Carolina Politics Online

The State is reporting today that both Senators Graham (R) and DeMint (R) have changed their opposition to offshore drilling as has Congressman Joe Wilson (R) of the Second Congressional District. They are three more of a growing list of politicians now supporting our nation’s ability to drill offshore in the wake of out of control gasoline prices. I just posted the other that North Carolina Senators Elizabeth Dole (R) and Richard Burr (R) and Congressman Mike McIntyre (D) have also moved in the direction of offshore drilling.

Already in North Carolina, Sen. Elizabeth Dole and Reps. Mike McIntyre and Walter Jones, both of whom represent coastal counties, have switched their positions.

All now support offshore drilling with the state’s approval. Dole and Jones are Republicans. McIntyre is a Democrat.

The News & Observer

President Bush lifted the executive order today, ironically put in place by his father, that banned drilling off the coast of much of the U.S.  While this does not clear the final path for coastal drilling, it eliminates one of the final hurdles.  The Congress still has to repeal their ban and while that has been an uphill battle for years, many representatives are changing their tune.

The quick pace of rising gas costs have made this a top issue for voters across the country.  With the exception of a few in heavily leftist areas, representatives in Congress are going to face strong resistance from their constituents if they continue to oppose efforts to open up our coastal waters.  We will undoubtedly see more members of Congress coming over to our side of the aisle on this.

But a broader pattern soon emerged when city officials asked the Marines at nearby Camp Lejeune for their experiences. In some Wilmington night clubs, they replied, military often means “no entry.”

“The golden rule seems to be not to look like a Marine if you want to gain access,” Master Gunnery Sergeant Michael P. Denman said in an email to base leaders after polling his company.

Other Marines gave similar impressions of downtown’s biggest clubs, alleging that doormen enforce rules with them while others slide by.

“The end result is Marines are denied by bouncers while civilians enter the bar right in front of them,” Lt. Jeffrey Hecker wrote.

The responses have touched a nerve with city and military leaders outraged that servicemen fighting two wars are apparently denied access to some bars that others enter with ease. This Tuesday, Saffo is attending a meeting of the Association of Bar Owners and Restaurants Downtown to discuss the issue.

Wilmington Star

There are a few different issues here.  We have men who have put their lives on the line for the rest of us serving our country being discriminated against because of their profession.  Some of the bar owners have said that when trouble breaks out in their establishment most of the time it is caused by a member of the military from the nearby Camp Lejeune or sailors docking at the port.  One bar owner claimed that the Marines are 90% of his problem.  If this is really the case, are these owner simply being watchful over their investment and can they really be blamed for it?

The bars are private property and I am very much in favor of the owners running their establishment as they see fit and allowing or turning away whoever they want.  On the other hand, I am not a big fan of discriminating against a group of people simply because other members of that group have caused problems.  You can’t paint every member of a group with one broad brush.  For argument’s sake, what if 70% of the fights were started by black patrons at the bar?  Would Jenkins be turning them away?  Not unless he wanted to go bankrupt due to lawsuits.  Furthermore, the Wilmington police have stated that Marines do not represent a disproportional part of lawless situations in the town and it is only a perception.

The initial reaction of hearing this story is wanting to jump on the bandwagon of accusing the bar owner of being unpatriotic or anti-American, but I think there are legitimate concerns presented on both sides of the issue.

A handful of protesters gathered at the New Hanover County Government Center on Monday to vent their disapproval with recent revelations about state Sen. Julia Boseman.

News broke two weeks ago that the Democrat was facing foreclosure on the $1.3 million home she once shared with her former domestic partner, Melissa Jarrell. At the same time, the publicity drew attention to the estranged couple’s nearly $5,000 back-tax bill on the home as well as a $3,813 back-tax bill on a lot in Landfall.

Then last week, Boseman’s past drug use hit the headlines. During a child-custody battle last year, she admitted to using marijuana in 2003. At the time, Boseman was a New Hanover County commissioner one year away from her election to the state Senate.

The protesters sought to connect the episodes with signs urging Boseman to “pay for taxes, not for pot.”

