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.
APD: a cautionary tale
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 09 February 2024 09 February 2024
A federal investigation into the DWI unit of the Albuquerque Police Department and an Albuquerque law firm has resulted in the mayor, the police chief and the district attorney all pointing fingers – away from themselves.
If you don't follow Albuquerque news, here's the gist: Albuquerque lawyer Thomas Clear (also chair of the State Public Defender Commission until the FBI raided his office) is alleged to have colluded with four APD officers and one lieutenant over DWI defendants. The scam worked like this: the cops in question would arrest a DWI offender, refer them to Clear for legal representation and then make a procedural error during the legal proceedings, most commonly missing a court date, leading to the dismissal of the charges.
Our bountiful food dilemma
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 12 January 2024 12 January 2024
America is awash in food. People from other countries who visit here or move here comment on the variety and volume of the food in our stores and the portions at our restaurants.
Then, they often like to comment on our collective obesity and tell us our food is crap.
It hits a nerve. But is it entirely deserved?
Our country has gotten fatter in the last thirty years. Since 1994, child obesity rates have doubled to nearly 20%. Nationwide, about 40% of Americans are considered obese, and another 30% considered overweight, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Make no mistake, healthcare is rationed
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 05 January 2024 05 January 2024
Whenever anyone talks about changing our healthcare system, the opposition warns of healthcare rationing. Here's the thing. Healthcare already is rationed, in truly haphazard ways.
I am among the most fortunate of Americans in that I am well-insured and quite knowledgeable about healthcare coverage from previous work experience. I consider myself to be a sophisticated consumer of our healthcare system. This was very helpful assisting my parents with multiple catastrophic hospitalizations, managing the pandemic, and managing my own medical issues (I happen to be a disabled veteran).
Who should decide who gets on the ballot?
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 29 December 2023 29 December 2023
Guest Column by Darrell M. Allen
The recent decision of the Colorado Supreme Court disqualifying Donald Trump from the 2024 ballot in Colorado is, well, unusual. Such a thing has never happened before in the history of the United States. The decision is not necessarily wrong, but it is unusual. What is far more unusual is that the Colorado Supreme Court was asked to judge whether Mr. Trump engaged in insurrection against the United States.
Spoiler alert: he did. On January 6, 2021, the then sitting President of the United States tried to overturn the result of the November 2020 Presidential election by force and violence.
We all saw what happened on January 6, 2021, with our own eyes. An angry mob, festooned with Trump flags and regalia, assaulted the United States Capitol building. The angry mob attacked Congress as it was duty-bound to count the electoral votes of the November 2020 Presidential election. The winner of that election was Joe Biden, 306-232 in electoral votes, 81 million over 74 million in popular votes.
The state of travel in 2023
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 23 December 2023 23 December 2023
I am a fairly frequent flyer. There are some basic survival skills and etiquette points modern airport travelers should know: never check a bag if you can help it; don't crowd the boarding area ahead of your boarding group; the armrest is for the center seat; if you bring a meal on a plane, consider its aroma; keep your shoes on; exiting the plane is done by row, not a mob rush.
But none of these can prepare travelers for times when airlines show complete disregard for their staffs and their passengers. Dear readers, I present to you American Airlines in 2023.
The GOP's ethics problem won't go away with George Santos
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 08 December 2023 08 December 2023
Former Congressman George Santos of New York is not a loveable character. Facing federal charges of conspiracy, wire fraud, false statements, falsification of records, aggravated identity theft, and credit card fraud around misuse of his campaign accounts, he is also a shameless and prolific liar.
Santos has claimed: to be the descendant of Holocaust survivors; a Wall Street executive with Goldman Sachs and Citigroup (both firms have no record of his employment); that his mother was a 9/11 victim; that his mother died of cancer; that he played college volleyball at a college he did not graduate from before getting an MBA at another university he did not attend; that he had employees at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando the night of the mass shooting; that he was never a drag queen.
But, more worryingly, he is accused of using his campaign account for shopping sprees for luxury items. That sounds fairly ho-hum. The federal charges also detail allegations that he fraudulently used donor credit cards to make charges in their name. That's a new one.
One person, one vote should mean something
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 01 December 2023 01 December 2023
It's interesting to me how unbothered many New Mexicans are by the decades of gerrymandering that have taken place in our state. The November 27 affirmation by the state Supreme Court of the lower court ruling upholding the 2021 redistricting plan signed into law by the Democratic legislature was similarly anticlimactic.
The all-Democrat Supreme Court simply agreed with the previous District Court ruling that well, yes, the Democratic legislature gerrymandered the 2nd Congressional District to improve Democratic performance in that district by 12 percentage points. But that wasn't an "egregious" gerrymander.
Meh. Politicians are going to politick. What are you gonna do?
The gift of creativity
- Category: One Woman's Viewpoint One Woman's Viewpoint
- Published: 27 November 2023 27 November 2023
Thanksgiving is not my favorite holiday, but it serves as a modest kickoff to the best time of the year: the Christmas and winter holiday season. I start the day after Thanksgiving and keep it going right up until Ash Wednesday. For me and my household, these winter months are a time to celebrate what and whom we hold close.
The house we live in now is the house we have lived in the longest. It is where we cared for both of my parents until their deaths. It is where we reimagined our lives and managed a business through the shock of the pandemic. And like many New Mexico homes, it is filled with art from local artists. None are from Santa Fe or Taos.
A number of the works are gifts. In the 1990s a Silver City artist drew an astonishing charcoal portrait of me and one of my mother, and one in color of one of my sisters. Nancy Sims worked full time in management at Gila Regional Medical Center but was drawn to the human face, perhaps from her career in nursing. Despite long hours at the hospital, she made beautiful art to give away. I don’t know if she ever had a formal show before her death.