the southern dem

In the week since Bob Geary of the Independent Weekly reported on a possible Grier Martin vs. Elizabeth Dole Senate race, a few bloggers have started to pick up the buzz. Notably, Senate 2008 Guru and liberal pontificator Daily Kos have weighed in on the possibility that Grier might jump in.

Senate 2008 Guru points out a few things which highlight Liddy's vulnerability:

The Onslow County Democratic Party held their annual convention on Saturday, April 14th, 2007.

Items of note:

• Mr. Billy Mills, Ms. Kever Clark, Mr. Ernest Wright, Ms. Elizabeth Koen, Mr. John Burns and myself were elected as the new leadership team.
• Ms. Jennifer Frye of Democracy N.C. was the guest speaker. She talked about the importance of getting youth involved in politics. One of the ways to do that is by funding elections with public money. If elections were conducted with equal amounts of money distributed, candidates would not need to "dial for dollars" and could engage the constituency. (For more information on Democracy NC read this post at BlueNC.)

"The White House also denied that Maliki's sudden decision had anything to do with a leaked memo that appeared in The New York Times today. The memo, by National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, raised doubts about the Iraqi leader's ability and will to stop sectarian violence."

They could be right...it might have something to do with al-Sadr making good on his threat. Maliki needs al-Sadr and if he crosses him he will be a dead man walking if he stays much longer. But the frank assessment from Hadley did not help encourage Maliki to play ball. And how about Colin Powell making his pronouncement that it is a civil war.

I give the Maliki "government" about 2-3 months...at the outside. Yesterday's mass killings in the Sadr urslum and today's reprisals, which include burning six Sunni worshippers alive while ISF forces stood by, are simply the symptoms of the underlying hatred and dysfunctional nature of this "nation". Our illustrious leader is planning to meet with Maliki next week in Jordan, not Iraq. We have 140,000 US troops in country and yet the threat is too great to meet in Baghdad. No word yet from Maliki's minions on the threat from the al-Sadr bloc's threat to leave the government if the meeting takes place. True, they hold only 30 of 275 parlimentary seats, but Maliki relies on al-Sadr's approval to remain in power as Sadr holds great sway, though not control, over the Mahdi army.

Larry Kissell is a strong progressive candidate and he is on track to take North Carolina's 8th Congressional District away from Republican Robin Hayes. Larry has tailored his issues to the voters in the district and his stance on each reflects true progressive ideals.

A couple of weeks ago I had an opportunity to meet Larry. I hadn't realized he would be at the Democratic convention in our county. I had been interested in this race from the beginning as I live on the border of his district, but not in it. I had initially thought Tim Dunn was the candidate to beat Hayes, but long before Dunn bowed out I had started to gravitate to Kissell. I wanted to meet him to see if all those qualities I felt he had - humility, integrity, compassion - were real.

Grab a cuppa and read the rest...

I'm sad to report that the unprecedented but brief outbreak of journalistic integrity in Western North Carolina is over.

Today in the Asheville Citizen-Times, Julie Ball wrote extensively about budget woes locally for the National Park Service. Apparently, (among other things) the Blue Ridge Parkway can't afford the 700,000 maps it hands out annually. Staff at the Great Smoky Mountains National Park has been cut by 13.

There are so many things wrong with the presentation of material, I literally don't know where to begin. And since I just listened repeatedly to the two audio clips they posted, I'm deeply depressed.