The N.C. Military Foundation spent $49,000 on lobbying in 2007.

According to state and federal lobbying disclosure forms, the nonprofit started by Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue to promote defense spending in North Carolina spent about a quarter of its consulting budget on lobbyists in its first full year.

With a tight budget, the group relies heavily on outside consultants, including two lobbyists, Jimmy Broughton and Mark Harkins. Executive Director Will Austin also does some lobbying of state government, and lobbyist John Mashburn also did some work in 2007.

The lobbyists are a bipartisan group.

Broughton is a former chief of staff to Republican Sen. Jesse Helms, Mashburn was general counsel to Republican Sen. Judd Gregg, Harkins was chief of staff to Democratic Rep. Brad Miller, and Austin was an assistant to Democratic Sen. John Edwards.

Broughton, Harkins and Mashburn work for Raleigh firm Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice.

In 2007, the foundation reported spending $9,340 for Broughton and Austin to lobby the state government, and $40,000 for Broughton, Harkins and Mashburn to lobby the federal government.

That year, it spent about $212,000 on outside consultants.

Who is consulting for the N.C. Military Foundation?

The nonprofit started by Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue in 2006 to promote defense spending in North Carolina runs on a tight budget, relying on outside consultants.

Here's a quick sketch of their major consultants:

Retired Major Gen. Mike Davidson: Former assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Gen. Hugh Shelton.

Hon. Mike Walker: Former acting Secretary of the Army in 1998 and Undersecretary of Defense.

Meg Ryan O'Donnell: President of Winning Strategies, a Raleigh communications firm.

Jimmy Broughton: Former chief of staff for U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms and federal lobbyist with Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice.

Mark Harkins: Former chief of staff for U.S. Rep. Brad Miller and lobbyist with Womble Carlyle.

As lobbyists on military issues, Broughton and Harkins also work for Blackwater Worldwide, a controversial security contractor based in Moyock.

Executive Director Will Austin says he met with Blackwater in the past, but the foundation does not typically promote specific military contractors, instead focusing on the state's overall military friendliness.

"We don't have a relationship with them," he said.

U.S. Reps. Brad Miller and David Price spent part of their summer vacation this week in a hotel in Liberia's capital city of Monrovia that lacked hot water but had exposed wiring, that smelled of gasoline and whose power blinked off occasionally through the night.

It was a change from the plush digs of Capitol Hill, Barb Barrett reports.

It also was a sobering reminder of the conditions in poor nations plagued by civil strife.

"We have just visited two of the poorest nations on the planet," Miller said Wednesday in an interview from Africa. "Liberia, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Both have been through horrific conflict."

Liberia had 14 years of civil war, and the Democratic Republic of Congo is emerging from a civil war that has killed more than 5 million people, said Miller, of Raleigh.

"These societies are not the slightest threat to us economically," he said. "Their poverty is a security threat to the United States. Failed societies and ungoverned areas are where extremism and terrorism really take hold."

Miller joined a Price-led congressional trip to the region to learn more about developing countries there and assist new democracies in strengthening their legislative branches. U.S. Rep. Mel Watt of Charlotte also was on the trip.

The delegation will be in Kenya, Malawi and Mauratania before returning to the United States. 

U.S. Rep. Brad Miller, who is in Africa this week as part of an official Congressional trip, opined about his last trip to the continent in his blog recently.

Miller, a Raleigh Democrat, was criticizing GOP presidential candidate John McCain about what it takes to have some foreign relations savvy. Miller, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, visited Nairobi, Kenya, and the Darfur region of Sudan last summer on another official tri.

He recalls his visit to a slum in Nairobi and says such understanding of a region's "music" is vital to understanding foreign relations, Barb Barrett reports.

Miller writes: "The more questions we asked, the more guarded the answers became. Then we walked through the slum. … As our delegation walked through Kibera, we all asked the same question: how can this be a stable society?"

U.S. Rep. David Price is not an easy traveler.

The Chapel Hill Democrat is going on an 11-day trip during the upcoming recess along with other members of the House Democracy Assistance Commission. (U.S. Rep. Brad Miller is joining him.)

The Washington Post's Al Kamen, who likes to critique lawmakers' junkets, called the trip to such political hotspots as Liberia, Kenya and Congo "no fun."

"In addition to meetings with heads of state, there are endless conferences and meetings about budgeting, legislative research and other exciting topics," he writes, tongue in cheek.

Price, a former professor who is something of a troubled democracy buff, has also taken trips to Lebanon, Afghanistan, East Timor, Haiti and Colombia — hardly the kinds of places you see on a poster in a travel agent's office. 

On the other hand, Mongolia's been pretty quiet since Gengis Khan died. 

How closely tied are North Carolina's Congressional Democrats to their presidential nominee?

Though all but one of the state's seven Democratic representatives will cast their superdelegate vote for Barack Obama, they're at slightly different levels.

