Carolina Politics Online

Dr. Dan Eichenbaum won the straw poll vote at this event and with it comes the endorsement of the Asheville Tea PAC. Eichenbaum is running in the 11th Congressional District to get the Republican nomination and the opportunity to unseat Congressman Heath Shuler (D) in November.

Regarding the video, who ever edited it duplicated the first minute and forty seconds, so you can save yourself some time and just skip right to 1:40 and start listening there.

UPDATE:

Republican House Leader Paul “Skip” Stam has a message for local governments that plan to keep funding elective abortions with taxpayer dollars: a lawsuit is coming.

Stam made the pledge minutes after the Wake County Board of Commissioners voted Monday along party lines to restore the county’s policy of covering medically unnecessary abortions in health care plans. Democrats on the board managed to reinstate the coverage after Commissioner Harold Webb, at home recovering from a stroke, phoned in his vote.

“There will be [a lawsuit], but in which county it will be and what month is a tactical question for whoever the lawyer and plaintiffs will be,” Stam said.

The Wake County Republican also had strong words for the four Democrats who voted to re-fund the procedure. “They’ve taken themselves down a path to a very minority status at the request of a Planned Parenthood lawyer,” he said.

The Carolina Journal

Think the Congress is the only government entity debating taxpayer-funded abortions? Think again…

After a pointed legal and moral debate, the Wake County Board of Commissioners agreed Monday to restore insurance coverage for elective abortions for county employees.

“I don’t think that government should be telling women what to do with their bodies,” board member Stan Norwalk said.

With Democrats outvoting Republicans 4-3, members overruled county manager David Cooke. Cooke removed the coverage from the county’s self-insured plan when he learned of language in a 1981 state Supreme Court decision that could be read to forbid counties from paying for elective abortions. Rep. Paul Stam, who was the plaintiff in the case, brought it to board chairman Tony Gurley’s attention this year.

The N&O

Hmmm. So my county tax money is now going to pay for something that I think is outright murder. Nope. Not happy. Campaign activities shall commence.

Here’s a quiz for all of you who supported this move: You think women have a “constitutional right” to an abortion, right? Fine, I’ll cede that. I have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms. So if I have to pay for your abortion, why can’t I make you pay for that sweet 9mm I’ve been eyeing down at the pawn shop?

Oh, but Celtic… abortions are a vital health procedure! Guns aren’t!

Nope. These are elective abortions. Try again.

Oh, but Celtic… a woman might need an elective abortion for some legitimate reason!

Fine. I need that 9mm for a legitimate reason: defending myself and property. And for the zombie uprising.

If I have to pay for your constitutional rights, you should have to pay for mine.

Look. Take abortion out of this. The county is making me pay for someone else’s elective medical procedure. Why? I’ll pay for an employee’s emergency medical procedure; I don’t have a problem with that. But your elective procedures should be your business- be it abortion or ear piercing. This was a bad vote, and those four Democrats are going to hear about it.

Or… a bunch of Obamanicas got together to bitch about this tyrannical health care bill they’re trying to shove up our asses. Same difference.

President Barack Obama’s name and the message of “change” were the rallying call at a forum for Democratic would-be opponents against Republican Sen. Richard Burr Monday night.
That partly was because the forum was hosted by Durham for Obama, an organization counting 11,000 members that helped mobilize Bull City voters in 2008.

Another reason was that the message of “change” was still an effective invocation, generating enthusiastic applause from the 300 supporters, voters and volunteers who packed into the St. Joseph’s AME Church Monday night.

“America voted for change in 2008, and we have not seen it,” said Elaine Marshall, N.C. Secretary of State.

“We need to send a senator with the courage, intent and strength to bring change to the U.S. Senate,” said Ken Lewis, a Raleigh attorney.

The economy and health care were the hot topics Monday night. Some of the changes that the candidates proposed included creating more jobs through tax breaks for small businesses and investments in green technology, and including a public option in health care reform.

The Herald Sun

The crap going on in Washington, D.C. right now has sapped any patience I would have had for this story. At this point, I’m just going to deem that any person who even remotely supports this health-care abomination is a traitor and a wannabe despot. So there.

