Border
'Building Green Economies' a border issue
For the first time in its history, the 26th Border Governor's Conference has been combined with a Green Technology Expo that opens today at the "Building Green Economies" conference being hosted by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Ten border governors, including New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, were among those scheduled to attend the invitation-only conference. The Green Tech Expo today and Friday is open to the public at no charge.
An official conference press release said Schwarzenegger's decision to hold the conference at Universal Studios, to incorporate the Green Tech Expo and to give the conference its overall environmental theme "is resonant of his desire to raise awareness among the general public that cross-border issues are about much more than illegal immigration."
A Chihuahua movie: What is Disney thinking?
Disney is set to release a stereotype-ridden animated movie called "Beverly Hills Chihuahua" in September. See what Albuquerque-born author Alisa Valdes Rodriguez thinks about it and give us your opinion.
Commentary
A visitor to interior Mexico might find it strongly reminiscent of America in the 1950s.
Dems Devote $20 Million to Hispanic Voter Outreach
The Democratic National Committee and the Obama campaign announced Tuesday that they will spend $20 million to on outreach to Hispanic voters. During a conference call with reporters, Obama for America National Hispanic Leadership Council Chairman Frank Sanchez and DNCVice-Chair Linda Chavez Thompson described a huge grassroots effort that will mirror Howard Dean's 50-state strategy, but focus resources on what they called "critical" states such as New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and Florida.
Dunn wins endorsement of man some call toughest sheriff in U.S.
Albuquerque — You've probably heard of America's Toughest Sheriff, Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz.
The man the Arizona Republic calls "a powder keg of public bravado" has garnered heaps of publicity for his unusual techniques. He moved 2,000 inmates into a tent city in the Arizona desert and re-instituted chain gangs for men, women and juveniles. He feeds his inmates the cheapest food in the country: two meals per day that cost an average of 15 cents each. He has the inmates' sheets, towels, socks and underwear dyed pink.
On Thursday Arpaio endorsed rancher Aubrey Dunn in the Republican primary race in the second congressional district.
Guv in Mexico Thursday for talks
Gov. Bill Richardson will travel to Mexico City on Thursday to participate in a wide-ranging discussion between governors of U.S. border states and their Mexican counterparts, the governor's office announced Wednesday.
The governors from both sides of the border also will meet with Mexican President Calderón Hinojosa, and his cabinet secretaries, to discuss key issues, incuding border security and immigration.
Guv trots off to Mexico
New Mexico’s globetrotting Gov. Bill Richardson is heading to Mexico on Wednesday to discuss a number of issues with leaders there. We can only hope he remembered to tell the lieutenant governor this time around.
History and culture in the digital age
I recently had a chance to sit down with University of New Mexico Law School Professor Laura Gomez and Dr. Estevan Rael-Galvez, the New Mexico State Historian. Gomez’s new book, Manifest Destinies: The Making of the Mexican American Race, was one point of discussion during the wide-ranging interview. We also discussed New Mexico’s rich history as well as how racial and ethnic tensions play out here. The video comes from KNME’s New Mexico In Focus program, which I co-host.
Immigration raids assailed by mayors
A resolution by Mayor David Coss of Santa Fe calling for a change in the way ICE conducts workplace raids of immigrants has been passed by the U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting in Miami.
The mayor, who has been an outspoken advocate for tolerance of immigrants, reportedly shepherded the resolution first through the mayor's Criminal and Social Justice standing committee. It was then passed by the entire conference.
Independents rising
Apparently Doña Ana County is a fairly independently minded place -- at least when it comes to politics. Currently 18 percent of the county’s registered voters have declined to state a party affiliation, and that number is growing: Some 33 percent of people who registered to vote from January to June in the county are “independents.” Doña Ana County’s percentage of registered independents is greater than the state average of 15 percent, and only Los Alamos County has as high a percentage. In addition Doña Ana County’s independent voter population is growing faster than that of any other county in the state.
McCain in a bind
On the eve of the Republican National Convention, leading Hispanic national organizations sent a bluntly worded letter to Sen. John McCain about his party’s platform positions on immigration. The groups urged McCain to ”...lead your party’s platform away from the deportation and detention path” which repudiates McCain’s past positions on immigration.
