Democracy for New Mexico

This and That on NH Dem Primary

So do you think Kennedy would be considered
too "angry" and "partisan" today?

• The Clinton campaign just doesn't get it:

Clinton is trying to cope with Obama’s momentum by emphasizing her appeal to younger voters and by taking more questions at her events. The Clinton campaign sent out a news release — titled, “Clinton Reaches Out To Young New Hampshire Voters” — announcing roundtables she’s holding with young undecided voters and the launch of an “Ask Hillary” feature on Facebook.

• The Edwards campaign says he'll stay in the race until the Dem Convention in Denver in August. Today, he's got Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon stumping for him in several New Hampshire towns.

• Latest polling by CNN/WMUR:

Obama 39%
Clinton 29%
Edwards 16%
Richardson 7%
Kucinich 2% 
Someone else 1%
No opinion 5%

• Who do the lobbyists like, according to Open Secrets?

Of course if you look around at other categories at the Open Secrets page, you'll see that both Clinton and Obama have received huge donations from individuals connected to big corporations.

• Richardson and has the endorsement of two NH newspapers. Check out on the hardworking Richardson campaign and be sure to click through to Blue Hampshire's video about their snow removal project inside a town rotary in NH. A real snow job!

• The Santa Fe New Mexican's Steve Terrell has analysis and lots of photos from following the Richardson Campaign in Iowa and New Hampshire.

• The other Big Bill (Clinton) is sometimes attracting, smaller, rather sleepy crowds in NH stumping for his wife, according to the NY Times.

• The elephant in the room:

1/19/08: Kickoff for Toulouse Oliver Bernalillo County Clerk Re-Election Campaign

Please join us for
Maggie Toulouse Oliver’s Campaign Kickoff
Please help Maggie kick off her campaign to continue as Bernalillo County Clerk!
Join us for food, music, fun and most importantly, a commitment to free and fair elections!

Saturday, January 19, 2008, 2 PM - 4 PM
Orpheum Art Space – 500 2nd St. SW
(SE Corner of 2nd and Coal)

For more information, please contact: Ariel Bickel at atbickel@yahoo.com or 321-6867.
Click for postcard (pdf).

Yesterday's Dem and Repub ABC NH Debates

Short and sweet reaction: Arent' you glad you're a Democrat? Seeing the candidates from each party engage one another back to back provided such a clear contrast between inclusive, forward-looking thinking and hackneyed, shortsighted phoniness that I can't believe anyone could watch the whole thing and still come out admitting to being a Republican this year....

As the Obama "movement" continues to gain strength, I think it's worth pondering what Chris Bowers at Open Left has to say about Hillary's chances for success -- even if she loses in New Hampshire and South Carolina -- and how a California showdown may be brewing.

Sunday Bird Blogging: Domestic Partnership Edition

Sunny the sun conure is excited about the 30-day NM Legislative Session that begins at Noon on January 15, 2008. As you can see above, he's a strong supporter of GLBT rights and equal rights under the law for all -- birds included. It's understandable given his rainbow coloring, isn't it? This morning he was reminding us how important it is to work with Equality New Mexico and the legislators to get the Domestic Partnership Act passed this time.

Last year's effort was foiled at the last minute by one vote when a certain Northern New Mexico legislator changed his mind and voted against the bill. I guess he doesn't care about giving our state's GLBT citizens (and others who prefer domestic partnerships) some of the basic contract rights that married people take for granted. Sunny wants to feel secure about the partnership of the humans he entertains daily in his extended flock, and he can't see why the idea of granting them rights to a civil partnership is a threat to anyone. He's no bird brain!

If you agree, it's time to sign up as a supporter of Equality New Mexico, maybe donate a few bucks to the cause, perhaps volunteer some time and start contacting your legislators to urge them to support this year's Domestic Partnership Rights and Responsibilities Act (HB28). The EQNM webiste makes it easy to sign a petition in support of the Act and have it sent automatically to your state senator and representative.

The bill (pdf), sponsored once again by the always terrific Rep. Mimi Stewart, has been pre-filed with the Legislative Council Service so advocates can hit the ground running when the Session begins. I'll be following the progress of the bill closely, so stay tuned. Sunny's looking forward to a big celebration when this year's Legislative Session comes to a close. We can do it this year!

(Updated) NH Debates Tonight for Dem and Repub Prez Candidates

UPDATE 1/6/08: Transcripts and video clips of the debate are now available at ABC News. I'm hearing the debates will be rebroadcast today at 5:00 PM MST in Albuquerque, but I can't find it in online TV listings so I'm not sure about that.
*****************
ABC will air back-to-back, 90-minute debates with Democratic and Republican presidential candidates tonight at St. Anselm College in Manchester, NH. They'll be moderated by Charles Gibson, chief news anchor of ABC News, and co-hosted by ABC, WMUR and Facebook.

