News-Record.com

So, there are these three cats who want to be governor. I spoke with them for this story on Saturday.

In an online exclusive (translation: we ran out of space in the @#$%#$ paper) here’s a chart comparing their policy positions on various topics.

Later in the week, I’m told we’re planning to get some video of Lt. Gov. Bev Perdue and Pat McCrory up. Both candidates interviewed (separately) with our editorial board in the N&R studios at the home office.

Local lawyer and convention delegate Marshall Hurley has sent along a couple photos. The first is of his son, Anderson Hurley, a 17-year-old senior at Grimsley who is serving as a page at the Republican National Convention.

It looks like he’s checking out a model of Air Force One.

And here is Anderson and a proud papa in front of a portrait of Lincoln.

Hurley is a delegate to the convention and sent along this reaction to Arizona Sen. John McCain picking Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate:

In 1996, a brand new member of the Atlanta Braves named Jermaine Dye stood up to the plate for his first at bat and hit a home run on his first try.

On Friday, Governor Sarah Palin stood up for her major league debut, and she crushed a grand slam homer out of the park.

The North Carolina delegates to the Republican National Convention have greeted Senator John McCain's choice for vice-president with passion and enthusiasm for this bright new star. She soared in her acceptance speech, showing her ability to connect with the American people. She spoke with a steady, authentic rhetoric, all her own.

Delegates welcome Governor Palin's energy and her commitment to government reform. Her political resume retells the story of the American dream: raising a family, building a business, grassroots community service and, most recently, placing a firm, conservative hand on the wheels of government in one of America's special places.

Mother Nature has disrupted our convention schedule but not our spirits. We have, appropriately, sought to find the balance between a focus on the threat to the Gulf coast and at the same time, conducting the business of the convention which we are charge to do. We will make our nominations, and the campaign will resume soon.

Our delegates are absolutely energized by this exciting ticket, led by real reformers. Senator McCain and Governor Palin are ready to face and debate their opponents: a self-promoting orator and his running mate, a relic from the Nixon era. In the next two months, North Carolina Republican activists will join together with a new determination to make our case for McCain-Palin to keep Barack Obama's callow fingers far away from the buttons of power in Washington, DC.

I saw a video clip over the weekend where he said concern of Hurricane Gustav went “beyond politics.” As in this story from the AP via the Star Tribune he was urging supporters to be mindful of those who might be in need.

So I can’t decide whether this is incredibly nimble and genuine or kind of cynical and exploitive – yes, covering political campaigns makes you suspect everyone’s motives - but Obama’s North Carolina campaign offices announced they’ll be taking donations for folks affected by Gustav.

RALEIGH, N.C. – U.S. Sen. Barack Obama’s Campaign for Change announced today that it will begin accepting non-perishables and other materials at its 16 statewide offices on Tuesday and Wednesday in an effort to assist families affected by Hurricane Gustav. “We wanted to give North Carolinians another way to provide support to families that may be in need in the aftermath of Gustav,” stated Marc Farinella, Obama’s North Carolina State Director. “Our grassroots organization is ready and willing to pitch in and use its resources to help in any way we can.”

Local residents are encouraged to bring non-perishables such as canned food, bottled water, first-aid supplies and other materials that may help people in the wake of the storm to their local Campaign for Change office. The supplies will be distributed to aid foundations that can ensure they are delivered to families in need.

The local Greensboro office is:
Greensboro
318 S. Elm St.
Greensboro, NC 27401
336.275.1964

Ramesh Ponnuru writes at the National Review Online blog:

Pro-Life Women

They are radically underrepresented in national politics. Elizabeth Dole is the only pro-life woman in the Senate that I can think of.is there a governor besides Palin who fits the category? The situation in the House is only a little better. The dearth of female pro-life politicians creates any number of political problems for pro-lifers. (That's why the Susan B. Anthony List exists.) All else aside, I am glad to see a female pro-life politician reach prominence.

So I guess if you’re looking for local connections to the national race, there’s one. I’m not really sure having a strong pro-lifer on the ticket gets McCain any more votes than he would have had. I have a hard time imagining a whole lot of voters whose sole focus is the pro-life issue going over to vote for the current Democratic ticket.

