NM bill would expand concealed weapons law

From KOB-TV.com - By Stuart Dyson, KOB Eyewitness News 4; Taryn Bianchin, KOB.com - A bill that would expand New Mexico’s concealed-carry firearms law was introduced in the legislature on Monday. The bill would allow people with concealed-carry permits to bring their guns into bars, schools, university classrooms and onto public transportation. Supporters of the bill point out that those permit holders are people over 21 years old, with clean criminal records that have passed a gun safety class. “This isn’t a bill designed to allow kids to carry arms to school,” said one of the bill’s sponsors, Rep. Zach Cook, a Ruidoso Republican. “I wouldn’t support legislation that would allow children to bring a weapon to school. This is for parents and other responsible, law-abiding adult citizens.” Some lawmakers admit they are staggered by the idea. “The week after the Tucson Massacre, to have dreamed this up - really?” asked Sen. Jerry Ortiz y Pino, an Albuquerque Democrat. “This is almost incomprehensible to me. It just seems to me that it takes things in the wrong direction.” Read more

NM bill would expand concealed weapons law

This Day In New Mexico History - January 25

This day in New Mexico history - January 25, 1869 - Happy Birthday Colfax County, New Mexico! It was originally part of Taos County, one of the original nine counties created by the New Mexico Territory in 1852. In 1859, the eastern part of Taos County, including all of the territory of Colfax County, was split off to form Mora County. Colfax County was established on January 25, 1869 from the northern part of Mora County. The original county seat was the gold mining town of Elizabethtown. By 1872, when the gold rush in Elizabethtown had died down, the county seat was moved to Cimarron which was on the stage coach route along the Mountain Branch of the Santa Fe Trail, and was the headquarters of the Maxwell Land Grant. In 1881, the county seat was moved from Cimarron to Springer, located on the former Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad, The Colfax County Courthouse in Springer was the site of one of the last important shoot-outs in the Colfax County War, but that story is for another day. This former courthouse, which is on the National Register of Historic Places is now the home of a museum devoted to the Santa Fe Trail. The eastern portions of Colfax, Mora, and San Miguel counties were severed to form Union County in 1893. After a referendum and a bitter legislative fight, the county seat moved from Springer to Raton in 1897. Raton was an important coal-mining town, and was also a railroad center. The citizens of Raton raised $8000 to pay one third of the costs of a new courthouse. That courthouse was replaced in 1932 by the current Colfax County Courthouse, an art-deco WPA structure that also is on the National Register of Historic Places. To read more about Colfax County New Mexico click here

This Day In New Mexico History - January 25

WAC Looks Poised to Lose.....Again

The New Mexico State University athletic programs participate in the Western Athletic Conference. Recent defections from the WAC Conference (Boise State, Fresno State, Nevada, Hawaii) are almost too significant and ominous to mention for NMSU fans. Patchwork repair has been done by the seemingly seriously wounded WAC. Now it is beginning to appear that WAC conference mates Utah State and San Jose State are on the verge of jumping off the sinking conference ship that is still known as the WAC.

News New Mexico sports editor Kyle Doperalski first got a whiff of this breaking story just a few hours ago. NewNM will be covering this breaking sports news story in more detail in the 7:00am hour on Tuesday January 25th. Could NMSU be the odd man out in a nationwide re-shuffle of NCAA Division I conferences that appears to be on the verge of rendering the WAC virtually irrelevant in collegiate sports? Listen at 7:00am. Maybe by then NewNM will have some answers for listeners.

WAC Looks Poised to Lose.....Again

Accounting Tweak Could Save Fed From Losses

From reuters.com -Concerns that the Federal Reserve could suffer losses on its massive bond holdings may have driven the central bank to adopt a little-noticed accounting change with huge implications: it makes insolvency much less likely. The significant shift was tucked quietly into the Fed's weekly report on its balance sheet and phrased in such technical terms that it was not even reported by financial media when originally announced on January 6. But the new rules have slowly begun to catch the attention of market analysts. Many are at once surprised that the Fed can set its own guidelines, and also relieved that the remote but dangerous possibility that the world's most powerful central bank might need to ask the U.S. Treasury or its member banks for money is now more likely to be averted. "Could the Fed go broke? The answer to this question was 'Yes,' but is now 'No,'" said Raymond Stone, managing director at Stone & McCarthy in Princeton, New Jersey. "An accounting methodology change at the central bank will allow the Fed to incur losses, even substantial losses, without eroding its capital." The change essentially allows the Fed to denote losses by the various regional reserve banks that make up the Fed system as a liability to the Treasury rather than a hit to its capital. It would then simply direct future profits from Fed operations toward that liability. More here

Accounting Tweak Could Save Fed From Losses

Acorn is Reborn

From nypost.com -Backed by hundreds of thousands of dollars in union donations, New York Communities for Change -- a rebranded version of the controversial organization that closed up shop amid several scandals -- is acting again as labor's attack dog on controversial issues. NYCC took over ACORN's office on Nevins Street in Brooklyn, shares some of the same board members and uses its membership lists and other resources. The "new" organization also fights to provide and preserve affordable housing for low-income New Yorkers. But when NYCC has to choose between low-income consumers and unions, it dances to Big Labor's tune. Consider Walmart's bid to open in New York City. It would offer discounted prices, which would disproportionately benefit the poorest New Yorkers. But instead NYCC has joined the campaign to block Walmart because it is a non-union shop that would compete with unionized stores. That puts NYCC on the same page as Stuart Appelbaum, head of the National Retail, Wholesale and Department Store union -- not all those low-income consumers. More here

