John Locke Foundation

Impact of Supreme Court ruling on NC's public campaign finance system

(RALEIGH) -- Could a recent ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court impact state’s public campaign finance system? Depending on who you talk to, the answer ranges from: some revisions are needed to it is the end of publicly funded campaigns as we know it.

The court struck down a provision in Arizona’s campaign finance law that can give political candidates extra money if their opponent spends a certain amount privately raised money.  North Carolina has a similar provision in its campaign finance system for judicial candidates. “It won’t make a big difference either which way on who decides to opt-in to public financing and who does not,” said Damon Circosta, executive director of the N.C. Center for Voter Education. “I’m still thinking we’re going to see robust participation from candidates from all across the political spectrum – incumbents, challengers, men, women.

UPoR Spins CMS Cynicism | The Meck Deck - John Locke Foundation ...

You can always tells when something smells so bad that the Uptown crowd notices their own stink. Out rides the UPoR with rosewater prose to declare anyone troubled by the stench “skeptics” and “critics” “suspicious” of a “difficult process.”

Bullcrap. Pete Gorman took middle school kids hostage and released them when he got what he wanted — money just like every other kidnapper. Further, private groups who took CMS at its lying, deceitful word went very far down the path to finding ways to use the Union County booster-club model. In fact, a certain big-name (and big wallet) auto dealer was lined up to help transition middle-school sports from CMS to local non-profits with substantial, six-figure support. Outside activists all but begged CMS admin to get together to crunch numbers, to no avail.

But evidently spin proof even for the UPoR, no mention of the curious demographics of not finding money for softball, baseball, soccer, and golf — then mentioning the gender-bean counting of Title IX as a reason. Really? Not some other sort of bean-counting? In CMS?

One thing for sure, the middle-school sports caper was Gorman’s walk-off home run.

One-party rule inevitably results in high-level corruption, and only after many high-profile convictions will a majority of voting eyes be opened sufficiently to result in the bums being thrown out. We have seen that at the State level: we had to endure Mike Easley, Jim Black, Meg Scott Phipps, Frank Ballance, Mike Decker, et al before the 100-year Democratic legislative reign was broken. What will it take in Mecklenburg County? We have learned that it is not enough to leak private information from personnel files of public officials to get fired. Public officials can with impunity threaten local employers when their employees have the temerity to question local leaders. School superintendents can operate a political slush fund to manipulate public opinion without fear of punishment. Underestimating costs and overestimating revenues from tax-supported public expenditures never seems to result in anyone being held accountable. We have a local newspaper that is nothing more than a propagandistic arm of the governing regime. So, absent criminal misconduct that is both investigated and prosecuted, we may be stuck with this brazen behavior for a long time.

Mr. Craighead- You must be new around here, welcome. The corruption down this way is kind of what I would call a “soft corruption”.

Locke and the Compass of Human Understanding, A Selective Commentary on the 'Essay'

Essay concerning human understanding

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Of Civil Government, The Second Treatise

An essay concerning human understanding