ROUNDHOUSE ROUNDUP: NO INVITE, NO BALL, CINDERELLA

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
December 7, 2006

If you’ve been saving up money to go to one of Gov. Bill Richardson’s second-term inaugural balls, I have good news and bad news.

First the good news: Your money’s no good here. Even though four years ago tickets to the three inaugural balls ranged from $50 to $100, this time around, it’s going to be free.

Now the bad news: Unless you receive an invitation from the governor’s campaign, you won’t be going to the ball, Cinderella.

The reason for this is simple: The Sweeney Convention Center, which was the site of one of the balls in 2003, is unavailable, Richardson’s campaign manager Amanda Cooper said Thursday.

For those who haven’t driven in downtown Santa Fe lately, Sweeney currently is a huge hole in the ground. The old building was demolished so a new convention center can be built.

“The governor and lieutenant governor wanted to have a historic ball,” Cooper said. “They wanted to have a people’s ball. But with Sweeney torn down, there’s no place. It’s a huge problem.”

Cooper said invitations are being sent to 7,000 people.

“Basically, anyone who bought a ticket to the last inauguration will get an invitation,” she said.


Boots ‘n’ bolos: The Jan. 1 ball will be at two locations in downtown Santa Fe: The Hilton and Eldorado hotels. Attire will be casual. “It’s all boots and bolos,” Cooper said.

No glass slippers.

Entertainment will be by New Mexico musicians, Cooper said, though she wasn’t ready to announce the lineup. I personally was pulling for New Mexico Music Commissioner Tony Orlando. He’s never made it to a Music Commission meeting, so I figure the least he could do would be to sing “Tie a Yellow Ribbon” at the inauguration.

Richardson’s campaign treasury is footing the bill for the balls, Cooper said.

The actual inauguration will be at the Roundhouse, followed by a reception in the Rotunda. This will be free and open to the public, Cooper said.

Speaking of campaign contributions: The final campaign finance reports for all state candidates is due today. But, as I’ve been pointing out for nearly a month now, the secretary of state’s Web site still only has a pitiful handful of reports from the last filing day, Nov. 2.

As of Wednesday evening, the only reports available online for statewide candidates from that date were those of Richardson and his Republican opponent, John Dendahl. This has been the case since early November.

Two weeks ago in this column, state Sen. Dede Feldman, D-Albuquerque, said she found it “very disturbing” that the reports were not online. “The secretary of state’s timely operation of this system is the lynch pin,” Feldman said.


Seven deadly seconds: Albuquerque pollster Brian Sanderoff says the bitterly fought and extremely close Congressional District 1 race between incumbent Republican Heather Wilson and Democrat Patricia Madrid probably was determined by seven seconds in late October.

Sanderoff, who did polling for the Albuquerque Journal, this week e-mailed his 2006 general election analysis to New Mexico reporters.

The document had no major revelations. But it’s a sobering reminder of how a small misstep can sink a campaign.

Referring to the Oct. 24 televised debate between Wilson and Madrid, Sanderoff wrote, “In what turned out to be the most important moment of the evening, Wilson pointedly asked Madrid how she could assure voters that she will not raise their taxes. Madrid stumbled on this question, waiting nearly seven seconds before she began to speak and then was unable to articulate a clear position.”

“Patricia Madrid’s seven-second ‘hesitation’ probably cost her the election,” Sanderoff wrote. “Most of the political fallout was not caused by the debate itself. The damage was incurred by the 30-second television ad that the Wilson campaign produced in order to capitalize on Madrid’s gaffe. This ad saturated the airwaves right through Election Day. Repeated viewing of the ad seemed to have a cumulative negative effect on the electorate. Madrid’s communication skills and articulateness were now being called into question by some voters.”

Madrid had been leading in all the polls, including Sanderoff’s, until that debate. Wilson squeaked out an 861-vote victory.

This makes you wonder about the future of televised debates in New Mexico. Madrid probably wishes she would have followed the lead of Richardson and U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce, who both won comfortable victories last month despite ducking debates with their opponents on TV.

PIZZ ON PAZZ

A few months ago, I announced that for the first time in 15 (or 16 years) I wouldn't be participating in the Village Voice's annual Pazz & Jop music poll, a survey of several hundred music writers on the best albums and singles of the year. This is because the new corporate owners of the voice had unceremoniously canned veteran rock journalist Robert Christgau -- the dean of American rock critics! -- as well as Chuck Eddy.

I'm happy to say that I will be participating in a new music poll being organized by Idolator, a music blog (owned by Gawker Media, which I guess makes them a sister of Wonkette.)

Read about the new poll in this New York Times story.