Each debate will be divided into two parts. During the first 45 minutes, Gibson will select three prominent issues to promote a dialogue. The candidates will be seated and encouraged to talk to each other, not just to the cameras. The second half will be a more traditional format, with Gibson and WMUR-TV political director Scott Spradling asking questions on a variety of topics.

Mike Huckabee, John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, Fred Thompson, Mitt Romney and Ron Paul will participate in the Repub debate, which will be broadcast starting at 6:00 PM in New Mexico. Slated to begin at around 7:45 PM, the Dem debate will feature John Edwards, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Bill Richardson. Both Joe Biden and Chris Dodd have withdrawn from the race.

ABC has Dems Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel and Repub Duncan Hunter from the debates based on criteria developed by the network. Candidates had to meet at least one of three criteria to participate: place first through fourth in Iowa, poll 5 percent or higher in one of the last four major New Hampshire surveys, or poll 5 percent or higher in one of the last four major national surveys.

On Friday, Kucinich filed a complaint with the FCC in response to his exclusion, arguing that ABC is violating equal-time provisions by keeping him out of the debate. He noted that ABC's parent, Walt Disney Co., had contributed to campaigns involving the four Democrats who were invited. "ABC should not be the first primary," the Ohio congressman said in papers filed at the Federal Communications Commission.

There will probably be a few minutes where both Republican and Democratic candidates are on the same stage. The auditorium will be emptied between debates and a new audience brought in. Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos will lead ABC's coverage, which runs from 6:00 to 10:00 PM in New Mexico.

The New Hampshire primary will be held next Tuesday, January 8, 2008.

Register Now for Presentation on Community Value Organizing

From Martha Domiguez, World Voices: Join us!
Community Value Organization
Presented by John Rogers of Germany
Saturday, January 12, 2-4 PM
Plumber Pipefitters Hall
510 San Pedro SE, Albuquerque, NM
Sponsored by World Voices Independent Newspaper

Learn about:

• Strengthening local economies and building community
• Currency circulation, keeping wealth local and increase numbers of local trades
• Poverty alleviation; social inclusion; community capacity building; sustainable development

John Rogers, who is visiting New Mexico from Europe, has been experimenting with local community currencies for the last 14 years –- working as an organizer, administrator, writer, trainer and lecturer. In 1993 he started a Local Exchange Trading System (LETS) in the UK that is still trading today. He founded the Wales Institute for Community Currencies which supports communities to start viable systems and researches their effectiveness. He now runs his own consultancy and training practice Value for People that spreads best practices in organizing and designing local economies and currencies.

Donation to attend is $25. Call 275-0597 to reserve your place by January 7th, Checks should be made payable to World Voices and mailed to 10805 Ralph NE, Albuquerque, NM 87112.

Jason Marks Elected PRC Chair

Congratulations Jason! The AP reports that Public Regulation Commissioner Jason Marks (right) has been elected by his fellow commissioners as the agency's new chairman, succeeding Ben Ray Lujan in that post. Lujan remains on the PRC serving his present term, and is running as a Democrat in the NM-03 2008 Congressional race. Marks, who represents PRC District 1 in the Albuquerque area, was elected to the PRC in 2004 and has served as vice chairman for three years. Commissioner Sandy Jones of PRC District 5, another Democrat, was selected as the new vice chairman.

Marks, a Democrat known as "the consumers' watchdog," is running for reelection to the PRC this year and is expected draw a Republican challenger. I guess they don't like his common sense views on global warming and renewable energy, as expressed in his recent op-ed in the Albuquerque Journal entitled, "Big-Oil Subsidies Aren't Key to Energy Future." As Marks writes,

Across the country, especially in states like New Mexico that have renewable portfolio standards, the public is benefiting environmentally and economically from the placement of wind, solar and biomass plants.

These renewable projects provide jobs and revenues to rural communities, and in our experience here in New Mexico, wind energy is a lower cost supply of electricity than natural gas!

You can read more about Marks' views on the PRC's role in dealing with the challenge of "a transition from fossil fuel dependence to an energy future based on clean and sustainable technologies" in a text version of his campaign kickoff speech I posted in October. It's a keeper.

