Mayor Governor McCrory
Published April 24, 2014
by Chris Fitzsimon, NC Policy Watch, April 22, 2014.
Pat McCrory has been Governor of North Carolina for 15 months now but he still doesn’t seem to have a handle on the position.
He does have one part of the job down. McCrory is always headed somewhere to cut a ribbon or tour a factory or get his haircut in a small town barbershop. He looks good on the videos his office produces and in the pictures they post of him on social media.
Many of his public appearances on Monday mornings and Friday afternoons are in his hometown of Charlotte, presumably to make it easier to spend the weekend where he was mayor for 14 years and where he may still feel more comfortable than in Raleigh.
McCrory seems to relish the mayor part of being governor and he’s good at it. But there’s a lot more to the job, and McCrory has yet to rise to the occasion as recent events have made clear.
Last week McCrory’s office issued a press release outlining what was described as a comprehensive plan to deal with the coal ash crisis, the massive spill into the Dan River and the leaking ash ponds across the state.
The crisis is so far the defining issue of 2014 and of McCrory’s tenure as governor. It is not only an ecological disaster of historic proportions in North Carolina, it comes after three years of shredding of environment regulations and oversight by the Republican General Assembly, the last year with McCrory’s full cooperation.
The coal ash spill also brings back questions about McCrory’s relationship with Duke Energy, his long career as an employee there and the million dollars the company spent in their efforts to get him elected.
And the issue speaks to McCrory’s decisions about key appointments. His point person on coal ash is Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources John Skvarla, who has pledged to make the department friendlier to the businesses it regulates and who thinks there’s something to the oddball theory that somehow fossil fuels are a renewable resource.
Given that troubling backdrop, McCrory’s long awaited response to the coal ash spill should have been a major event in his still young administration. But it wasn’t.
McCrory office announced his “comprehensive plan” with a news release not with a major speech or press conference where he and Skvarla could answer questions and reassure the public. He could have had key lawmakers there to present a united front for legislation this summer to address the crisis.
But it turns out key legislators weren’t even told the announcement was coming. At least one powerful Republican Senator doesn’t think McCrory’s proposal goes far enough because it does not require Duke to move the coal ash from all the ponds to lined landfills that are far less likely to leak.
It’s not rocket science for a governor to give key House and Senate members a heads up about a major policy initiative, especially when they are in the same political party. It is governing 101. Most governors would have the lawmakers already on board, not caught by surprise by a news release.
Also last week McCrory appeared at a press conference on Tax Day held by a conservative foundation at a Raleigh hotel less than a mile from his office at the State Capitol.
McCrory’s wrong about the tax plan passed by the General Assembly last summer. Most people will not pay less.
The bottom 80 percent of taxpayers will pay more on average while the wealthy and out of state corporations will get big breaks. And the plan will cost more than $600 million a year when fully implemented, a far cry from McCrory’s commitment that the tax changes would be revenue neutral.
Putting the misleading spin aside, if McCrory wanted to talk about taxes on April 15th, why didn’t he have his own event in his own office instead of appearing at a hotel down the street at a news conference hosted by ideological groups, one of whom receives the bulk of its funding from Art Pope, McCrory’s State Budget Director. Not very gubernatorial.
It reinforces the widely held view in Raleigh that McCrory’s not really in charge, that Pope is calling most of the budget shots, and legislative leaders are running almost everything else.
Maybe that is the model McCrory is used to. He’s the mayor, cutting ribbons and making speeches but the city manager and the majority on the city council have all the power.
The North Carolina Association of Community College Trustees held their annual meeting recently that included a panel discussion previewing the summer General Assembly session.
After an hour and half of questions and predictions, one of the panelists pointed out that Governor McCrory’s name never came up.
Apparently, nobody on the panel or in the audience thought he would be much of a factor in this summer’s session— a telling commentary on the governor and his power, or lack of it, and his grasp of the job 15 months after he took the oath of office.
- See more at: http://www.ncpolicywatch.com/2014/04/22/mayor-governor-mccrory/#sthash.nKSsHtOD.dpuf
April 24, 2014 at 7:32 pm
Norm Kellly says:
So, if we believe what's in this post, then the coal ash ponds have only been in existence in our great state for the 3 years that Republicans have had partial control of Raleigh. Isn't it a requirement that we take libs at their word, they never lie and are always correct (never right!) and the word of a Republican is always to be questioned, never to be trusted, and probably influenced by big money from some low-life like the Koch brothers.
So to quote the author ' it comes after three years of shredding of environment regulations and oversight'. See, the author honestly tells us that the coal ash pond issue was created within the past 3 years, and it is fully, completely the fault of the Republicans that the spill happened. Also, this will be the defining moment for the McCrory administration.
