Commentary: Lives, like the world in T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men, often end not with a bang but a whimper. Same for political lives.
The sad spectacle of Jerry Apodaca, our long-ago governor, endorsing Steve Pearce, poles apart from Jerry politically – and invoking John F. Kennedy, who'd have made short work of Pearce – reminded me of a better day.
On June 1, 1974, I was sitting in a hot tub with Jerry after we'd run 13 miles through the streets of Albuquerque. It was a campaign event. Jerry, who loved running, got to run and campaign simultaneously.
And he shaved eight minutes from his previous best time! Not a runner, I stupidly bought new sneakers for the event. After a mile or two, blisters on the tops of my toes were unbearable. I tossed the sneakers into the back of a truck and ran the rest of the way barefoot.
I was a young reporter, spending much of that weekend with Jerry and Clara Apodaca. They reminded people of the Kennedys, because they were young and liberal and charismatic. I liked them. Had to be objective in my reporting. But I liked them.
More recently, I'd been aware Jerry had serious health problems. Then I heard rumors that Clara wanted their son, Jeff, to run for Governor. When Jeff ran, I interviewed him. Engaging guy, although I didn't know how much to trust him.
Now Jerry (or someone) has written an endorsement comparing far-right Congressman Steve Pearce to Kennedy. The JFK comparison is silly. Pearce helped found the extremist “Freedom Caucus” in 2015 and is one of the most extremely conservative current Congresspersons. (Government shutdown, anyone?) JFK went to an early meeting of the Americans for Democratic Action and championed relatively progressive ideas. On most issues, Lujan Grisham's positions are much closer than Pearce's to the ones Jeff Apodaca ran on.
Jerry's endorsement claims Pearce is a moderate, reaching across the aisle to work with Democrats. Half the time Congressman Pearce can't even work with Republicans. Is Jerry hallucinating?
Jerry's example of Pearce reaching across the aisle is that when Jerry called, Pearce answered. (Jerry says Michelle Lujan Grisham didn't. Her office says Jerry never called.)
Meanwhile Jeff has a new radio gig on a conservative pro-Pearce program. As a radio host, I'd be the last to say he shouldn't do that. We need civil inter-party discussion. However, watching the first show on Facebook Live, I noticed that Jeff criticized Lujan Grisham, but never criticized Pearce. As to Donald Trump, whom Pearce follows like a dog but wants voters to forget, Jeff said what Pearce's campaign would have him say: “The President has less to do with New Mexicans' daily lives than their Governor.” In other words, please ignore Pearce's support of Trump's dangerous policies. And please listen to what Pearce says this week, not what he's done and said for years.
Jeff posed as the Progressive alternative to Grisham. Now he's getting friendly with her far-right opponent. Eloquent testimony that he's about ambition, not conviction.
Assuming your brains aren't addled, you don't write something like Jerry wrote unless you're peeved that someone whipped your son in the primary, scoring three times as many votes; or unless you're desperately ambitious for that same son, who may want something from Pearce. Either way, it's kind of a sad last political gasp from someone who once commanded respect.
I started this column with sadness. The sadness deepened as I read the El Paso Times article I wrote about that 1974 half-marathon. Sixty-three of the 70 runners finished the race. I remember running right along with Jerry, listening and watching the folks interacting with him, until my blisters stalled me. Jerry finished in 1:48, I in 1:58. But the old article strengthened my memory of the energy in his campaign for governor.
The evening before the run, we'd been in Taos, where (as I described it in the paper). "Both the towns rally and the race were symbolic of the kind of campaign Apodaca has run.
"He has declined to seek endorsements, and almost intentionally avoided them at times, he says. 'We didn't think that was what we needed to win,' he said Saturday. 'People are reacting against that. What we needed was a groundswell of popular support.'
"In Taos, where the Democratic Committee had endorsed [gubernatorial candidate] Tibo Chavez, Apodaca was greeted enthusiastically and feted by an overflow crowd at Los Compadres.
It was an Apodaca type crowd in a casual, warm, almost homey atmosphere. One man read a poem to the candidate in Spanish, several young pwople joked with him about next morning's marathon, and one local political leader recovering from a heart attack surprised Apodaca and worried his doctors by showing up at all.
"Typically, Apodaca was taking the time and spending his energy on thiskind of rally in a small town. He expects to do well in such areas both in the north and in the south, but he still will have to run strongly in Bernalillo County to win.
"Although he has spoken frequently on issues, he seems to be banking on personal appeal -- as in the Taos rally -- and energy -- like the energy he displayed Saturday morning."
It's ironic, in the context of this blog post, that in 1974 Apodaca said he spurned endorsements in favor of the kind of "groundswell of popular support" Pearce is not seeing across the state. (i'm sure he was exaggerating when he said that to me, but certainly in Taos he wasn't the choice of the County Democratic Committee.) My memory, which may or may not be accurate, is that Jerry was an underdog in seeking the Democratic nomination. He was vigorous and articulate and progressive.
In the column I refer to Jerry calling and Pearce responding. The actual words of the endorsement are a little cryptic on that: "I know the new politicians of the 21st century don’t need my advice. But friends recently suggested I sit down with both gubernatorial candidates to discuss the concerns I outlined above. I agreed to but didn’t expect anyone to call.
"I never heard from Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham. I did receive a call from Congressman Steve Pearce. I was surprised how open he was and how we agreed on about 80 percent of the issues that plague New Mexico."
He never says he called Lujan Grisham. Her office says he didn't. It would appear that "friends" -- or, more likely, a son who had recently met with Pearce and spoken highly of the congressman -- initiated the connection between Pearce and Jerry Apodaca.
By the way, I left phone messages for Jeff Apodaca, to ask him a couple of questions. I know indirectly that he's been defending his father's endorsement.
While I was working on this column, I also read a Facebook post by Bill McCamley that raises numerous pertinent questions about the elder Apodaca's written endorsement of Pearce: