Same ole same ole in Raleigh? An editorial comment on Republican redistricting | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This article originally appeared in the Beaufort Observer.

    Sometimes we agree with the WDN's editorial position and sometimes we don't. Either way we don't hesitate to say so. We think competition in ideas is just as good as competition in other areas.

    We agree with the WDN's recent observation that "Something's rotten" when it talked about the new redistricting debacle just imposed by a few Republicans in Raleigh on Beaufort County. Yep, we chose those words carefully. It was a debacle and it was imposed on Eastern North Carolina and it came, from what we know, from just a few in a backroom deal.

    The change was to split Beaufort County down the middle. That was done in order to accommodate the desires of Washington County Democrat Representative Tim Spear to have a more friendly district in which to run. Spear voted with the Republicans in several gubernatorial veto overrides and while he vehemently denies a deal, we think you've got to be pretty naïve not to see what was going on. There is no logical explanation for the revisions otherwise. It was pure "politics as usual in Raleigh."
NC General Assembly, May 25, 2011.     photo by Stan Deatherage
    How do we know? We know that Buzz Cayton of the Beaufort Patriot Tea Party tried to contact legislative leaders before the vote and all were "unavailable" until it was a "done deal." Cayton explained this in an open meeting of the Tea Party Thursday night. And GOP Chairman Greg Dority has all along opposed splitting the county. Dority says he was not consulted before the change was made.

    But most importantly, the change was made even though Rep. Bill Cook opposed it. That about says it all. There was no "Downeast" involvement in the decision.

    Cook has been a faithful freshman in the House. He worked hard to get elected and he has worked hard during the session, according to all reports we have heard. But he is one of those rare legislators who votes his principles and lets the chips fall where they may. He had a chance early on to craft a district that would have virtually ensured his re-election but he chose not to do so because he heard from his constituents that they did not want a split county.

    We suspect the problem Cook ran into was that he was too principled, if there can be such a thing. The GOP bosses knew he would vote his conscience and they know what his conscience dictates to him. So they did not have to worry about his vote. But Spear was the opposite. They not only had to worry about how he would vote, they did what they felt would ensure that he would vote with them in setting up a Devil's Dilemma of "vote with us or suffer in redistricting."

    Spear says he did not talk to the GOP bosses. Give us a break, Mr. Spear. We've got sense enough to know that you did not have to leave that cover. Spear voted as a staunch Democrat most of the session and then voted with the Republicans at crunch time and ended up with a plum. It's just that simple.

    We think Spear should have voted to override the vetoes. But we think he should have also voted and worked for other conservative causes, such as the elimination of the Racial Justice Act. In the end he voted to support ObamaCare (HB2). But he will likely say he "voted for HB2 before he voted against it". And he did. But in that one bill it appears that he was waffling on principle. He ended up voting against HB36 which requires government contractors to use e-verify to prevent hiring illegals. He voted against term limits for the Speaker and Pro Tem. He voted against HB 111 which would have made it easier for holders of concealed carry permits to eat in a restaurant. That is, he voted against it before he voted for it. (More wheeling and dealing?)

    He was only one of 15 who voted no on HB 300, which would simply have provided that the order in which candidates' names appear on the ballot be rotated to provide some fairness. That bill, incidentally, was co-sponsored by Rep. Cook. Likewise, he voted against the voter photo ID bill, which was also co-sponsored by Rep. Cook.

    You can click here to review his 2011 voting record. You will note numerous instances of his voting both for and against different versions of the same bill. While that is legitimate in some instances, it is also an indication of legislators who "wheel and deal" on their votes.

    And much of this backroom dealing can be seen in Spear's action on getting a domestic violence shelter restored to Beaufort County (which also served Washington and Hyde counties). Bill Cook introduced HB 757 which would have curtailed the backroom deals that go on in how domestic-violence funds are distributed by the state and would have given Beaufort and other counties a chance to restart a shelter for victims of domestic violence. Spear refused to help Cook get the bill out of committee. So now Beaufort still does not have a shelter and Washington County victims have to go to Pitt or Dare counties for shelter, which many of them cannot do.

    So what we have is one representative who gets the shaft for sticking to principles and the other gets the spoils from backroom dealing.

    And we think that is exactly what is wrong with Raleigh. It does not matter whether Republican or Democrat. These politicians who vote one way one day and another the next and who "play the game" to get special favors for themselves and special-interest groups is why so many people are fed up with government today.

    We'll have more to say about all this as time goes by, but we want to agree with the WDN that "something's rotten" in Raleigh. And we believe we need more people of principles like Bill Cook who will stand up for what they believe is right rather than making backroom deals.