Our view B-2 My view B-3, B-4
SUNDAY, MAY 25, 2014 THE NEW MEXICAN
OPINIONS
B
Contemplating Memorial Day. Page B-3
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Cheney, Christie are bad company ‘‘Y
ou know them by the company they keep.” This is often an unfortunate truth. Unfortunately, our governor keeps very bad company, in the persons of Dick Cheney and Chris Christie, who will attend her fundraiser in New Mexico as political “stars” (“Christie, Cheney stump for gov.,” May 16). Cheney, whose control of the White House made him the most harmful subversive ever to tread on U.S. soil, who was a major player in steering the U.S. government into lawlessness, and who remains unrepentant and unredeemed, is as bad a company as one can find among U.S. politicians. Christie oversaw a staff that was happy to seriously inconvenience hundreds of thousands of commuters for days, for the sake of political retribution. He is not as as bad as Cheney, but the combination strongly invokes both lawlessness and ruthlessness. One wonders if these would be characteristic of our governor during a second term. Hans von Briesen
Santa Fe
Thank you, angels On behalf of La Familia Medical Center and the staff from our OB program, we would like to thank the Santa Fe Woman’s Club for hosting a baby shower to benefit newborns of La Familia. We especially would like to thank Carol Rose for organizing the event and luncheon. Adorable and delicate crocheted and knitted baby items, hand-sewn baby garments —270 pieces in total — were created and donated by women from a variety of groups including: The Friday Crochet & Knitting Group from the Mary Esther Gon-
zales Senior Center, the Prayer Shawl Ministry from the Rodeo Road Baptist Church, the Santa Maria de La Paz Sewing Angels and the Northern New Mexico Quilting Guild. Thanks to Bernice Pearl, who crocheted 39 gorgeous baby hats, and to Marlys White, who knitted 20 lovely baby sweaters. All who participated in the baby shower are truly angels, and we thank them for their generosity. Gloria Martinez
development director La Familia Medical Center
Yesterday’s news Rob Nikolewski’s piece in Sunday’s New Mexican about Bill Clinton puzzled me (“Bill Clinton: Too little, too late,” May 18). Monica Lewinsky’s article in the new issue of Vanity Fair has generated buzz in the gossip media, but what relevance does a 16-yearold Washington scandal have to issues we care about here in New Mexico? I lived through that period in Washington, and knew and still know most of the actors personally. I am not going to apologize for Bill Clinton’s personal conduct, but the piece was lazy and sloppy commentary, including a profound lack of understanding of the political roles played by, among others, Chris Hitchens. As we go forward, perhaps the “watchdog” might want to focus on issues important to New Mexicans rather than a subject about which
he has a surfeit of moral judgment but limited knowledge of the facts. “Racino” — the Albuquerque racetrack scandal, might be a start? Or mental health care? Or education? Or job losses? Or the efforts on the part of the Martinez administration to eviscerate the medical marijuana law? It is a target-rich environment. Please don’t waste our time on yesterday’s news when there are so many tomorrow stories. Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV (ret.)
Santa Fe
Meat’s dangers Folks ready to fire up their outdoor grill on Memorial Day face a deadly choice of inflicting food poisoning or cancer on family and friends: food poisoning by E. coli and Salmonella bacteria, if they undercook the meat; cancer, if they heat meat to the point of creating cancer-causing compounds. Luckily, a bunch of enterprising food manufacturers and processors have met this challenge head-on by developing a great variety of healthful, delicious and convenient un-chicken, veggie burgers and soy dogs. These delicious plantbased foods don’t harbor nasty pathogens or cancer-causing compounds. They don’t even carry cholesterol, saturated fats, drugs or pesticides. And, they are available in the frozen food section at most supermarkets and natural food stores everywhere. Check out the array of alternative cheese and mayonnaise substitutes, delicious and cholesterol free, in the refrigerated section, too. This Memorial Day offers a superb opportunity to consign meat to a bad memory and make new memories by sharing wholesome veggie options that are better for you and your family and friends. Seth Rosenthal
Santa Fe
The lesson of acequias for today’s world
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hile the old adage is quite a semicircle, and pronouncements true, “There is nothing are made regarding the use of water quite as lovely as a tree,” in the Province of Valencia. This for me there is nothing more beautradition dates from Medieval Spain and the partidor de aguas or cequier tiful in the spring than to see the which is equivalent to a water chief, numerous acequias in our village which is very much in keeping with running, announcing spring. In this the traditions of our presharsh land of “Dias de mas ent-day mayordomo. y dias de menos,” where at times drought can linger Besides cequiers, other for years or unexpected officials were the veeder frosts can kill the last bit who oversaw the duties of the cequiers. The veedor of fruit on your trees, acerepresented the rights quias running full of water of the comuna, that is, at least offer hope. a community of irrigaI always marvel at our tors. According to Jose ancestors’ tenacity and Orlando Rivera in Acequia Culture ability to survive in such a Romero … water, land, and comhostile environment. Yet Commentary munity in the Southwest, they did survive, mostly “In Spain, as in Colonial because they knew how to New Mexico, the job manage water efficiently, fairly and of these local water inspectors, even in an environmental manner called ‘veedores’ or ‘hombres perithat today we can’t seem to accomtos’ (expert men) much like New plish or appreciate. Mexico, was to insure that customA few years ago while attending ary practices were being followed, a conference in Madrid, we took especially under conditions of water a bullet train down to Valencia on scarcity or in the settlement of disthe Mediterranean to visit and stay putes.” with friends. The highlight of our What is more astonishing to me visit for me was attending an openin this land of water scarcity is the air proceeding of the “Tribunal de strong environmental standards Aguas.” These men in robes form
