Posts Tagged ‘Bill Richardson’
No pardon for Billy the Kid
Hope he grows the beard back
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, on his final day in office Friday, did not pardon legendary outlaw Billy the Kid.
“It was a very close call,” Richardson said from his office in Santa Fe when announcing he “decided not to pardon Billy the Kid,” one of New Mexico’s more infamous native sons, on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
Richardson said his decision was based in part on ambiguity surrounding the record in which territorial Gov. Lew Wallace agreed to pardon Billy the Kid — real name Henry McCarty but also known as Henry Antrim and William H. Bonney — in exchange for the outlaw’s testimony in a range war killing, but later reneged on his promise.
Billy the Kid testified but “Wallace didn’t keep his end of the bargain,” Richardson said, and the criminal, romanticized by oral tradition and Hollywood, later shot and killed two deputies…
Richardson said a decision about Billy the Kid’s fate in this matter was important because “this is America’s history” and the issue has festered since 1881.
Legend says Billy the Kid killed 21 men but it is generally accepted that he killed between four and nine before he was shot to death by Sheriff Pat Garrett at the age of 21.
This is a special chuckle here in New Mexico. As well as Governor Bill plays the media in New Mexico, he games the national and international media-types even more thoroughly.
He’s been playing the Billy the Kid card for eight years and every time he gets coverage from the BBC to Pravda.
Meanwhile, the TV stations down in Albuquerque tried to climb on board with online polls for viewers – and got fewer than a thousand responses.
That’s OK, though. Next week our shiny new Republican governor takes office and she can start increasing the unemployment numbers with the state employees she will lay-off. Newspapers and TV will forget about the Lincoln County wars for another decade or so.
Bill Richardson tries to salvage border governors’ meeting – UPDATED
Daylife/Reuters Pictures used by permission
New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson says he is trying to rescue a long-scheduled meeting between the governors of U.S. and Mexican border states.
The six Mexican governors scheduled to attend the September Border Governors Conference in Phoenix have canceled their plans in protest of SB 1070, Arizona’s controversial immigration-enforcement law.
“I feel very strongly, and so do the Mexican governors, that we need to have the conference because this is a conference that has been going for 30 years,” Richardson told The Washington Post. “It’s a conference that diffuses a lot of problems.”
The Post reported the Mexican officials said they would meet somewhere other than Phoenix; however, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, chair of the conference, responded by canceling the event altogether…
Richardson said SB 1070 had created a “serious breach” in relations along the border and is trying to organize a meeting in Washington or in another Western state.
Brewer, every day, sounds more and more like a Republican who fears for her job. It’s boring watching her slide further and further to the Right while claiming to represent all the people. Not an uncommon problem for someone reasonably incompetent at the breadth of issues requiring leadership at the governorship level in hard economic times.
After all, it was her Fearless Leaders who dropped us into the sub-prime crapper. Now, she’s hoping to rely on the rage of American xenophobia to pull her coals out of the fire.
As much as Republicans would rather croak than admit it, it’s only the undemocracy of term limit laws that keep Richardson from being elected a 3rd time in a row. He’s continued to create jobs, public transit, federal funds in excess of taxes to our state. He could invite the border state governors to New Mexico for the conference and the only question would be – where are we going to eat, tonight, Bill?
UPDATE: Har! I knew it. Governor Bill has taken over hosting the meeting. Though, I bet the AZ guv will not attend.
Where’s the stimulus money going?
Solid topic – especially for a nation of voters who have no problem coming up with an analysis and opinion that requires absolutely no information. They listen to Talk Radio, their favorite pundit – cripes! whoever they met at the American Legion bar on Friday night.
CNN started a series, this week, taking the time to get up close and personal with several projects, every day.
Let the Flash load and click through to every aspect of the program
Till now, the Feds have relied on transparency to provide info to the voting public. That only works as well as the effort citizens put into looking at the information available. Poisonally, I think the average American hasn’t gotten as far as Google.
Encanto supercomputer goes online in New Mexico
No, this ain’t the newest, fastest supercomputer in the world, although – come to think of it – it is the fastest supercomputer owned by a state government.
Gov. Bill Richardson spearheaded the launch on Monday of eight “gateway” sites to connect communities across New Mexico with the state’s supercomputer in Rio Rancho.
The sites will be used by universities and local businesses that need high-performance computing for design and modeling purposes. Users can access the supercomputer, dubbed “Encanto,” for research, educational activities, training and business modeling in the areas of energy, environment, digital film and biotechnology, said Richardson.
“The opening of these supercomputer gateways is significant to New Mexico’s economic and high-tech future,” Richardson said. “We’re bringing the highest level of supercomputing to every corner of the state, giving New Mexicans the opportunity to tap in to its remarkable educational and economic possibilities…”
At today’s launch event, Richardson met “virtually” with university and college heads from the gateway sites, using the supercomputer’s teleconferencing capabilities…
Encanto is housed at the Intel facility in Rio Rancho. It can perform 172 trillion calculations per second.
Rock on, Governor Bill.
Time to sort out relations, commerce, between Cuba and the U.S.
Daylife/AP Photo used by permission
The United States and Cuba should show some flexibility and take steps to improve relations, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Friday during a weeklong trade mission to the island nation.
“There is a good atmosphere [between the two countries],” he said at a news conference in Havana on Friday. “It is the best atmosphere I’ve seen in many years…”
In his first trip to Cuba in 13 years, when he negotiated the release of three political prisoners in 1996, Richardson said he is not in Cuba as a special U.S. envoy.
“My main objective is trade and to improve commercial ties with Cuba,” he said, though he acknowledged plans to report recommendations to the Obama administration early next week…
The governor also called on the Obama administration to ease restrictions of biotechnology products, allow Cubans to travel to the United States for academic and cultural exchanges, and implement the changes to Cuban-American travel and remittances announced in April…
Richardson…met with Cuba’s National Assembly president, Ricardo Alarcon, and received a personal letter from former President Fidel Castro.
Governor Bill has always been skilled at diplomacy. He also has a long, consistent history of following through on positive solutions to difficult tasks. Time to utilize his stature in Latin America.
Obama could do worse than find a task in this vein for Richardson in his administration now that the jive accusations about pay-for-play have been sorted out as groundless.
And restoring commerce and normal relations with Cuba is overdue.
