TRASHING THE GOVERNOR: ENTHUSIASTICALLY EMBRACING THE RANKEST FORMS OF SEXISM
Daniel Libit’s blog post is riddled (as is often the case) with obvious falsehoods and total rewrites of events that have already been documented as being the opposite of what he tries to claim. In short, it is a treasure trove of errors, so thoroughly disprovable that we can’t really assess his underlying motive.
It might be difficult to assess his underlying motive, but something is very clear: Daniel Libit is obsessed with trying to prove to everyone that he's underappreciated and that he knows better than everyone else.
As has been previously reported, Libit was "enamored" with former Lobo Head Basketball coach Fran Fraschilla while he was in high school. Libit also frequently and rather snottily attacks national sports reporters In Libit's world, "everyone sucks — coaches, athletes, sports reporters, et al." To be blunt, LIbit seems like the guy who spent a lot of time upside down in a trash can as as a teenager.
Now it's payback time? We don't know.
One thing for sure however, Libit's current blog is overtly and viciously sexist, and in an unprecedented way. Just look at the following passages in which Libit tries to impute a weird relationship between Governor Susana Martinez and former UNM basketball coach Craig Neal:
"I think Susana had a crush on him."
Sure, he's ostensibly quoting former UNM regent Mel Eaves — who also comes off looking like a knuckle-dragging troglodyte of the first order — but it's clearly Libit's intent to ask for such a quote, or to use it to buttress his own odd fantasy. To prove himself, here is how Libit goes on to characterize this poignant photograph of the governor and Coach Neal:
"The image showed the governor and the coach standing face-to-face, staring intently into each other’s eyes: Neal’s right hand rests insouciantly on Martinez’s left shoulder, as she gazes up at him with a tight-lipped smile.
The picture captured, among other things, an increasingly rare sign of comity between the state’s chief executive and its largest university. But Neal was a special exception.
But this is not only sexist in the extreme, it's ridiculous. It violates every facet of "Occam's Razor" not to mention common sense, that being: The simplest explanation for any event is most likely the most accurate one.
Instead, Libit goes to great lengths to choose the most conspiratorial and bizarre explanation for this photograph and for the governor's very normal interaction with a UNM coach.
Here's what the photograph actually depicts: A governor fighting back tears as she accepts the thanks from Neal for her generous donation to Coaches Versus Cancer. She is "tight-lipped" for good reason: She's doing all she can to keep her composure as they acknowledge their own personal losses to the cruelty of cancer, and she had just referenced her own mom in the speech she had just delivered.
(Libit also ignores the pink socks and the facts. New Mexicans familiar with the cancer fighting efforts know the pink socks are part of the fundraising effort. If he weren't pursuing a preconceived goal, Mr. Libit would notice things like that.)
Also in attendance at the Coaches Versus Cancer press conference? Janet Neal.
Why would anyone present this photograph, or the relationship the governor has with a state-sponsored university's head basketball coach in such a cruel and sexist manner? What is going on in this blogger's mind? Is there any call for such meanness? Seriously?
And besides, Libit himself reports what both Martinez and Neal have publicly stated: they are friends. Again, the simplest explanation — not the one festooned with wild-eyed conspiracy theories — is usually the accurate one.
MEL EAVES: TROGLODYTE EXTRAORDINAIRE
To make matters even worse, Libit had just laid out what he himself describes as an attempt by Richardson's regent Mel Eaves, to get re-appointed to the UNM Board of Regents by making campaign contributions — something everyone knows was the Richardson norm.
But although that's the way things worked with Richardson, it didn’t work with Martinez. So then, like a textbook misogynist, Eaves decides to go on the attack, accusing Martinez of having a “crush” on Coach Neal. Whoa. (If he had gotten the quid pro quo appointment he was expecting, we suppose Eaves would not have invented a "crush" scenario. But we digress.)
In any case, anywhere else in the world, Eaves' scurrilous remark would have been treated as the blatantly sexist comment it obviously is. No reporter, no journalist would take this seriously. But Libit not only doesn't object to the Neanderthal comment, he acts as though it's legit. In fact, he runs with it and promotes it. He ends up treating cave man Eaves as some kind of heroic whistleblower instead of the dim-witted, disappointed office seeker he appears to reveal himself to be.
It is a perfect example of a double standard that a blogger with an ax to grind, and a preconceived story, sets himself up for.
GOVERNORS, REGENTS, UNIVERSITIES
You won't find it in Libit's article, but you need to know that it's actually normal for governors to take an interest in their states' universities and higher education systems. They're actually paid, and expected, to oversee universities — it's a fiduciary responsibility to look after the taxpayers' interests. Again, for the purposes of dissing Martinez, Libit actually appears not to know any of this.
As is the case with supreme court justices, judges, cabinet officers, a governor's staff, and all kind of appointments, it is no surprise that any governor in any state will take an interest in the the appointment of regents. After all, they run the state's universities. If a governor didn't care what happened in higher education it would be political malpractice. But Libit treats this routine "Government 101" subject as if it's something from outer space.
