RALEIGH, N.C. – Voters in North Carolina would put Republicans in charge of the General Assembly according to results of a new poll released today by the Civitas Institute.

According to the poll of 600 likely voters, respondents were asked if the election were held today for state legislature, would they be more likely to vote for the Republican candidate or the Democratic candidate.  40.7 percent of voters preferred Republicans.  37.8 percent said Democrats.  21.5 percent were undecided.  This question is often referred to as a “generic ballot” test to gauge the overall sentiment of the voting public towards one party or another.

“For only the second time in the four and a half years that Civitas has been polling North Carolina do we see Republicans leading the generic ballot,” said Civitas Institute senior legislative analyst Chris Hayes.  “The tide is certainly with the Republicans at this moment as Democrats have averaged a five point lead on the generic ballot since we began polling.”

The only other time Republicans led on the generic ballot test in North Carolina was in Civitas’ March 2006 poll.  In what may not be a coincidence, that poll was taken right after the State Board of Elections completed hearings into the campaign finance irregularities of former Democratic House Speaker Jim Black.

This month’s poll was conducted the week before the State Board of Elections held hearings on former Democratic Governor Mike Easley’s finances.

“It appears these Democratic scandals are having some effects on who the public wants in charge of the state government,” added Hayes. “For Republicans to lead at those two points in time leads me to believe there may be some direct correlation between the events.”

Full text of question:

If the election for North Carolina state legislature were held today, for whom would you be more likely to vote – a Republican candidate or a Democratic candidate?

REPUBLICAN – 40.7%
DEMOCRATIC – 37.8%
UNDECIDED – 21.5%

This poll of 600 likely general election voters in North Carolina was conducted Oct. 20-21, 2009 by McLaughlin and Associates of Alexandria, Virginia. All interviews were conducted via telephone by professional interviewers.

The poll of 600 likely general election voters has an accuracy of +/- 4.0% at a 95% confidence interval.

WASHINGTON – Republican Party leaders are trying to avoid a public confrontation over a GOP-led effort to rename the Democratic Party the “Nationalist Socialist Democrat” party.

The Republican National Committee is slated to vote on several resolutions Wednesday. Leaders already have softened one that would have pointedly criticized Republicans who supported recent billion-dollar bailouts.

Party Chairman Michael Steele and others say the party should also drop the renaming resolution and focus on more serious problems. To avoid a party dispute over the renaming, they were trying to compromise on milder language that would simply criticize Democrats for what they call socialist tendencies.

The fight reflects a divide between Republicans who want a more centrist message and party hardliners.

When he runs for re-election next year, U.S. Sen. Richard Burr is almost sure to face a strong, well-financed Democratic opponent determined to duplicate Democrats’ success in 2008.

Burr just doesn’t know who it will be.

N.C. Attorney General Roy Cooper, the top choice of many Democratic leaders, told supporters yesterday that he will not run for Senate because he wants to remain in North Carolina. Cooper’s decision clears the path for a wide-open field of Democrats who are considering a run against Burr, a one-term senator whom many see as vulnerable.

“North Carolina is a swing state. It’s going to be competitive. You can expect millions of dollars in special-interest money to be spent,” said Paul Shumaker, a political strategist for Burr. “The Democrats did it effectively in 2008, and they’ll try to do it in 2010.”

Indeed, Democrats are feeling invigorated by last year’s success, in which Kay Hagan pulled off an upset of former Sen. Elizabeth Dole. They believe that Burr is just as vulnerable as Dole was, and they hope to unseat him with the same flood of new voters that came out in support of Barack Obama last year.

Burr’s approval rating is just 36 percent, according to a poll taken this month by Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm. That’s a dangerously low number for an incumbent, and it’s nine points lower than Dole’s approval rating at the same point in the cycle two years ago. The poll, which surveyed 755 North Carolina voters, was taken from May 8 to May 10 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.6 percent.

“I will tell you that this is a very winnable race,” Morgan Jackson, a strategist for Cooper, said yesterday after Cooper ruled himself out of the race. “It’s not all that different from two years ago.”

The election is still 20 months away, but both sides are laying the groundwork for a tough campaign. In the Dole-Hagan race, the combined spending by both candidates and outside groups was nearly $50 million.

The 2010 race is likely to be in line with that.

Burr, who is from Winston-Salem, has already started mailing cards to Republicans and unaffiliated voters, and he has set up a Web site targeting new voters. Those are clear signs that Burr wants to avoid the mistakes of the Dole campaign, which failed to attract many newly registered voters and got trounced by the Democratic Party’s early-voting drive.

