I wrote about the arena issue here. It’s been a real sore spot for Charlotte conservatives, and the GOP candidates for gov. know it:

“It’s hypocritical to say (you) follow the will of the people when 57 percent voted against the arena and the city built it anyway,” Smith shot back.

“Fred’s exactly right on the arena,” Orr added. “It all comes out of the public pocketbook.”

In a 2001 nonbinding referendum, Charlotte voters rejected a package that included a new uptown arena and several cultural projects.

The $342 million package would have been paid for largely with a countywide hotel-motel tax. The defeat sped the departure of the NBA Charlotte Hornets.

In 2003, with the promise of a new team, the mayor and City Council approved a new $265 million arena. It was financed largely with taxes on hotel rooms and car rentals, as well as the sale of city-owned property.

Yes, the original bond pkg was for a new arena for the Hornets, and it was voted down by a majority of Charlotteans. Those voters made it clear that they did not want a new arena funded with taxpayer money. Do you think it matters in the eyes of the people who voted against public funding for a new Hornets arena that the arena the city ended up helping fund was for a new team? Get serious. After the arena bond pkg died, I remember McCrory stating that we would get an arena, and that the city would figure out a way to get one built with private funds. The city never gave up on their plans to build an arena, whether it was for the Hornets, or another team.

65% of Bobcats arena project was funded with city money, and they explained it away on a technicality, noting that the 2001 bond referendum was “non-binding” – something they didn’t make clear in advance of the vote. That’s just wrong and it was like a slap in the face to voters in this city.

On Jim Black’s residence, I think you’re nitpicking. Matthews is just one footstep away from Charlotte, and his optometrist office is (or was?) in uptown Charlotte, and the district he represented includes parts of Charlotte.

Let these spineless ones kid themselves as they sell out for a light rail that will not work, for a stadium that the voters did not want, and the 25 million still owed on the one they imploded.

Sound like a good leader to me if you are making the money of the backs of the tax payers.

Hey that sticks it to the Republicans and the Democrats.

Keep on play politics as usual and watch the fall of the temple.

Fred gives us a clear choice that is working to get the people to be involved. The EAST and the WEST will contol the state and not let a few city slickers buy the place with our tax money.

Go FRED go.

Don Yelton
founder of citizens speak and committed to connecting the East with the West and squeezing the “crap” out of Raleigh. Remember we got Black from McCory’s town and what did that cost us in the long run. I will not even mention Campbell that was on Black’s defense fund.

Fred Smith, on the other hand, has been an absentee senator, missing OVER 300 VOTES in 2007 alone! So while it is just great that he took the time to visit every county, it seems as though his concern is false — if he was really concerned about North Carolina, he would be doing his JOB as a senator. After all, our legislature is mostly Democratic, and every Republican vote counts.

If you want to talk about visits, Pat McCrory is still doing his job as Mayor of Charlotte, and only recently quit his full-time job at Duke Energy. Fred Smith has been the most absentee Senator in Raleigh, feel free to look it up. He’s another Mike Easley that can put on an impressive front, then retreat from his job. It isn’t in McCrory’s nature to do that.

I was at a GOP Lincoln Day Dinner last saturday in Watauga County. Pat’s spokesperson said “Pat wanted to be here, but he has a fundraiser in Charlotte”. Sorry Watauga County money is more important. Pat has been in WNC three times, Fred Smith 65 times, that shows me alot.

If Pat McCrory wins (and that is a mighty big if), he will have to change his strategy. You cannot be a concensus builder if you don’t get out of Charlotte and talk to folks.

As far as who has endorsed Smith, I wouldn’t be thrilled the Raleigh establishment supports a Raleigh insider. Pat McCrory is able to come in as a true outside reformer really have a positive effect on state government from the bully pulpit. If by some chance Smith did get elected, I don’t see him governing effectively. McCrory is a consensus-builder and a man with vision. I don’t see that same vision in Smith, and that is why I will be voting for Pat McCrory on May 6 and will encourage as many people as I can to do the same.

Many Unaffiliated voters that I know, were Conservative Democrats that became Unaffiliated because their party left them. Fred Smith will appeal to them as well as the Conservative Democrats in the east. Beverly Perdue might win the Democrat nomination, but I truly believe that she will not be the Governor of North Carolina. I have heard many Democrats say that they will not vote for her or Moore, they see them as an extension of Mike Easley. Many of these folks have said that Easley is the worst Governor in modern history.

I agree that Pat is a likeable fellow and a very skilled politician. His major problem is that candidates from Charlotte have very little in common with rural and urban North Carolina voters. The eastern and western part of North Carolina feel like orphaned children that have been abandoned.

Fred Smith is the only candidate that has made the effort to visit and tour all 100 counties in North Carolina, not once but many times he has visited every county. I appreciate someone coming up to me, looking me in the eye and asking for my vote. It is my fervent hope that Fred Smith’s campaign will change the way that statewide candidates campaign. They need to get out of the television studio and travel across this great state and see how wonderful it is from Murphy to Manteo.

Our families know us better than anyone else. The next group of people that know us the best, are those that we work with. Fred Smith has been endorsed by 17 NC GOP State Senators, 18 NC GOP State Representavives, GOP District Attorneys’ and the majority of NC GOP Sheriffs (active & retired).

It is time for the NCGOP to get back to our core values and unite the west with the east – Fred Smith is the only GOP candidate that can do just that.

I’m sure a “true conservative” like yourself is absolutely sick of the “Tax-Hike” Mike Easly administration in Raleigh, just as I am. Thankfully, he can’t run for re-election this year, but his carbon copies Perdue and Moore both seem to have this sense of entitlement that it’s their turn to play governor. And because NC historically elects Democratic governors, they can rest easy in their knowledge that whoever wins the Democratic primary will probably be the next governor of North Carolina.

The only hope the Republican Party has is to nominate the most electable candidate, and I think Pat McCrory probably has the greatest appeal across the board. All of the Republican candidates have the conservative ideals we’re looking for in a Republican, but we really need to be looking at electability if we want a chance against the Democrats.

Fred Smith is a good guy, but if he wins the nomination, we can pretty much hand the general election over to the Democrats. Not only does Smith lack the appeal needed to win over Democratic and unaffiliated voters, but I’ve actually had a few Republicans tell me they probably would not vote for Smith in a general election.

I know that you said you would have a hard time voting for McCrory in the general election, but I think if and when it comes down to moderate McCrory versus socialist Perdue, the choice will be very easy for most North Carolinians.

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