The fact is a governor is always looking to appoint men and women who share her vision for her state — people who support her philosophy of applying the law, of growing the economy, of treating people fairly, of fighting crime, of pursuing efficiency in government...or any other applicable goal involved. The appointment of regents is no different.
Martinez is guilty of supporting Lobo (and Aggie) basketball and its players, and of supporting athletics at UNM and other state schools. This is what governors are supposed to do. It’s not remarkable that the Governor of Kansas was at the KU game with Martinez.
Martinez even provided President Obama — a college basketball fan — with a Lobo jersey and a piece of the Pit floor from the 1983 NCAA National Championship game. Again, it promoted The Pit — and New Mexico — when that information was covered in the national articles about the visit. That’s what governors should be doing.
Libit seems (or pretends) to be baffled by things like this.
LIBIT ATTACKS SPECIFIC REGENTS
Student Regent Ryan Berryman is attacked as having a conflict because he worked for the basketball team. What about student regents before who worked in health sciences? Or the current student regent who belongs to the law school? It is literally impossible to have a University of New Mexico student regent who is not involved in some component part of UNM — that’s the whole point, they're students!
Notably, Libit reports in his breathless style of "breaking an exclusive," that one student passed-over for the position makes the shocking claim that she was asked about her thoughts on the governor’s higher education reforms during her interview. OMG, the Governor’s office cares about whether her appointments support her agenda? Stop the presses! Man bites dog!
The Matt Chandler revisionist history continues. Chandler was voted down not because of his support of Republican candidates through his work at Advance New Mexico Now, but because of his prosecution of a corrupt Richardson judge and his willingness to take on Chief Justice Charlie Daniels on that very issue. Democrats have admitted as much in private.
[Editor's Note: NMPJ has done extensive research on this event, has acquired all court records, and we will publish an exposé in the coming months —and the sordid, possibly unlawful, conduct of several actors holds up to shame and profound embarrassment some of the highest ranking people on the New Mexico bench and others serving at the bar.]
REORGANIZING THE UNM HEALTH SCIENCE CENTER GOVERNING BOARD
Libit's treatment of this issue is nothing short of pathetic. Rather than help inform the New Mexico reader — who may be a genuinely interested taxpayer — Libit offers no history, no background on where this governing board came from. Instead, he just decides to shill for the old Richardson crowd.
Here is the fact: The current Board was only established in 2010, and it was an obviously transparent attempt to shield Richardson cronies from a new, incoming administration. The Board also runs completely contrary to the New Mexico Constitution and also to any concept of proper oversight and governance. Richardson also exempted this "new Board" from a variety of laws, including the state personnel act and others having to do with transparency and responsibility.
Establishment of this particular board is one of the boldest political moves in recent memory. The idea that half of a university is governed by this board — a board that acts entirely separately from the university president and from the board of regents — would be seen by most neutral observers as some kind of "movida" (as we say in New Mexico). Others might even characterize it as insane.
CONFLICTS?
Moreover, ongoing conflicts abound. For example, Suzanne Quillen sat on that board and championed projects — including the hospital — that would have benefited her own company. Does Libit touch on that at all? Uh, no.
Imagine the blowback if someone not on Libit's "approved list," say, regent Rob Doughty, were to start the next year by creating a new (virtually independent) oversight board for athletics and decided to appoint Martinez loyalists to it? And what if he then topped it off by saying "this board — not the regents or the university president — will control athletics."
Would that be seen as a political move, or would it be a Libitian form of "good government"? That is exactly what the UNM Health Science Center governing board is at its very core.
OTHER MISREPRESENTATIONS
Libit claims that Governor Martinez didn’t like Coach Steve Alford. This piece is somewhat laughable as Libit tries mightily to find a conspiracy somewhere, anywhere. He tries to support that claim by using an off-hand comment by a press staffer before an interview.
If Libit is as savvy as he believes himself to be, he might have realized that the anti-Alford comment had more to do with the fact that the staffer had read Libit's own, then-recent, scathing article about how much he dislikes Alford, and that the staffer was trying to butter him up.
COPE FIELD?
If Governor Martinez had any misgivings about naming the baseball field after Johnny Cope, an Occam's Razor explanation (i.e. the simplest) would be that it almost certainly had more to do with her being a former District Attorney and the fact that he’s a convicted felon, rather than Cope being a Democrat.
In her mind, she's most likely thinking "Can you imagine how that would make the state look?" Again, the fiduciary duties that Libit has never heard of.
SEATING AT THE PIT
Libit claims that Governor Martinez requested that her seats be moved from where Richardson sat. But a simple inquiry by NMPJ has revealed that that claim is false. Richardson sat in a special, cordoned-off VIP section in the Pit. When The Pit was renovated that section was removed. By the time Martinez took office and attended her first game as governor there was no such section at all.
THERE'S MUCH MORE, INCLUDING THE RYAN CANGIOLOSI SAGA AND THE HARVEY YATES ROLE: Please see the upcoming article in the next edition of New Mexico Political Journal.
Email us (at nmpj@dfn.com) with your feedback, comments, questions and ideas.