It’s a brutal, ruthless place. Tangles of campaign rhetoric wind down the sides of looming billboards smeared in dirt and detritus. The mind’s a blur—thousands of sound bytes and buzz words swarm around you, infest your senses, aiming right for your moist mucus membranes. Mossy paths are grown over with too many baffling instructions; at times it seems too daunting to go any further. It’s survival of the fittest, or the richest.
Now that you’re provided with the information you need to make educated choices at the polls, how do you find said polls? What do you need when you get there? And how do you determine if you’re even registered? Relax, dear readers, we’ve done the work for you.
Job Description: Oversees the statewide election process, including maintaining lists of registered voters, evaluating voting machines and certifying precinct boundaries. Regulates lobbyist activity. Manages campaign finance reports. Second in line of succession to the governor.
Job Description: One of the more powerful offices in the state. Governs the management of state lands, which affects wildlife, townships and public education, as most of the revenue from the office goes toward New Mexico schools. Whoever holds the office next will have imperative decisions to make on what our state does about energy production.
Job Description: New Mexico's chief legal representative. Writes advisory letters and opinions. Prosecutes and defends cases in upper-level state courts.
For better or worse, culture is a commodity here in New Mexico. Municipalities such as Santa Fe, Taos and even Silver City have done much to capitalize on their cultural strengths. This has improved the quality of life of city dwellers in countless ways, both tangible and intangible. Albuquerque, unfortunately, is still struggling to catch up.
In the print edition, we had a “Clip-Out” guide, but we think you’ll agree such paper-centric concepts don’t play very well on the web. Instead, we offer both a print-it-yourself PDF or a text file you can unzip and copy to your iPod’s Notes folder (your ‘Pod must be in hard disk mode). So cyber!
