Let's just state the obvious first, especially considering he is Governor of New Mexico, a border state with Mexico and has wrestled with illegal immigration more than he like to admit.
Richardson courts Hispanics in Nevada, early-vote states (click here)
DIANA MARRERO GANNETT NEWS SERVICE -->
WASHINGTON -- Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, the first major Hispanic presidential candidate, hopes his performance in a recent televised Spanish-language debate will boost his standing among Democratic White House hopefuls.
Despite a distinguished résumé -- he was an ambassador, secretary of the Department of Energy and a U.S. congressman -- he is stuck in
second-tier status.
Richardson, whose mother is Mexican, is courting Hispanics in Nevada and other early-vote states to help push him to the front of the field. But he downplays his ethnic roots as a selling point.
"I'm not running as a Hispanic candidate," he said after the debate on Univision, the nation's fifth largest network. "I'm running as an American governor proud to be Hispanic."...
The fact that he was Secretary of Energy (click here) in the Clinton White House made him an attractive candidate to lead an energy starved nation into a next generation of American innovation.
Energy Secretary Richardson To Install Final Magnet In New Fermilab Accelerator (click here)
Science Daily — Batavia, Ill.--Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson will help usher in a new era in physics at the energy frontier when he takes a wrench to four bolts at the Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory on Thursday, September 24.
Richardson will tighten the last four bolts on the final 20-ton dipole magnet -- one of 432 electromagnets, each 30 feet long, connected in a two-mile underground ring -- to be installed in Fermilab's new Main Injector Accelerator, a six-year, $229 million construction project. The new accelerator will inject high-energy protons into Fermilab's Tevatron, more than tripling the scientific capability of the world's most powerful particle accelerator. By creating trillions of high-energy collisions between subatomic particles moving at nearly light speed, the Tevatron allows scientists from across the U.S. and around the world to study the structure of matter at the smallest scale ever observed by human beings....
I feel he is very competent as a leader. He has been the President of the Democratic Governor's Association (click here) which has seen the majority of the states take on Democratic leadership across the board. Two vital new Governors showing exceptional ability in their early years of their first terms are Governor Patrick of Massachusetts and Governor Spitzer of New York. In realizing the brevity Bill Richardson brings to leading the nation's majority of Governors, he is more than adequate for Presidential politics and if nominated would be able to win the election. There is no doubt in my mind about that. The question in many Democrats minds is; "Do we want him to be anything but a leading Democratic Governor?"
Richardson seeks challengers' views on Iraq (click here)
Democratic presidential candidate Bill Richardson would like to have his challengers explain their views on troop pullout from Iraq because they're not the same as his plan, he said during a Council Bluffs visit Thursday.
"I'm asking, 'Why do we need troops behind? How many? How long?'" he said while delivering his own plan at the Iowa National Guard armory on East Kanesville Boulevard.
Granted, all the Democratic candidates want the Iraq war to end and have the troops return home safely, Richardson said. But there is a fundamental difference between their withdrawal plans and his, he said.
"I say we leave zero troops behind."...
The one 'thing' about Richardson's stand on "Leave No Troop Behind" is the plan for withdrawal was claimed by him when he stated '...his sources tell him the troops could be moved out of Iraq safely in three short months.'
Indeed.
But, the source he claims to have was faciliated by the spouse of his former boss, the current New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. The concern I have for this very bright man and agile political figure is the 'idea' of a contingency plan was not his, yet, he more than took credit for information that would enhance his position politically. In all honesty, that is a bit out of character for Bill Richardson and I can't help but hold him up to the light to realize he didn't ask for a contingency plan first.
Hm.