McCain's tightrope act
John McCain’s town-hall meeting today in Las Cruces was obviously aimed at attracting Hispanic, Democratic and independent voters. And in trying to attract all three he walked a tightrope as the Republican presidential candidate asserted independence from his party and its special interests while at the same time he sought to reassure Republicans by pledging to pick a vice-presidential nominee who shares his values. You can listen to the 25-minute interview conducted on McCain’s campaign bus by clicking here.
Mexico notebook: Desperate children
XALAPA, Mexico -- One of the more disturbing stories to come out of Mexico in recent days is a report that the number of children attempting to travel by themselves to the United States has risen in the last three years.
The International Migration Organization [OIM] reports that children as young as 12, hoping to join family already in the States or feeling unwanted or abused in their current family situation, is at 500 a year from the southern Mexico state of Veracruz alone.
These children, aged 12 to 18, hail from cities large and small, including the port of Veracruz, the capital city of Xalapa, and Cordoba, Orizaba, Santiago Tuxtla, Acayucan and Rio Blanco, reports the daily newspaper A-Z Xalapa.
Mexico Notebook: Going places
While the American airline industry is cutting dozens of routes from its schedules, it appears the Mexican industry is doing just fine.
The Mexican airline Aeromexico announced this month it is buying more planes and adding destinations.
An article in El Sol de Zacatecas says Aeromexico is buying 12 new Embraer 190 jets, configured the same as its current Aeromexico Connect line, each with 11 first-class seats and 88 in tourist class.
Mexico Notebook: Here, they make house calls
Three days away from finishing language school in southern Mexico, our daughter came down with severe stomach pain, just as she had been marveling about how lucky she had been to avoid illness for six weeks immersed in her host culture. Unsure of what to do, I called the doctor she had seen three days earlier and explained the situation. I was sure I understood his reply, even though my Spanish is not the best. I just couldn't believe what I was hearing. He was asking for directions to our hotel.
Mexico Notebook: Should PEMEX, the 'people's oil,' be privatized?
A recent edition of Reforma, one of Mexico City's largest-circulation newspapers, had no fewer than four articles in its first four pages related to one of the the hottest news items in this nation: the proposal to privatize Mexico's national oil system, PEMEX. People go to the polls Sunday to decide. The vote comes 70 or so years after this nation nationalized oil to wrest control of Mexico's natural resource away from American companies in the late 1930s. Mexico is considering privatizing because, it says, it needs investment to further exploration, most notably in the Gulf of Mexico.
Mexico Notebook: Solar hot water for life
CHIHUAHUA CITY, Mexico -- "Free! Hot Water for Life," screams the billboard by the highway. In the near distance are the boxy-modern condos that spring up like hongos [mushrooms] around virtually every city in Mexico to accommodate their burgeoning populations.
No doubt the company selling this solar water heater -- in this case Signa Hogar -- would like to see a solar boiler atop each one.
Why don't we see signs like that in the States?
NM chile growers feel burned
NM jumps to No. 2 for immigration-crime prosecution, feds say.
The New Mexico district climbed in April to No. 2 on the list of per-capita prosecutions of immigration-related crimes by the U.S. Department of Justice.
With 217 prosecutions, the New Mexico U.S. Attorney’s Office trailed only the Southern California office in per-capita prosecutions in April 2008. A year earlier, New Mexico was fifth on the list, and it was also fifth five years ago. Following New Mexico in April 2008 were the west and southern districts of Texas, the Arizona district, the south Florida district and the east Arkansas district.
NYTimes: NM kid becomes El Gringo, and makes good in Mexico and here.
Shawn Kiehne, aka El Gringo, is apparently big with a certain demographic, not that I knew this fact until Sunday.
But according to The New York Times, he's gaining popularity among Mexican and Mexican-American audiences, a U.S.-born 30-something who sings in Spanish and plays his version of Norteno music, replete with all the accordions and 12-string bass guitars.
Here's another thing I didn't know: El Gringo is from Los Lunas, N.M.