LATEST ON SPEAKER BATTLE

House Speaker Ben Lujan defends his relationship with the controversial Smiley Gallegos in my story in today's New Mexican. Read it HERE

The letter that prompted the story by whistleblower and Las Cruces Democratic activist Frances F. Williams can be found on Heath's blog HERE

The state Republican party's New Mexico For Sale blog immediately jumped on Williams' letter. But they call her "Francis" and identify her as "the good man responsible for revealing the corruption that led to the downfall of the state’s housing authority system." The post concludes by saying "New Mexico needs more men like this." Read it HERE

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, December 3, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
I Hate Music by The Replacements
Dogfood by Iggy Pop
Hate & Whiskey by Nashville Pussy
We Like to Drink We Like to Play Rock 'n Roll by The Unband

(Lexie Shabel Interview)
(Sure Do Feel Like a) Piece of Shit/Give it Up by The Unband
(More Lexie interview)
Let It Rock by The Unband

Down to the Well by The Pixies
That's Enough For Me by Camper Van Beethoven
Journey to The Center of The Mind by The Ramones
Where's Your Boyfriend At by The Yayhoos

High Flyin' Baby by The Flamin' Groovies
Motor City is Burning by Mc5
Homicide by 999
When We Were Young by Roy & The Devil's Motorcycle
Clampdown by The Clash
Caroleen by Pere Ubu
Blue Christmas by Stan Ridgway

Little Things by Los Lobos
Sex, Fashion & Money by The Grabs
The Gypsy's Wife by Leonard Cohen
The Way the Wind Blows by A Hawk & A Hacksaw
Cast Away Dreams by Lindsey Buckingham
All These Things by Elvis Costello & Allen Toussaint
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, December 1, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
Blistered by Miss Leslie & Her Juke Jointers
Atonement by Lucinda Williams
Jesus is Number One by Ramsay Midwood
Jerry Lynn by Angry Johnny & The Killbillies
Jimmy Parker by Ed Pettersen
Love Out of Time by Scott Kempner
Room Full of Roses by Dean Martin

I Just Can't Be True by Webb Pierce
Gun Shy by Nancy Apple
Whoa Sailor by Maddox Brothers & Rose
No Goodwill Stores in Waikiki by Blaze Foley
Joy by Harry Nilsson
I Just Can't Let You Say Goodbye by Willie Nelson
Lucille by The Beat Farmers
New Morning Sun by S. Whitt Denson
Paradise Here Abouts by Howe Gelb

Nashville Radio by Jon Langford
Sin City by The Mekons
Get Thee Gone by The Geraldine Fibbers
Ghost of Mae West by Trailer Bride
Living on the Road Again by Artie Hill & The Long Gone Daddies
If I Had My Boots by Lynn Anderson
Oklahoma Bound by Joe West
Donut & A Dream by Tony Gilkyson

Christmas in Washington by Steve Earle
The Old Account by Rob McNurlin
Does My Ring Burn Your Finger by Solomon Burke
Thursday Night Las Vegas Airport by Chip Taylor
Somebody Else by Eleni Mandell
Got to Find Blind Lemon Part 2 by Geoff Muldaur
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

Steve Terrell is proud to report to the monthly Freeform American Roots Radio list

CASH IN ON A WAR CRIMINAL

Here's the coolest African scam e-mail I've received all week. (The link provided by the sender, "Mr. Steve," is a legit CNN story.)

Dear Sir,
I am personal assistance of Mr charles Taylor, the former Liberian President. At the moment he is presently indicted by the Laws for various allege charges and warcrimes.

You can look up this site below for update:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/africa/03/29/taylor.nigeria/index.htm

I have a re-profiling amount in an excess of USD500M, which I seek your partnership in accommodating for me due to the pressures from the present Government on possible steps to investigate / confisticate his assets both locally and internationally,

All details would be given to you as soon as i confirm your sincere and genuine readiness to front in this venture with me.

Awaiting your reply.

Mr. Steve

So not only am I supposed to be stupid enough to fall for this tired crap, I'm supposed to be greedy and amoral enough to cash in on the ill-gotten loot of a deposed war criminal.

TANGLED UP IN HIBBING

Note: I didn't do a Terrell's Tune-up this week because I had to do some reviews of Santa Fe Film Festival movies. This one was published this week. Others will be next week.

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
December 1, 2006

No Bob Dylan fan will want to miss Mary Feidt’s Tangled Up in Bob. But don’t expect to find much of Dylan in this search for the roots of his genius. There’s not much actual Dylan music here and little footage of Dylan concerts. (There is an all-too-brief audio clip of Bobby Zimmerman singing “Tutti Frutti” at a high-school talent show.)

But this is a look at the world from which he came, the world that shaped him, and the world he fled as soon as possible. And the movie ends up being as much about Taos writer Natalie Goldberg — who serves as the on-camera guide for the film — as it is about Dylan.