Ponnuru mentions the Susan B. Anthony List, which looks like it’s supposed to serve as a counter-weight to Emily’s List, although I must confess having never seen the pro-life group active here in NC. The SBA List does have a big picture of Palin up on their site, so they’re obviously excited about the prospect.

Alright, let’s acknowledge that Gov. Sarah Palin is easy on the eyes in a way that no vice presidential contender has ever been. And let’s further acknowledge the fact her teen daughter is knocked up and that’s going to make for good 24-hour news cycle fodder for all this week. Oh, and the whole trying to fire a trooper over a personal vendetta thing is priceless, ham-handed and maybe a touch worse worse than a certain North Carolina letting his wife get a humongous raise from a state university and travel first class on the taxpayer's dime.

But is McCain's Veep pick reckless? As in, if McCain croaks in office and the United States is faced with something akin to 9/11 are we going to be having a wicked case of buyers' remorse? At least one pundit seems to imply that.

From Slate’s John Dickerson:

Each new fact we learn about Sarah Palin—her reversal on the bridge to nowhere, her disagreements with McCain on issues from windfall profits to global warming, emerging facts about troopergate—contribute to the feeling that this whole Palin thing is being made up as we go along. It may be fun to read about, and it sure is fun to cover, but it also supports the judgment of the Palin pick that I first heard from a Republican veteran shortly after the announcement: "Reckless."

Obama was supposed to be the risky candidate. That's certainly how Republicans have painted him. Judging from how he's run his campaign, though, he's very conservative. Nevertheless, polls have shown that voters think McCain is the less risky pick by as much as 20 percentage points. Now that McCain has made a high-profile decision essentially defined by its riskiness—observers have called it a "Hail Mary pass" so often, I'm starting to think it's a play for the Catholic vote—the question is whether McCain has squandered his advantage with voters on the question of risk.

Click here for the whole thing. To be clear, I'm not sure whether Dickerson was talking about "reckless" in terms of a pick for Veep or "reckless" in terms of picking someone to put a heart-beat away, but one would seem to imply the other.

Got an answer to my question about how Brooks & Dunn felt about Obama using their song "Only in America" at the Democratic convention:

They're fine with it.

Jackson Browne and John Mellencamp on their music being used by McCain?

Not so much.

So the NRSC has an ad up attacking state Sen. Kay Hagan, a Democrat, who is running to unseat Republican incumbent Sen. Elizabeth Dole.

Wait, wait, wait a minute… I though the NRSC didn’t have any money because Republican Senators were a bunch of disappointing skin-flints, according to National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Ensign.

I’m so confused. Well, here’s something else to make your head hurt (via Real Clear Politics.):

I wonder, with beech volleyball off the tube for a whole two weeks now, is the Olympic theme really going to resonate? And if anyone took the whole, “we should really keep the third-party ads out of this race” thing seriously, this should just about put a nail in that coffin.

For those needing a flashback, the Politico has the 92/93 ad up that the DSCC put up in August:

Without taking a stand as to the message, I’ve got to like the DSCC ad better. North Carolina has plenty of old codgers talking politics, some of them even on front porches. While the Olympics are temporary, grumpy old men are an institution down here.

Is it me, or is this campaign getting sillier by the minute?

Frank Eaton at Blue NC has put a video on state Sen. Kay Hagan up on YouTube. It is the first product of their BlueNC TV effort.

The video is well produced relative to a lot of stuff on the web. Content-wise, it is a rah-rah affair, stocked with footage from a campaign office opening in Greensboro. But if you need a reminder of what Hagan’s stump speech sounds like, here you go:

The folks at Gallup have an analysis out of their latest polls in the presidential race up in video form. The most interesting upshot for me was that Sen. Barack Obama’s efforts to make nice with supporters of Sen. Hillary Clinton seem to have born some fruit during the convention. A big question: how much will Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s choice bring some of the remaining Clinton stalwarts into the camp of (the almost official) Republican Nominee John McCain.

Sen. Elizabeth Dole met with the News & Record’s editorial board today, mainly to chat about her re-election race here in North Carolina. But the Republican incumbent chatted at the beginning of the interview about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Arizona Sen. John McCain’s choice as a vice presidential running mate.

