nc-11

After a one-week "mid-season hiatus" where the boys in the editing room decided to put together a Hal Needham-style "blooper reel" rather than assemble an entire episode (the evidence of which can be seen here), WNCNN, Western North Carolina's source for God Fearin' News is back with their fourth episode!

In it, our hard-hitting news team delves into Congressman Charles Taylor's behind-the-scenes fundraising activities, and catches a true act of desperation on camera. Later on, anchor Johnny Joe Rockslide introduces a new segment called "What Does a Tourist Think?", where he solicits the opinion of Ruth Schwartz from Long Island, NY after giving her 15 minutes to do research on the Internet, and the WNCNN staff pays tribute to the embattled Congressman with a touching and heartfelt music video.

Good Lord! When it rains it pours around here!!! Two big stories we're tracking tonight:

First, I guess you can color me unsurprised... (via AC-T):

The debate is off.

In late September, U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor, R-Brevard, agreed to debate his congressional opponent on television for the first time since 1994. But this year’s Democratic challenger, Heath Shuler, said he doesn’t have time in his schedule for a televised debate, which was tentatively planned for Oct. 22.

The Asheville Citizen-Times and WLOS-News 13 had planned to co-sponsor the debate, which would have aired on the TV station. Taylor, who last debated Democratic challenger Maggie Lauterer 12 years ago, had agreed to all the format specifications and the date, but a Shuler spokesman told the Citizen-Times the challenger's schedule did not allow him the time for a debate.

AZ-08,CO-07,IA-01,IN-02,IN-08,IN-09,KY-04,NC-11,NM-01

What do they have in common? Bob Perry and a new Republican 527 called Americans for Honesty on Issues that has popped up to run negative ads against 9 Democratic House candidates.  Some of the negative ads have already run in Iowa and Colorado.

The Strategy Group received $14,136.66 from Americans for Honesty on Issues for making a "Heart in Tennessee" ad production, date of disbursement 10/05/06 and Pathfinder Marketing received $114,454.00 for the "Cable/Broadcast Media Buy" for date of disbursement 9/29/06. The candidate listed is "Joseph Heath Shuler"

Okay, I'm getting this weird deja vu feeling that I've done this before. But, maybe not. Here's my take on the recent Wall Street Journal hit-piece on Chuckie Taylor.

Wow...

Via TPM Muckraker:

Rep. Charles Taylor (R-NC) has a remarkable talent for steering federal dollars to benefit properties that he owns, The Wall Street Journal reports this morning.

As you read about the millions that Taylor has earmarked for himself ($11.4 million to widen a highway that runs through a resort town where his development companies own thousands of acres, $3.8 million for a park that is "directly in front of the Blue Ridge Savings Bank, flagship of his financial empire"), recall Taylor's dogged opposition to federal money going to a 9/11 memorial. As chairman of the House Interior Appropriations subcommittee, Taylor was for years the sole impediment to releasing the $10 million in federal funds needed to buy the land for a memorial in Shanksville, Pa., where United Airlines Flight 93 crashed.

To follow up on an earlier post about Charles Taylor's recent "friend to the Veterans" campaign ad - on Saturday night (10/7/06) a commenter @ BlueNC (take a bow, Dan Siler!) pointed something out that I found very interesting. Click on the pic below for the full-sized version:

Cross-posted from NC House Races
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This weekend, my girlfriend and I went to a wedding at beautiful Lake Lure, North Carolina. On Saturday, we took a drive from Lake Lure up to Asheville, traveling along US 74 through some truly lovely country.

Anyway, the point of this post isn’t to blather on about my weekend. What I noticed as I drove to Asheville was the amazing profusion of Heath Shuler and WNC Democrats signs along the road – and the total absence of Charles Taylor signs. Now, I’m sure that the GOP will get their sign operation up and running soon enough. But Democrats in the western part of the state are doing one hell of a great job making their support visible. [Some press on the sign campaign here and some background from Henderson County Democrats here.] And especially in the 11th District, where I saw so many Shuler signs and not a single Taylor sign.

Cross-posted from NC House Races
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As I wrote here, Charles Taylor has seen the writing on the wall and has decided to try a Hail Mary pass – he’s declared that he is ready to debate his Democratic challenger, Heath Shuler. It would mark the first time Taylor has debated an opponent since 1994.

That is, if it actually happens. The campaigns have apparently deadlocked over the date of the proposed debate – Taylor wants October 29th, Shuler wants November 1st.

So I've been sitting on this video footage from an interview that the Asheville Citizen-Times conducted with Charles Taylor earlier this year, and I've been threatening to do something with this for months. So this morning I woke up, threw on a pot of coffee, fired up the video editing software and decided to do something with this stuff.

So here it is.

Dear all - you need to click the Google video link and go give this a 5-stars. That will increase the exposure it gets. - RP

Via the Asheville USA Today Jr.:

The National Association of Manufacturers will present its Award for Manufacturing Legislative Excellence to U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor during a ceremony from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. today at the manufacturing facility of Volvo Construction Equipment on Hendersonville Road in Skyland.

The award is presented to members of Congress who vote in the best interest of the manufacturing economy at least 70 percent of the time on key votes, as determined by a committee of the association’s member companies.