Here's where they stand, from closest to least close:

G.K. Butterfield: Switched endorsement from John Edwards before the South Carolina primary. Stumped in Tennessee, Louisiana and Georgia. Participated in multiple teleconferences. Talked to reporters. Served on "Truth Squad." Attended rallies. District backed Obama by 63 percent. Name-checked in acceptance speech. Still working.

David Price: Defended Obama. Endorsed before primary, after Edwards dropped out. Participated in teleconferences. District backed Obama by 66 percent. Name-checked in acceptance speech. Still working. 

Mel Watt: Previously skeptical of black candidate's chances. Endorsed before primary, after Edwards dropped out. Participated in teleconferences. Served on "Truth Squad." District backed Obama by 78 percent. Name-checked in acceptance speech.

Brad Miller: Wife sat behind Obama for acceptance speech. District backed Obama by 63 percent Stayed neutral before primary, endorsed shortly afterward.

Bob Etheridge: District backed Obama. Stayed neutral before primary. Endorsed Obama the day before Clinton dropped out. Attended Obama rally.

Mike McIntyre: District backed Clinton. Stayed neutral before primary. Endorsed Obama the day before Clinton dropped out.

Heath Shuler: Received $10,000 from Obama's PAC in 2006. District backed Clinton. Endorsed Clinton after primary. Staff says he's been too busy to think about race since then.

Are soccer moms making a comeback?

State Sen. Kay Hagan, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, has co-sponsored three different bills related to soccer in the past two years.

One 2007 bill honored the UNC-Chapel Hill women's soccer team's 2006 national championship. Another bill invited the women players to the legislature for recognition. And a third bill filed this session would create special "Support Soccer" license plates.

Hagan, a 54-year-old mother of three, has been described as a "soccer mom from Greensboro" by both the N&O and the Charlotte Observer, as her daughter Carrie plays the sport. And in 1999, she led a fundraising effort for new soccer fields in Greensboro.

When Republicans proposed a redistricting plan that would have put her in a heavily Republican area in 2001, then state Sen. Brad Miller jokingly noted how it would affect her.

"I think under this plan, it would be easier (for you) to make it to your child's soccer games," he said.

Her Republican opponent, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole, is no slouch in the soccer department either, co-sponsoring a 2007 resolution commending Wake Forest University's men's team.

Correction: An earlier version of this post misstated Miller's position at the time.

The state's Congressional Democrats endorsed Kay Hagan.

The seven U.S. representatives issued a joint endorsement of the Democratic nominee, who faces U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole in November.

"Kay Hagan has a decade-long record of effectiveness in the North Carolina state Senate, and has earned the distinction of being one of the Senate's top 10 most effective lawmakers for three consecutive terms," said U.S. Rep. David Price in a statement. "She's a work horse, not a show horse."

Along with Price, U.S. Reps. Mel Watt, Mike McIntyre, Bob Etheridge, Brad Miller, G.K. Butterfield and Heath Shuler backed Hagan.

"I'm so honored to receive these endorsements," Kay said. "I'm looking forward to working with them in my campaign and of course, when I am up in Washington working in the U.S. Senate."

The superdelegates in North Carolina mostly backed Barack.

Here's a breakdown of the state's 19 superdelegates in the Democratic presidential primary race between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Clinton

Gov. Mike Easley
U.S. Rep. Heath Shuler
Susan Burgess, Charlotte Councilwoman

Obama

U.S. Rep. G.K. Butterfield
U.S. Rep. David Price
U.S. Rep. Mel Watt
U.S. Rep. Brad Miller
Jerry Meek, N.C. Democratic Party chair
Dannie Montgomery, N.C. Democratic Party vice chair
Everett Ward, former Democratic Party director
Joyce Brayboy, public policy lobbyist
Jeanette Council, Cumberland County commissioner
Muriel K. Offerman, Democratic National Committee
David Parker, Statesville attorney
U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge
U.S. Rep. Mike McIntyre

Carol Peterson, Buncombe County commissioner
Two delegates to be named at the state convention.

A state workers' group may get involved in federal races.

In the past seven years, the State Employees Association of North Carolina's political action committee has stuck to local and state races in its endorsements and independent expenditures.

But after SEANC voted in May to affiliate with the national Service Employees International Union — which has one of the country's top PACs in federal races — it is reconsidering.

SEANC Executive Director Dana Cope told Dome that decisions in Washington on issues such as Medicare funding often affect North Carolina and the group's state political goals. At the same time, it does not want to spread itself too thin.

"We want to get the most bang for the buck," he said.

The group is now coordinating its efforts more with SEIU, which sent flyers in a 2005 Raleigh City Council race and has given to U.S. Reps. Brad Miller and David Price, former U.S. Senate candidate Erskine Bowles and state Sen. Janet Cowell.

Cope said SEIU got permission from his group before giving $5,000 in late March to U.S. Senate candidate Kay Hagan, who was not endorsed by SEANC in the primary and may not be in the general election.

If SEANC decides to get involved in Congressional races, it will have to register as a federal PAC.