“I think she’ll be a very strong voice. She is commander and chief for the national guard of her state, and has a number of years in public service at various levels,” Dole said. “And I tell you, you know its interesting, when you’re the mayor, you have people knocking on your door, they’re right there across the street … it gets you very deeply involved in issues across the board.”

Dole was asked whether the Palin pick was hasty, teen-age daughters aside. Given news reports that McCain had only one or two conversations with the woman before putting her on the ticket, was the choice hasty?

“Knowing him and his way of doing things, I think he would have been very careful knowing how important this particular choice is,” Dole said.

Click here for the whole conversation. It’s about five minutes.

Update: Speaking of Palin, here's the McCain campaign's latest ad touting Palin (and knocking Obama):

The National Federation of Independent Businesses endorsed Republican Sen. Elizabeth Dole in her re-election campaign versus Democratic state Sen. Kay Hagan today.

This isn’t a huge shock, but I was a bit surprised to hear both Dole and NFIB state director Gregg Thompson talk about union activity prominently in their presentations. In particular, both took aim at the card check bill, which would do away with secret ballots for creating local unions.

“It’s a very scary piece of legislation,” Thompson said.

During her talk, Dole said, “I stand with you to oppose give-aways to union bosses, such as the card check bill.” Here’s about a minute of her talk:

Update:I noticed the video audio was on the poor side, so click here for the full audio of Dole’s talk made with a mic not tacked on as an afterthought to my camera.

Here's a picture of Dole speaking with Rep. John Blust on her way in:

As the AP reports, Republican Sen. Elizabeth Dole has an ad out attacking Greensboro Democrat Kay Hagan.

"They call her 'fibber Kay' Hagan," the ad begins.

Who the heck are “they?” Now, I’m not going to say I’ve talked to all 9 million residents in North Carolina, but I get around. Until the ad aired, I never heard anyone use that moniker. (And yes, I’ve heard some people use some nicknames for Hagan, not that one though.) Here’s the ad.

In other Senate campaign news of the day, a new poll shows Hagan up in the race by five points.

So, if you watched Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s speech at the convention Wednesday night, what did you think?

For me, the best line was this zinger:

“My fellow citizens, the American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of personal discovery.”

That there is funny. Probably not fair, but funny.

Palin obviously was unleashed to be the attack dog on the ticket, the traditional role of the vice presidential nominee. Her most effective line may have been this one:

“Let us face the matter squarely; there is only one man in this election who has ever really fought for you.”

For a lot of folks, that’s a tough one to answer. Sen. Obama may give a good speech, but for a lot of folks, military service is a powerful trump card.

For those chewing over whether it is right and proper for we scruffy media types to talk about Palin’s pregnant daughter, here’s a question: Palin talked about her son heading to Iraq and made a point of talking about her baby to reach out to the parents of special needs kids. If those children are fair game to use as political props, why is the pregnant teenager off limits?

Diane Lamb in our news library sent along a link to the Anchorage Daily News’ Sarah Palin archive, which is handy for those who want to know about the rise of the Republican Vice Presidential nominee.

Available there: video of that jet she tried to sell on e-bay. Palin made reference to the jet in her speech last night.

Also, there are stories from prior debates like this one where she said teaching creationism along side evolution in public schools would be a good idea.

The volatile issue of teaching creation science in public schools popped up in the Alaska governor's race this week when Republican Sarah Palin said she thinks creationism should be taught alongside evolution in the state's public classrooms.

Palin was answering a question from the moderator near the conclusion of Wednesday night's televised debate on KAKM Channel 7 when she said, "Teach both. You know, don't be afraid of information. Healthy debate is so important, and it's so valuable in our schools. I am a proponent of teaching both."

This, from the NYTimes, is a breakout on the words that speakers used at the respective conventions.

Republicans overwhelmingly touched on taxes and business, while Democrats hit upon change, energy and health care.

While the frequency of just a single word may not indicate much, it does show the areas that the respective parties may focus upon as we head to November. Also, certain words are dropped along the way to ignite a little passion in each party.

Like this, on disasters: While Democrats mentioned Hurricane once, Republicans said Sept. 11 twice. What about those words might galvanize one party against the other?

Pretty nifty tool for following the major presidential candidates on the trail.

