Tag search result

So what is Richard Burr? Chopped liver?

President Barack Obama was introducing North Carolina's two senators, Richard Burr and Kay Hagan, calling them both hard working.

“And the better looking one – Kay Hagan,” the president said, in a way that is either gallant or sexist, depending on your point of view.

Obama also gave a shout-out to Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, who Burr defeated last month in the U.S. Senate race.

Republican Sen.  Richard Burr, having just come through an easy re-election campaign,  is in much better political shape than his Democratic seat-mate, Kay Hagan.

Burr has a job approval rating of plus 44 percent and a disapproval rating of 34 percent, according to a new survey by Public Policy Polling, a Raleigh-based firm with Democratic leanings.

That compares to Hagan, who has an approval rating of 33 percent and a disapproval rating of 44 percent.

Fortunately for Hagan, she does not have to face the voters until 2014.

The poll of 517 North Carolina voters was conducted Nov. 19 to 21 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percent.

President Barack Obama will travel to the Winston-Salem area on Monday for an official event related to the economy, his first trip into the state since his party, in his words, took a “shellacking” in the mid-term election.

The White House refused to release further details about the event, but Triad TV station WXII Channel 12 reported that Obama will visit Forsyth Technical Community College.

It will be Obama’s fourth trip to North Carolina since he became president.

His last visit to the Tar Heel state was in April, a largely off-the-record weekend vacation in Asheville with his wife, Michelle.

A few weeks before that trip, he came to Charlotte to tout the health reform bill.

With two years before the next presidential election, North Carolina remains a politically important state for Obama. He won here narrowly in 2008. Republicans have done better since then, taking over the state General Assembly in November.

But in Congress, the state lost just one Democrat, U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge of Lillington, who suffered defeat in his largely rural district to tea party activist Renee Ellmers.

In North Carolina, Obama remains in a close race with four potential GOP candidates, according to a survey released Monday by Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm in Raleigh.

Obama remains statistically tied with Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin, according to the survey, which had a margin of error of plus or minus

The same survey showed a 45 percent job approval rating for Obama in the state, with 51 percent disapproving.

On Monday, Obama will head to the hometown of Republican U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, who easily won a second term in November. U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan, a Democrat, is from the neighboring city of Greensboro.

GOP not waiting: Republican lawmakers are busy preparing for their historic transfer of power, taking a series of steps aimed at confronting a projected $3.5 billion budget shortfall and at mastering the mechanics of running a branch of government that has been in Democratic hands for 112 years. (N&O)

License tags come clean: Starting today, you might get a $100 ticket if your automobile license plate is obscured by one of those fat frames that promote pastimes, car dealers and alma maters. (N&O)

Food safety overhaul: The Senate passed a sweeping overhaul of the nation's food safety system Tuesday, after tainted eggs, peanut butter and spinach sickened thousands of people in the past few years and led major food-makers to join consumer advocates in demanding stronger government oversight. (NYT)

Dealing on tax cuts: President Barack Obama and top Republican congressional leaders - who have had a rocky relationship for nearly two years - insisted Tuesday that they got the midterm election message from voters and began searching immediately for a way to extend Bush-era tax cuts. (McClatchy)

The U.S. Senate has passed legislation pushed by U.S. Sen. Richard Burr that would ban the creation or distribution of videos that show animals being tortured or killed for the titillation of viewers.

According to the U.S. Humane Society, animal crush videos typically involve scantily-clad women or girls often using stiletto heels to inflict the torment to satisfy a sexual deviancy for viewers.

The Animal Crush Video Prohibition Act of 2010 bans the creation or distribution of videos that show the intentional drowning, torturing, burning, suffocating or impaling of small animals. Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican, was among the chief sponsors of the Senate bill.

The legislation follows a U.S. Supreme Court decision in April that declared an existing ban on the videos as “overbroad” because it might criminalize some speech protected by the Constitution, the Humane Society said.

The bill passed the House on Monday, and now goes to President Barack Obama to be signed into law.

U.S. Sen. Richard Burr has signed on to a Republican no-earmarks pledge gaining attention in a behind-the-scenes Senate power scuffle within the GOP, reports Washington correspondent Barbara Barrett.

The pledge is the brainchild of U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, who wants Senate Republicans to ban earmark spending in the 112th Congress. Earmarks are congressionally directed spending that benefit home districts.

DeMint, a tea party-backed Republican who has been working to increase his influence in the Senate, has gathered support among his colleagues for giving up earmarks.

At the same time, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has been quietly lobbying against the ban, according to Politico, a Capitol Hill newspaper. McConnell has said he worries the ban will give more spending authority to the White House.

