Posted on 04/26/2002 11:58:50 AM PDT by vannrox
Why this election will be worth watching
Staff Writer
|
|
10. We don't know when it is.
After dodging a handful of legal bullets, the N.C. primary is still scheduled for May 7. But now a pair of bazookas could delay it indefinitely.On March 27 the U.S. Supreme Court will hear Utah argue that census numbers give it the right to an additional congressional district, and that North Carolina's new 13th District really belongs in the Wasatch Mountains. On April 4 Republicans will urge the N.C. Supreme Court to delay the election by upholding a lower court ruling that new legislative districts are unconstitutional.
Don't send in those absentee ballots just yet.
9. U.S. Senate races so hot they're cool.
It's the first time in 30 years that Jesse Helms is not on the ballot in North Carolina, and the first time in 74 years that Strom Thurmond is not on a ballot of any kind.
North Carolina would have one of the nation's most watched races even if Republican Elizabeth Dole weren't running. But she is. That's why President Bush came to Charlotte last week and why pundits will keep punditizing about the race, especially if Dole ends up running against Democrat Erskine Bowles, former chief of staff to President What's-his-name.
8. Congressional races that are actually competitive.
One is in the new 13th District, which includes parts of Raleigh, Burlington and Greensboro. The district leans Democratic. It should -- it was drawn by Democratic state Sen. Brad Miller of Raleigh, who happens to be running for Congress in it. Another is in Eastern North Carolina's 1st District, where several people are trying to replace retiring 10-year incumbent Democrat Eva Clayton.The state's hottest congressional race figures to be in the 8th District, redrawn to make it harder for incumbent Republican Robin Hayes to win. The district always had stopped at the Mecklenburg County line. Now it includes 100,000 Charlotteans, which will give this race more local interest than ever.
The economy could factor into this race more than any other. A lot of the district's voters work in textile plants, or did. Hayes' tie-breaking vote to give the president new trade authority wasn't popular among critics who say it would result in more N.C. jobs going overseas.
Even with the advantages of incumbency, Hayes can't afford to be too comfortable. Before he won his first term in 1998, Democrats had represented the district for decades.
7. TV ads that could reach higher -- or lower -- standards.
North Carolina is the state where slash-and-burn politics reached an art form. Who can forget Democrat Jim Hunt's 1984 ads against Helms that featured the sounds of machine guns and pictures of dead Salvadorans? Or Helms' 1990 ad that showed a pair of white hands crumpling a job rejection letter as a narrator complains that the job went to a minority? Nobody had to remind viewers that Helms' opponent was Harvey Gantt, an African American.
Democrats have tried to draw first blood this year with an ad blasting Dole for holding a fund-raiser with then-Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay last September, less than two weeks after the World Trade Center attacks, at a time her campaign said her campaign was on hold.
Now wait for the Republican ads.
They might show Bowles morphing into Bill Clinton. Or feature the shuttered Montgomery County textile plant whose closing in May will cost 300 jobs. The plant is owned by Springs Industries, a company run by Bowles' wife, Crandall.
The Senate campaigns won't be the only ones running ads. Because Charlotte is the biggest TV market in the 8th District, and one of the biggest in South Carolina's 5th District, you'll have a steady diet of them.
6. General Assembly races that mean something.
With Democrats solidly in control of the state Senate, most of the action will be on the House side. There a switch of three seats would put Republicans back in control and take the speakership from Matthews Democrat Jim Black.That's why Black already has $460,000 in his campaign bank and Senate Democratic leader Marc Basnight has nearly $800,000.
Expect to be reminded, oh, maybe a million times, that Democrats pushed through a $1 billion tax hike last year.
5. Court races with a local angle.
Other than the Senate races, the only statewide races on the ballot are two Supreme Court contests and five races for the Court of Appeals. The latter may be interesting for Charlotteans.