Acorn is Reborn

First Black Tea Party Formed in Houston

From biggovernment.com -Anita MonCrief, infamous ACORN whistleblower, was asked to go on Sean Hannity’s radio show Thursday the 20th to discuss the founding of America’s first black Tea Party. Named after the first person to die in the Revolutionary War, the Crispus Attucks Tea Party was founded January 18th, 2011, at “This Is It” soul food restaurant in the heart of Houston, Texas’ 3rd district. The 3rd district is Represented by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, and was the focal point of rampant ACORN-style vote fraud and widespread voter intimidation this past November. It is thus fitting that this tea party had its inaugural meeting right down the street from Lee’s residence. With the typical politesse and considerate attitude of conservatives — always left unreported by the press (do ya think?) – Rep. Lee was extended an invitation to the event. And with typical leftist rudeness, Lee snubbed it. Wonder why? These are her constituents, after all. More here

First Black Tea Party Formed in Houston

Pearce Interviewed on NewsNM

Steve Pearce

Congressman Steve Pearce appeared on News New Mexico today for an extensive interview on developments on Capitol Hill. Topics discussed included the upcoming State of the Union address by President Obama and Pearce's vote to repeal the controversial healthcare reform law. Michael, Janice, and Jim also explored Pearce's ideas on China and lowering the corporate tax rate. You can hear the interview in the second half of hour two at this link:

Pearce Interviewed on NewsNM

Parker: Repeal More Reality TV Than "Theater"

Star Parker

Townhall - Democrats who are calling the House's decisively passed repeal of Obamacare -- the so-called " Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care" act -- theater are hallucinating. Perhaps it was theatrical to include in the name of the repeal act "job killing", though that is what it is. But I prefer melodrama to dishonesty. Calling Obamacare -- government mandates, subsidies, price controls, taxes, and rationed care -- "patient protection" and "affordable" is the height of dishonesty. The House repeal vote was important because the House is the legislative body closest to the people, and the people voted unequivocally last November to repudiate socialized medicine. Read full column here:

Parker: Repeal More Reality TV Than "Theater"

Doan: Government Unions Looting Taxpayers

Lurita Doan

Townhall - Lines are being drawn and the fight to reduce overly generous pay and benefits to government employees at the federal, state, and local level is underway. Not too surprisingly, public employee unions are gearing up, rallying government employees, and exerting pressure to maintain the generous pay and benefits that has loaded government with unsustainable debt. Public employee unions are, even now, pressing the Obama Administration for additional benefits and power. President Obama, either unwilling, or perhaps unable, to bring long-overdue accountability to powerful public employee unions, has instead issued guidance requiring greater Union representation and input into federal agency decision making. Obama's decision will likely embolden union bosses to think they can escape accountability and an honest review of benefits, salary, and pensions of government employees. Read full column here:

Doan: Government Unions Looting Taxpayers

31 Dead in Moscow Airport Homicide Bombing

Washington Times - MOSCOW (AP) — A suicide bomber set off an explosion that ripped through Moscow's busiest airport on Monday, coating its international arrivals terminal in blood. The attack killed at least 31 people and wounded nearly 170, Russian officials said. The terminal at Domodedovo Airport was engulfed by smoke and splattered with body parts after the midafternoon explosion that sprayed shrapnel, screws and ball bearings. Amateur video posted on YouTube showed a pile of bodies on the floor and other bodies scattered around. Luggage lay strewn across the ground, and several small fires burned. A dazed man in a suit pushed a baggage cart through the carnage. A man in blood-soaked clothes said he was just a few yards away from the explosion and thought he had been severely injured. "The guy standing next to me was torn to pieces," said Artyom Zhilenkov, a 35-year-old driver. Doctors told Mr. Zhilenkov that he had not sustained any injuries, but he was splattered by other victims' flesh and blood. Read full story here:

31 Dead in Moscow Airport Homicide Bombing

Still Key Players

Mary Helen Garcia

NMPolitics.net - Group plans to use influence to force bipartisan cooperation. ‘Those who dig in along party lines are not going to be passing legislation this session,’ Cervantes says. Though they weren’t successful in overthrowing Speaker Ben Luján, a group of four Southern New Mexico Democrats who crossed party lines to try to oust the House’s leader still wield a great deal of power in the Roundhouse. Those four – Las Crucens Joseph Cervantes and Mary Helen Garcia, Dona Irwin of Deming, and Andy Nuñez of Hatch – benefit from their willingness to cross the aisle, and from the new reality in the House that it takes fewer rogue Democrats to help Republicans win a fight.

Donna Irwin

 “Voters said they wanted change,” Irwin told NMPolitics.net. “This may be the way to make that happen.” Democrats have long held a large numerical advantage in the House, but not any more. The GOP picked up several House seats in the November election, and there are now 37 Democrats and 33 Republicans. With Nuñez considering becoming an independent, the numbers for Democrats are even less solid. Consider some of the ways in which the four southern lawmakers could influence things: Read full column here:

Still Key Players