The Cowardly Tactics of the Purely Self-Interested

Several Boone residents have contacted us about an anonymous mailing they're received spreading fear about the steep-slope regs currently under consideration. "Your property rights are at risk," it says.

We received this same "pre-sorted" and bar-coded mailing today, so we're assuming it's gone to every property owner in town ... an expensive undertaking. The return address says the sender is something called "Committee for Responsible Environmental Regulation" and lists a P.O. Box in Boone. The two sheets inside contain no names of actual people who make up this "Committee" ... with the highly theatrical (and we suspect, misleading) name.

So we'll just have to stake out P O Box 2630 and see who picks up the mail. We can guess ... but we have a reasonable need to know just who's stirring this up, since we've been targeted by this particular "educational" campaign.

Bottomline: It's just plain cowardly to put this kind of stuff out without putting your name on it. If you feel so strongly, looks like you could also be honest about it. So until the "committee" identifies itself, and despite however sensible and "responsibly environmental" its message is, I find this mailing wholly unreadable and approximately tantamount to night-riders burning crosses.

UPDATE: A simple Google search indicates that P O Box 2630 is an address for Templeton Tours.

FURTHER UPDATE: The N.C. Secretary of State's corporate registry says that the "agent" for Templeton Tours is Maurice Templeton.

Dixie Chicks -- You Go, Girls!

Now that Donald Rumsfeld has declared that criticism of El Presidente amounts to "appeasing" Islamo-fascists, we shouldn't be surprised to see a few public stonings of war dissenters. It'll serve 'em right.

The Dixie Chicks have been through their own hailstorm ever since lead singer Natalie Maines criticized George W. Bush on the eve of the Iraq war. Country music radio stopped playing their songs. They got death threats. The bullies of Nashville and Washington intended to run them out of town.

Now the Country Music Association awards nominations have been announced, and the Dixie Chicks haven't been nominated for their new album, "Taking the Long Way." They got a big ole snub.

Maybe because the new album contains an in-your-face answer to the nastiness of the last three years: "Not Ready to Make Nice"

I'm not ready to make nice
I'm not ready to back down
I'm still mad as hell
And I don't have time
To go round and round and round

The Dixie Chicks' current tour, which was to include an appearance in Greensboro on October 22nd, has been re-routed out of some "red" states (including the Greensboro gig), according to this morning's NPR piece on the group.

Those who support this president and his dandy little war want to see the Dixie Chicks fail ... and worse. Crucifixion, anyone? But the defiance in the song quoted above is far more all-American, far more in keeping with the promise of freedom, than Mr. Rumsfeld's suggestion that we're traitors if we criticize.

Desperation at the RNCC

Someone forwarded to me an e-mail that went out to the wide world from the Republican National Congressional Committee. Of course, fundraising appeals have always tried to push emotional buttons, but this one, rather than the standard gay-liberal-socialist-Democrats-want-to-sell-America-out-to-terrorists pitch, we get this:

Republican Congressional candidates are facing a desperate situation nationwide. Our candidates in targeted districts are in very serious danger of losing on Election Day. And if we lose those swing districts, the Democrats will undoubtedly win the majority on November 7th.

That's sort of ... how you say? ... straight-forward.

The author of this e-mail, NRCC Executive Director Sally Vastola, waxes confessional: "I have not personally seen a more grave and dire situation for Republicans."

Yeah, that'll shake the money tree.

Inquiring Minds Want to Know

Candidate financial reports make puzzling reading sometimes.

Take N.C. Senate candidate David Blust's 2nd quarter 2006 report, fer instance.

Scroll down to Expenditures ... lingering, if you will, on the names of those who gave him big bucks back during the primary ... but scroll down.

On May 5th, 2006, Blust paid his own company, Blust Properties, $3,541.23 for "advertising." Then on May 31st, he paid Blust Properties another $3,500.00, again for "advertising."

Year-to-date paid to Blust Properties ... $7,164.23.

That's about a third of all his campaign expenditures listed year-to-date, $22,630 ... paid to his own company. For "advertising."

Hmmm.

