Election Day

In case you need help remembering who to vote for tomorrow:

www.folduscandidate.com.

And this guy? Would not be my choice.

Locally Speaking, The Finale

As I have bemoaned in the comments, if not in previous posts, the local media outlets don't see to be doing a bang up job of reporting and informing North Carolinians on the upcoming primary.

This morning I located the following site, www.unctv.org/election.index.html, which seems to more than make up for the other outlets shortcomings. Yeah public television! My tax dollars at work.

So go there and you can find out about everyone running in your district from the US President race down to the NC State Auditor race (really!). I will wait while you squeal with joy.

On to the race for NC Lieutenant Governor. There are eight candidates, four democrats and four republicans, so I am going to keep this relatively short and sweet. The democrats are: Dan Besse, Hampton Dellinger, Walter Dalton and Pat Smathers. The republicans are: Timothy Cook, Greg Dority, Robert Pittenger, Jim Snyder.

I have actually met Dan Besse on several occasions. He seems nice and low key, very into women's rights. He goes into a lot of detail on his Web site, so I will just cherry pick what interests me. Under education he talks about moving away from teaching for tests; he wants to develop a co-op pool for health insurance that small businesses can join; he has served in several environmental positions, such as the NC Environmental Management Commission and wants to emphasize recycling.

Hampton Dellinger seems like a snappy, young'un with lots of motivation, but I think his Web site is a bit hazy on his stands. In his issues section he highlights some specific things like raising the compulsory school age in NC or his opposition to the Navy's OLF site in the eastern part of the state, but he doesn't seem to go any further, like "this is what I think we should do for the environment." He's been Deputy Attorney General and served in the Clinton Administration. On the UNCTV site he says in his state that he supports a woman's right to choose and affirmative action.

Walter Dalton has served in the NC Senate since 1996.  His daddy was a state senator as well. Dalton's Web site says he has supported the SCHIP program in the state and also worked to get funds for the UNC Cancer Center. He authored the character education bill which when I looked that up said it was all about "instilling core, ethical values." Frankly that creeps me out a bit. But then he sponsored something called the Home Protection Pilot that lets NC workers who have lost their jobs take out no interest loans to pay their mortgages and gives them 120 days to avoid foreclosure. So that is cool. I can't find any mention of women's rights issue or anything, but he does sound decent on the environment.

The final dem is Pat Smathers. A fellow capricorn, Smathers served as Mayor of Canton and was in the National Guard for more than 25 years. On his site, he doesn't go into much detail about his plans but describes each city in the state as links in a chain and each must be strong (he's a poet!). Basically he seems to want to give some power back to the local communities to try and fix their issues because they are the ones closest to the issues not someone in Raleigh.

Whew! Now the republicans.

Timothy Cook doesn't appear to have a Web site, an article in the News & Observer says he has run twice before and lost and has held no other public office. He is an industrial chemist and says he helped create biodiesel. The article also mentions he was convicted of a misdemeanor assault charge, but as long as he stays out of trouble there is no judgement, he says he's innocent.

Next. Greg Dority, a widower with a young daughter (I am just going to get the heart string-factor out of the way first), has done security work with ABC News and after the Gulf War did security field work in the Balkans and Caucuses. He has brief snippets about illegal immigration and state spending under issues on his Web site, but nothing indepth. Not that I will be voting republican here, but that seems to me to be a problem.

Robert Pittenger is a NC State Senator. On his Web site he mentions his efforts to champion medical malpractice reform as well as his efforts to halt illegal immigration by banning contracts to companies that knowingly employ illegal aliens. Under issues, taxes he mentions getting rid of incentives to lure big companies to NC because of our favorable business tax climate rating. He introduced a bill that would limit the damages that could be put on health care providers for liability claims. He of course mentions the church he attends at the bottom of his About Robert page.

Jim Snyder has served as a NC state representative. His Web site details his issues, which include a right to bear arms paragraph and a section on the rights of the unborn. Sorry you know me, that pretty much ends it for me right there. You can read more for yourself if you like. And like all the other GOP Lt. Gov. candidates he seems to be still married to his high school sweetheart. Awww.

Dang! I am worn out now. You guys are on your own. Go look at the UNCTV site and get informed and VOTE on Tuesday. Or I will come after you!

Locally Speaking 2.0

So let's talk about the NC senate race. There are four democrats who are interested in taking on  the Joker Elizabeth Dole. 

The one you have probably heard the most about is Kay Hagan. A current state senator, Hagan shares her stances on the budget, education, energy/environment, health care, immigration, the military and national security on her Web site. A few highlights: budget-wise she talks of working toward balancing our national budget; on the environment she wants to push for water conservation to help with drought problems like NC has had; under health care, she would push for extending coverage for all children; on military issues, she is the aunt of two current military members and is for the recent GI bill.

The next candidate is John Ross Hendrix. A former Republican who apparently got fed up with the GOP and switched sides, he kind of comes off on his Web site as a crackpot. But don't just take my word for it, see for yourself—under his long list of issues on his home page he has one for conspiracy theory. He calls it the Troll Conspiracy. Methinks this isn't going to get him a lot of votes. While I think he is just kidding, what I read of his site sounds like the rantings of my dad, amusing, but not necessarily the sort of thing that gets one elected.