The first member of the North Carolina Congressional Delegation is pledging to vote “yes” on the latest version of health care reform. U.S. Rep. David Price said the bill will keep insurance companies from denying coverage because of pre-existing conditions, ban lifetime limits on care and strengthen oversight for insurance companies seeking to raise premiums.

Price also said the reforms will benefit the American people while reducing the federal deficit.

North Carolina News Network

Let it be known that Congressman David Price is now on record supporting a socialist take over of the American health care system and a culture of corruption that is ripping apart our Federal government.  He is also for raising the cost of health insurance for 85% of the country and he is a cowardly liar.

The inability to deny those with preexisting conditions and to implement lifetime limits will result in premium increases across the board for all of us.  Correct if me if I’m wrong, but this is the exact opposite result of why we were told they were engaging in health care “reform.”  Price is also a liar of the worst kind.  This bill will not reduce the Federal deficit one penny.  They make this claim because they will begin taxing for the program next year even though it won’t kick in until 2014.  That is how they achieve a deficit “reduction.” The bottom line is that the Federal government intends to spend another trillion dollars that we don’t have while we are already running annual deficits of a trillion and a half.

Today the Pelosi Congress is now considering passing this legislation with what has become known as the “Slaughter Rule.”  In essence, they will attempt to pass the Senate bill without actually voting on it.  Is this the representation that the American people voted for?  No, this isn’t representation at all.  It’s decree.  What this is is government tyranny and David Price is going right along with it.  It’s time for the American people to revolt against the oppression of the Federal government.

Richard Burr’s campaign headquarters here in the basement of a bank building may look unassuming, but it neatly illustratesthe problem for his Republican primary challengers.

Burr has space set aside for volunteers, fundraisers and strategists, all of whom are working for a candidate who has already successfully run one statewide campaign and six bids for the U.S. House before that. The campaign expects to raise $15 million by the end of the year.

Designed to fight off the Democrats’ eventual nominee, Burr’s operation is beyond anything GOP challengers Eddie Burks or Brad Jones say they have at their disposal.

“I can’t imagine it,” Burks said of Burr’s fundraising goal. “There’s just no way that I can get the kind of money he has … Everybody who’s sent me anything, I’ve known who they are.”

The News-Record

It’s a shame that running for office has become so difficult for the average American. I think one of the reasons our country is in such a mess is because most of the successful politicians don’t have to be policy experts as long as they’re fundraising experts.

“I can’t imagine it,” Burks said of Burr’s fundraising goal. “There’s just no way that I can get the kind of money he has … Everybody who’s sent me anything, I’ve known who they are.”

Burks’ campaign staff consists of a manager and a treasurer, but he has no plans to hire a fundraising consultant.

That said, Burks has already produced three television spots and hopes to have enough money to put them on in specific spots throughout the state.

Jones said he will use some radio commercials and rely on friends throughout the state to spread the word about his campaign.

“It’s just going to be a grass-roots thing,” he said.

Neither Burks nor Jones think that Burr has been conservative enough or responsive to North Carolina’s needs.

“During the years of the Bush administration, he was a rubber stamp for every spending program,” Jones said. “They tried to outspend the Democrats and he went right along with it. And now that the executive branch is no longer held by a Republican, he’s acting conservative again.”

Jones said if he were elected he would call for an audit of all federal systems “down to the broom closets” and push Congress to adopt a balanced budget. The federal government also needs to make good on promises to those who have been forced to pay into Medicare and Social Security, he said.

When asked why he was running against Burr, Burks said it wasn’t an easy decision for someone who has served one term as a small-town mayor and is in the third year of his first term on the Asheboro City Council.

“It came to me in church one evening,” said Burks, who describes himself as a born-again Christian. Feedback from other businessmen and local government officials helped push him fully into the race.

“I found a surprising number of people who are involved in politics … who knew nothing about Senator Burr,” Burks said.

He said other city officials described Burr as “inaccessible.”

Your ReTHUGlican/DemoCRAP two-party duopoly at work:

Unaffiliated legislative candidate Mark Brody is suing the state over what he calls unfair and unconstitutional ballot access laws.

After collecting the 3,000 signatures it took to appear on the 2008 ballot, Mark Brody ran as an unaffiliated candidate for North Carolina House District 103.

