The latest edition of Kids Count provides more devastating news about New Mexico and the condition of our children. The report, created by the Annie E. Casey Foundation (a center/left non-profit that works nationwide) analyzes and ranks all 50 states based on 16 variables relating to childhood outcomes.

Surprising absolutely no one, New Mexico again was at the very bottom once again at 50th. I analyzed the report and counted 7 variables that improved, 7 that got worse, and 2 that stayed the same relative to last year’s report. Based on this it is hard to point to any trend line pointing towards improvement.

That’s a problem for New Mexico’s left-wing politicians like Gov. Lujan Grisham, a majority in our Legislature, and the vast network of organizations that reflexively support big government schemes as the path to improving conditions for New Mexico kids.

For decades New Mexico has struggled to provide good outcomes for children. For decades we were told that New Mexico is a “poor” state and that if only we poured more money into government pre-K, K-12, and numerous other taxpayer- funded programs that improvement would come.

But, for the last decade the money to improve New Mexico has been available thanks to record- setting growth in oil and gas production. Despite massive spending growth in education and the creation of taxpayer- funded universal pre-K, our kids still face the worst outcomes nationwide.

If you cannot blame a lack of funding or failure of government programs to “move the needle” for our kids, what do you do instead? If you are New Mexico Voices for Children you blame “racist” standardized tests! In response to New Mexico’s poor performance on Kids Count, the organization wrote, “New Mexico’s ranking in the education domain is heavily impacted by national standardized test scores, including fourth grade reading proficiency,” said Emily Wildau, KIDS COUNT Coordinator at New Mexico Voices for Children. “Reading proficiency is critical for students to succeed academically and as adults. These scores do not reflect the ability of our children, but rather an education system that is not designed with our multicultural, multilingual students in mind.”

Set aside the fact that standardized tests only account for two of the 16 variables contained in the Kids Count report. Also set aside that numerous other states with large minority populations outperform New Mexico (Texas and Maryland are two) or (like Mississippi) are showing dramatic improvement on Kids Count and other education performance indicators.

It isn’t just our education system that has failed to “move the needle” on difficult challenges facing New Mexico children. A December 2023 Legislative Finance Committee report found that “In FY23, New Mexico spent over $10.1 billion of state and federal funds on income support programs – $2.6 billion more than in FY19. Over the same time, poverty levels have remained stubbornly high with poverty rates staying around 18 percent.”

Rather than pursuing the failed government- driven model of more spending and more programs, New Mexico needs to change direction. Adopting educational choice costs nothing while empowering families to make the education decisions that work best for them. And, of course, with the massive budget surpluses available to them the Legislature and Gov. could and should embrace tax reforms and other policies that would diversify New Mexico’s economy and get more people involved in the best anti-poverty program we know of, a job.

(EDITOR’S NOTE:


Paul Gessing is president of New Mexico’s Rio Grande Foundation. The Rio Grande Foundation is an independent, nonpartisan, tax-exempt research and educational organization dedicated to promoting prosperity for New Mexico based on principles of limited government, economic freedom and individual responsibility..)

By TRIP JENNINGS Last week the Supreme Court gave American presidents broad immunity against criminal prosecution. It is the first recognition in our nation’s 240-year history of any form of presidential immunity from prosecution.

Many stories focused on the short-term effects of the ruling, mainly how it impacts ongoing criminal prosecutions of former President Donald Trump and this year’s presidential contest.

However, I’d like to set aside electoral politics and the many questions raised by last week’s ruling, such as: what actions, exactly, would presidential immunity protect? Can a president lock up political rivals with impunity?

Instead, let’s imagine a future in which a person who is already the most powerful single individual in the country is given more power without a concomitant strengthening of protections to guard against abuse of power.

The ruling doesn’t only render prosecuting Donald Trump more difficult but creates broad immunity for all past, current, and future presidents.

In other words, a Democrat or a Republican or a progressive or a conservative could be the beneficiary of this new vision of executive power depending on who the American people elect as president.

People cheering last week might start frowning when this occurs to them —that the expanded presidential powers can benefit partisan, ideological adversaries, too.

After all, what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. That’s particularly true in American politics.

You learn these things when you report on politics for a long time.

Perhaps more surprising, to me at least, was the optimistic view the court’s conservative majority has of humans and their relationship to power. (Some might say the conservative majority’s view is naive, others might say cynical.)

Not to sound flippant, but it is as if the court’s conservative jurists just set up the United States to relearn Lord Acton’s by-now-almost-cliché observation — power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

It’s become a cliché because it communicates a truth about human affairs that’s been around for millennia — one the country’s founding generation knew all too well.

I wonder what they would make of last week’s ruling.

This, by the way, was a generation that fought a war to throw off the yoke of King George III’s imperial rule. A generation that commended George Washington for strengthening the fledgling democracy when he retired to his farm after winning the Revolutionary War in 1783, even though he could have assumed leadership of the nation. A generation that praised Washington again for emphasizing public service over personal ambition when he retired a second time after serving as the first president of the United States. It was an act that won Washington comparisons to Cincinnatus, a fifth century BCE Roman general. Cincinnatus came out of retirement to serve as Rome’s dictator to defend the city against invaders only to eschew power and retire to his farm after the war was won.

The founding generation had a healthy skepticism of power. Partly, because many of them subscribed to a view of human nature that believed even the best of us can succumb to the temptation to abuse power if we are allowed to use it unchecked. Because of that view, plus their lived experiences and understanding of history, they bequeathed to us a system of checks and balances — in the form of institutions — to guard against abuses of power. Ideally, their hope was, the president, Congress and judiciary would check each other’s power.

