Crack Babies?

Whatever else those 500 Republicans were doing behind closed doors in New Bern at their annual state convention this past weekend, they evidently indulged in some powerful hallucinogens. Here's just one drug-induced mis-firing of some GOP synapses (courtesy of the Charlotte Observer): "The problem we have being Republicans," said Frank Feldman, vice chair from Union County, "is we're free spirits. We don't do much in lockstep."

For example (evidently), there were dozens of homosexual couples registered at the convention (not to mention at Crate & Barrel), and the Buddhist seminar on self-effacement was standing-room only.

But nothing, evidently, could quite quell a bad case of the jitters: "The Democrats have always been better about turning out their base, so we better get serious," said former Raleigh Mayor Tom Fetzer, now a political consultant. "We don't have any help from a national ticket. It's going to be a low-interest, quiet affair, and we've got to inject some life into it."

Never has so much life needed to be injected into so many unpredictable "free spirits," eh?