He earned 30 percent of the vote.

Brody assumed his high numbers at the polls would secure him an automatic place on the ballot in 2010.

He was wrong. When he went to his County Board of Elections last month to file for office, he was turned away. The board said if he wanted to get back on the ballot he had to petition all over again. He has until June to turn in the signatures.

Brody refuses to petition again. He says doing so would lend legitimacy to what he calls an unjust and incomplete election law.

The Carolina Journal

Good luck with that. The Democrats control the legislature, and they’d probably outlaw the Republicans if they could get away with it. And if the Republicans take over this year, how sympathetic will they be to Mr. Brody and those like him?

This is really one of those things where voters need to hold their elected representatives accountable. Ask your state house or state senate candidate if they will ease up on these restrictive laws. If they won’t, ask them why they have a problem with freedom and free elections?

Raleigh, NC – Wake Community PAC calls for the resignation of Wake County Commissioner Stan Norwalk for comments made concerning elective abortion insurance coverage for Wake County employees.

In an interview with David Bass of Carolina Journal, Wake County Commissioner Stan Norwalk stated:

Keeping the abortion coverage in the plan actually saves taxpayer dollars, Norwalk said, since bringing a child to term “would cost 10 times as much.”Wake Community PAC Director Joey Stansbury stated:

“Wake County Commissioner Stan Norwalk’s comments go beyond the pale of offensive. Stan Norwalk’s statements are so grossly offensive on so many levels. Mr. Norwalk’s statements lay bare the old argument of eugenicists who put a dollar value on the cost of life. Mr. Norwalk simply evaluates expectant children as an economic commodity – noting that economically it would cost taxpayers less if these children were disposed of before birth.

Mr. Norwalk’s comments are a slap in the face to single mothers and struggling families in Wake County’s socially economic disadvantaged community. He has reduced their children to a cost benefit analysis.

Stan Norwalk owes them and all of Wake County his apology. And his resignation.”

Meet Susie — the poster dog for animal rights in North Carolina.

You might remember her as the badly burned and beaten puppy found in a south Greensboro park last summer. The pit bull-shepherd mix captured the hearts of many, and they rallied to save her.

Now Susie’s supporters will gather Sunday to rally again — this time to advocate for tougher animal cruelty laws in North Carolina. They’re going door-to-door in Guilford County with information on the state’s laws, which allowed Susie’s abuser to get off with what they say is a light sentence.

Earlier this month, a judge sentenced Lashawn Whitehead to probation for felony animal cruelty, a judgment that followed the state’s structured sentencing laws. Whitehead, 21 , also received six to eight months in prison for setting personal property on fire. That personal property was Susie.

The News-Record

I’m in favor of a little “eye-for-an-eye” in cases like this. Forget the six-to-eight months in the clink; let’s pour some gasoline on this son of a bitch and light a match. Let’s see how he likes it. Maybe we’ll add a little something extra and douse the fire with vinegar instead of water.

“We want everybody to understand how minimal the penalties are for cruelty to animals,” said Roberta Wall , a Greensboro real estate agent who fostered Susie until she was placed in a permanent home with Donna Lawrence .

Under structured sentencing, the judge did not have the option to give Whitehead prison time on the cruelty charge, which is a Class I felony, the lowest level.

Under what has been dubbed “Susie’s Law,” that charge would be bumped up to a Class F felony, which allows a judge to hand out an active prison sentence.

Wilmington’s Juggling Gypsy hookah bar is the first establishment in the area fined for violating the state’s new indoor smoking ban.

The Castle Street bar received two violations from the New Hanover County Health Department carrying a total of $400 in administrative penalties, under the ban that went into effect Jan. 2.

Juggling Gypsy Manager Denny Best said the bar would appeal the fine and ask for a hearing with the health department.

If unsuccessful there, Best said this week the bar would appeal further to the court system and planned on holding a fundraiser later this month to raise money for legal fees if it gets that far.

The Star News

Gasp! Smoking? In a hookah bar?!?! Why… I’ve never heard of such a thing. Surely the benevolent busybodies of government can protect all us peons from the scourge of the dastardly people forcing customers into their bars and exposing them to second-hand smoke.
[/sarcasm]

Good luck to the Gypsy. I’ll keep my on this case and let you know how to donate to their defense fun if it gets that far.