NM Senate Leaders Pre-File Bill to Restore Petition Signature Option for Candidates

The pre-filing of a bill to restore the petition signature option for statewide and federal candidates to get on the ballot if they don't get 20% of the vote at party pre-primary conventions was just announced in the press release below. Don Wiviott, a Democratic candidate for Congress in NM-03, filed a lawsuit yesterday asking the Santa Fe District Court to determine whether the 20% requirement, passed unanimously into law last legislative session as part of a larger bill, is constitutional.

Press Release: Santa Fe, NM – Senate Majority Leader Michael S. Sanchez (D-Valencia County) announced that on December 17, 2007 he and Senate Minority Leader Stuart Ingle pre-filed Senate Bill 1, Primary Ballot Access for Certain Candidates. The bill allows candidates for statewide offices to be placed on primary ballots by petition of signatures. During last year’s legislative session that provision was removed in House Bill 1156 thereby requiring candidates to receive at least 20% of preprimary convention delegates before their names could be placed on the ballot.

Senate Bill 1 restores the language that was deleted in last year’s bill. “It’s important that candidates continue to be allowed other avenues for getting on the ballot. The system we have had for many years was working well. Restoring the original language is the right thing to do because giving voters choices is what it’s all about,” said Sen. Sanchez.

Pursuant to Senate Rule 11-12-1, amended during last year’s legislative session, senators may pre-file legislation from December 15 through the Friday before the regular session. This year senators may pre-file bills from December 17, 2007 through January 11, 2008. Pre-filed legislation will be introduced and referred to committee on the first day of the regular session which begins on January 15, 2008.

Senate Bill 1 and all other pre-filed bills are posted at the New Mexico Legislature’s website. A link to the website is available on the Senate Democrats’ website www.nmsenate.com.

Iowa Results: Change, Youth, Women, Money

Obama with the evening's most moving speech

Off the top of my head:

• About 67% of Iowa Dem caucusgoers voted for progressive change candidates (Obama and Edwards) over the status quo, business as usual triangulator (Clinton).

• According to so-called "entrance polls," almost a quarter of the Dem participants were under the age of 30 -- and of that group Obama got 57%, Edwards 14% and Clinton 11%.

• Obama captured the majority of women voters even tho Hillary targeted this demographic very heavily.

• Hillary did better with union members and low income voters than Edwards, despite his populist messaging.

• About 235,000 Dems are estimated to have participated last night, versus 124,000 in 2004. Only 114,000 Repubs attended caucuses, and about 60% of them were self-defined born again Christians or evangelicals. Among these voters, Huckabee got about 45%.

• Repub Mitt Romney outspent his rivals by huge margins and had a much larger paid staff, yet Romney finished a dismal second. Edwards beat Clinton by one point despite spending only about $4.2 3.2 million on ads to her $12 7.2 million or so. (Obama spent approximately $9 million on ads).

• Candidates with a heavily populist economic message -- Mike Huckabee and John Edwards -- had strong showings.

• According to anecdotal reports, large numbers of Independents and Republicans switched over last night to vote in the Dem caucuses, and most of them were caucusing for Obama. About 40% of registered voters in New Hampshire are Independents, and predictions are that the majority will back Obama, with the rest going for McCain.

• Sen. Chris Dodd and Sen. Joe Biden withdrew from the race last night. They each garnered less than 1% in "viable" support. Gov. Bill Richardson finished with viable supporters that numbered about 2%, but has announced he'll stay in the race at least through New Hampshire. (I originally reported that Mike Gravel had also withdrawn from the race, based on a statement by Keith Olbermann, but today the Gravel campaign insisted their campaign was still alive.)

• Four Dem candidates will participate in Saturday's debate in New Hampshire -- Obama, Edwards, Clinton and Richardson.

• New Hampshire's primary is set for next Tuesday, January 8th, which doesn't give candidates with disappointing finishes in Iowa much time to regroup.

• I thought the speeches of Obama, Edwards and Clinton last night were all very good, but that Obama's was a soaring, moving, historic masterpiece. It gave me goose bumps and even brought a few tears to my eyes -- and I was pulling for Edwards last night.

My prediction: Obama will win New Hampshire and South Carolina by significant margins and go on to sweep the majority of states on Super Duper Tuesday on February 5th. My gut is telling me there's an almost unstoppable new energy afoot in the electorate, especially among its younger members, and Obama is a master at feeding it with inspiring rhetoric and, yes, hope.

I think people are clearly seeking an uplift in candidates and their rhetoric at this critical juncture, not more cynicism. They seem to be very tired of looking back, of politics as usual, of positioning that reeks of phoniness and political expediency and of Beltway-style conventional wisdom. I'm really starting to believe that, as Obama says, a majority of Americans think it's time to turn the page.