Consumer Confidence Drops Sharply in August

Thanks to Stumpy for this link to the Dow Jones Market Watch, a site I don't often cruise, and to the story that consumer confidence has fallen in August to the lowest level since last November, when the nation was still recovering from Katrina.

"...consumers are growing increasingly pessimistic about the short-term outlook."

Karl Rove's life just got a little more miserable.

Sharpe Upsets Foxx (In More Ways Than One)

We like seeing this talk about a political earthquake this year that would take out The Madam and put a good man in her seat, Roger Sharpe.

After his speech Saturday night in Boone to several hundred Watauga County Democrats, old party veterans were looking at each other and saying, "It could by Gawd happen!"

What a speech it was!

Meanwhile, Madam Foxx is doing her part to make herself unappetizing even to the Republican faithful. Her recent meeting with the Republican members of the Blowing Rock City Council over the Forest Service's plan to clear-cut the land directly below the town "did not go well," according to a participant.

True to her native arrogance, Foxx cussed the Blowing Rockers for putting pressure on her about the timber harvest. Apparently, if you don't have an opinion perfectly in synch with the congresswoman's, and if you dare to contact her with that opinion, well, get ready for a tongue-lashing.

One Republican in that meeting later said, "That's the last time I'll ever vote for that woman."

Arrogance like Foxx's eventually catches up with a person.

ADDENDUM
Virginia Got-Rich-On-The-Backs-of-Immigrant-Labor Foxx DID have the arrogance, incidentally, to show up at the "field hearing" in Gastonia on Friday. No self-serving and highly hypocritical quotes from her that we've found yet.

FURTHER ADDENDUM:
Foxx released a statement about how "out of touch" Roger Sharpe is on her hot-button issue of border security.

WHAT SHE SAID
It is important to point out that I sympathize with those who desperately wish to live the American dream here, on American soil. I understand their desire for liberty, free markets, property rights and guaranteed freedoms.

WHAT SHE MEANT
I'm so sympathetic ... I give some of them the freedom to wash my clothes, scrub my floors, and hoist plants in my nursery. God, I love the free market!

If Our Eyes Don't Deceive Us...

...in a new Wall Street Journal "Battleground States Poll," James Webb is leading George Macaca Allen by 1.3 percentage points.

That's within the "margin of error," but it may also be a bellwether.

We can hope, can't we?

Foxx Lowers Profile on Immigrants, Is Weak on Logging

According to the N&O today, Madam Virginia Foxx isn't listed as planning to attend the "field hearing" in Gastonia today about illegal immigration. Earlier in the week, the W-S Journal said she'd be there. Hmmmm. Hypocrisy catching up with her? (Her employment of Mexicans detailed here and here.)

The Charlotte Observer buried a little item, too, that says the Madam hasn't signed on yet to a plan to keep several thousand acres of the Pisgah National Forest "scenic" and logging free. Wait'll those rich Republicans in Blowing Rock find out that Foxx won't support them in their opposition to the clear-cut in The Globe.

Here's the Observer piece, in its entirety:

Local members of Congress haven't embraced a proposal to designate a logging-free "scenic area" of 30,000 to 40,000 acres in Pisgah National Forest, where the U.S. Forest Service plans to cut timber. The Forest Service plan to log 231 acres stirred an uproar in the mountain resort town. Property owners fear the logging will ruin views from Blowing Rock and the Blue Ridge Parkway. Opponents crafted proposed legislation that would ban logging in the area. But neither U.S. Reps. Patrick McHenry nor Virginia Foxx, the Republicans who represent the area, have voiced support for it.

McHenry of Cherryville is studying the Forest Service project, said spokesman Aaron Latham. "He believes proposals involving land management should be based on preserving scenic beauty while ensuring environmental and economic health in the area," Latham said.

Foxx of Banner Elk hosted a meeting with the Forest Service and Blowing Rock's town council on Wednesday, said press secretary Michael Frohlich. He called legislation premature as the two sides continue to talk.

What does that sound like to you? Wonder if some Foxx & McHenry high rollers -- that it, big-dollar contributors -- might not be calling in chits to make sure that the sell-off of public assets (as in TIMBER) to private parties goes forward. Oh, Virginia Foxx LOVES privatization.

Saints Alive! Or Not

Trouble at the Christian Coalition.