McConnell has support too; Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe told Politico the earmark ban was a “phony issue,” given its small role in the federal budget.

Burr’s no-earmark pledge puts him on DeMint’s side, along with several other conservative senators.

This isn’t the first such anti-earmark pledge for Burr, a Winston-Salem Republican. He promised in 2009 that he wouldn’t ask for new earmarks, though he did agree to continue sponsoring requests for some ongoing projects.

The Senate returns to Washington next week, when Republicans – including those just elected – will hash out the issue behind closed doors, at the GOP conference next Tuesday.

 

Saying she’s in “a very winnable race,” Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Elaine Marshall rallied about two dozen supporters at Mecklenburg County’s Democratic headquarters this morning.

“I’m fired up,” she said, after jogging across the parking lot from her campaign camper to the knot of supporters, reports Jim Morrill. “We have won. Democrats have won the early vote. We’ve got to conclude it tomorrow.”

Among her greeters were several elected officials and candidates as well as former Charlotte Mayor – and two-time Senate candidate – Harvey Gantt.

“Elaine, we’ve got your back,” Gantt said.

Marshall is challenging Republican Sen. Richard Burr.

She will appear in Cary this afternoon.

Democratic Senate candidate Elaine Marshall was to have made 10 campaign stops from Winston-Salem to Lumberton Saturday, urging her supporters to work harder and criticizing Republican Sen. Richard Burr.

“The choice could not be clearer for the people of North Carolina,” Marshall told about three dozen campaign volunteers at a Democratic headquarters in Raleigh Saturday afternoon.

“I've taken on special interests, and he's taken from special interests,” Marshall said, alluding to her own record as secretary of state.

“If you want somebody who will stand up for the rank and file, for the middle class folks of America and North Carolina, those who are seeing the American dream slip through their fingertips, you need to talk on that telephone and get people out to vote.”

Marshall said Burr sees nothing wrong with the way Wall Street and BP operate and is willing takes their contributions. He voted 20 times for tax policies that reward companies that ship jobs overseas, she said.

She said North Carolina Democrats are doing “better than any place in the country” in turning out their voters.

“We have won October, but we also have to win November,” Marshall said.

Marshall campaign aides said that when early voting closed Saturday there were long lines in Democratic neighborhoods in Durham and Raleigh.

Early voting as of Friday showed that of the 862,126 people who voted, 46 percent were Democrats, 37 percent were Republicans and 17 percent were unaffiliated. About 20 percent of the voters were African-American, which if that trend were to continue would be in the high range, although below the 23 percent that turned out in the 2008 election to vote for Barack Obama for president.

Lindsay Siler, director of Organizing for America, the old Obama netowork, said the North Carolina Democrats had put together the most extensive volunteer effort ever seen in a mid-term election here.

Burr, meanwhile, was campaigning in the western part of the state with stops in Pinehurst, Stanly County, Monroe, Cornelius, Catawba and Lincolnton.

Republican Sen. Richard Burr released a feel good TV ad this week showing how he understands the concerns of average North Carolinians.

But apparently he got the wrong ocean.

As an announcer says “We need leaders who care about the things we care about: family, a job security, a better future,” there appears on the screen an idyllic photograph of a family – a husband, wife and a little girl - sitting on a beach.

But the family appears to be looking into the sunset, not a sun rise. And there appears to be an island in the distance. The whole picture shouts west coast.

Samantha Smith, Burr's campaign spokeswoman, said the Burr TV ad, called “priorities,” contained stock footage, and she did not know where it had been shot.

 

Democratic Senate candidate Elaine Marshall has narrowed the gap with Richard Burr, but the Republican incumbent still maintains a comfortable lead according to two new polls.

A survey by Public Policy Polling shows Burr leading Marshall by a 48 to 40 margin, down from a 13 point gap three weeks ago. Libertarian candidate Michael Beitler was at 3 percent. She has closed the gap because some of the Democratic voters have begun to come home.

A WRAL News Poll also shows a narrowing gap, although it shows Burr with 53 percent and Marshall at 38 percent, with Beitler at 5 percent.

The PPP survey found that while Marshall is picking up support among Democrats, Burr's backing remains steady. It also found that Burr holds a commanding 52-24 advantage lead among independents suggesting his soft-edged ideological campaign is working.

Marshall has made gains at a time when she has raised her profile by finally going on TV with her advertising campaign and appearing in three TV debates.

The PPP survey of 597 likely North Carolina voters was taken from Oct. 15 to 17th and had a margin error of plus or minus four percent.

The WRAL poll was conducted by SurveyUSA polled 857 likely voters Friday through Monday. The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.