The Fate of Mac Butner

Josh Howard

The notoriously racist and otherwise just generally bigoted chair of the Rowan County Board of Elections will have his hearing before the State Board of Elections (SBOE) in about 30 minutes from now.

Wish we could be there to watch SBOE Chair Josh Howard -- he who found nothing either surprising or offensive in the revelation that Watauga County Commission attorney Stacey "Four" Eggers was actually running the Watauga County Board of Elections, despite Howard's previous observation that putting Four on the board would constitute a conflict of interest.

Howard also continues to rubber-stamp the public actions of Watauga BOE Republicans Bill Aceto and Luke Eggers, despite a judge's ruling that those actions are unconstitutional infringements on the rights of young voters.

Mr. Howard should find it fairly easy to relieve Mac Butner of his position this morning, but you never know how far Mr. Howard will go to justify the behavior of any Republican on any county BOE.

UPDATE
The SBOE just removed Mac Butner from his position on the Rowan County Board of Elections by a 2-3 vote, Chairman Josh Howard voting with the two Democrats to remove him.

Howard is quoted as saying, "I'm not leaving someone who says these things on a County Board of Elections - not on my watch."

Interesting. He's certainly allowed plenty of shit to remain in place RE Watauga County.

Rhonda Amoroso

FOOTNOTE
As remarkable as Josh Howard's siding with the Democrats today is the vote by Rhonda K. Amoroso and newly appointed member James Baker, both Republicans, to retain Mac Butner as chair of the Rowan County board.

They are purely partisan protectors of any status quo that any county Republican Party in North Carolina decides to install in the local "fair elections" office.

O Goody! When NC Establishes a State Religion, Can I Be High Priest?

We would have suspected an April Fool's joke, but House Joint Resolution 494 was filed on April 2, so we guess The Honorables are as serious as a heart attack:

The North Carolina General Assembly does not recognize federal court rulings which prohibit and otherwise regulate the State of North Carolina, its public schools, or any political subdivisions of the State from making laws respecting an establishment of religion.

And guess who's a co-sponsor of this appalling piece of sapience, which seeks to overturn the Bill of Rights and a couple of hundred years of judicial wisdom about forcing their goddamn religion on other folks....

Yep. Jonathan Jordan.

Along with Carl Ford and Harry Warren of Rowan County, chief sponsors (and you can read the background on how Rowan County is this unbelieveably beleaguered Christian bunker holding out for Christ against improbable odds), and Justin Burr, Jeff Collins, Debra Conrad, Bert Jones, Allen McNeill, Larry Pittman (who wants to execute abortion doctors), Michele Presnell, Edgar Starnes (who also thinks that voting on Sundays is of the devil), and Chris Whtmire.

Maybe some of these are actually good people and wouldn't kick a dog. I don't know. But they're trying to do bad things to this state (not to mention to our founding principles and documents).

"Unnecessary, Bureaucratic and Costly": Rowan Co. Citizens Push Back on Voter Photo ID

Rowan County Republican commissioners approved a resolution on Nov. 21, asking the state legislature to pass a "local bill" to require that all voters in the county present government-issued photo ID before they vote.

A Salisbury resident asked the State Board of Elections how many voters in Rowan do not currently have government-issued photo IDs, including NC driver's licenses. Almost 6,000 was the answer ... almost 6,000 active, registered voters. Mainly elderly, mainly female, and -- natch! -- mainly African-American. An African-American voter in Rowan County is twice as likely as a white voter to not have voter ID.

Which is, of course, the point of the law, the target of the law, the ulterior motive of Republicans everywhere who are pushing this diminution of democracy.

People in Rowan County came out to their County Commission meeting Tuesday night to complain about the colossal waste of commissioner time on this resolution and the naked racial politics behind it. “When you look at it on a local level, is this something we can justify — that we can say that we need?” one Salisbury resident asked. “This just seems like it’s following the leader of the national agenda, and the national agenda seems like it doesn’t want people to vote.”

The Board of Aldermen of the Rowan County town of East Spencer also passed a resolution Tuesday night opposing all such suppression of voting rights: “[The] Voter ID Act provides an unnecessary, bureaucratic and costly resolution to address a problem that may only occur in one out of each one million or more votes cast,” the resolution states. “[The] Voter ID bill would cause more problems with widespread voter disenfranchisement than it could possibly solve.”

The East Spencer resolution also points out that "the law would disproportionately affect the elderly, people of color, students, low income residents and people with disabilities."

A similar resolution was effectively killed by tabling in Lenoir County (Kinston) Tuesday night, where momentary sanity broke out among the county commissioners.

Hattip: DemocracyNC

Rowan County Seized by Queer Fear

Last night the Rowan County Commission, evidently bored with county budgets and the managing of county departments, staged a circus for the benefit of bigots and voted unanimously (including the votes of two Democratic commissioners) to ask the state legislature to pursue "a constitutional amendment declaring marriage between a man and woman the only legally recognized union."

And a good ole gay-bashin' time was had by all!

Amazingly, given the atmosphere of hellfire and brimstone, an equal number of people spoke against the resolution, some quite eloquently (and futilely). One man said the civil rights of a minority should never be decided by a majority vote. (Apparently, the commissioners had never heard that novel tenet of democracy.) A retired minister called the resolution unnecessary because the state already defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman. He added that homosexuals are being vilified and discriminated against. Lina Drinkard of Salisbury said, "This is an inappropriate topic for county commissioners." She added that the board is "dividing the citizens of Rowan County. This is not good leadership." William "Bill" Stanback talked about his daughter, a lesbian who has a divinity degree and married her companion of 25 years on Valentine's Day. Stanback said he was proud of his daughter, but he was not proud of the commissioners. "This is not the thing to do," Stanback said. "We elected you to run Rowan County. This is not within your appointed duties."

Not within their appointed duties, but the Rowan Commissioners were bent on satisfying the prejudices of the loving Christians who carried signs outside the County Administrative Bldg. condemning homosexuals to everlasting damnation.

According to Matt Comer, during the public comment Garland Faw of Truth Temple Baptist Church quoted Leviticus 20:13, about the "abomination" of homosexual love, but Pastor Faw omitted the rest of the verse which called for homosexuals to be put to death. Because -- hey! -- we don't want to get caught reading all of Leviticus too literally, right, Pastor?

County government in Rowan has gone completely loony-tunes.