2008 GENERAL ELECTION
NOVEMBER 4TH

(I am always asked to present how I will cast my ballot first.  Those wanting to go straight to discussion should click here)

Here's how I will cast my ballot (in ballot order--click name for discussion of candidate):

My father was a card-carrying member of the national Republican party. He sent the Republicans an occasional check, and he hand wrote letters to George W. Bush and other Party leaders when he thought they were losing their way.  He wrote a lot of those letters in his last two years of life.  That's because he believed the Republicans were pushing us down the wrong track, just like 86% of the rest of the country believes.

When my father returned home from his last hospital visit to await a preliminary visit from the local Hospice team, we sat in the den--me on the couch and him in a rolling hospital bed--and watched some of the political primary carnage.  I bitched about the race-bating and the sexism.  I moaned about the lies ("They'll say anything to win!").  I complained that the Republicans were trying to fool the American people once again with talk about gays and guns and abortion when the stakes for all us were so great this year. When Barack Obama reached out from the TV screen late one night, I watched my father's face when Obama insisted this election wasn't about the "small things."  It was about the "big things" like jobs, health care, and energy. I expected my father to complain about pie-in-the-sky liberal double-talk.

Instead, he said, "That man sees what we can become rather than what we are."

The bottom-line is we are not called to the better angels of our nature by the McCain/Palin team, a team that offers at best a continuation of the same trickle-down economics that got us into such a royal mess in the first place and a woman a heartbeat away from the Presidency who believes seeing Russia from her back door qualifies her to negotiate on our behalf with the likes of Putin.  A woman who is, quite frankly, a slap in the face to all of us who have worked so hard to advance the notion that women are just as, or even more, qualified for effective and strong national leadership in America.

Dole cites her ability to achieve funding to improve roads and water and sewer systems in both urban and rural areas and her help in getting North Carolina universities and community colleges funding for research, medical centers and job training initiatives.

Cole's campaign emphasizes ending the war in Iraq, abolishing the personal income tax, a free-market health care reform, and a "radically anti-bureaucratic response to the turmoil over illegal immigration." Cole traces the immigration problem to U.S. wage laws that restrict piece work and set minimum wages: "The government banned the low end of the labor scale but they didn't abolish the need for the work. They created a black market to fulfill a need."

Cole says that one of his major goals this election will be helping Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr and Mike Munger, the party's candidate for governor.  He adds that issues such as the Patriot Act, the war in Iraq, and out-of-control taxation drove him to get into the race.

Perdue is a former school teacher and health care professional, She grew up in the mountains of Southwest Virginia and has lived most of her adult life in New Bern.  Perdue became the first woman ever elected to the state House from her part of the state and became the first woman ever elected Lt. Governor in North Carolina.

Perdue cites among her accomplishments: helping to raise teacher salaries, increasing technology in schools and sponsoring such initiatives as Smart Start and the Safe Schools Act, creating a prescription drug benefit for low-income seniors, support for investments in North Carolina’s Biotechnology sector, helping to pass minimum wage increases, initiating the NC Green Business Fund, and support for the Clean Smokestacks Act and the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Portfolio Standards.

McCrory is from Greensboro (by way of Columbus, Ohio). He  earned a bachelor's degree in political science and education from Catawba College in Salisbury in 1978.  McCrory was a Senior Adviser with Duke Energy's Business and Economic Development Group.  He served on the Charlotte City Council from 1989 to 1995 and was elected the city's mayor in 1995 (now in his seventh term).

Cooper also recently took on Walmart.

Crumley is focused on two issues for his campaign: poor handling of the state's crime lab and the state's ever-increasing problems with illegal immigrants and gang activity. Crumley says there are backlogs in the state's court system and that the system needs to be more productive.  He also says the Attorney General's office has been slow to respond to gang problems across the state. Crumley  "compliments Cooper for his work with other state attorneys general to force social networking sites like MySpace to improve their internal controls, but then took him to task for failing to go further and persuade the General Assembly to pass the original version of Jessica's Law, which institutes stricter penalties for sex offenders."

• Lower insurance rates for anyone that takes a driver refresher or safety class every four years and maintains a safe driving record.
• More affordable business insurance for locally based and operated companies. 
• Lower insurance for the family farmer and all state teachers.
• Free drug care for the elderly.