Albuquerque Public Schools (APS) is doing such a poor job of educating our children that people are leaving the school system for alternative forms of education. To put it in business terms, APS is losing customers. A competent business would look at loss of customers and look inward to find the root cause and make serious changes. A government school system looks to its legislature and says "Help". In a moratorium, the board of education is asking the state's legislature to not allow "new educational programs, including charter schools, be considered or approved..due to increased financial hardships to public school districts." In other words, stop the competition so we don't lose any more students to better functioning learning systems. There are so many things that APS can do to improve educational outcomes, Self examination and improvement is hard - takes a lot of work. It seems convincing the legislature to restrict the competition is much easier.
I was a teacher in APS and I am married to one, so this is not about the teachers. Good teachers would love to teach instead of being handicapped by bureaucratic baloney. And the good teachers are leaving and going where they can do what they love. The APS problem starts at the state, goes down to the board of education and the APS bloated administration.
We suggest the legislature send APS Board back to the drawing board and make them face their problems responsibly and do something constructive. 

Like everyone who visits this site, I am just one of the millions of Americans who feel I don't have much influence on the decisions made by big government, big business, mainstream media, etc. What I do have are my principles, my integrity, and my desire to do what is right for myself and my country. I believe in the U.S. Constitution, individual liberty and responsibility, and a free market economy.
In spite of the current perversions to the basics of American society, I will live my life according to my beliefs. I believe the majority of Americans conduct themselves the same way. "The millions of us that pull society forward."
It saddens me to see those that have lost the American dream trying to revert to the experiments of socialism/communism.  That model of governance has only produced misery and suffering and enriched a very few at the top. So what can I, with my small voice do? As one person, not much, but I can do a little.
I have dropped by Facebook account because I do not believe it is a large organization's right to control my speech or right to hear others' ideas. I have sold my stocks in Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Cisco, Intel, and Microsoft for their support of domestic terrorist organizations.  I know it wont make a bit of difference to them, but it means something to me - I can't support organizations that are trying to destroy my beloved country. And what if there are millions of us that feel the same way and stop supporting them?
I cannot influence the world, but I can live my own life with honor and integrity. What about you?

The environmentalists and those on the left that do their bidding have declared war on carbon-based energy sources. In New Mexico, our democratic controlled legislature is following the same tune and last year passed the Energy Transition Act to go along with the Green New Deal. New Mexico is all and gas rich and it funds our education system as well as the many programs development by our state government. Oil and Gas also support a huge workforce for the state and as the Biden administration takes steps to shut down the industry, most critics focus on the job and revenue loss as being disastrous for this state. But that is only part of the story about the unplanned disaster that will hit New Mexico and the rest of the country. The “rest of the story” is about how do we plan and implement the change in sources of energy. The entire world’s economy depends on energy. With all the government’s responses to climate change, where is the plan to replace carbon-based energy with solar and wind? With current proposals it appears that the strategy is, let’s shut down oil and gas and when the lack of energy becomes a crisis it will force the economy to get serious and to invest in solar and wind. At that point the economy is collapsing for lack of energy resulting in declining funds for investment, research and development, and tax revenue.
We are talking a very serious change in energy generation and to try and force it without a clear, well thought out plan to achieve a successful transition is not a very intelligent way to operate. Has anyone in New Mexico’s state legislature or our federal government looked at possible scenarios of the impact of their decisions?
It appears the plan is to create an artificial energy shortage and see what happens. People still need to heat their homes, cook their food, heat their water, drive their cars and businesses still need energy to provide goods and services and deliver them to customers. What will it take to convert all of our houses, apartments, transportation, and businesses to total electric? How will we replace all of our gasoline vehicles with electric? Where will we get the materials for storage batteries and how will we handle the disposal of those batteries when they no longer hold a charge? With the additional environmental pressure on mining, where do we get the materials for wind, solar and storage devices? As we shut down oil, we can’t use plastics, so we are left with metal, which must be mined. With the required more efficient electrical collectors, storage and transmission devices comes the need for exotic materials, which are expensive and in limited supply.
I am not suggesting these hurtles cannot be overcome, but that we need to have a plan for addressing them before we consider turning off the spigot. That is just plain common sense. And for all you environmental crisis buffs out there, take a serious look at the unintended consequences of your demands. You may be putting more strain on the environment than you planned.
We must require our government officials to develop an honest, well thought out long-range plan, including risk analysis, before they implement a knee-jerk reaction to special interest groups and not substitute one crisis for another. My guess is the result of good planning will show the effort to substitute solar and wind for oil and gas is untenable and will not meet the goal of reversing global warming.

