Once a week I search YouTube for the most recent New Mexico-themed videos. Occasionally there’s something jaw-dropping. Most weeks, there ain’t jack and I post nothing.

Today, however, we’ve got a relocation firm trying to pass Santa Fe off as Albuquerque, a 2nd Street nose-picker and Barbie drama.

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These are the headlines blaring out of newspaper boxes all over Santa Fe this morning.

From the Santa Fe New Mexican: “Councilors OK plan to buy CSF campus.” (Nice photo, too.)

And from the Journal North, or whatever it’s called now:

Ouch. That’s too bad.

I’m not at all familiar with the Journal’s deadlines, but I do wonder why an editor didn’t make a decision to hold the front page until the City Council vote, given the importance of the CSF issue to the Santa Fe’s future and overall economy. Maybe it would’ve cost too much money. Maybe everybody wanted to get home in time to catch the end of America’s Got Talent.

Worse, the Journal’s website—which could be updated at any time, mind you—still features the now-incorrect “hangs in the balance” story.

Seriously: Why? This is 2009. The story could be updated in five minutes.

Now, this might seem trivial: The Journal misses a story. Big whoop. Actually, for reasons that might not be immediately obvious, it’s pretty important.

Santa Fe is lucky to be one of the few remaining American cities with two daily newspapers. That may not be the case for very long, if one of them continues to operate like this.

For all their limited resources, occasional screw-ups and outright vapidity, The Journal and the New Mex serve to check and balance one another. (SFR plays that role, too, but the fact is, this paper has two full-time reporters—and comes out once a week.) I’d say on most days, the Journal beats the New Mex on depth. So it would be a real shame if the Journal rendered itself irrelevant, as it did with today’s top story.

UPDATE: Jim Scarantino over at the New Mexico Liberty pitched a similar ideal day earlier. He suggested we sell the Roundhouse. I’m suggesting we pawn it…Ok, ok. I need to read the Liberty more often.

Want to melt the state’s hiring freeze? Want pay raises for teachers? Want to expand health care? Forget the stimulus package. Let’s pawn the Roundhouse!

That’s what legislators in Arizona are considering in their desperation: Sell Capitol buildings and other state properties, lease ‘em back, then re-purchase them when (if) the budget’s flush again. The estimated gain: $735 million.

From AP:

Desperate for cash, Arizona state lawmakers are considering selling the House and Senate buildings, then leasing them back over several years before assuming ownership again…

Under the complex financial arrangement, state government services would continue without interruption while the state picks up a cash infusion estimated by Capitol number-crunchers at $735 million.

Gov. Jan Brewer said Wednesday she hadn’t made any decisions on which state properties should be sold.

For investors, the deal means long-term lease payments from a stable source.

“What they want is an asset that you’re not going to walk away from,” said Tom Manos, Gov. Jan Brewer’s top fiscal adviser.

I don’t know what we could raise off selling the Roundhouse. And I don’t know how much we’d need to lease back considering the Legislature’s only in session 30-60 days each year (give or take a few special session weeks).

Most of the year, a full three floors are left unoccupied. Maybe we could rent back a few rooms for the legislature’s interim committees and let the buyers rent out the rest as some super-prime convention space. (How cool would it be for the National Association of Registered Proctologists to convene their meetings from the desks on the House floor?)

Actually, now that I think about it, maybe selling out our government to the highest bidder ain’t such a great idea.

I want you to know that I do not think you are crazy (at least not most of you). I understand that you’ve developed a passion for a smart, complicated creature that is a keystone species of its ecosystem, and that your passion is an extension of your environmentally sensitive stance. But I don’t think you’re very smart.

At least, I don’t think you’re very smart in terms of how you go about protecting the Gunnison’s Prairie Dog here in Santa Fe. I’m not talking about the fact that there’s no actual intact Sagebrush ecosystem inside Santa Fe’s city limits or pointing out that feeding prairie dogs fruits and vegetables (as so many of you are prone to do) is not part of maintaining the natural ecosystem that you so covet, instead I am talking about your behavior regarding the College of Santa Fe.

Turning up at meetings that are meant to hash out issues of buying and leasing the property and raising issues that are simply not relevant to the current conversation is not helpful. You’re all very kind to say that you want there to be a college, but you keep amending that sentiment with a “but.”

Think it through: If you love open space and you love prairie dogs you should be desperate for that land to be owned by the city and the state. The only thing you should do right now is fanatically support the purchase of the property by the city. Don’t say another word about anything except for your whole-hearted support. If the deal is approved, you will be dealing with two entities that will be forced to dialogue about open space and conservation trusts. You will be dealing with two entities that are bound to master planning processes and public input. It is your best shot.

But if your hemming and hawing about prairie dogs contributes to the general uncertainty about the deal, to the point that it fails, the land will unlimately fall to private developers and then you and your prairie dogs will be screwed. See how that works? If you love prairie dogs and you want to save them, shut the hell up about them. For now.

Four years ago, Dr. Eve Elting was approached to take part in a medical cannabis company not unlike Canntechs (which SFR reported on last week) in California. She was a skeptic at first, but did her due diligence and found that, yes, it can help patients with a long list of conditions. Now, Elting has expanded her practice to Truth or Consequences and is evaluating patients from all over the state as one of the few self-identified medical cannabis specialists. She is also a member of the state advisory board for the Department of Health’s medical marijuana program–and would like to see marijuana just plain legalized.

Q&A after the jump.

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