Wilmington Star

Boseman has just recently paid the back taxes she owes on the property. However, a state legislator should not fall into that situation in the first place. A politician who cannot manage their own finances should not have a deciding vote in Raleigh as to how the governmental body manages billions of our tax dollars.

The drug use I don’t really care about. She can be smoking a big fatty right now for all I care as long as it is not effecting her ability to do her job. There is an issue though that has surfaced today regarding Boseman paying rent to currently reside in the home of a lobbyist. According to the story she isn’t breaking any ethics rules because she is paying the owner a market rate, but that really doesn’t matter. Lobbyist is an ugly word these days. People cringe when they hear of lobbyists and I don’t know why Boseman would want to paint a shadow over herself even darker than what she already has with everything else going on .

This seat was held by a Republican prior to Boseman winning it so she is going to have to work hard to convince voters to keep her if she wants to serve another term. A gerrymander isn’t going to help her like with many other politicians.

WRAL.com

Sen. Julia Boseman kept to legislative business Tuesday, trying her best to downplay recent revelations that she smoked marijuana the year before she was elected to the Legislature and that she had defaulted on a $1.3 million loan on her former coastal home.

The unpleasant disclosures generated compassion from Democratic colleagues in the Senate, where powerful Senate leader Marc Basnight called her an excellent lawmaker.

“Prior to her being elected, obviously, she made mistakes. She admitted to those mistakes, and she’s deeply sorry for what happened in her past,” said Basnight, D-Dare. “In life, if we punish those who make mistakes, then no one would be elected.”

Senate Minority Leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, however, said he was concerned – particularly about the unpaid taxes.

“The people in New Hanover County will have to make the decision, whether (her problems have) something to do with her ability to perform her duties as an elected member of the North Carolina Senate,” Berger said.

Basnight says “In life, if we punish those who make mistakes, then no one would be elected.” You know how stupid and arrogant that sounds? So what is Basnight hiding in his past? It seems that when Democrats are breaking laws or committing immoral acts it is ok. And Senator Marc Basnight has deemed it in his best interest to protect the entrenched corruption and dishonesty in the North Carolina Democratic party.

John William Ingram V has been named the new sheriff of Brunswick County to replace Ronald Hewett, who resigned after he was suspended and charged with embezzlement and obstructing justice.

The Wilmington Star-News reported that Ingram was selected Saturday in a secret ballot by the county Democratic Party to serve the rest of Hewett’s term that ends in 2010.

The Fayetteville Observer

McAllister, a nine-term House member, had come under scrutiny last year when the State Board of Elections ordered her to pay a penalty of nearly $17,000 for improper financial transactions related to her campaign funds.

In unofficial results with all precincts reporting, McAllister had 49 percent of the vote, compared with 51 percent for challenger Elmer Floyd, a local civil rights leader. Floyd faces no opposition in the general election.

The News & Observer

This was a good result. McAllister needed to go. She’s had too many shady dealings and frankly, I don’t think she’s all with it.

Boylan, who a month ago was charged with driving while impaired, won his seat in 2006 after he benefited from animosity surrounding a power-sharing between his predecessor and House Democrats. These days, the widespread enmity between GOP moderates and conservatives has dwindled compared with the 2004 and 2006 House Republican primaries.

Undoubtedly the DWI damned his reelection.

Convicted felon and former Rep. Thomas Wright, a Democrat from Wilmington who was expelled from the legislature earlier this year, lost to the former Wilmington City Council member appointed by Gov. Mike Easley to serve out his term. Sandra Spaulding Hughes had 74 percent of the vote with 81 precincts reporting, to 10 percent for Wright, who is serving time for his April conviction for fraud.

Hopefully now Wright will sit back in jail and leave us all in peace. I would say that he should have not tried to run for his seat again and go out with some dignity, but the man never had any to begin with.

A Wilmington high school student is on court-ordered probation after admitting she baked marijuana into cookies that were given to a teacher.

The Star-News of Wilmington reported Friday that 17-year-old Elizabeth Ann Coleman was given two years supervised probation and ordered to perform 96 hours of community service. She also must write an apology letter to the Spanish teacher.

WBT

Wow, this kid got off easy.  You know what though?  She will be a story for her classmates to tell their friends and others down the road for the rest of their lives.  Nobody in Elizabeth Coleman’s class will ever forget who she was.   She’ll become a high school legend.  Two years of probation is almost kind of worth a little immortality.

