One Woman's Viewpoint
Merritt Hamilton Allen, whose work is published previously in the Edgewood Independent, will also provide her columns to the Grant County Beat.
Declaring an emergency in New Mexico is too easy
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 15 September 2023 15 September 2023
Twenty years ago, two key pieces of legislation were enacted in New Mexico. First was the Concealed Handgun Carry Act, which was introduced in the Senate by a Democrat, and passed both chambers with a strong majority. Second was the Public Health Emergency Response Act, also introduced by a Democrat, and which passed with only two dissenting votes.
Last week, Governor Lujan Grisham used the latter to overturn the former without ever convening the Legislature. On Sept. 8, the governor issued an executive order declaring that gun violence has created a public health emergency. Effective immediately, anyone carrying a firearm in public in Bernalillo County shall be subject to a civil penalty punishable by a fine of up to $5,000.
Why are we enabling an ethically challenged senator?
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 25 August 2023 25 August 2023
What would you think if a sitting state senator was also a lobbyist? And that senator drafted legislation that would ensure he no longer had to register as a lobbyist? Or that his lobbying clients are county officials, so his fees are coming from public funds? How about that he has employed a convicted child sex offender since 2005? Or has been the subject of a sexual harassment investigation that found more than one of the numerous allegations to be substantiated?
Only in the New Mexico legislature.
Santa Fe attorney David Yohalem filed a complaint against State Senator Daniel Ivey-Soto (D-15) last week with the State Ethics Commission, alleging the senator violated Financial Disclosure Act, the Lobbyist Regulation Act, and the Governmental Conduct Act. This week, he filed an addendum with allegations of violations of the State Procurement Code.
New Mexico's redistricting lawsuit – still a lot at stake
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 18 August 2023 18 August 2023
It's August 2023 and we still don't know what our congressional districts will look like for the 2024 election. We can thank the Democratic supermajority in the Legislature for crossing the line and gerrymandering the 2nd Congressional District beyond recognition.
This week, an amicus brief was filed by a consortium including election reform groups, redistricting experts and a retired chief Judge of the Court of Appeals. The brief, supporting no political party, provided detailed research and data regarding the CD2 map as adopted by the Legislature and the fairness test ordered by the State Supreme Court.
Is it climate change? Is it inflation reduction? Neither.
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 11 August 2023 11 August 2023
President Biden came to New Mexico this week on a quick three-state junket to try to make voters care about the Inflation Reduction Act which is really about climate change. 70% of us know next to nothing about the IRA, according to The Economist. The President might be better off if things stayed that way.
The IRA is a trimmed-down compromise salvaged out of the Build Back Better behemoth which would have been our eleventy-seventh ginormous pandemic stimulus. Because Congressional Republicans and Joe Manchin bravely took a stand against wasteful government spending, it's merely a $391 billion boondoggle to nowhere.
But Merritt, I hear your cry. The IRA not only pays for itself, it reduces the deficit by over $300 billion over the next decade!
Why the indictments matter
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 04 August 2023 04 August 2023
This week special counsel Jack Smith issued the most serious indictment yet against former President Donald Trump: four charges relating to attempts to overturn the 2020 election. Trump has responded predictably: "Massive Fraud," "NEW ELECTION," "Witch Hunt," etc., etc. The GOP, although with less enthusiasm, continues its codependent response for fear of losing the lunatic fringe it calls "the base."
The August 1 indictment essentially consists of four counts charging a former president for conspiring to prevent the peaceful transfer of power. This is a grave accusation that will have historical consequences for centuries to come. The proceedings have been made even more fraught by the relentless narrative slamming the Department of Justice as a purely political outfit, eagerly pounced upon by House Republicans, GOP primary candidates, and alt-right media.
The new nuclear age can't come fast enough
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 28 July 2023 28 July 2023
New Mexico is getting worldwide attention with this last weekend's box office opening of the film "Oppenheimer" which centers on Robert Oppenheimer, the Manhattan Project, and the establishment of Los Alamos in its current role as a nuclear research hub.
(Full disclosure: I saw "Barbie" instead. I have no regrets.)
(Additional full disclosure: I am not handwringing over whether it is okay or not to see films already made in light of the current writers' and actors' strikes. I have no regrets.)
Los Alamos is also setting itself apart from other Western communities by returning to its roots, if you will. Its county-run utility is looking to the latest nuclear technology to meet its decarbonization goals for power transmission. Their utility managers have signed on to become anchor customers of the first small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs) to come online, joining Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS), a compact to subscribe to power generated by a cluster of six SMRs in Idaho.
Surprise! Threads is a money-making enterprise
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 14 July 2023 14 July 2023
In its first week, Threads, the Meta/Instagram/Facebook alternative to Twitter, signed on more than 100 million users. It seems many of them expect Threads to be a “safe space” from the scary right-wing Elon Musk-controlled Twitter.I have terrible, terrible news for Threads account holders. Mark Zuckerberg is monetizing your data just as fast, if not faster, than Musk. With three very different platforms from which to track and mine your data, parent company Meta gets more data from more users to sell and more ad revenue than Twitter ever thought about.
Social media is not a public service. It is a massive global market bringing in hundreds of billions in revenues. The enjoyment of instant connection and the giddy potential of viral recognition come at a price – our privacy.
Here are some highlights of the data rights you are giving to Meta by using Threads:
Polarization has eroded the power of Congress
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 07 July 2023 07 July 2023
Congress has been so polarized along partisan lines for so long, voters are now accustomed to it. The devolution from rules of civility began some three decades ago when Newt Gingrich rose to the Speakership and both sides quickly jumped onboard the tribalism train.
Republicans weren't the first to try to refuse to certify a presidential election this century. In 2001, a dozen Democratic House members objected to the certification of Florida results and tried to block the counting of Florida's electoral votes. When then-Vice President Al Gore refused, they left the House chamber in protest.
In the next Congress, Democratic senators blocked President George W. Bush's federal appellate court judicial nominations no fewer than ten times. After regaining a GOP majority in 2005, new Senate Republicans were ready to invoke the "nuclear option" and eliminate the filibuster to prevent such actions in the future until the "Gang of 14" stepped in and brokered an agreement that Democrats would not filibuster judicial nominations and Republicans would not propose the nuclear option.