The North Carolina we all fell in love with on The Andy Griffith Show lives on in Person and Caswell Counties.

The former district attorney for Person and Caswell counties stopped drivers by flashing a gold badge and tried to use dismissed cases to win re-election, according to a search warrant filed Tuesday.

The State Bureau of Investigation has been investigating Joel Brewer since last fall, officials said, but the reason for the probe hadn’t previously been disclosed. Brewer, who retired last month, has said he is cooperating fully with the investigation.

SBI agents searched Brewer’s office at the Person County Courthouse two weeks ago, seizing two folders containing pink copies of citations, notes, phone messages and letters, according to the search warrant. One file was for male defendants, and the other was for female defendants, the warrant states.

Two people told investigators that Brewer would keep the pink copies in his office after dismissing charges and would call the defendants up during a campaign to remind them of the cases. He wanted the defendants to vote for him and to work at the polls for him on Election Day, the people told investigators.

WRAL.com

The first shot has been fired in the battle to uphold states’ rights and the Tenth Amendment. Call or email your state legislators and tell them that we want North and South Carolina to follow suit and unite against this encroachment of the Federal government.

RICHMOND — The Virginia General Assembly has given final approval to a bill that would make it illegal for the government to require individuals to purchase health insurance, a measure intended to conflict with Democratic efforts to reform health care in Washington.

Thirty-four other states are weighing similar legislation to block the individual mandate, which is an element of bills that have passed both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. But Virginia is the first state to complete legislative action on such a bill.

Gov. Robert F. McDonnell said Wednesday that he intends to sign the legislation.

The Washington Post

Wake Superintendent Del Burns, who until Tuesday ran one of the nation’s highest-profile school systems, will serve out his tenure on administrative leave for making what board members said were “totally inappropriate” public criticisms.

Members announced after a closed meeting Tuesday night that Burns, 56, will remain available for consultation and will be paid until his previously announced resignation date of June 30.

The session was the third closed meeting that board members had held on Burns’ tenure since Feb. 16, when he abruptly announced his resignation and his intention to remain in the job until June 30. At that time, Burns said he was resigning because he could not in good conscience carry out the directives of the new school board majority.

Two days later, he gave pointed interviews objecting to the majority’s plans to make extensive changes in Wake County’s diversity-based assignment patterns and other policies including mandatory year-round schools.

The N&O

Bad-mouth your new bosses in public, go bye-bye.

Del Burns has presided over four straight years of declining graduation rates, but he is being paid more than the governor of N.C. and slightly less than the President of United States. Wake County residents can thank the old status-quo board for that genius move.

Don’t let the door hit ya where the dog should of bit ya, Del.

On Saturday, D’Annunzio got into a flap with officials at the Cumberland County Republican Convention in Fayetteville.

During a forum, candidates drew cards with random questions. When rival Lou Huddleston of Fayetteville was asked if he supports eliminating federal agencies, he replied without mentioning D’Annunzio.

When D’Annunzio tried to respond, organizers told him according to their ground rules, he couldn’t. Party chair Suzanne Rucker took his microphone. He walked off the stage.

On his blog, D’Annunzio said the forum was “put together to enable the home town candidate to attack me while not giving me any opportunity to respond with the truth.”

Charlotte Observer

If the rules were followed consistently throughout the forum then I have to call bullshit on this accusation of there being some kind of conspiracy theory in favor of Lou Huddleston, which is who D’Annunzio is referring to.  The rules are the rules.  They drew questions at random.  Nobody can control who got what question and if they weren’t allowed to opine on the questions of other candidates then that’s the way it is.  It’s not the way I would conduct a debate, but the rules should have been understood before it started.  On the other hand, if they were allowing other candidates to do follow ups and not D’Annunzio then he has a point to be upset.  All of that aside, I think he conducted himself poorly by walking off the stage and it’s more negative press that he doesn’t need.  He’s already been getting poked pretty hard by the alternative media.

Lou Huddleston, of course, is taking advantage of this and calling for D’Annunzio to drop out of the race.  That’s not necessary.  The voters are perfectly capable of making that decision on election day.