 

What is the TEA Party's position?
We believe in:

• Individual liberty (= Freedom + Responsibility)
• Smaller federal government
• States rights
• Return to the three branches of government concept

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There is a place where you can explore your ideas with like-minded people who think like you do. Your feelings of conservatism, freedom, getting government out of our lives can be expressed without fear of reprisal. Even if you are a liberal and want to have an intellectual discourse with people with different viewpoints.

Come to the Albuquerque TEA Party where we welcome honesty, truthfulness, and pride in this wonderful country and state.


Come to our monthly meeting (Third Tuesday of every month) or e-mail us at info@abqteaparty.com

The Left had to change the term global warming to climate change, since the earth's temperature seems to have levelled off. But with the term Climate Change, they have complete control of the conversation. Anything that happens with the weather, storms, draught, cooling, warming - it is all Climate Change. The big question becomes - "Do you believe in Climate Change?". And that is a trap, because the words that are left out of the question are "human caused". Any intelligent person knows that climate is constantly changing and that there are countless, interacting natural processes that cause it. We also know that human activity has dumped a lot of CO2 into the atmosphere. We know that CO2 is not a pollutant, but necessary for life. We especially know that even the best minds in atmospheric science do not know the exact impact of human activity on climate, and especially how reduction of CO2 emissions will impact climate.
Who in their right mind would gamble tens of trillions of dollars and the complete collapse of the US economy on a complete unknown? The position of the Albuquerque TEA Party on this insane push to destroy our country is that it must be stopped and we must start by controlling the language. We are not climate change deniers, we are human caused climate change skeptics. Start by demanding the evidence to the left's assertion.
The Left works on emotion and so must we. This Green New Deal will take huge amounts of money out of everyone's pockets through high energy costs and/or higher taxes. By the time we have the opportunity to check to see if this great experiment worked, the damage will be irreversible.
Control the language - it is not climate change, but human caused climate change and direct the conversation to the cost of this unsubstantiated experiment that will cause massive misery.
For two short videos on this, one by an MIT climatologist and the other by the co-founder of Greenpeace, check out: https://www.prageru.com/video/climate-change-what-do-scientists-say/
https://www.prageru.com/video/what-they-havent-told-you-about-climate-change/  

Senate Bill 489: We need a real debate on the benefits and the costs.

Senate Bill 489 – The Energy Transition Act – not so fast! The consequences of passing this bill without an honest debate could be devastating to the economics of our state. Call it risk, call it unintended consequences, but to ignore bringing everything in the open instead of ignoring them for political expediency is dishonest.
It is obvious that making New Mexico a completely carbon free state will be a very expensive undertaking and with the planned shutting down of the oil and gas industry, where will that money come from? New Mexico tax payers and energy users. The shell game of PNM floating bonds to cover the cost and then raising energy rates to repay the bonds doesn’t hide the fact that we are going to pay for this transition.
How many wind farms and solar panels will we need to replace our current energy consumption?  How many acres of the land we fight to keep pristine will be required? How much extra infrastructure will be required to transmit the electricity to where it is needed? What happens when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine? Batteries. Another cost, plus batteries have a limited life span (as do solar cells) and must be replaced. When we convert all our cars to electric, we have to charge their batteries – which takes electricity, which requires more energy systems. Then the gas stations will go out of business so our tourist trade will only support visitors with electric cars. Another source of income reduction. Don’t forget we have to maintain these complex energy systems.
We need a debate about how much our energy costs are going to go up, either through higher rates or taxes (to subsidize the effort). It is not free. Business will see an increased overhead with higher energy costs and we run the risk of businesses leaving or passing the costs onto the consumer. Businesses looking to move to NM will have second thoughts with increased operating costs and taxes. Products made in NM will be more expensive which will drive consumers to buy products produced out of state. The list of consequences goes on.
And who gets hit the hardest? Low and fixed income folks. To use an old phrase, we are forcing them to make a decision whether to buy food for the table or pay their higher tax bill or energy costs. I hear the answer – subsidize them and make the rich pay it. How long will people with higher incomes stay in NM with that strategy?
The biggest question is, what is the positive payback for NM? What do we have to gain? If the only answer is the wish to reduce carbon dioxide in the air and save the planet, then let’s bring those facts to the table and include them in the discussion to ensure the return on investment is real.
The Energy Transition Act has far reaching consequences for our state and responsible people want to have an honest, in-depth debate about this effort. If the case can be made by the proponents of this bill that it will benefit NM and its people, then let’s proceed.
Graham Bartlett
Albuquerque