By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE – Eight attempts, eight incompletions.
That’s not a statistical line for a struggling quarterback but rather the number of times New Mexico Watchdog has tried without success to log onto healthcare.gov since the Affordable Care Act was rolled out Oct. 1.
Sunday night and Monday morning, NM Watchdog tried [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE — The federal government is expected to pick up tab to repair road damage sustained during last month’s record rainfall.
The head of the New Mexico Department of Transportation told New Mexico Watchdog he expects the federal government to pay the $20-million repair bill.
“At this time we [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE — Some eyebrows were raised — and maybe a few harrumphs uttered — in the past week as news came out that former  Gov. Bill Richardson has been named to the Governors Fiscal Leadership Council, a new group aimed at addressing the country’s fiscal crisis.
“We are honored [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE — The advertising blitz from the New Mexico Health Insurance Exchange aimed at individuals looking to sign up for policies under the Affordable Care Act is on hold due to technical problems with the federal government’s website.
“We’re holding back on paid media until we know when the glitches at [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE – When it comes to weather, the climate in New Mexico — 300 days of sunshine annually — is hard to beat.
But when it comes to taxes? New Mexico’s climate ain’t so good.
According to the Tax Foundation, a fiscally conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C., New [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE – Dear readers, you may recall that on Tuesday — the first day of the rollout of the new health care law — I posted a story on my attempt to get information on what individual health care coverage I was eligible for here in New Mexico.
I [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE – While New Mexico‘s budget is highly reliant on the oil and gas industry, the federal government would have to remain shut down for about four weeks for it to really alter the state’s bottom line.
That’s the word from the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association.
“I’m not [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
SANTA FE – Well, that didn’t take us very far.
On the first day of the New Mexico Health Insurance Exchange, I wanted to compare how my employer’s health insurance package stacks up against the platinum, gold, silver and bronze plans that are being offered in the state.
Who knows, for all [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
Maybe it’s the (bad) influence of “Breaking Bad,” but a recently designed map of the United States lists New Mexico as being the most anti-social place in the nation.
A tongue-in-cheek look at the 50 states produced by the Cartographic Research Lab at the University of Alabama and circulated on [...]

By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog
Fracking has some friends in the Democratic Party.
Two former Obama officials made some glowing comments in recent days about the process of hydraulic fracturing, which is used to extract oil and natural gas using high-pressured liquids to break through rock under the earth’s surface.
Environmentalists hate the technique, but proponents [...]