Couple things come to mind immediately. Yup, the author is correct. Cleaning up the mess created by the libs over the past several decades could very well be the defining moment for McCrory. If Pat handles cleanup of the lib-created disaster well, it could be a tremendous feather in his cap!
If the Republicans have been in control for 3 years (but only partial control!), and they have shredded environmental regulations, then what exactly was the situation like when the demon party fully controlled Raleigh and the coal ash pond disaster was being invented? If the author wants to claim that the environmental regulations/standards have been shredded in JUST THE PAST 3 YEARS, then the opinion of the author must be extremely low of the demons who were only recently kicked out of power. The author must have written somewhere, at some point, just how much he believes the demons who may have written environmental regulations, then ignored them, resemble something as low as slug slime! Must be true. When the demons were ignoring, avoiding, environmental regulations, regardless of how tough they were, did the author chastise them? Did the author write about what a hazard the dems were creating?
And, it is just plain stupid if anyone expects that just because the libs wrote/endorsed/supported tough environmental regulations that they would deserve ANY credit at all. If they didn't enforce those regulations, if they allowed those regulations to be ignored/put aside/waived then what they say doesn't/didn't matter. When the libs created the environmental disaster that happened AFTER they were removed from office, they are STILL RESPONSIBLE for the disaster. Regardless of how tough the regulations were that they supported. They turned around and ignored the same regulations! It's time for regular folk to start thinking because it's obvious the politicians and media types are determined to pull the wool over our eyes. Listen to what we say, there's nothing going on behind that curtain.
Why does a long-term relationship between Pat and Duke cause the author concern? What was Pat's influence with Duke creating coal ash ponds near the Dan River? Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't environmental regulations the responsibility of THE STATE? If Pat had influenced the regulators at the STATE LEVEL to allow Duke to ignore the tough environmental regulations put in place by the libs in Raleigh, then there might be a there there. But if it can't be demonstrated that Pat influenced the STATE REGULATORS while he was ONLY a MAYOR, then why is this author so determined to let his lib buddies off the hook and firmly place Pat on that hook? (i know; i answered my own question. you know what they say about strange bedfellows!) Does the author have proof that Pat bought off the regulators to ignore Duke? Did Pat have so much power while ONLY A MAYOR that he could get STATE LEVEL regulators to ignore the rules written and supported by such loving, kindly, environmentally concerned libs in Raleigh? How could Pat, only A MAYOR, have so much power, influence, control in Raleigh? I sense a desire to shift the blame away from the real culprits, lib politicians, to a straw man, the Republican party. What could be the purpose of this? Hmmmm. Thinking hard. . . . Could it be that the author is angry at voters for removing his compatriots from office, his friends and buddies? No, couldn't be. There has to be more to the story of Pat's power, authority, control that's just not been let out yet. It's JUST GOT TO BE PAT'S FAULT!!! There's no other choice. None at all. Whine! Whine! Whine. Truth will kill the lib story soon enough.
So libs complain now about EVERYTHING that Pat does. Even where or when he does or doesn't hold a press conference. And do you know for sure that Pat didn't talk to key legislators on the phone before the press release about his initiative? Is there ANYTHING that Pat can do, short of resigning, that you libs would accept? Where he holds a presser is bad for you. When he holds a presser is bad for you. Who attends the presser is bad for you. Who sponsored/paid for the presser is bad for you. Is there anything sticking in your craw? Really? Don't care. Don't wanna know. Cuz it doesn't matter. It's obvious that everything done by your opponents is bad. Libs have shown that they will lie any time they can. They will mislead any time they can. They will disparage a Republican (or any opponent for that matter) any time and every time they can. Even if what they say about their opponent isn't true, they will still say it. When I say that the current White House occupier is incompetent, extra-constitutional, racist, and a socialist, I am then called a bigot or racist. Never are my statements of truth accepted or even investigated. Since I am making true comments about a lib, my comments immediately send libs into fits, convulsions, and I'm labeled. What makes my comments even more vile to libs is that I am making true statements about a BLACK man! This is NOT ALLOWED according to libs. The only reason ANY and ALL libs can understand as to why I might oppose the occupier is because I am a racist, intent on holding down black people. It doesn't matter that he really is a socialist. It doesn't matter that he really does operate outside the Constitution. I'm the problem, as far as libs are concerned.
But what about the opposite direction? What does the author say about Pat that's true? Nothing. Pat used to work for Duke. True statement. Then it ends. Non-true statements but supposed to be accepted. My statements are true, but are to be vilified.
Everything in the lib world is upside down, 180 degrees out of phase. The author just reinforces this truth.
