Opinion
Opinion
DATA DISPATCH: UNM men’s basketball is spectacularly hard to watch
Joe Rull | January 29Why beat around the bush here? UNM Basketball: Pandemic Edition just flat-out sucks. In almost every measurable, demonstrable way, the University of New Mexico's men's basketball team (1-9 in conference play thus far) is a complete and unmitigated dumpster fire. Obviously, there's a ton of factors at play here, and they're not all UNM's fault. Moving a roster full of fresh faces out of the state for the season was never going to be easy. My god, though — do they really have to make it look this hard? Even the most casual of college hoops observers knows that today's game is all about pace and space. The up-tempo, trigger-happy style of basketball has completely transformed the game as we know it over the better part of the past decade.
Opinion
Analysis: Biden’s inauguration marks shift toward consistent U.S. policy
Liam Debonis | January 25Joseph R. Biden Jr. was sworn in as the 46th president of the United States on Wednesday, marking the official end of former President Donald John Trump’s term and the new administration’s inheritance of a destructive domestic and foreign agenda and its consequences. In the last four years under Trump’s “America First” policy, the U.S. flouted warnings from climate scientists, abruptly abandoned allies in foreign conflicts, backed out of international groups — including the Paris Agreement and the World Health Organization — and instituted discriminatory and exclusionary immigration policy which was challenged by the ACLU as a violation of U.S. and international law. The erratic isolationism was interspersed with impromptu and often jaunty meetings between the former president and foreign dictators, an abrupt assassination of a top Iranian general taken without consulting Congress and a half-baked plan to purchase Greenland.
Opinion
LETTER: Bill 18F would cut funding for ‘irreplaceable public service’
University of New Mexico College Democrats | November 18The University of New Mexico College Democrats strongly oppose ASUNM Senate Bill 18F that would slash guaranteed funding for student publications from 8.5% to 4% of ASUNM revenue. Student publications such as the Daily Lobo are indispensable to the undergraduate population at UNM, having been proven to be a unique and irreplaceable public service by providing students with steady, credible reporting and information, most recently with information on where and how to vote in the 2020 election.
Opinion
LETTER: Structural changes needed to prevent tragic deaths like KUNM news director
Keegan Kloer and Austin Fisher | November 16In the wake of KUNM news director Hannah Colton’s death, a common refrain by friends, loved ones and community members circulated: “Check on your friends, and reach out if you need help.” As two people who were very close to Hannah, we hear and appreciate the gesture. Creating communities of care and resilience is important. But checking on Hannah, asking that she reach out, did not solve the underlying problems that led to her death. Hannah was a journalist who led a chronically understaffed and resource-deprived newsroom, no different than most other newsrooms and many nonprofits. Every day she confronted very real structural violences of a world organized around profit and white supremacy.
Opinion
LETTER: The value of transparency
Sall Ahmadian | November 2The University of New Mexico’s Student Fee Review Board (SFRB) was created to add the voice of our University’s students to the budgeting process. Through this board, the students’ representatives voice concerns and make adjustments to the use of the community’s student fees. The goal of the SFRB is to enhance UNM’s academic and intellectual environment by supporting student activities and organizations. While there are tough budget and management questions to be answered each year, this year presented difficult decisions based on a continued decline in student enrollment.
Opinion
EDITORIAL: UNM administration flouts First Amendment with gag order on Daily Lobo reporter
Daily Lobo Editorial Board | November 2Let it be known that there is no doubt that Daily Lobo data editor Joe Rull could quite easily “break the ankles” of any student government representative, for Rull is an absolute beast in the post, his footwork is immaculate and he knows every move in the book. In addition to reaffirming our data editor’s skills on the court, we must also make clear that when the University of New Mexico Dean of Students, Nasha Torrez, violated the First Amendment rights of a member of the student newspaper, she violated the rights of the newspaper as a whole.
