A4 Thursday, November 20, 2014
OPINION
Negative ads allowed Martinez to choose her opponent
Did Susana Martinez’s campaign strategists influence the selection of her opponent? Did the Martinez machine want Gary King to be the Democratic nominee for governor? Brian Sanderoff thinks so. That was one of several points Sanderoff made in a recent talk about the forces at work in this year’s election. Despite how we prefer to think of ourselves, in many ways we voters are the captives of trends, from ethnic preferences to the unpopularity of sixth-year presidents. Sanderof f is president of Research and Polling and a respected analyst of New Mexico politics. In the Democratic primary, we recall, there were five candidates, three Hispanic and two Anglo. The Martinez campaign ran TV commercials during the primary against candidate Alan Webber. The intention, said Sanderoff, was to draw Anglo votes from
EDITORIAL
MERILEE
DANNEMANN TRIPLE SPACED
Webber, which would tend to shift to King. With Hispanic voters divided, that would put King on top. King, Sanderof f explained, would be the easiest candidate to beat because he has the longest public record. He has served eight years as Attorney General and 10 years in the Legislature. That enabled the Martinez opposition researchers to find negative gems like the building in Moriarty that has no doubt become the best known lease in state history. (King explained to me that there was no other building available in Moriarty to serve as a public health clinic, and he gave
the state a very favorable deal.) Please don’t be shocked. Politics is a nasty business and running ads is a perfectly legitimate tactic under today’s rule book. The Martinez campaign was a state-of-the art professional endeavor, and negative ads work. Opposition research is not uniquely Republican. Apparently someone from Tom Udall’s campaign was in the audience with a recording device when Allen Weh issued his now-famous “So what?” In the background of this election is a major shift in New Mexico voter registration. While Republican registration has remained constant at about 31 percent, Democratic registration since 1982 has dropped from 63 to 47 percent, while independent voters (“DTS” or “decline to state” in New Mexico parlance) have increased from 7 to 22 percent. The youngest voters, age 18 to 22, are more likely to be DTS than registered in either party.
Roswell Daily Record
New Mexico has more Hispanics than Anglos (47 percent to 40 percent), according to Sanderoff’s statistics, and some people vote their ethnicity. Hispanic Democrats have to make a choice when a Hispanic Republican is running against a non-Hispanic Democrat. The cross-over vote helped widen the margin of Martinez’s win. It also may help explain why the Republicans ran candidates named Lopez and Aragon in the second-tier positions of State Treasurer and State Auditor. One curious trend, Sanderoff points out, is that in presidential midterm elections, the President’s party usually loses seats in the New Mexico House as well as in Congress. The loss this year has put Republicans in control of the House, but that happened with only four seats changing parties. The big loss was in 2010, when the Democrats lost eight seats. Democrats also lost in the midterms of the Carter and Clin-
ton administrations, and Republicans lost seats during the Reagan and Bush years. If you don’t know much about the State Land Office, and you voted for Aubrey Dunn, it’s likely you did so for one reason: the Dixon apple orchard TV commercial. In that advertisement, the former owner of the Dixon orchard blamed commissioner Ray Powell for her family’s financial loss after the orchard was damaged by fire and flood. It was a devastatingly power ful ad, and Powell’s response was too little, too late, too wimpy. It remains to be seen whether Dunn will make a better commissioner than Powell has been. We didn’t elect him on the basis of his qualifications. And that’s pretty much the case for most of the people we elected. Contact Merilee Dannemann through triplespacedagain.com.
State is keeping Obamacare afloat
Democrats are in a furor over the Supreme Court. Soon, the nine justices will consider whether Obamacare’s all-important subsidies for state health exchanges must be scrapped because of a key passage in the Affordable Care Act. Regardless of the outcome of that case, however, the president’s health care scheme faces enduring problems. Top of the list? Enrollment. Without robust numbers, the magic sense of inevitability that will cement the ACA system will continue to elude Obamacare. That’s why California’s successes with its state exchange have taken on an outsized importance. The nation’s enrollment numbers are taking a nose dive. But if Covered California falters, they’ll truly plummet. The statistics tell the story. In an embarrassing move, the administration had to revise its estimates downward for next year’s numbers — and this year’s. Reuters reports that the White House expects as few as 9.1 million enrollees will sign up in 2015. That’s a big plunge from the 13 million predicted by the Congressional Budget Office. Administration officials only believe 83 percent of last year’s enrollees will renew in 2015, says Reuters. Meanwhile, Covered California is popping champagne bottles. Having “led the nation during its first year with about 1.2 million enrollees,” the exchange now “predicts the tally will jump to 1.7 million in year two — a 500,000 increase, more than many states netted in total last time around,” writes Chris Rauber at the San Francisco Business Times. Rather than a victory lap, however, the administration’s handpicked choice to run Covered California is embarking on a highstakes, high-cost PR campaign. As Mr. Rauber reports, executive director Peter Lee recently embarked on a “nineday, 21-city bus tour” that’s just one part of a federally-supported community outreach effort. Price tag? $95 million. No matter how much momentum Mr. Lee seems to have, the unintentional message is clear: Covered California is a make-orbreak proposition. No expense must be spared to keep its enrollment numbers high enough to dwarf Obamacare’s disappointing results nationwide. Perhaps the evident nervousness comes from a simple realization: even if Covered California continues to put up big numbers, unless the rest of the country starts to catch up, Obamacare won’t be able to function as intended. It won’t supply the universal coverage it aspired to. It won’t keep costs as low as its advocates claimed. And in its place, a messy hodgepodge of state and federal rules will emerge, each ripe for challenge in court. It’s always a challenge to prognosticate when it comes to Supreme Court decisions — as those counting on John Roberts to overturn the ACA know all too well. But whatever happens, Covered California’s anxious triumph reveals just how uncertain Obamcare’s future continues to be.