The interactive map allows you to pick a time span within which the candidates travel, where they go, and who goes where. Wanna know only where the VP candidates are? Where Cindy McCain and Michelle Obama are going? Or, maybe you want to see where the presidential candidates themselves have been over the last week or so.

You can search all of them through the interactive map. Looks like Biden has been spending some time in Florida.

Voters in Guilford County will have several opportunities in the next few weeks to hear from candidates in the 2008 election.
Sept. 16: Guilford County Unity Effort forum featuring candidates for several offices, 6 p.m., New Light Baptist Church Family Life Center, 1105 Willow Road, Greensboro. Will include candidates for U.S. House districts 6 and 13; governor; state auditor; N.C. Senate District 27; N.C. House districts 58, 59 and 62; Guilford County commissioners; and Guilford County Board of Education. Information: Sharon Hightower, 508-5346.
Sept. 23: Guilford County Unity Effort forum featuring candidates for several offices, 6 p.m., High Point Theater, 220 E. Commerce Ave., High Point. Featuring candidates for governor, superintendent of public instruction, commissioner of Agriculture, commissioner of Insurance, Guilford County Board of Education and High Point City Council. Information: Sharon Hightower, 508-5346.
Oct. 13: Education issues forum, 7 p.m., Koury Hospitality Careers Center, GTCC, Jamestown. Featuring Guilford County commissioners and Board of Education candidates. Sponsored by the Guilford Education Alliance and other partners. Information: 841-4332.
Oct. 21: Forum, noon, Holy Trinity Episcopal Church, 607 N. Greene St., Greensboro. Featuring U.S. House 6th District Rep. Howard Coble and challenger Teresa Sue Bratton. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters. To make lunch reservations, call 643-2131. Information: Rebecca Klase, 297-9948.

From Saturday's paper: this story laying out the U.S. Senate candidate's position on a couple of union-related issues.

The summary is this: Incumbent Republican Elizabeth Dole is no fan of legislation that would make it easier for folks to unionize or any legislation that would force North Carolina to allow public employees to collectively bargain.

State Sen. Kay Hagan, a Greensboro Democrat, didn't offer up an absolute endorsement of either of those ideas, but was fairly friendly toward them.

Click here to listen to Hagan's answers.

Click here to listen to Dole's.

And then click here for thoughts from editorial writer Doug Clark.

Some after action notes: This difference in positions could bolster the NRSC's narrative that Hagan is seeking support from traditional national Democratic strongholds, including big labor. (Click here for an example of that.)

After my story ran, a spokeswoman with the campaign wrote to say she would not be in favor of a federal law over-riding North Carolina's law prohibiting collective bargaining for public employees.

I think Kay was confused by the premise of the question, and inferred that he was talking about EFCA and not the separate issue of the federal govt. mandating that states allow public employees to collectively bargain. She would support public employees being allowed to collectively bargain (NCAE for example) if state law allowed that and the employees voted to do so. But fundamentally she believes that public employees being allowed to collectively bargain is a state's right issue.

Respectfully, that's was not the case. Clark asked this question several different ways during the editorial board interview, which you can her via the link above. You can listen to the segment yourself, but here's one fairly clear exchange:

Clark: "This is (about) collective barging for public employees. So, North Carolina law doesn't allow that. But would you support federal legislation that would mandate recognition of collective bargaining writes for state employees?

Hagan: "Not mandate it, but I would look at having the collective bargaining process available if the employees so voted on that."

Clark: "If the employees...?"

Hagan: "They would have the authority to make that decision."

Clark: "So, if the NCAE wanted collective bargaining rights, you would support that?"

Hagan: "Yes."

Clark: "Even though current state law currently prohibits that?"

Hagan: "Yes."

I'm not seeing a whole lot of ambiguity or confusion in those answers. By way of fuller disclosure, she was asked about her answers after the main part of the editorial board interview was over (but before she left the room) and confirmed them.

The U.S. Senate race between Democrat Kay Hagan and Republican incumbent Elizabeth Dole has been popping up in the ol' Google reader. The general trend seems to be national writers assessing North Carolina's campaign as increasingly competitive. Here are a couple of examples:

The New Republic blog breaks down Dole's barking dog ad:

In what is shaping up to be a hotly contested race, North Carolina Senator Elizabeth Dole has released a new ad admonishing her opponent Kay Hagan, a state senator, for lying. The spot is a response to ads that aired in August decrying Dole's work in the Senate as ineffective.