That same skepticism of too much power accumulating in one position was evident a century and a half later when Congress passed and the states ratified the 22nd Amendment, a measure that bars a president from being elected more than twice. Ratified in 1951, it was a response to Democratic President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s decision to defy tradition and run for and win his third and fourth presidential terms. Up until then, every American president had followed Washington’s example, serving only two terms.

I’m not sure what the Supreme Court’s end game is by making this ruling. There is much speculation and theorizing.

All I know is that last week’s ruling feels monumental, and that it will take time for us to understand the full effects on the system of checks and balances the founding generation gave us.

(Trip Jennings career began in Georgia at his hometown newspaper, The Augusta Chronicle, before working at newspapers in California, Florida and Connecticut. Since 2005, Trip has covered politics and state government for the Albuquerque Journal, The New Mexico Independent and the Santa Fe New Mexican. He holds a Master’s of Divinity from Columbia Theological Seminary in Decatur, Ga. In 2012, he co-founded New Mexico In Depth.)

Summer is here and we have just celebrated the Fourth of July. It’s going to get hot. The election season is here. The first debate is over and the polls are coming in, with President Biden slipping 3 to 5 points. It is going to get hotter.

Democracy is said to be in the balance. Both candidates warn us if the other one wins, it is over and only they can preserve democracy. We are in a lovehate war and prisoners of the popularized thoughts from elitest focus groups where political speak designates right from wrong and propagandized by a bias media. Face it, whether CNN, MSNBC, CBS, Fox or others, editorial opinion permeates what we hear as truth. Real news, void of commentary is a commodity in short supply. Media has patrons who attempt to tell us what we are to believe. The concept is called “truth to power,” but what is truth in politics?

If the elections are free and fair, then democracy has survived. In my opinion, it is the republic which is in peril, not democracy. Our democratic- republic is a system of laws, created and theoretically followed by those we elect and enforced by the judicial system.

Many Americans feel the Biden administration has weaponized the justice system and unjustly gone after former President Trump. If you are a Democrat, you probably believe Trump is guilty of crimes. If a Republican, you probably see this as an unfair persecution. State governments have tried to keep him off the ballot, using the 14th Amendment and the accusation of his instigating an insurrection on January 6, 2021.

This strategy also works for the Republicans who say democracy is threatened by attempting to block a candidate and sequester the vote, the very foundation of democracy.

After the recent decision of the Supreme Court on presidential immunity, President Biden has tried to incite the public in a speech, saying that “any president, including Donald Trump, will now be free to ignore the law.” He claimed the High Court issued ‘a fundamentally new principle, and it’s a dangerous president.” His claim is false.

The justices said specifically a president is not shielded from prosecution for private actions, not a part of his constitutional duties. The Court’s ruling will also protect Mr. Biden and he should be glad considering he has ignored immigration law, allowing, even encouraging millions of immigrants to illegally enter the country and ignored the Supreme Court’s ruling that only Congress has the right to eliminate student debt. President Biden has ignored that law and the Court’s decision and in a vote-soliciting appeal continues to issue orders to cancel student debt.

Progressives take issue with the High Court and tout the necessity of packing it with progressive judges. They still sting from the three originalist Justices seated during the Trump presidency. Progressive Congresswoman Cortez (AOC) has announced she will file impeachment articles against some of the “rogue” Justices for their centrist and constitutional rulings on this year’s docket.

Looking at actions during the Biden presidency, one must conclude Democrats had rather rule by executive orders than by duly passed laws as stipulated in our Constitution.

Beginning with the Obama administration, government dictates began making social changes which seem backward. Diversity, equity and inclusion have canceled the idea of equality, void of race, sex, merit or politics. When someone is chosen for a job, qualifications might be a criterion. I will consider potential as well, as people grow into jobs. Consider the selection of our vice president who was chosen by Biden who promised to select a “woman of color.” To me, that decision excluded all others with broader political experience and was unwise as she was and is completely unqualified to be president. Such are the DEI decrees of current politics and to the exclusion of those who think differently. Everyone is equal except those who aren’t. DEI may appeal to some, but it discredits the principle of truth to power.

Mr. Biden also mishandled classified material by retaining documents dating back to his time in the Senate, Neither candidate is a perfect person or perfect choice. Each have glaring faults. Mr. Trump is a braggart and often exaggerates beyond truth. He demands personal loyalty of his advisors, above objective perspective on issues. His childish name-calling is far from becoming to the presidency. He is accused of being totally selfish in his quest to be president again. He has offended many in government by declaring he will drain the swamp. Those in the intelligence community claim he is unfit to be president and not to be trusted with our nation’s secrets. He is currently under indictment for mishandling classified material, but the special counsel Robert Hur, refused to refer Biden for charges, stating he is to old and feeble, with a lapsing memory to be successfully prosecuted. Other accusations of his direct involvement with his son, Hunter also shadow him. Media figures are now reporting receiving pre-approved questions before Biden interviews. You can only ask him what he is prepared to answer. Truth to power?

I am concerned for our country for several reasons. Merit and truth matter. We are political prisoners of what we perceive as truth, entrenched in one camp or another. Each side wants control of government and no matter which candidate wins, the fight for control will continue. Our politicians have ceased being for the people, opting to preserve their power. President Ronald Reagan said that “The founding fathers understood that only by making government the servant, not the master, only by positing sovereignty in the people and not the state, can we hope to protect freedom.

President Biden’s lackluster debate performance may prove to benefit down-ballot challengers seeking to defeat incumbents. We need a new crop of politicians. Let us pray for our country that those who govern us will seek the will of the people and may the people field candidates who represent us.

(EDITOR’S NOTE: Tom Wright is a columnist from Santa Fe and an investor in El Rito Media, LLC., owner of the Artesia Daily Press)