Rep. Luciano "Lucky" Varela, D-Santa Fe, chair of the Legislative Finance Committee

Minutes ago, Trip Jennings at the New Mexico Independent reported that New Mexico legislators, fed up with the Governor’s line-item vetoes, are contemplating a lawsuit in order to, as Sen. John Arthur Smith, D-Hidalgo, told SFR yesterday, “draw a line in the sand and let the executive know [he's] not supposed to cross over that line.”

The problem, Smith explains, is that Governor Richardson may be using his line-item veto power in questionable ways—like indirectly altering where state money goes. If true, such a practice is tantamount to challenging the legislature’s constitutional authority to appropriate funds.

That’s not new, Smith says. “With this Governor, it seems like it’s a continuous effort,” he says. “He’s interpreting regulation, I believe, without the reinforcement of law behind him. This Governor is pretty bold.” Continue reading »

Last week’s news brief about a lawsuit against the Dahn Yoga organization, a controversial group that SFR has covered previously, generated a goodly number of comments on our website. It looks like an astroturf campaign, judging by the pseudonyms and the striking similarity of the comments.

Many not only blame the messenger (that would be SFR), but also the woman who alleges she was sexually assaulted by Dahn Yoga founder Ilchi Lee, whom a follower describes as “the most giving considerate and hard working person I have ever met.”

It’s not all a love-fest, though. This comment, by a “Dahn Instructor,” suggests that Lee’s accuser just wants attention:

Jessica Harrelson is lying about these claims not only because she wants money, but because she knows that stupid, sensationalist reporters will eat it up. Why don’t you report AFTER the trial… And why don’t you report a public apology about your BS story AFTER the trial…

For the record, the reason newspapers don’t wait to report until “AFTER the trial” is because hundreds of years of legal practice in countries around the world has led to the expectation that trials will be public events. The reason people got so upset about Guantanamo Bay was that the military commissions there were closed to the public and thus, prone to abuse.

This is Civics 101, folks, which must not be included in Brain Wave Vibration courses.

Others worry about the harm to Ilchi Lee’s reputation:

Trail [sic] by media tarnishes the reputation and discredits the life of a person who has dedicated his life to empowering people to recover their health and happiness and toward establishing peace on this planet. This kind of irresponsible reporting will unfortunately prevent people from experiencing all the benefits of this practice.

More irresponsible would be to swallow Dahn Yoga’s sales pitch as a kind of miracle cure—as one commenter writes, “so much cheaper then paying at hospital!”

In any event, the response was enough to warrant a reply. And, it seemed worthwhile to post a copy of the complaint, so anyone who’s curious can read exactly what’s been alleged against Dahn. Here it is in PDF form.