“In 2008, the turnout program for Republicans was a 72-hour turnout program,” Shumaker said. He promised that the Burr campaign “will be doing a lot of things differently.”
Democrats, meanwhile, have already published a Web ad attacking Burr. Their most important task now is to find a candidate to run against him.

Cooper, a likable, politically moderate candidate with strong crime-fighting credentials, was aggressively recruited by party leaders. But he said in an e-mail to supporters that he wants to continue his public service
in North Carolina rather than move to Washington.

Another heavily recruited candidate, U.S. Congressman Heath Shuler, D-11th, also said recently that he will not run for Burr’s seat – though he may reconsider now that Cooper has dropped out.

If Cooper and Shuler both stay out of the race, a Democratic primary is likely.

The only person who has publicly expressed interest so far is Kenneth Lewis, a lawyer who lives in Chapel Hill and was a fundraiser for Obama last year.

Cal Cunningham, a former state senator from Lexington, is also seriously considering a run. He is an Army reservist who recently returned from Iraq, and he has been making the rounds at various Democratic functions across the state. He works as a lawyer in Winston-Salem for the law firm Kilpatrick Stockton.

“I’m getting a lot of encouragement,” Cunningham said yesterday.

Behind the scenes, the list of other names being floated as potential candidates is long. It includes other North Carolina congressmen, current and former state legislators, elected officials in the state’s executive branch – and even Elizabeth Edwards, the wife of former senator and presidential candidate John Edwards.

The situation is reminiscent of the prelude to the Dole race, when many high-profile Democrats, including then-Lt. Gov. Bev Perdue, were urged to run against Dole but declined.

Finally, an initially reluctant Kay Hagan, who had little statewide name recognition, was persuaded to enter the race.

She ended up beating Dole by nine points.

“The lesson from Kay Hagan is: Step up to bat,” said Gary Pearce, a veteran Democratic consultant. “Kay Hagan stepped up to what people thought was an unlikely race. And she’s a U.S. senator.”

The Breakdown: Who might run against Burr?
Attorney General Roy Cooper’s decision not to challenge U.S. Sen. Richard Burr clears the way for a long list of other Democrats who are rumored to have some interest in running. Here are 10 of the top names being mentioned:
• Cal Cunningham, former state senator. Cunningham, a captain in the Army reserves who recently returned from Iraq, is young (just 35) but politically connected. He has been increasing his visibility lately by traveling the state and speaking at Democratic functions. He lives in Lexington and works as a lawyer in Winston-Salem.
• Walter Dalton, lieutenant governor. Dalton is a moderate Democrat and a good campaigner. After serving in the N.C. Senate, he was elected last year to be lieutenant governor, a job with high visibility but little real power.
• Bob Etheridge, U.S. congressman for the 2nd District. Etheridge is a popular congressman and former state schools superintendent. But he may be unwilling to give up his influential new assignment on the House Ways and Means Committee.
• Kenneth Lewis, a lawyer and Democratic fundraiser. Lewis publicly expressed interest earlier this year in running against Burr. He has worked on previous Senate campaigns and Barack Obama’s campaign in North Carolina.
• Elaine Marshall, North Carolina’s secretary of state. Marshall ran for U.S. Senate in 2002, losing in a Democratic primary. She is popular among women voters, a group in which Burr has polled well.
• Grier Martin, state representative from Wake County. Martin was recruited in 2008 to run against Elizabeth Dole, but he declined. Like Cunningham, he is an Army reservist, and some Democrats believe his military credentials would make him a strong candidate.
• Charles Meeker, mayor of Raleigh. Meeker is said to have ambitions for higher office, and he is popular in Raleigh, the state’s second-largest city.
• Brad Miller, U.S. congressman for the 13th District. Miller, like Martin, was heavily courted in 2008 to run against Dole. Like Martin, he declined to run and may be kicking himself.
• Richard Moore, former state treasurer. Moore lost the Democratic nomination for governor last year in a tough primary against Bev Perdue. He may not want to risk another loss, but he is ambitious and charismatic.
• Heath Shuler, U.S. congressman for the 11th District. Along with Cooper, Shuler was considered a top choice among party leaders to challenge Burr, but Shuler said recently he is not planning on running. With Cooper out, Shuler could reconsider.

Highlights of the nonbinding Democratic budget blueprint for the 2010 budget year starting Oct. 1.

Spending – Calls for $3.4 trillion in new spending, including $1.2 trillion for defense and domestic programs funded through appropriations bills, and $130 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nondefense appropriations would receive a $40 billion, 8 percent boost. Benefit programs such as Medicare and Social Security, as well as interest payments on the $11.2 trillion national debt, account for most of the rest.