[snip]

There is another interpretation of the dog, however--one that's even less flattering. Some critics, including some people close to Hagan, have said that in using the dog, the Dole camp is implying that Hagan is whining, or--no way to put it delicately--that she is a bitch.

Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal's "Political Diary" blog titles its latest entry "Panic Time in North Carolina:"

Sarah Palin thrilled the GOP this week in St. Paul, reminding more than a few GOP veterans of how Elizabeth Dole wowed them at the 1996 Republican convention in San Diego. Too bad Mrs. Dole wasn't there to enjoy it. She skipped this week's festivities to focus on her re-election battle against state Senator Kay Hagan in what has become a must-watch race.

And for good reason: A new poll by a Democratic firm shows Mrs. Hagan with a five-point lead, echoing a host of recent polls that show a tight race getting tighter. Mrs. Dole is the biggest star on the North Carolina stage now that John Edwards is in disgrace. Chapel Hill-based venture capitalist Alston Gardner emailed us to explain why she's in trouble: "Much like John Edwards, she's just another pretty face that hasn't delivered for the citizens and leaders of North Carolina. Her focus has always been on a national audience and not doing the less glamorous, but politically necessary constituent services." Ouch.

U.S. Senate candidate and Libertarian Christopher Cole doesn't have the money to put a campaign ad on the air, but he has been making use of e-mail to raise questions about Republican Elizabeth Dole, the incumbent, and Democrat Kay Hagan. One missive that arrived over the weekend takes aim at Hagan for her role in the Dell deal.

For those who didn't catch the news last week, Dell has said it might sell its plant in Forsyth County. That plant, Cole points out, was lured to North Carolina by way of incentives passed during a specially called session of the General Assembly.

Hagan was one of the original sponsors of that bill. (More here.-PDF)

Cole had this to say:

As do all Libertarians, US Senate nominee Christopher Cole opposes so-called "economic incentives", more properly referred to as "corporate welfare", as an immoral tax on citizens to benefit corporate profits. In addition to the moral issue, Dell's cut-and-run with Hagan's complicity clearly demonstrate the uselessness of such incentives.

Corporate welfare cannot produce economic development. Rather, it props up inefficient businesses at taxpayer expense. By promoting inefficient businesses over self-sufficient, consumer-preferred competitors, such government-corporate hybrids actually reduce longterm economic growth. In other words, the development and jobs claimed for such projects are actually just snake-oil promotions.

As a supporter of laissez-faire capitalism over corporatism, only Libertarian Christopher Cole advocates letting taxpayers keep their own money, because they can be trusted to support the best companies in the market. Something which cannot be said of Democrat Kay Hagan.

I'm not sure this line of attack works in a political context - readers probably tuned right out at "laissez-faire capitalism" - or is necessarily fair - a lot more people than just Hagan helped craft and vote that bill.

Still, Hagan has been trying to hammer away at Dole's voting record. I'm wonder if along with the yipping dog commercial, we're going to see some critiques of Hagan's state Senate votes from Dole's campaign.

By the way, here's a sample of what lawmakers at the time said about their approval of the Dell deal to my colleagues:

A bundle of tax incentives crafted to draw a major computer maker to the Piedmont Triad cleared the legislature Thursday.

The measure, worth at least $242.5 million over 15 years, could result in Texas-based Dell setting up a factory in either Guilford or Forsyth counties and employing perhaps as many as 2,000 people.

"We all know Dell can go anywhere in the world," state Sen. Kay Hagan , D-Guilford, said during floor debate. "We need this company. We need these jobs."

Salaries will average $28,000 and range from $18,000 to $140,000, state officials said.

Senators approved the bill 33-15. The House passed it a few hours later 92-18.

No matter how distasteful such government-sponsored breaks for certain businesses may be, North Carolina cannot stop the practice and risk missing out on new jobs, said Sen. David Hoyle, D-Gaston.

"If we don't play, we lose," said Hoyle, co-chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. "If we don't pass the bill, the jobs will go to Tennessee or Virginia, plain and simple."