that our ancestors created during the Spanish colonial period, way before the Environmental Protection Agency. Because acequias also provided fresh drinking water, no acequia was to be contaminated by washing clothes, washing hides, etc., or any other source of detriment that might affect the community. And I must add, this included both Hispano and Indian communities, because they were both united by acequias. Fines were real in those early days instead of a slap on the wrist. If you take a hard look, realistically, where there is anything that grows and thrives in this land of water scarcity, it is along acequias. From Socorro and even farther south to southern Colorado, earthworms to mighty 200-year-old cottonwood trees, salamanders, water snakes, etc., and our aquifers depend mightily on acequias. Like the veins in our bodies supplying much-needed nourishment to our hearts and brains, without our acequias there would be no life as we know it. These acequias were a minor marvel of engineering. If one visits Spain today, the remnants of Roman
aqueducts dot the countryside. Moorish acequias still deliver precious cold water to the Alhambra. In New Mexico, our earliest colonial acequia goes back to 1598 with the establishment of San Gabriel by Oñate’s settlers. In fact, one of the most important factors in establishing a community was the need and requirement that acequias be constructed to water fields for food. In this harsh yet beautiful land, our ancestors, both Hispanic and Native American, must be turning over in their graves when they see one more golf course and one more casino or one more development open. Every drop of water is precious and sacred for life. One can only question in this arid land where we lost the message. Maybe greenbacks are more important than green oasis. With climate change radically affecting our weather and our entire lives on this planet, it is going to take radical measures to curb our water abusers. Unfortunately, our politicians prefer to look the other way as long as the political contributions keep coming in. Orlando Romero is a historian and writer.
Editorial page editor: Inez Russell Gomez, 986-3053, igomez@sfnewmexican.com Design and headlines: Brian Barker, bbarker@sfnewmexican.com
Liberal talk radio changes in Santa Fe
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ans of KTRC, the liberal talk radio station in Santa Fe — and fans of liberal talk radio everywhere for that matter — have taken a couple of vicious blows in recent days On Thursday, syndicated radio host Ed Schultz — who promotes himself as “America’s Number One liberal talker” — announced that he’s quitting his threehour weekday radio show. The way he made it sound, he just wants to go fishing. However, Schultz said he’ll continue doing his weeknight television show on MSNBC and he’s going to start doing an hourlong audio show that will be available on his website. That was last week. Steve Terrell The week before that, another popular synRoundhouse dicated host, Randi Roundup Rhodes also called it quits. While the Rhodes departure was announced several weeks in advance, Schultz’s announcement even took his affiliates by surprise. “We just got the news ourselves,” said Scott Hutton, general manager of Santa Fe’s Hutton Broadcasting, told me Thursday. Hutton wasn’t sure what would replace Schultz’s show. When Rhodes left the airwaves, KTRC did some reshuffling of its schedule, moving Thom Hartmann’s show up to Rhodes’ 1-4 p.m. time slot and replacing Hartmann’s 4-7 p.m. slot with a guy named Norman Goldman. If every place had Santa Fe’s political leanings, Hutton observed, liberal talkers probably wouldn’t be dropping so rapidly. Hartmann has a following here. Hutton said several listeners were glad that his show is now live on KTRC (which means you’ll probably hear more people from Santa Fe calling in). This Goldman guy lost me, though. I tuned in a few nights ago, and the first thing I heard was Goldman not comparing the Republican Party to Hitler, but saying the Republican Party is Hitler. Perhaps a lot of profound political dialogue followed that, but I wasn’t listening. Meanwhile, on the other side of the aisle and the dial, right-wing host Sean Hannity’s show was dropped by his syndicator. So on KKOB in Albuquerque and many other stations across the country, Hannity was replaced by Michael Savage (who was fired by the pre-progressive MSNBC 11 ago for telling a gay man who had called his television show, “I hope you get AIDS and die”). To admit to a guilty pleasure, however, currently Savage is my favorite because he is so far out there. A woman I know, who is liberal, says she believes that Savage is actually some kind of parody of rightwing radio hosts — some kind of Stephen Colbert without the punchlines. I don’t believe that, but he’s the most consistently entertaining of any of them, left or right. I probably listen to political radio way different than most fans of the medium. To start with, when I’m in my car (almost the only time I actually listen to this stuff), I do a lot of flipping back and forth between left-wing (KTRC) and rightwing (KKOB). Usually, I change channels when the one I’m listening to gets dull. (Or the host calls someone a Nazi.) Sometimes, when there’s a hot topic, you can create some homemade comedy with your car radio. For example, in 2012, the day after the news of Mitt Romney’s “47 percent” video broke, both Rhodes and Hannity were frothing. Flipping between their stations made it sound like a shouting match was going on inside my car. Both broadcasters got more and more outraged by the minute. (My kids both are happy that they no longer have to depend on me for transportation.) Speaking of unintentional political comedy on the radio, a few weeks ago, Ed Schultz said something that nearly made me laugh so hard I nearly drove my car off the road. He got in an argument with a caller and said, “Well, you’re a fricking [expletive]. How about that? Get the [expletive] out of here! How about that? I’m sure they hit the seven-second delay on that one. … I hope that that didn’t go out. Did we catch that one? I need some direction. Did we catch that one? Yes or no?” The answer was no. I’m not sure whether that had anything to do with Schultz’s departure. Maybe the outburst was an indication he really does need to cut back on his hours. Contact Steve Terrell at sterrell@sf newmexican.com. Read his political blog at roundhouseroundup.com.
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