Goldberg is not only a fan of Dylan’s music (“It’s knockout. It’s just totally changed my life.”). She also identifies with his early life. She grew up in a small town on Long Island, New York, where she felt like “the lone Jew.” “I think I’m always looking for examples to live my life by,”
Goldberg explains to a man who knew Dylan as a youth. She says she probably wouldn’t be as interested in Dylan if he weren’t “Jewish and didn’t come from a small town where he was an oddity. ... The fact that he’s Jewish and the only Jew from up in a town, Hibbing, up in the Iron Range in Minnesota — if he can do it, I can do it.”

After going to Hibbing, Goldberg realizes her assumption about Dylan being the only Jew there wasn’t correct. She even finds his old synagogue. Goldberg visits the house in which the singer grew up, chatting with the young family who lives there now and sitting on a bed in his old room. “He grew out of a real life, not some imagined fantasy world,” she says. She talks to old friends and neighbors of the kid who started out as Bobby Zimmerman.

“I’m not a fan. But it’s nice to see the notoriety that he gets from people,” a former neighbor says in an interview at a Hibbing tavern. But Dylan’s not the only celebrity to come out of Hibbing. This man seems more impressed that it’s the hometown of basketball star Kevin McHale, who played with the Boston Celtics and is now an executive with the Minnesota Timberwolves.

One former classmate of Dylan’s told of a cynical old miner who said he did not believe Dylan wrote his songs. “He paid somebody to write them for him,” the old miner claimed. “Iron Range people, as a rule, do not want to give credit where credit is due,” the classmate explains. “They’re pessimistic largely because of the boom-and-bust cycle of the mines.”

Goldberg goes to the iron mine that was the chief livelihood of the town. She goes to a polka dance. And she goes to Dylan’s high school.

Her favorite discovery in Hibbing is Dylan’s high-school English teacher, B.J. Rolfzen, whom she describes as “someone who loved literature from the inside out with his soul and spirit, not as some intellectual understanding.” Later in the movie, Goldberg says she connected with Rolfzen because she had two great English teachers “who saved my life” in high school.

Unlike the basketball fan at the bar, Rolfzen describes Dylan as “a Shakespeare for this age.”

The most touching scene is when the elderly teacher sings along to a recording of Dylan’s ode to mortality, “Not Dark Yet.” Sitting at his kitchen table, Rolfzen reverently bows his head as he sings. “I like the line, ‘I was born here and I’ll die here against my will.’ Same here. If I had a choice, here’s where I would stay. They can have the other side, whatever it may be. ... This is the world for me.”

“I can see how this place might have been boring for Bob Dylan in the ’50s,” Goldberg says, walking down a Hibbing thoroughfare. “But, you know, maybe that boredom gave him something. He was empty when he left here, and he was free to be a conduit for all that came through him.”

It does look a little boring. And some of the people seem a little thick — like the young music-store employee who says that the only Dylan song he’s ever heard is “Forever Young,” which was sung at his graduation.

To Goldberg, Hibbing is “some old dream I’ve had of America. Small, Midwestern, brick buildings, storefronts, people knowing each other.” But spending time in Hibbing via Tangled Up in Bob leaves you feeling anything but empty.

Tangled Up in Bob; documentary; 67 minutes; Scottish Rite Temple; 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 7

ROUNDHOUSE ROUNDUP: AT THE MOVIES

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
November 30, 2006

Gov. Bill Richardson loves the movies. Now he’s in one, showing this weekend as part of the Santa Fe Film Festival.

Inside Bill Richardson is the work of Neil Simon. No, not the famous playwright. This isn’t “The Good-bye Governor.” It’s Neil H. Simon, former KOB-TV newsman, who now works as a freelance journalist in Washington, D.C.

Weighing in at only 30 minutes, the film is basically a television public-affairs special — which it originally was — not a full-length documentary in the Michael Moore/Morgan Spurlock/Al Gore vein.

For those who have followed Richardson’s career, there are not many startling revelations. But it’s a good, balanced overview of Richardson’s career.

There are old black-and-white still photos of baby Bill, as well as old news footage of a younger, slimmer and bearded (!) Bill Richardson pressing the flesh.

The film covers Richardson’s triumphs — campaign victories, his renown hostage-release missions and legislative conquests. There are glowing words from Richardson’s staff; friendly comments from Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce president Terri Cole; and an interview with the guv himself.

There are even clips from the Richardson spoof on Saturday Night Live last year (Comic Horatio Sans has to be praying that our governor’s 2008 dreams come true) and Richardson’s 2004 appearance on The Daily Show. (“I’m getting the sense that you’re here for selfish reasons,” host Jon Stewart tells him.)