This incident is one of two obstacles to put a rut in the D’Annunzio campaign just this week.  His top political adviser Jack Hawke resigned from the campaign regarding a dispute over a blog that D’Annunzio has been writing called “Christ’s War” which according to the Charlotte Observer “combines politics with Biblical references and end-times theology.”

Hawke said he advised the candidate to take it down after a February Observer story quoted passages from it.

It disappeared from public view for a while but then reappeared. Another news story about the blog ran Thursday in Raleigh’s News & Observer.

“He took it down, told me it was down and down to stay,” said Hawke, who advised former Gov. Jim Martin and gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory. “Next I knew it was in the N&O telling me it was back up. … I don’t think any candidate should get up at 3 or 4 in the morning, sit down in front of a computer and pour your heart out. It’s just not a smart thing to do.”

Charlotte Observer

The Obama administration will accept no more public input for a federal strategy that could prohibit U.S. citizens from fishing some of the nation’s oceans, coastal areas, Great Lakes, and even inland waters.

This announcement comes at the time when the situation supposedly still is “fluid” and the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force still hasn’t issued its final report on zoning uses of these waters.

That’s a disappointment, but not really a surprise for fishing industry insiders who have negotiated for months with officials at the Council on Environmental Quality and bureaucrats on the task force. These angling advocates have come to suspect that public input into the process was a charade from the beginning.

ESPN

Of course it was a charade. Obama doesn’t give a damn about what the public thinks about anything. He’s demonstrated that pretty consistently throughout the past year.

So what is the point of this? The states have been managing the use of their waterways with little to no problem for over 200 years. Well, it turns out that this whole unconstitutional power grab is being orchestrated by the radical left environmental movement.

As ESPN previously reported, WWF, Greenpeace, Defenders of Wildlife, Pew Environment Group and others produced a document entitled “Transition Green” shortly after Obama was elected in 2008. What has happened since suggests that the task force has been in lockstep with that position paper.

Then in late summer, just after he created the task force, these groups produced “Recommendations for the Adoption and Implementation of an Oceans, Coasts, and Great Lakes National Policy.” This document makes repeated references to “overfishing,” but doesn’t once reference recreational angling, its importance, and its benefits, both to participants and the resource.

Additionally, some of these same organizations have revealed their anti-fishing bias by playing fast and loose with “facts,” in attempts to ban tackle containing lead in the United States and Canada.

That same tunnel vision, in which recreational angling and commercial fishing are indiscriminately lumped together as harmful to the resource, has persisted with the task force, despite protests by the angling industry.

As more evidence of collusion, the green groups began clamoring for an Executive Order to implement the task force’s recommendations even before the public comment period ended in February. Fishing advocates had no idea that this was coming.

The commercial and recreational fishing industries have already been taking a big hit in both North and South Carolina and the last thing we need is further encroachment by the Federal government.  The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has already exhibited plenty of incompetence in the way it enforces U.S. fisheries laws such to the effect that Congressman Walter Jones (R-NC-03) has called for a halt to all prosecutions of fishermen by the NOAA and a complete overhaul of how the laws are enforced.

Morlock fears that “what we’re seeing coming at us is an attempted dismantling of the science-based fish and wildlife model that has served us so well. There’s no basis in science for the agendas of these groups who are trying to push the public out of being able to fish and recreate.

“Conflicts (user) are overstated and problems are manufactured. It’s all just an excuse to put us off the water.”

In the wake of the task force’s framework document, the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation (CSF) and its partners in the U.S. Recreational Fishing & Boating Coalition against voiced their concerns to the administration.

“Some of the potential policy implications of this interim framework have the potential to be a real threat to recreational anglers who not only contribute billions of dollars to the economy and millions of dollars in tax revenues to support fisheries conservation, but who are also the backbone of the American fish and wildlife conservation ethic,” said CSF President Jeff Crane.

Morlock, a member of the CSF board, added, “There are over one million jobs in America supported coast to coast by recreational fishing. The task force has not included any accountability requirements in their reports for evaluating or mitigating how the new policies they are drafting will impact the fishing industry or related economies.

“Given that the scope of this process appears to include a new set of policies for all coastal and inland waters of the United States, the omission of economic considerations is inexcusable.”

