ABQjournal Newsseeker - Latest Comments in Interior Nominee Salazar Vows to "Clean Up Mess" at Department

Re: Interior Nominee Salazar Vows to "Clean Up Mess" at Department

adamsjohn2 — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 12:36:10 -0000

Hi Michael,
Great to be able to read your blog while you ride the train with President-elect Obama. I also enjoyed reading your front page report in ABQ Journal this AM. There are a couple of questions that I would like you to respond to today. Why do you refer to J. Sanchez as a "teaching assistant" when her official job title description is "education assistant"? I realize that I may be splitting hairs, but the ABQ Educational Assistants Association is working hard to educate the public about EAs - who they are, what they do, and their poverty-level wages - which are set by statute by NM State Legislators and the governor. Seems to me that it's confuses readers when one uses "teaching assistants" instead of "education assistants". Your comments? Also, the other thing I was wondering about - are you having any conversations with J. Sanchez today on the train? If so, do you have any idea if she will have the opportunity, or the inclination, to speak with the President-elect and inform him that the 6,600 EAs in NM's public schools are paid poverty-level wages by the state's lawmakers, and what the President-elect plans to do about this fact? Ms. Sanchez, in case you were not aware, is the daughter of the former president of the ABQ Educational Assistants Association (AEAA) Frances Sanchez. After Frances retired, Kathy Chavez became the AEAA president. Anyway --- your comments?

Re: Interior Nominee Salazar Vows to "Clean Up Mess" at Department

Mike Woolsey — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:19:21 -0000

Gee, that's funny: You would have thought that since Senator Salazar would have called for, "Massive Investigations and Hearings," if the Interior Dept. was such a mess? I mean really, the Senate was under the Democrat's control and Senator Salazar was in position to raise a stink, thus exposing the problems and righting the ship, right?

But wait! NOW, he's the Secretary of the Interior and, "There's a new Sheriff in town?" If he had that water and wildlife expertise when he was a Senator, then what on God's Green Earth was he doing with it, when he had the legislative opportunity????

Politics as usual in DC, period, end of story!

Re: Interior Nominee Salazar Vows to "Clean Up Mess" at Department

Jbaca16 — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 13:53:18 -0000

the USFS has been under the Ag department for many years. They considered the forests to be crops. Really. It should be turned back to Interior and melded with BLM at some point.

Re: Interior Nominee Salazar Vows to "Clean Up Mess" at Department

Johnny_Mango — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 13:37:50 -0000

I thought that the Bush administration had switched the USFS to the Department of Agriculture. I hope Salazar can get it back under the Interior Dept. where it belongs.