RALEIGH — North Carolina had a very busy Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2003. I can’t remember the last time that so many important pieces of political news broke at the same time. No doubt I’ll pick up some of these threads in the coming days and try to weave them into a swatch or two, but for now all that seems possible is to make a list and toss out a few quick comments.
* First, there was the John Edwards announcement. Turns out he’s running for president of the United States. The shindig down in Robbins drew more than a thousand Democratic well-wishers, including Govs. Jim Hunt and Mike Easley and would-be Senate nominees Erskine Bowles and Dan Blue. Edwards also did the morning talk-show circuit and made lots of morning news updates. Unfortunately for him, the announcement didn’t rate much of a mention by the afternoon, because:
* Retired Gen. Wesley Clark let it leak out by late morning that he would announce for president the following day. This was almost certainly an attempt to steal the spotlight from Edwards, who occupies some of the same “moderate, electable Southern Democrat” political turf for which Clark is angling. I see the hand of the former First Couple behind this. They probably stroked Clark’s apparently massive ego enough to convince him that his late entry could result in the Democratic nomination for president or vice president.
Actually, the most likely scenario is that if Clark has a political constituency, it will come from Edwards and Richard Gephardt, the two candidates who would seem to be the most salable against Bush. Splitting this vote might guarantee the nomination to Howard Dean or a damaged John Kerry. Gosh, if that results in a Bush re-election, then who would be the Democratic nominee for the open White House in 2008?
Speaking of open political contests, North Carolina now has one for Edwards’ Senate seat in 2004. So it was interesting that:
* The News & Observer ran a poll that showed both Bowles and Blue trailing Republican Rep. Richard Burr. Everyone seemed surprised by the finding, including Burr, given that Bowles just ran statewide last year. My sense is that the weak Bowles number reflects disaffected liberal Democrats telling the pollster they are undecided. There is an undercurrent of anti-establishment sentiment among Democrats, no question about it.
And speaking of that N&O poll:
* The newspaper did another of its hard-to-explain spin jobs for Gov. Easley. The poll actually found that 42 percent of North Carolinians say they will vote to re-elect him. That’s approximately the same re-elect number that President Bush has nationwide, and Democrats are increasingly gleeful about it. Indeed, the N&O‘s pollster pointed to Bush’s decline in the polls as an important trend. But then the same pollster, one Del Ali, said that Easley’s number showed that the governor’s race was “his to lose.” That sounded familiar, so I looked up the last
No, the poll clearly shows that Easley will have to work hard to win re-election. He starts only with the partisan Democratic vote, which (like the Republicans’) is in the low 40 percent range. As an incumbent, he apparently has few if any weak-Democrat or unaffiliated voters in his column. This isn’t good news for him. Usually those who aren’t motivated to support a known incumbent early on end up breaking disproportionately for a challenger, as long as the latter is credible.
On the other side of the aisle, Republicans will likely make too much of the Easley number. Political analysts used to say that a re-elect number below 50 percent was a danger sign, but they’ve backed off that assessment in recent years. It turns out that voters used to be more deferential to incumbents than they are now. The re-elect number speaks mostly to whether you have your party’s base behind you, and then whether you have anything else in your corner. For Easley, the answers to these questions are, in order, 1) kind of and 2) not really. The race is fluid and unpredictable, not at all a foregone conclusion.
Which might also be said about:
* The latest scandals to hit North Carolina politics. Longtime Davidson County Sheriff Gerald Hege has been indicted on multiple counts, as has a sitting Republican county commissioner. The situation looks ominous for both. This ought to serve as a useful reminder to partisans out there that political misjudgment and ethical squalor are present across the spectrum. Meanwhile, more revelations are keeping the East Carolina University and Frank Ballance scandals in the news.
Which helped to distract attention from the fact that:
* The North Carolina Senate is in special session this week considering a medical-malpractice bill. Tuesday afternoon, Democrats outvoted Republicans to pass a bill that would impose a version of a loser-pay rule on frivolous lawsuits (good), a regulatory cap on malpractice premiums (bad), and a new scheme to force taxpayers and medical providers to finance an insurance trust fund (very bad). The bill will have to wait until next May for the NC House to take it up, which underlines the silliness of the Senate holding a special session in the first place.
* Meanwhile, Hurricane Isabel continued to hurtle toward the North Carolina coast. Already, state politicans are making plans to respond, with Easley declaring a state of emergency late Tuesday. There is already talk about whether the state budget can handle another hit if disaster relief becomes necessary.
I hear that there was some news outside North Carolina, too. Something about the 9th Circus Court of Appeals stopping the California recount? Perhaps I just better stop now.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation and publisher of Carolina Journal.