Raleigh | Just last month, Thomas Wright was the eight-term representative of N.C. House District 18. On Monday, he was a convicted felon, sentenced to six to eight years in prison.

Wake County Superior Court Judge Henry Hight handed down Wright’s sentence a couple of hours after jurors found him guilty on three of the four felony fraud charges he faced.

The jury convicted him of obtaining property by false pretenses by defrauding a bank to lend him $150,000.

The Wilmington Star

And so the sorry saga ends.  It would seem that justice has prevailed.  Wright’s lawyer is still making a fool out of himself, but I wouldn’t expect anything less.

Prosecutors brought fraud charges against former Rep. Thomas Wright without any legitimate evidence to prove their case, his attorney said today, comparing his client’s case to the biblical fight between David and Goliath. “Sometimes, David wins,” attorney Douglas Harris said during his closing arguments at Wright’s criminal trial.

The Wilmington Democrat is charged with pocketing $8,900 in donations to his Community’s Health Foundation and fraudulently obtaining a $150,000 loan to buy a building for a museum to commemorate Wilmington’s 1898 race riots. He could be sentenced to nearly 10 years in prison if convicted on four felony counts of fraud.

Winston-Salem Journal

No, no evidence whatsoever. That is exactly why the State House voted almost unanimously, with only four dissenters, for the first time in over 120 years to expel a state legislator from the General Assembly. Harris is attempting to try Wright in the media, but he is only succeeding in making himself out to be a fool.  What the man ought to be doing is making arrangements for additional accommodations in Jim Black’s jail cell.

Burgaw | Sandra Spaulding Hughes is going to the General Assembly.

The former Wilmington councilwoman was named Thursday night as the new representative of District 18, filling the void created by Thomas Wright’s historic expulsion last month. Wright was kicked out of the House for allegedly bilking businesses and donors out of nearly $350,000.

“I am elated,” Hughes said. “The community is now going to say we have someone in the position.”

Wilmington Star

Former Rep. Thomas Wright denied Thursday he committed fraud by persuading a state official to write a letter about a nonexistent state grant and insisted he didn’t use the letter to take out a $150,000 loan.

Taking the stand in his own defense, Wright also said he had little to do with setting up the financing that led to the 2002 purchase of a building that he hoped would be used to house health care offices and a museum commemorating the 1898 Wilmington race riots.

The financing “had already been arranged by someone else working on this thing,” said Wright, making his first extended comments on the events that have caused him legal problems for more than a year.

The Wilmington Star

Bolivia | Just a few days after Brunswick County Sheriff Ronald Hewett was suspended from office, a local grand jury indicted him Monday morning on three counts of embezzlement by a public official and one count of obstruction of justice.

At a hearing soon after the indictments were handed up, Hewett appeared in front of Senior Resident Superior Court Judge Ola Lewis, who set his bond at $25,000 on the four felonies. If convicted, he could face up to two and a half years in prison on the obstruction charge and nearly five years on each embezzlement charge.

Wilmington Star

Trackback: Brunswick County Sheriff Suspended

Jacksonville City Councilman Jerome Willingham was in the Onslow County Jail late Friday night, accused of failure to pay child support.

Willingham, 52, of Kerr Street, was found in civil contempt and must remain in jail until he pays $4,723 to the court, according to an order signed by Onslow County Superior Court Judge Thomas G. Foster Jr.

Jacksonville Daily News

The petition seeks Hewett’s suspension on the grounds of willful or habitual neglect or refusal to perform duties of his office, willful misconduct or maladministration in office, extortion, intoxication or upon conviction of being intoxicated, Gore said.

Among the allegations in the petition is that Hewett has been intoxicated at crime scenes; intimidated his employees; required employees to perform campaign duties, such as painting campaign signs, while working on county time and while off duty; and ordered employees to work at his residence.

Recordings and photos from more than 20 former or current sheriff’s office employees support the affidavits in the petition.

The News & Observer

Now there’s a sheriff to be proud of.  This guy sounds like a regular Vic Mackey.