This is not the only access issue threatening the public’s right to fish, but it definitely is the most serious, according to Chris Horton, national conservation director for BASS.

“With what’s being created, the same principles could apply inland as apply to the oceans,” he said. “Under the guise of ‘marine spatial planning’ entire watersheds could be shut down, even 2,000 miles up a river drainage from the ocean.

“Every angler needs to be aware because if it’s not happening in your backyard today or tomorrow, it will be eventually.

This is what happens when you put an out of touch ideologue beholden to radical special interests in the highest office in the land. The fact that Obama intends to implement this with an Executive Order completely bypassing Congress gives credence to the accusation that he is becoming an elected dictator, much like Hugo Chavez.

This won’t be used to just regulate fishing either. Rest assured that the bureaucratic entities created to manage all of this will also be used to thwart any oil or natural gas exploration off our coastal waters, thus effectively reinstating the Federal drilling ban that just expired less than two years ago.

There is already talk of a ban on bottom fishing all the way down the North and South Carolina coasts to Georgia.  Thousands of jobs in these states can potentially be effected by this at a time when they are experiencing double digit unemployment rates. That aside, there is also the element of this being yet another chipping away at the block of individual freedom and liberty that Americans have enjoyed for over two centuries and that the President and this Congress spit on daily.

If this is put into place it seems like El Presidente will get to decide when and where you go fishing. With the industry being so large I am hoping this will end up in the Supreme Court with a Constitutional challenge if Obama makes good on this move.

For Release March 8, 2010

Keadle Asks for FEC Investigation

Scott Keadle takes issue with Congressman Patrick McHenry’s abuse of the franking privilege in a recent mailer to residents of North Carolina’s 10th Congressional District.

“Mr. McHenry has spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayers’ dollars sending thinly-disguised campaign mail to voters. All of them have pretty pictures and explain what a great guy he is. All of them cost a lot of money, and add to the mountain of bills that McHenry and the Washington politicians have piled on the struggling taxpayers in this district,” said Keadle.

“This is an abuse of his office and McHenry should charge all costs to his campaign fund and not taxpayers,” said Keadle. “This is just one more example of how out of touch this Congressman is with the struggling citizens of North Carolina.”

“I’m calling for the Federal Elections Commission to investigate the printing and mailing of this slick color brochure,” added Keadle.

In anticipation of McHenry’s denial of adding to the size of government, Keadle said: “Mr. McHenry, please do not insult us further by denying that you voted for bigger government when you were in the majority under the Bush administration. In FY2006, for instance, you voted to increase taxation of North Carolina families by more than 5% of their paycheck. Saying a Republican President made you do it doesn’t make it right or ‘conservative’.”

—30—

Contact:
Garry Ballard
Keadle for Congress
press@keadle.com
704-775-8037

Surely you’ve heard of the infamous “naked body scanners” that the TSA has just been licking its chops over for years to deploy at airports across our country.  There are already a few out there actually, but they will be making a debut at 11 more airports, including Charlotte Douglas International.

The effort, being spearheaded by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano (D), is in response to the near tragedy involving the Fruit-of-Kaboom bomber on Christmas Day in Detroit.  This is despite the fact that had these scanners already been in place in Amsterdam where the would be bomber boarded the plane, they would not have detected nor prevented him from bringing his explosive syringe on with him.  In typical authoritarian form however, the Federal government never misses the opportunity to exploit a tragedy in order to push through their oppressive agenda.  Naturally, the ACLU and other privacy advocates are outraged over the deployment of these machine, as am I.

These scanners are optional (for now).  Nobody will be forced to walk through them, but if you are singled out in line to go through the scanner and you refuse, you’ll be subject to a pat down, so there is a slight intimidation factor present.

I will not at any time or any place walk through one of these machines as I am reminded by the words of Ben Franklin who reminded us in 1775 that, “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

The National Enquirer, the publication that broke the John Edwards / Rielle Hunter affair, is claiming today that a grand jury may indict the disgraced presidential candidate and former North Carolina Senator.  According to the source, Edwards has been under investigation for the misuse of campaign funds related to paying his mistress.

Edwards may get to live in two Americas after all.  The one he is in today and the one that exists behind bars.