I would like to defend New Mexico and El Paso. If you are any kind of outdoors men, New Mexico is for you. It isn't all desert, I live about a 2 hour drive from beautiful mountains. If you love skiing and snow boarding, NM is awesome. You like camping and fishing, NM is great! Hunting ? Everywhere. I live and go to school in Las Cruces and the cost living is cheap and schooling is cheap. You can buy a nice 4 bedroom house for 150,000. Juarez is close and fun. Bit of a drug war going on, but hey that's not going to stop me from rooting on the US women against Mexico! Anyway, the only bad thing is, like jsarno said, is that you have to travel long distances to get anywhere.
As far ad El Paso being high in crime, that inst accurate at all.
"The National Crime Prevention Council ranked El Paso as one of "Six Safer Cities" across the nation. In 2001, Money Magazine ranked El Paso as the 3rd safest city with a population of over 500,000 in the US. In the same category, the Christian Science Monitor rated El Paso No. 1 in 1999."
El Paso Relocation