Next we have Duskin Lassiter. There doesn't seem to be any personal info on his Web site (listen I don't need to know what brand of toothpaste someone uses, but I like to know what they do, etc.). He does link from each issue page to a 12-page manifesto of sorts detailing all his stands and at the very end mentions he is a self-employed, working class individual (and no I didn't read the whole 12 pages).  Overall, the site itself looks a little home made, and what he lays out on it a bit simplistic. He may be a great guy, but I don't think he has a serious chance from the looks of this.

Finally we have Jim Neal. He's an MBA, money-type and if you are looking for an impressive Web site, his is it (he looks like a TV anchor). He seems to be the only real competition for Hagan. On his site he links to some articles that are very critical of Hagan and basically say she is a Republican in Democratic clothing. On his issues page he talks about his opponent but I was confused about whether he meant Dole or Hagan.  He doesn't seem to say much about the actual mechanics of what he would do on the issues, such as health care, economic security, Iraq and energy independence. He does go on quite a bit about entrepreneurship in the state though. Some of the stuff I read about him compared him to John Edwards in terms of his stance on things. Speaking of personal info, apparently he is openly gay.

Oh hell. Apparently there are two others as well, the News-Record.com didn't list them, but a link from a recent Channel 14 Carolina story mentions Hagan, Neal, Lassiter and then Howard Staley and Marcus W. Williams. Uncle, people, Uncle! Look them up yourselves if you care.

8 Days

In a mere eight days my fellow North Carolinians will head to the voting booth. My hope is that they will come out in record numbers as they recognize and celebrate the fact that they actually have the opportunity to make a difference in the presidential primary season, something our state hasn't had in a LONG time.

I had a friend email me this morning about something political and presumed I was voting for a particular candidate. I replied that I wasn't sure who I was voting for yet. Surprisingly enough (no more so than to myself) I am still very undecided about the presidential primary. There are many things about both Obama and Clinton that I like and admire; likewise there are things that give me pause.

I will say this, that whatever decision I make on May 6 it is a decision I will be keeping to myself. I have to give my husband credit for this one, I actually asked him the other day if he had made up his mind and he said he wasn't going to tell me. Now of course I have my suspicions as to who he is leaning towards and was a bit miffed that he wasn't going to tell me, but once I listened to his reasoning I got behind the whole idea. 

We used to live in a society that thought it wasn't polite to talk about your religion or politics. Obviously that has changed dramatically. While I LOVE talking about politics I can see where the idea of taking a little of that back, making it a bit more private isn't such a bad thing. 

So expect me to be sporting with pride my "I Voted" sticker next Tuesday, but just don't expect me to tell you who that vote was for (but you can guess it was for a democrat!).

Waffle House

Here I was 99.9% positive of my support for Obama and then I felt myself waffle with some information provided to me by a few of my NOW brethren (or should that be femren?) about the differences in stances between Clinton and Obama on women's issues. (See even I can occasionally have doubts when it comes to all things political.)

Apparently, Obama doesn't have a section on his Web site about women's issues and Clinton does. And then there is more stuff, which now of course I have forgotten. (Dang all those brain cells tied up with remembering that the Jason Alexander that Britney Spears married in Vegas for like 72 hours is in fact NOT the Jason Alexander that played George Costanza on Seinfeld—although really, wouldn't that have been more interesting?) Suffice it to say, my 99.9% support slipped to 99.5% and had me questioning my decision and praying, yet again, that all this would be decided before NC's primary in May and then I wouldn't have to choose. Weak of me I know.

Then another big, flakey waffle got added to the pile this morning after reading a blurb from The Economist on Obama's possible presidency and what that could bring about:

"Unlike Hillary Clinton, Mr Obama will not inspire venomous, high-spirited obstruction from the Republican congressional minority. On the contrary, an Obama victory will be cast as such a triumphant watershed moment (and quite reasonably so) that we should expect an especially drawn out and sunny honeymoon." 

Read for yourself, here.

So now I am back to being 99.7% positive I am for Obama. But the lack of 100% certainty is wearing me down. Or maybe I am just off kilter after having President's Day off yesterday.

Which brings me to another thought. I know everyone complains about holidays like Christmas and Easter and how we miss the point and commercialize them, etc. But do we hold sacred any holidays anymore? Did we ever? I mean, I don't know about you, but I didn't spend two seconds yesterday reading or learning anything about our presidents, much less celebrating them. Heck, I didn't even think about them as I went out to breakfast, watched a movie and or got a new cell phone.


(Goodbye, my beloved Sprint TP2100, if only we could spend another seven years together . . . Damn the digital, and not analog, world we live in that is tearing us apart. On the positive side, next time some bitch rear-ends me I can take a picture of her license plate as she is driving away.)

I am all about having a day off from work, but should we just be honest and say that is what it is rather than pretending we are honoring our past presidents by having a big furniture sale?