Energy policy changes to watch for in Republican-controlled Congress Under a Republican-controlled Congress we can expect changes in Washington, D.C. — with energy front and center. The past six years have seen taxpayer dollars poured into green-energy projects that have embarrassed the administration and promoted teppan-style renewables that chop-up and fry unsuspecting birds midflight and hurt the economy. Meanwhile, Republicans have touted the job creation and economic impact available through America’s abundant fossil-fuel resources. Voters made their preference clear: Republicans won more seats, and with bigger majorities, than anyone predicted. Big changes in energy policy are in the works because a wealthy country is better able to do things right. A growing economy needs energy that is efficient, effective and economical — which is why countries like China and India will not limit energy availability and why Republicans want to expand access in the U.S. What energy policies should we watch?
MARITA NOON
ENERGY MAKES AMERICA GREAT INC.
Keystone pipeline
Post-election, the Keystone pipeline suddenly leapt to the front of the lame-duck-legislation line. The pipeline failed by one vote. Months ago, Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and John Hoeven (R-N.D.), along with 54 others (including 11 Democrats), reintroduced legislation to authorize building the Keystone pipeline — but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has blocked the popular bill by repeatedly denying requests to take up the legislation. The House has already approved eight previous Keystone bills and quickly passed an identical bill sponsored by Landrieu’s election opponent Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-LA). Had the bill passed, the question was whether the White House would approve it, though
an Obama veto was expected. A veto would have further angered his union supporters. With many Democrats already on board and a push for more support from union leadership, the new Congress will be able to pass it—this time with a vetoproof majority.
Federal lands
President Obama likes to brag about the increased U.S. production of oil and gas. In his post-election press conference he stated: “Our dependence on foreign oil is down.” While the statement is true, it falsely implies that he had something to do with that fact. Reality is, as a Congressional Research Service report makes clear, while oil production has increased 61 percent on state and private lands, it has decreased 6 percent on federal land where the administration has authority. Additionally, the report points out, applications to drill on federal lands take nearly twice as long to process under the Obama administration than they did previously. One prediction has drilling in
the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge becoming a part of the Republican Party’s vision of energy independence — something Alaska’s senior Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-Ark.) has argued for.
Oil exports
Before the new Congress is sworn in, we already hear a lot of talk about lifting the ban on oil exports that was put into place in response to the 1970s Arab oil embargo. With the Republicans now in charge come January, Murkowski will become the Chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. She is expected to start by “holding hearings, pressuring Obama administration officials, and testing the level of support from party leadership” regarding lifting the export ban.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
President Obama’s Clean Power Plan (CPP) has widespread opposition within the
As times progress, American society goes in reverse REPRINTED
FROM
BY JASON DARENSBURG NEW MEXICO DAILY LOBO GUEST COLUMNIST
ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Whatever happened to the Space Age? I never thought I’d grow old in an era where everything is actually worse than it was in the good old days. Civilization has seemingly gone several steps backwards spiritually, socially and technologically since the 1970s. I grew up expecting to take my summer vacations on Mars, and here it is 2014 and we’re living in a country that currently lacks even a high-speed rail
system. The aging space shuttle fleet was decommissioned a few years ago, following numerous catastrophic failures, yet America is supposed to be the wealthiest, most technologically advanced nation on Earth. What went wrong? This is certainly not the future I envisioned growing up. We were supposed to be living in moon bases by the end of the 20th century, hanging out on space stations and cruising around in anti-gravity vehicles. Promises were made. It was our duty as Americans to lead the way in this noble endeavor “for all mankind.”
Instead, our nation now stands on the verge of economic collapse and our technological advantage is quickly eroding. The sciences are being systematically defunded at a time when funding should be greatly increased. The most sophisticated technology available is being used to track, control and kill people — not to help them. A perfect example of this phenomenon is the fate of America’s space program. It defies logic that 70-year-old solid rocket technology is still the foundation of modern space travel. The Nazis built the first ballistic missiles in 1944 for use as terror weapons against the
Allies. Following the war, instead of being prosecuted for war crimes, thousands of Nazi scientists were hired to help develop America’s nuclear missile capabilities against the Soviets. In 1958, NASA was conceived by the Department of Defense as the public face of America’s manned space program, and former SS Lieutenant Wernher von Braun was appointed its director. Thus began the Space Race. By the time NASA retired the shuttle fleet in 2011, America was the undisputed leader in space exploration. Our scientific achievements were a source of great national pride for many. Yet we
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were told at the time that no replacement vehicle had been created to succeed the already obsolete space shuttles, which had been in service since 1981. Now we’re supposed to believe that the only way to get our astronauts to the International Space Station is by paying the Russians to launch them using even more antiquated technology than the shuttle. The recent failure of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, which exploded over the Mojave Desert in California, killing one pilot and seriously injuring another, demonstrates how
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