Elections
News and opinions related to local elections.
Tune to WCOM in at 8:30 on Election night (tomorrow) for a half hour of discussion about the 2008 primary election with me and Carrboro elected officials Mark Chilton and Dan Coleman. Listen on the radio at 103.5 FM if you are in central Carrboro, anywhere else you can catch the Internet stream at http://communityradio.coop.
I will also attempt to stream a live video of us while we're on the air. If that works, you can find the video right here on this page.
Afterward we will either hit the candidate parties (where are they?) or go home and geek out on election data.
Date:
Tuesday, May 6, 2008 - 4:30pm
I like Senator Obama just fine, but one more phone call or doorbell
ringing from his people and I'm ready to file a restraining order.
On
the other hand, I have no mail, no phone calls and no
knock-knock-knocking on my door from Senator Clinton's people. Other
than lunch in February with a strong supporter of Senator Clinton, I
have seen neither hide nor hair of the campaign.
Is this common throughout Orange County? Or is it just my neighborhood? Or demographic?
I know as a long time observer of campaign finance issues, it is rare that a major corporate political action committee gives to an incumbent’s opponent in a primary. So I noted with interest that Duke Energy’s PAC gave Senator Ellie Kinnaird’s opponent $2000 in this primary. Ellie was the only state senator to vote against Senate Bill 3 which, although sold as renewable energy bill, was hijacked by the utilities so that it shifted most of the financial risk for building new coal and nuclear plants to the ratepayers.
Ellie saw this bill clearly for what it was, spoke out strongly against it, and clearly incurred the wrath of Duke Energy. As Democracy NC found in its research, in the four years ending in 2006, Duke Energy and Progress Energy averaged investments of $10,000 per North Carolina legislator in campaign contributions and lobbying expenditures.
It doesn’t work with our good senator. She represents us instead. Let’s keep it that way.
Thanks to The Independent Weekly for their recent article uncovering who is funding some of the most contentious local campaigns.
We already knew that statewide realtors and developer interests were funding the opposition to the Land Transfer Tax, including deceptive mailings and robocalls. Now we can see just how much money they are pouring in to fight this modest proposal. Fiona Morgan reports that the realtors had raised $234,239 as of April 28th.
The committee has spent $205,115 on direct mailings, polls and ads.
With 95,805 registered voters in Orange County, that amounts to $2.14
spent per voter as of April 18, more than two weeks before the election.
- Independent Weekly: Orange: Sprawl lobby just says no to LTT, 4/30/08
For those of you haven’t voted yet, if you want to get a
look at the ballot before you head in to the polls, you can bring up an exact
copy of it here.
You need to enter your address, and affiliation, and then
you will get a PDF document of the ballot you will need to complete when you
vote.
http://www.sboe.state.nc.us/PrecinctFinder.aspx
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