A Theme Typified

On this blog I have characterized the Diane Denish NM gubernatorial campaign as a continuance of the Bill Richardson administration. A simple argument could be made empirically from the political standpoint that that for the last eight years Denish has “served” as Lt Governor in apparent lockstep with Richardson and four years earlier ran as Lt Governor in apparent lockstep with Martin Chavez’s losing campaign. Apparent lockstep because in twelve years either running for or in office as Lt Governor and not many people in New Mexico even know what exactly Diane Denish stands for or what she would do as governor. One must use those twelve years as an implicit endorsement and mirroring of the entirely political make up of professional politicians Chavez and Richardson. Even in political ads that are not misleading attack ads Denish characterizes herself as a corruption fighting business woman without any evidence of either claim. What business has she ever run? What and how, as Lt Governor, did she have responsibility for investigating anything? And what resulted of these investigations done by the Lt Governor?

One of the worst aspects of the last eight years of the Richardson/Denish administration has been the way in which partisan politics has invaded almost every aspect of state government. Cronyism and mischaracterizations about everything has occurred. No one can understand the state’s budget and where everything goes and what’s left or owed, Political donors from out of state have received lucrative state contracts and the number of political appointees with thinly described work duties has increased immensely. This kind of behavior erodes confidence in governance and results in deserved pessimism of the political class by the citizens of New Mexico.

When politics rules in government there is only the effort to maintain power and that diminishes actual achievements. Evidence abounds of this in the Denish campaign. So bereft of actual achievement over the last twelve years as a candidate for or as Lt Governor, Diane Denish has decided to instead attack Republican gubernatorial candidate Susana Martinez for actual work she performed as the Dona Ana county district attorney. In the latest Denish identifies two cases where sexual predators were not identified in the predator registry. In a thirty second ad this sounds horrible and a dereliction of duty. And absent of context would certainly put Martinez’s credibility into question. However, it seems as though the whole story deserves longer than thirty seconds, in a response from a victim’s father:

the prosecutor did what was in the best interest of my daughter. In that case, I had moved my daughter to Nevada to a rehabilitation school to help her recover from her issues. I did not want to take her back to New Mexico and drag her through a trial and communicated that to the DA’s office when we discussed how to proceed. The plea agreement was in my daughter’s best interest.

So, the case involved a plead leading to a conviction that did not include registration as a sex offender because a father wanted to protect his daughter. Worse yet it appears that the New Mexico democrat party contacted this father soliciting his participation in the spot. Denish’s campaign denies contacting this person but it is hard to believe as the ad is hers. So, Denish’s campaign and the New Mexico democrat party are fishing for victims to attack their opponent.

There is only one word to describe this behavior. Slime. The democrat party believes they are justified because Martinez has run ads with victims that support her. This is nonsense and a hollow justification to act in the worst way possible. It is surprising that Denish, absent any actual achievements and attacking in a misleading way is about even in the polls. I hope that the people of New Mexico start paying attention and realize what happens when a lifetime politician is elected to office.