advanced that attack, repeatedly saying his Democratic rival sides with "extremists" on environmental issues, according to the Albuquerque Journal.

It appears that the cultural wars over the 1960s are still being fought -- in New Mexico, no less. I wonder sometimes how significant fighting over things that happened nearly 40 years ago are to everyday Americans. But it's a theme we've seen over and over again. Below is a long excerpt from the Albuquerque Journal story by Jeff Jones. It includes a glimpse into Pearce's own personal history, his view of that time and how he came to decide on the ad. After reading it, tell us what you think.

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Ad watch: Group supporting White takes aim at Heinrich

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Dems give Tinsley mock Santa Fe 'Resident of the Month Award'

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Report: Want to save a trillion gallons of water, American West? Here's how

Southwestern states could save more than 1 trillion gallons of water a year by cutting use in four key areas, a report released today by Environment New Mexico suggests.

According to the authors of "Using Water Wisely," the region might reduce water use by more than 5 million acre-feet per year — 1.8 trillion gallons by doing the following:

Help farmers make the switch to drip irrigation
Help homeowners embrace low-water landscaping
Reduce the use of coal and natural gas to make electricity
Provide conservation incentives to businesses

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Richardson to Beltway types: Lay off

Bill Richardson says that strategists who are urging Obama to hit back strong against McCain's recent negative campaigning have a "beltway" mentality, and are full of "sour grapes" for being excluded from Obama's "outsider campaign."

In a classic piece of reporting, The Hill--which is a website that is part and parcel of what it terms the "chattering class"--reports that Obama surrogates like Richardson think the response to McCain, despite the concerns of that same "chattering class," is right on track in a campaign that is just warming up:

“One of the advantages of Obama is he doesn’t listen to the Beltway mentality,” Richardson told The Hill.

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Santa Fe architect gets props in Business Week

Santa Fe architect Edward Mazria's challenge to the building industry -- to achieve carbon neutrality in construction by the year 2030 -- has caught the attention of Business Week magazine, which is running a full-length story on Mazria's 2030 Blueprint message in its current issue.

The article, "Building a Greener America," says the "bold" challenge Mazria's nonprofit Architecture 2030 issued to the building industry in 2006 "now seems prescient."

"A survey published by McGraw-Hill Construction Research & Analytics with the U.S. Green Building Council in July stated that green building is expected to represent 6% of American residential construction this year, up from 2% in 2005. Given the battered state of U.S. housing, that kind of growth is promising."

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TODAY'S TOP STORIES: More bad news for Jerome Block, Jr.

Jerome Block Jr. Under Fire Again

Things just keep getting worse for PRC candidate Jerome Block Jr. So far, he's been accused of drunk driving, peeing in the bushes at Summerfest, riding with a drunk driver and lying about having a college degree. Today, the Santa Fe Reporter unearths a decade-old restraining order against the candidate, and connects it to gang activity in Santa Fe.

Albuquerque can't make the mentally ill take their meds says the state Court of Appeals. The AP reports that the court yesterday upheld a lower court's ban on enforcing the law, which had been promoted by Mayor Martin Chavez after a schizophrenic man shot five people, including two police officers, in 2005.

llinois Congressman and former chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Rahm Emanuel will be in New Mexico on Thursday to help raise money for Ben Ray Lujan, Martin Heinrich and Harry Teague, according to the Santa Fe New Mexican.

And just for laughs you've got to see Paris Hilton's new video (watch it here). Even if you hate Hilton, you'll get a kick out of her reaction to John McCain's ad, which included a glimpse of her in an attempt to paint Obama as a celebrity ditz.

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AIDS on rise among Hispanics

AIDS is on the rise among Hispanics in New Mexico, the state Department of Health reported Tuesday.

The agency reported Hispanics now represent about half of new HIV/AIDS infections in New Mexico. The Department of Health examined its HIV/AIDS data after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported the number of Americans infected by HIV is about 40% higher than the federal agency had originally estimated.

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The science of green little men

Half a world away, the University of Melbourne in Australia announced this week it is bestowing its first doctorate degree in ufology to a man whose research took him to the three places in the world most key in the history of the subject. The No. 1 spot listed? You guessed it: Roswell, N.M.

In a press release, the university announced:
 

Martin Plowman, from the School of Culture and Communication, investigated hundreds of UFO sightings and interviewed dozens of ufologists as part of his PhD thesis.

Mr. Plowman will become Dr. Plowman next Saturday (August 9) when he is conferred with a Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Melbourne.

As part of his research Mr. Plowman visited key sites in the history of ufology, including Roswell, New Mexico; crop circle hotspots in Wiltshire, England; and the Valley of Elqui in the Chilean Andes, and examined the links between UFO sightings and religion, politics, national security and popular culture.

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That stubborn achievement gap

The latest achievement gap results announced by the state Public Education Department were both positive and negative.

The achievement gap, of course, refers to the difference between the academic performance of the majority of students compared with racial, ethnic as well as a few other subgroups.

The PED reported some positives such as a continued increase in the reading scores of disadvantaged students and an increase of more than 12 percent of Hispanic eighth-grade students scoring proficient and above on state standardized tests. Also math scores improced by 15 percent for Native American students over the last four years.

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Drilling in the West

Oil production on western lands during the Bush administration is down 12 percent from the average during the Clinton era, according to an article in the New York Times August 3. Average production overall was 97.9 million barrels annually from 2001 to 2006, while production in the 1990's averaged 111.5 million barrels per year.

The Bush administration, though, has issued three times as many permits as Clinton did in the last six years of his administration. As it turns out, companies are going for natural gas instead of oil, with production of that commodity being 34 percent higher, at 2.4 million cubic feet annually, than the 1.8 billion it was during Clinton's administration.

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Historic Santa Fe Indian School in ruins

(© 2008 Photo by George Johnson)

The turn-of-the-century buildings at the Santa Fe Indian School have been a part of the drive along Santa Fe's Cerrillos Road for the duration of the lifetime of virtually everyone alive in Santa Fe today.

So it's easy to relate to the shock described by those who witnessed their demolition without warning over several days last week. I felt it just seeing the pictures, several of which were posted by George Johnson on his blog, The Santa Fe Review, under the apt title "Indian Ruins."

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Can cow manure power homes? NY firm and Amarillo dairy give it a go.

A company in west Texas is doing what its competition couldn't over the border in New Mexico — using cow manure to power homes.

Using a process known as methane digestion, the New York company Microgy is planning to turn millions of tons of cow manure, food scraps and bacteria every year into natural gas at a plant now under construction about 40 miles southwest of Amarillo, The Amarillo Globe-News reports.

Cnossen Dairy, which has about 10,000 head of cattle near the town of Hereford, will remain in the milk business, and therefore in the manure business. Microgy, a subsidiary of Environmental Power, plans to install six large digesting tanks that turn the manure and other materials into clean methane gas. The resulting methane, which the company markets under the trademark name Renewable Natural Gas, will be pumped into an existing natural gas pipeline.

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State lawmakers talk tough on adjudicating water rights

State legislators meeting in Las Cruces this week are talking about springing loose millions of dollars in state funds to help untangle one of the state's thorniest issues: who is entitled to water and how much are they entitled to?

The Las Cruces Sun-News reports that state Sen. Mary Kay Papen, a Las Cruces Democrat, suggested at a meeting of the Water and Natural Resources Committee that the Legislature appropriate $10 million for the process of adjudicating water rights. And rather than wait, she suggested making the allocation during the special session that begins next week in Santa Fe.

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