If you're running a political machine and looking to keep the governorship under your wing far into the future perhaps about now you start peeling away from embattled ABQ GOP Mayor Richard Berry? You can't really go all in for likely candidate Lt. Gov. John Sanchez as he is from the anti-Susana wing of the GOP.  Maybe you look for a new face like Monique Jacobson, the cabinet secretary for Children Youth and Families? Or another little known personality who isn't riddled with bullet wounds like the mayor?. . .

And if you are ABQ Dem Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham angling for that far away '18 race for governor, aren't you thinking about that ethics hit you took and how it plays into further ambitions? Not reporting gifts of expensive carpets because you did not think they were particularly valuable, were "unattractive" and "not a carpet I would have purchased" is the kind of catnip producers of those prime time political ads dine on.

Speaking of ads:

The never-ending political cycle is already producing memorable TV ads. At least that's the view of the WaPo's Chris Cilizza who ranks one from Republican Senator Mark Kirk as among the best:

Want to see a terrific political ad? Spend 60 seconds watching this commercial--the first of Illinois Sen. Mark Kirk's (R) 2016 reelection bid. The ad tells the story of a stroke Kirk suffered in early 2012, barely two years after he was first elected to the Senate.

NOMINATIONS OPEN

The floor is no open for nominations for the "Worst Ideas So Far Of 2015." Our runaway favorite nominee is the idea of electing the ABQ police chief. Yours?

WORTH A SHOT?

What do you think? Is a constitutional amendment that would let us take $100 million a year for 10 years from the state's $17 billion Permanent Fund for very early childhood (ages zero to five) worth a shot to address this problem and many more?

. . . University of New Mexico researchers. . . presented a survey administered to more than 1,300 Native Americans from seven New Mexico communities. The survey asked people about their exposure to adverse childhood experiences like problems with alcohol and physical violence at home, separated or divorced parents, a close family member serving time in jail, physical abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse. The numbers were off the scale. Twenty-nine percent of those surveyed had been exposed to four or more of those experiences as children. But even that number might be low. Since the surveys were conducted face-to-face, researchers say they assumed that some were reluctant or embarrassed to keep answering “yes” to the questions.

OVER ANALYZING?

Joe

A number of readers said we overreached in analyzing the fatal shooting of a Rio Rancho police officer:

Comparing Albuquerque with Baltimore and Chicago is outrageous. It's ridiculous given the 29 shootings there--9 of them fatal--over the Memorial Day weekend. It's one thing to point out facts--it's another to make totally false comparisons.

We didn't intend such a comparison, only that "shocking" crimes like the fatal officer shooting in Rio Rancho and teenage boys being gunned down in multiple numbers in the streets of Baltimore and Chicago seem to be escalating.

Reader Alan Wagman came with this:

Joe, Your blog refers to an escalation of shocking crimes, apparently based upon events of one weekend. While any murder is a murder too many, one should not draw conclusions from one weekend. Murder rates in the U.S. are down to historically low levels. Firearms-related deaths of law enforcement officers from January 1, 2015 through May 26, 2015 are down 11% from the same period last year.  For long-term trends on firearms-related deaths of law enforcement officers, see this.

On another topic reader John Ingram writes:

After more than a decade of corporate income tax cuts, corporate tax credits, various tax giveaways (TIDDS), ABQ is still going nowhere. Claw-back the aforementioned tax revenues and invest the millions of public taxpayer dollars in new infrastructure. This will create jobs, stimulate demand, and increase consumer spending on a scale which will eventually make ABQ "attractive" to commerce. All else has proven fruitless.

THE BOTTOM LINES

Reader, attorney and armchair historian Foster Hannett writes:

Senator Clinton P. Anderson's sole surviving child, Nancy Anderson Roberts, has passed away at her home in Albuquerque. Also, a former administrative assistant to Senator Anderson, Richard "Dick" Heim,  passed away in Albuquerque recently.  He headed up the NM Department of Health or Human Services in the administrations of Governors Bruce King and Jerry Apodoca. They both lived interesting lives and were well-known in political circles across the state. . . .

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2014. Not for reproduction without permission of the author