In this post from over the weekend, I talked about state Sen. Kay Hagan and her position on unions. Specifically, the Democrat who is trying to unseat Republican Elizabeth Dole told our editorial board she might favor a federal policy that would force states like North Carolina to allow public employees to collectively bargain.

Cutting to the chase, Hagan says she misspoke. But a little background: For those who might have missed it, there's audio in the original post. But this exchange between Hagan and editorial writer Doug Clark will give you a flavor of what I'm talking about:

Clark: "This is (about) collective barging for public employees. So, North Carolina law doesn't allow that. But would you support federal legislation that would mandate recognition of collective bargaining writes for state employees?

Hagan: "Not mandate it, but I would look at having the collective bargaining process available if the employees so voted on that."

Clark: "If the employees...?"

Hagan: "They would have the authority to make that decision."

Clark: "So, if the NCAE wanted collective bargaining rights, you would support that?"

Hagan: "Yes."

Clark: "Even though current state law currently prohibits that?"

Hagan: "Yes."

A spokesman for the campaign called me over the weekend to say Hagan was confused and didn't mean to say that, that in fact she would not support such a law. Because that was in direct contradiction of several direct quotes, I asked to hear from Hagan herself.

Hagan called me this morning while I was on the line with someone else, but left a voice mail. I've posted a portion of it here, so you can hear straight from here. It cuts off abruptly at the end because she launches into a phone number that probably doesn't need to be on the internets.

Click here for the audio of that.

"Once I'm elected to the U.S. Senate, I want you to know that I will never support a bill at the federal level that mandates states allow collective bargaining of state government employees. I truly believe that's a state's rights issue," Hagan said.

As the football announcers say: you make the call.

Campaigning for the national and state elections is in full swing, and you can expect the local races to heat up soon.

Today we found the Web site for this At Large Guilford County commissioner candidate, Libertarian Paul Elledge. He had a blog, but it hasn't been updated for months.

While we're at it, here's Web sites for the other At Large candidates:

Democrat John Parks
A Google search for Democrat "Paul Gibson" and Guilford County did not return any blogs or Web sites. His page on the county's Web site.

Republican Larry Proctor (who has fundraiser coming up)
Republican At Large challenger Wendell Sawyer showed up in Yes! Weekly's blog, but another google search didn't turn up any personal Web sites for the challenger.

So. We had a story in Sunday's N&R about elections in the Internet age.

Do you think it's as important on the local level as on the federal level?

I was raised in Maryland, a state south of Mason-Dixon Line that is none-the-less not quite southern, at least in the Baltimore-D.C. corridor. Sure, we have syrupy, hot summers, regional dialects and you can find a descent plate of chicken and greens around, but the state’s affluence, industry and proximity to New Jersey, Philadelphia and the like - not to mention Washington, D.C. - dilutes the states southern-ness – southernocity – whatever.

So it took me a while to learn some of the subtleties of the lingo - scratch that, I'm still learning - when I moved down here in 2000. Among the oft used phrases I ran across was "Bless your heart." As the urban dictionary points out it can be a term of sympathy. If can also mean something else entirely, akin to suggesting what one might do with one's head while taking a long walk off a short pier.

So it was a bit jarring to see the term used in Politico's piece that paints U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole as the very model of a modern southern matron. One, I haven't heard her use it all that often. And two, well, bless their hearts, from the Politico piece:

RALEIGH, N.C. — If Elizabeth Dole sometimes channels Scarlett O’Hara as she works the Tobacco Road campaign circuit, then state Sen. Kay Hagan seems to have some sort of long-distance mind-meld with Chuck Schumer.

Um, wasn't Scarlett O'Hara a selfish pragmatist willing to step on friends and family members to get what she wanted? Ah, she was well mannered about it though. Here’s a bit more:

On a warm summer evening in Raleigh, Dole floats through a crowd of corporate farmers and sausage processors, greeting them with no shortage of “Oh, bless your hearts” as fans bask in her Southern charm.

Speaking at an agribusiness forum, Dole runs through her accomplishments on immigration, tobacco and biofuels, making homespun, folksy jokes along the way.

Then Hagan steps to the mike and blasts away, sounding more like a candidate for the New York City Council than the Carolina native that she is.

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