Health care – Permits Obama’s health care reform initiative to advance under fast-track rules that block GOP filibusters in the Senate.

Taxes – Endorses extending middle-class tax cuts passed in 2001 and 2003 under President George W. Bush. They include: a 10 percent tax bracket, lowered rates on income and investments, relief from the “marriage penalty,” education tax breaks and the child tax credit. Provides a three-year “patch” of the alternative minimum tax so more than 20 million taxpayers don’t get hit with tax increases averaging $2,000 a year. Increases the top income tax rate from 35 percent to 39.6 percent for individuals making more than $200,000 per year. Allows Obama’s $400 “Making Work Pay” tax credit for most workers to expire at the end of next year.

Deficits – Projects deficits of $1.7 trillion in 2009, $1.2 trillion in 2010, $916 billion in 2011, $620 billion in 2012, $581 billion in 2013 and $523 billion in 2014.

Debt – Estimates an increase in the national debt to $17 trillion by 2014.

The Raleigh Democrat has co-sponsored a bill that would create a one Financial Product Safety Commission instead of 10 agencies that oversee lending now, the N&O reports.

RALEIGH, N.C. — Gov. Bev Perdue will participate on a panel of governors at the U.S. House Democratic Caucus Issues Conference Friday.

New York Governor David Paterson, Ohio Governor Ted Strickland and Colorado Governor Bill Ritter are also expected to participate. Governor Perdue will urge congressional members to move quickly on a stimulus package that funds infrastructure and other economic development projects and that will put North Carolinians back to work as soon as possible.

The conference will take place in Williamsburg, Va. Friday.

From the Winston-Salem Journal
Former Gov. Robert W. “Bob” Scott, who died Friday, once joked that he “thought a megabyte was something you eat,” but he helped set the stage for 21st century education in North Carolina.

Scott, a Democrat who was governor from 1969 to 1973, was part of a well-known political family that hailed from a Haw River farm. His father, Kerr Scott, served as governor from 1949 to 1953, and also served as a U.S. senator.

Bob Scott, educated at Duke and N.C. State, was a popular governor with a self-effacing sense of humor. He and his beloved wife, Jessie Rae Scott, once hosted a black-tie ‘possum dinner at the governor’s mansion, complete with menus printed in French.

Scott laughed hard and he worked hard. He was delightfully unscripted, a trait that’s missed in today’s slick politics. He was among the last of the good ol’ boy politicians, but he was progressive in many ways. Like his father, he improved the state’s roads. The son pushed for an increase in the state’s gasoline tax to pay for expanding the state’s highway system.

He also helped push for the state’s first retail cigarette tax – to help pay for the first public kindergartens in the state. And he helped lead the consolidation of the state’s universities into one system.

But perhaps Scott’s greatest legacy is his service to the state’s community college system. As the president of the system from 1983 until 1995, he expanded it and helped build community colleges into centers for promoting literacy and economic development. He made people realize that community colleges are crucial for improving the state’s quality of life.

“Scott has always been the champion of the students who depend the most upon community colleges: working-class North Carolinians upon whose skills and training the state’s economy depends,” we said on this page 14 years ago.

Now, as factories close and farms give way to developments, community colleges are even more important. Laid-off workers depend upon them to train for higher-tech jobs, as do high-school graduates. Scott laid the groundwork for today’s strong community-college system, but did little boasting about it. As he left the presidency of the system, he joked that someone more computer-literate should lead it as the 21st century approached. “On the information highway, I’d probably get on the wrong bus,” he said.

But in many ways, Scott was on the right road, both in leading North Carolina and the community-college system. And the state is the better for his service.

ASHEVILLE, N.C. – A former Buncombe County commissioner and state treasurer candidate may have the inside track to become North Carolina’s next Democratic Party chairman.

David Young announced his bid Thursday in an e-mail. Young said he’s received the endorsements of Gov. Beverly Perdue and departing chairman Jerry Meek. The state party’s executive committee will elect Meek’s successor Jan. 31 in Raleigh.

A spokesman for Perdue didn’t immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

Young also listed county party leaders, Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton and State Treasurer Janet Cowell – who defeated Young in last May’s Democratic primary – among supporters.

Other announced candidates include vice chairwoman Dannie Montgomery, 11th Congressional District Chairman Luke Hyde and former U.S. Senate candidate Jim Neal.

North Carolina Sen. Kay Hagan supports the release of $350 billion in bailout funds, shifting her position just a few months after opposing a bailout bill that passed while she was running for Congress.
     
Read the full story