Tracking Iowa Caucus Results (Live Updates) - 7:30 PM, Projected Winners Obama & Huckabee

The winner of the Democratic Iowa Caucuses 2008

The winner of the Republican Iowa Caucuses 2008

UPDATE 8:30 PM: OK, this is my last update. I'm off to put my feet up and stare at the tube. You're on your own!

Senator Barack Obama: 37.52%
Senator John Edwards: 29.87%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 29.41%
Governor Bill Richardson: 2.10%
Senator Joe Biden: 0.94%
Uncommitted: 0.13%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.02%
Precincts Reporting: 1721 of 1781

UPDATE 8:02 PM: The question is, will Obama's momentum carry him to a win in New Hampshire, where all those Independents vote? Polling consistently shows Independents like Obama, not Clinton. Will Edwards hang on through New Hampshire hoping for a miracle? Will Richardson call it quits? About 60% of caucus voters on the Repub side were reportedly evangelical Christians and most of them voted to make Huckabee the winner.

Senator Barack Obama: 37.21%
Senator John Edwards: 29.97%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 29.57%
Governor Bill Richardson: 2.15%
Senator Joe Biden: 0.94%
Uncommitted: 0.12%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.03%
Precincts Reporting: 1650 of 1781

Earlier updates are below the fold.

UPDATE 7:47 PM: Clinton in 3rd by a minuscule margin. Youth turnout big. Dems get twice the turnout of Repubs:

Senator Barack Obama: 36.86%
Senator John Edwards: 30.15%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 29.87%
Governor Bill Richardson: 2.07%
Senator Joe Biden: 0.91%
Uncommitted: 0.10%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.03%
Precincts Reporting: 1562 of 1781

UPDATE 7:36 PM: Razor-thin margin between Edwards and Hillary for 2nd.

Senator Barack Obama: 36.37%
Senator John Edwards: 30.47%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 30.15%
Governor Bill Richardson: 1.96%
Senator Joe Biden: 0.93%
Uncommitted: 0.09%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.03%
Precincts Reporting: 1448 of 1781

UPDATE 7:27 PM: NBC proclaims Obama the winner! So does CNN.

Senator Barack Obama: 35.26%
Senator John Edwards: 30.99%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 30.78%
Governor Bill Richardson: 1.82%
Senator Joe Biden: 1.02%
Uncommitted: 0.11%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.03%
Precincts Reporting: 1316 of 1781

UPDATE 7:20 PM: Obama hanging in with a slim lead. Entrance polling had about half the Dems saying their most important factor in choosing was an ability to bring about change.

Senator Barack Obama: 34.95%
Senator John Edwards: 31.24%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 31.02%
Governor Bill Richardson: 1.68%
Senator Joe Biden: 0.97%
Uncommitted: 0.10%
Senator Chris Dodd : 0.03%
Precincts Reporting: 1173 of 1781

UPDATE 7:10 PM: More than half the precincts in. Talk about a tight race! If this keeps up I doubt that Richardson will be "viable" in many precincts, which means he can urge his supporters to Obama (or whoever) and be a sort of kingmaker....

Senator Barack Obama: 34.06%
Senator John Edwards: 31.71%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 31.45%
Governor Bill Richardson: 1.76%
Senator Joe Biden: 0.94%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.05%
Uncommitted: 0.03%
Precincts Reporting: 923 of 1781

UPDATE 7:00 PM: Wow, these results are coming in quickly. Must be mostly small, rural precincts. Reports that turnout is high.

Senator Barack Obama: 33.20%
Senator John Edwards: 32.09%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 31.77%
Governor Bill Richardson: 1.79%
Senator Joe Biden: 1.02%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.07%
Uncommitted: 0.05%
Precincts Reporting: 630 of 1781

Huckabee Projected Repub Winner
CNN (and now MSNBC) has projected Huckabee to be the winner on the Repub side! There's no wheeling and dealing at Repub caucuses - one person one vote:

Huckabee 7,809 35%
Romney 5,355 24% 0
Thompson 3,178 14% 0
McCain 2,638 12% 0
Paul 2,425 11% 0
Giuliani 830 4% 0
Hunter 72 0% 0
25% of precincts in

6:30 PM MST: For some reason, the Iowa Dem Party already has some results up:

Senator John Edwards: 36.37%
Senator Hillary Clinton: 31.56%
Senator Barack Obama: 28.02%
Governor Bill Richardson: 1.97%
Senator Joe Biden: 1.09%
Senator Chris Dodd: 0.57%
Uncommitted: 0.42%
Precincts Reporting: 64 of 1781

(Percentages are State Delegate Equivalents.)

What do they mean? Not a whole helluva lot at this point, but it's a start ....