At least three Mecklenburg County District Court judges -- Republicans Bill Constangy, Eric Levinson and Fritz Mercer are running for appeals court seats. Incumbent Democratic Justice Hugh Campbell Jr. also is from Charlotte.
By the way, this year, for the first time, District Court elections will be nonpartisan like Superior Court races.
4. Regional races Geraldo could love.
There are a hundred stories out there. Here's one.In the Lenoir area, District Attorney Dave Flaherty Jr. is running for re-election. A year ago he pleaded guilty to DWI. Then he was busted for violating his limited driving privileges and took three months off. Flaherty declined to say where he'd been, but acknowledged dealing with "issues of codependency and depression." Republican primary opponents are talking about "restoring confidence."
3. Mecklenburg races with plots and subplots.
Control of the board of county commissioners could come down to one race, the one for the seat held by Democrat Becky Carney.
Carney is running for the legislature against former Democratic commissioner Patsy Kinsey. And District 3 Democrat Darrel Williams is running for her seat. Though Patrick Cannon, a black Democratic member of the Charlotte City Council, was elected at-large last fall, the last time a black commissioner ran at-large he lost. That was Democrat Jim Richardson, whose loss two years ago frustrated some black voters, who blamed southeast Charlotte Democrats for turning their backs on Richardson.
Williams' at-large bid opens a seat in District 3, which runs north from uptown. Several Democrats are running. Two are worth noting. Eric Douglas, until recently head of the Black Political Caucus, has had a running feud with Republican commissioner Bill James over what James alleged were illegal campaign activities by the caucus. The other one is Gyasi Foluke.
Last year Douglas tried to kick Foluke out of the caucus after Foluke referred to white people as "crackers." Stay tuned.
The at-large race also features two of the county's first Hispanic candidates, Democrat Angeles Ortega and Republican Dan Ramirez. The race could measure the political muscle of the county's growing Latin population.
No school board member is running this year, but they might as well be. The board plans to ask voters to approve $215 million worth of school bonds. The vote will come a few weeks after thousands of parents get their first taste of school choice.
At the same time, city officials plan to ask for $40 million in bonds for affordable housing and $180 million for street improvements. Some voters won't forget the 2001 referendum on a new uptown arena. Six months after voters rejected it, the City Council voted to consider a plan that would put city money toward a new uptown arena.
If none of that interests you, there's the always-exciting race for Soil and Water Conservation District supervisor.
2. Money: Now you see it; now you don't.
Elections offer their own economic stimulus, at least if you own TV stations and newspapers. The stakes this year, as well as rising campaign costs, means money will pour freely into North Carolina.The Senate race could top $20 million. Both Helms-Gantt races cost more than $22 million, and the 1984 Helms-Hunt race was $25 million. Congressional races, which will help determine who controls the House, also will be pricey. So will legislative races.
Candidates won't be the only ones spending money. At least theirs is easy to identify. Other political money can be a shell game.
Independent groups such as labor unions, the National Rifle Association and others will get involved in N.C. campaigns. Groups that run so-called "issue ads" -- ads that can target candidates as long as they don't specifically say vote for or against somebody -- don't have to report how much they spend or where the money comes from.
The N.C. parties have a labyrinthine series of bank accounts. That makes it hard to track how soft money -- donations not subject to limits -- comes in and where it goes. In 1999-2000, about $9 million in soft money found its way to North Carolina in direct contributions from national parties to candidates and state parties. Even such reported money can be hard to track.
In 2000, for example, some N.C. legislators sent "hard" money contributions to their national party. It came back as soft money contributions to the state parties.
1. That other campaign
Democratic U.S. Sen. John Edwards already has it on his calendar. By Nov. 5, there will be only 14 months until the 2004 New Hampshire primary.
-- STAFF WRITER ERICA BESHEARS CONTRIBUTED.
-- JIM MORRILL HAS COVERED NORTH CAROLINA POLITICS SINCE 1985. REACH HIM AT (704) 358-5059; JMORRILL@CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.COM.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.