This film never will be used as a campaign tool for any future Richardson campaign. The film discusses Richardson’s temper and his speeding, and shows low moments, such as the bi-partisan blasting he got from U.S. Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W. Va., and U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., at a 2000 Senate Armed Services Committee meeting when Richardson was the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy.

There are local critics, too. There are interviews with usual suspects, such as state Rep. Dan Foley of Roswell (now House GOP whip), state Sen. Joe Carraro, R-Albuquerque, and Republican operative and blogger Whitney Cheshire.

But there are some discouraging words from unexpected sources. Christine Trujillo, president of the New Mexico Federation of Labor, says “We just sort of shake our heads in awe because we feel very disenfranchised.”

University of New Mexico political science professor Christine Sierra says in the film that some critics “felt that, in a way, Bill Richardson was too much of a compromiser, that he would, you know, wet his finger and see which way the wind was blowing and then decide to take the path of least resistance.”

Inside Bill Richardson will be shown at 2:30 p.m. Sunday at the theater formerly known as the Jean Cocteau Cinema, now the New Mexico Film Museum, 418 Montezuma Ave. Tickets are $5 at the door.

A discipline problem: Richardson was discussed Wednesday in The Washington Post’s online chat with political blogger Chris Cillizza. A participant from Baltimore wanted to know, “Is there anything you see holding him back from grabbing the center should Hillary Clinton not run?”

Cillizza replied, “I think a candidate with the résumé of Gov. Richardson certainly belongs in the conversation about the 2008 nomination but continue to hear concerns from Democrats that he is simply not disciplined enough to run a campaign under the national spotlight. At the moment, that question is unanswerable.”

Cillizza last week raised the same “discipline” concern In his blog (The Fix), but added, “Before you write off Richardson, however, ask yourself what other potential 2008 candidate could have pulled off this ad?”

There’s a link to Richardson’s well-liked western parody campaign ad from the recent campaign.

Speaking of ads: Another D.C. publication, The Hill, published a story Wednesday that some Republicans are angry at the Republican Governors’ Association over a $115,000 anti-Richardson ad.

The comical ad featured a bobble-headed — and incredibly thin — cartoon Richardson bouncing from one state to another, mumbling and squealing “Whee!” The basic thrust was that Richardson’s out of state too much, running for president.

“That late expenditure in the noncompetitive race was the coating on a bitter pill for GOP operatives in several red states with Democratic governors,” the story by Aaron Blake says. “Their candidates received little financial help from the governors’ association and went on to lose by stunning margins.”

Not to mention the irony that the RGA is headed by Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who is running for president himself.

Making the move: The contest for speaker of the New Mexico House isn’t the only leadership battle brewing among House Democrats. Besides the pending Ben Lujan/Kenny Martinez showdown, at least two candidates are vying for majority leader.

In addition to the previously reported bid by Rep. Joe Cervantes of Las Cruces, Rep. Mimi Stewart of Albuquerque confirmed Wednesday that she’s running, too. “I’ve served for 12 years,” she said, “and I have a real understanding of the workings of the floor and committee system.”

HOUSE LEADERSHIP BATTLE

Looks like it's on between House Speaker Ben Lujan and House Majority Leader Kenny Martinez.

You can read my story in today's New Mexican HERE.

Of course this has been all over the political blogdom of the state. Heath has been all over it. He's even run a totally unscientific, (but fun to watch) poll. Monahan has made a few posts on it (Here's the best). Mario weighed in this morning.

I have to give special kudos to Kate Nash of The Albuquerque Tribune who scored a major journalistic coup last week when she actually got Kenny Martinez to return a phone call. (Neither Martinez nor Lujan returned my calls yesterday.)

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, November 25, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Thanksgiving in Reno by Too Much Joy
We're Gonna Have a Real Good Time Together by The Velvet Underground
Record Junkie by The Monsters
Five to One by The Doors
One-Track Mind by Johnny Thunders
Turquoise Boy by Sonic Youth
Details of the War by Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah
March of the Cosmetic Surgeons by French, Frith, Kaiser & Thompson

River of Dreams by Jerry Lawson & Talk of the Town
One More Time (Over and Over) by Fleetwood Mac
Angel by Camper Van Beethoven
What Makes You Think You're the One by The Twilight Singers
Get Back/Glass Onion by The Beatles
The Sparrow by A Hawk & A Hacksaw
Harlem Nocturne by Esquivel

PERE UBU SET
Blue Velvet
Wasted
Sentimental Journey
Drinking Wine Spodyody
i Hear They Smoke the Barbecue
Texas Overture

The Valley by Los Lobos
I Met Her in Church by The Boxtops
Red Apples by Smog
Hangin' Johnny by Stan Ridgway
In the Land of Fairies by Lisa Germano
True Love by Tiny Tim & Miss Sue
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis