Albuquerque’s favorite Karen is out with a new column defending her last column for defending a woman who threw her newborn in a dumpster.

On Saturday, The Albuquerque Journal’s “UpFront” columnist Joline Gutierrez Krueger humble-bragged about rejecting an offer to talk to Nancy Grace “ — yes, that Nancy Grace —” about attempted murderer Alexis Avila.

Krueger described Avila as “a confused, immature, ignorant, frightened teen” who “deserves to be held accountable”…but.

“But the public, especially teens, deserve better communication and information on safe haven laws and other alternatives to unwanted pregnancies.”

It’s the “but” that got Krueger into trouble, and her follow-up column responding to critics — titled, “News of teen mom sparks reader debate: Feedback faults messenger, not message” — doesn’t make her argument any more palatable.

Being “just 11 weeks into her 18th year” isn’t a great defense of attempted murder. Children know as soon as they’re old enough to play dolls that you don’t throw babies in dumpsters. 

Living in Lea County — “where the nearest Planned Parenthood is more than 100 miles away in Texas” — has absolutely nothing to do with the Avila case, because she only found out she was pregnant the day before she gave birth.  

But the crux of her argument — both times — is that society bears some responsibility when young mothers kill their children, and that Avila is somehow deserving of sympathy because of her ignorance of the law.

“I also saw Avila’s case as a shocking admonition that we have not done a good job of educating the public, especially young people, about our state’s safe haven law.”

It’s disgusting that this is how some people think about society — that its role in “educating” teenagers is to provide them with resources to kill their child (without having to drive 100 miles to Texas). The deflection from the crime itself to society’s failure to prevent murder is foundational to leftists’ aversion to personal responsibility. 

The feedback Kreuger received didn’t fault the messenger, it faulted the message, because society isn’t to blame for poorly communicating how to properly dispose of your baby. It’s to blame for raising immoral children.

Reasonable people are disgusted by Avila, not sympathetic, because any person over the age of five knows better. 

Calling those who criticized her column “bellicose, age-biased folks,” Krueger attempted to scapegoat her bad take by playing the victim of ageism.

“In more diplomatic discourses I have read, they have said that to reach younger folks about safe haven laws the message has to come from younger folks and in venues they inhabit.

“‘We never let officials promote the law. No 16-year-old cares what legislators think,’ one of the organizers told a newspaper that is not the Journal. ‘We get into the culture of 13-, 14-, 16- and 17-year-olds by using young people and making it normal to discuss the safe haven law. It’s standard demographic marketing.’

“The group recommends avoiding using old faces (ouch!), old voices, suits, uniforms and podiums and instead suggests employing teen influencers and radio DJs to promote the law in the media, online and music festivals. Avoiding images of babies is also key, the group says, because ‘young women see it as a problem that needs to be solved, not as a baby.’”

The “newspaper that is not the Journal” is Central Jersey News. The quote about demographics is from an article written in 2018.

Only a print columnist could convince herself that teenagers get information from print newspapers. But the argument remains untethered from reality. 

Radio DJs? Online? Music festivals? Why not “don’t kill your baby” memes and Instagram warnings?

If we’re raising children who don’t know as teenagers not to murder, the problem isn’t ignorance of the law or poor public messaging. It’s a lack of personal responsibility, and morality.

Avila deserves the harshest punishment available under the law. Killing babies is abhorrent. And both parents and teachers carry the burden for failing to educate children about the sanctity of human life, because apparently newspaper columnists won’t do it.