Thomas Wright is wasting no time to trying to get back his seat in the General Assembly.

The former New Hanover County legislator was booted Thursday from the N.C. House. Today, his attorney was at Wake County Superior Court, filing paperwork seeking to overturn the overwhelming vote.

Wilmington Star

You must admire the man’s spirit, but only for a few seconds at which point you remind yourself as to what a lousy sack of monkey crap he is.  Even if Wright truly believes he has done nothing wrong, which he knows damn well he’s guilty, but even if he legitimately believed he has been wrongly accused, why on Earth would he want to go back to Raleigh.  He is finished, washed up, kaput.  Nobody is going to give him the time of day.  He’d be ostracized from the time he’d return.  He wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything in the House because nobody would ally themselves with him.  Wright can no longer adequately represent his district.  He is tainted.  For once in your life, Mr. Wright, do the right thing.  Move on.

It’s official! He’s outta there!

Thomas Wright has been expelled from the N.C. General Assembly for what legislators called a pattern of improper and unethical conduct.

By a vote of 109 to 5, House members today resolved to remove Wright amid allegations that he defrauded political donors and businesses of nearly $340,000. The General Assembly last expelled a sitting legislator in 1880.

Immediately after the vote, Wright was ordered escorted from the floor.

Even after the expulsion, Wright remained defiant, telling reporters he remains the elected representative of District 18, even though the resolution approved today declared that seat vacant. Wright said that he would let voters decide his fate in May.

The Wilmington Star

Wright is still on the ballot for the May Primary so technically he could still be voted back in office if his constituents are truly that stupid and I’ve learned never to underestimate the stupidity of the voting populace.

The House clearly made the correct decision on this and it’s another step forward for weeding out the corruption in Raleigh, but apparently four members of the House aside from Wright himself felt that embezzling a few hundred thousand in tax dollars was no big deal. The four “No” votes on expulsion were:

• Earl Jones (D-Guilford)
• Mary McAllister (D-Cumberland)
• Earline Parmon (D-Forsyth)
• Larry Womble (D-Forsyth)

Why am I not surprised to see McAllister on that list?

Gov. Mike Easley on Tuesday called a special session to consider removing Wright from office for ethical misconduct. The session will be held at 10 a.m. March 20, as House Speaker Joe Hackney requested earlier.

Last week a six-member committee of Wright’s fellow legislators unanimously recommended his expulsion after finding “clear and convincing” evidence that the Wilmington Democrat had acted fraudulently and unethically.

If expelled, Wright would become the first sitting lawmaker thrown out of the General Assembly since 1880.

The Wilmington Star

I can’t think of anyone better than Thomas Wright to be the first expelled legislator in 128 years.

Push him out!  Shove him out! Waaaaaaaaaaaayyyyy out!

Push him out!  Shove him out! Waaaaaaaaaaaayyyyy out!

State Rep. Thomas Wright acted unethically in pocketing money meant for charity and mishandling campaign contributions and should be kicked out of the legislature, six of his fellow lawmakers concluded Thursday.

The disciplinary recommendation by the special House ethics committee will now be considered by the whole chamber. But it was unclear when – or if – House Speaker Joe Hackney would ask Gov. Mike Easley to call the General Assembly back to Raleigh for a special session.

The Wilmington Star

It looks like Wright’s future in the General Assembly is short lived.  Jim Black had better start making some room in his jail cell.  He’s going to have a new roommate shortly.

Raleigh - The deputy director of the state Board of Elections testified Wednesday that state Rep. Thomas Wright failed to disclose the existence of hundreds of campaign contributions, adding up to nearly $185,000, and four bank accounts where the funds were deposited.

Kim Westbrook Strach told members of the special House ethics committee that the Wilmington Democrat also filed numerous incomplete or incorrect campaign-finance forms, disclosed some contributions months late, and didn’t disclose $8,900 in charitable contributions to a foundation he set up.

“Never in my time at the Board of Elections have I audited a committee that had this amount of nondisclosure,” she said.

The Wilmington Star

That’s because Wright is one corrupt SOB.  Not that the man has any honor or integrity to begin with, but he illustrated precisely how slimy he is when he had his lawyer play the race card earlier this week.