McHenry at Civitas last month

McHenry fundraising? Not so good

From the Charlotte Observer:

Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-Cherryville, raised $118,000, had $123,000 in the bank, and carried $90,500 in debt on a 2004 bank loan.

Here's their report on the rest of North Carolina's congressional delegation:

Shuler's penchant for raising money, which he ably displayed last fall in his upset of incumbent Charles Taylor, hasn't skipped a beat since he's been in office.In the first three months of 2007, he raised more than $220,000, a large majority of it coming from special interest groups. Shuler, whose campaign had about $202,000 in cash as of March 31, is already being targeted for ouster by national Republicans who want to reclaim the western Carolina seat.

Another lawmaker who had a hard-fought scramble for political survival, Rep. Robin Hayes, took in nearly $163,000 for the quarter, more than a third of it from political action committees. The Concord Republican had $176,000 in cash and $23,000 in debt, according to newly released records on file with the Federal Election Commission.

. . .

Also sitting on substantial nest eggs are Rep. Howard Coble, R-Greensboro, with about $705,000, including $62,000 pulled in this year, and Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-Banner Elk, who had $691,000 in the bank, about $69,000 from this year's fund-raising.

Here's a tally of how the campaigns of other regional lawmakers fared in the first quarter of 2007 compiled from FEC records:

Rep. Mel Watt, D-Charlotte, raised $4,700 in the period and had $56,000 in the bank.

Rep. Sue Myrick, R-Charlotte, raised $84,000 and had $43,000 in cash.

Rep. John Spratt, D-S.C., raised $119,000, and had about $199,000 in the bank and $44,000 in debt, a loan from himself incurred in 1984.

So it looks like McHenry's trailing his peers. Wonder why?

Keeping track of McHenry

There are many ways to evaluate your congressman. Here are just a few:

Govtrack concludes:

Patrick McHenry has sponsored 12 bills since Jan 4, 2005, of which 11 haven't made it out of committee (Average) and 1 were successfully enacted (Average, relative to peers). McHenry has co-sponsored 268 bills during the same time period (Few, relative to peers).

Open Secrets gives a great financial overview of the special interests that back McHenry:

1 Commercial Banks $94,249
2 Leadership PACs $90,913
3 Real Estate $85,741
4 Health Professionals $82,800
5 Insurance $75,000
6 Retired $48,365
7 Securities & Investment $48,250
8 Beer, Wine & Liquor $37,300
9 Lawyers/Law Firms $33,033
10 Accountants $32,314
11 Finance/Credit Companies $29,250
12 Retail Sales $28,900
13 Pro-Israel $27,500
14 Food & Beverage $25,300
15 Textiles $24,700
16 Misc Manufacturing & Distributing $23,700
17 Lobbyists $21,000
18 Automotive $18,500
19 Pharmaceuticals/Health Products $16,250
20 Electric Utilities $16,000

I highly recommend you explore the open secrets site for other McHenry nuggets like this one on personal finances:

Net Worth: $301,018 to $877,000

And this one on top contributors:

1 National Beer Wholesalers Assn $25,000
2 American Bankers Assn $18,000
3 Bank of America $16,999
4 Commscope Inc $15,900
5 Wachovia Corp $15,250
6 Every Republican is Crucial PAC $15,000
7 Independent Community Bankers of America $12,000
8 Hickory Furniture Mart $11,100
9 Patrick Yarns $11,000
9 Reynolds American $11,000
11 KPMG LLP $10,704
12 Desert Caucus $10,000
12 Independent Insurance Agents of America $10,000
12 National Auto Dealers Assn $10,000
12 Outback Steakhouse $10,000
16 Freedom Project $9,999
17 American Society of Anesthesiologists $8,500
18 General Electric $8,250
19 Corning Inc $8,050
20 NorPAC $8,000

Project Vote Smart falsely claims this background for Pat:

Professional Experience:
Sales, Small Business
Special Assistant, United States Department of Labor.

but let's not hold that against them. On the positive side, Project Vote Smart has a great section on how interests groups rate him, his voting records, and his public statements and speeches.

They also have a survey on their positions on the issues but since Pat hasn't answered it, there's a spot to request he do so. That might be worth a few clicks on your keyboard. Congressmen respond more to constituents than to government watchdog groups.

News roundup: What's going on in the 10th

[Photos by Lynn Willis.]

NC's 10th congressional district is on fire. Literally.

The most recent, pictured at right, burned 750 acres in Linville Gorge. It still burns.

Near Blowing Rock last week, 120 acres burned in the national forest around Globe.

Two weeks ago a smaller fire burned 60 acres in Linville Gorge.

104 jobs lost, 160 jobs gained

According to the Hickory Daily Record:

HICKORY -- A Hickory-based sock maker will shed 104 jobs in a second round of layoffs this year.

International Legwear Group will eliminate the jobs at its Hickory and Hildebran locations beginning June 29, according to a document the company filed with the city of Hickory with notification of a layoff.

The cuts come after the company announced its intention to cut 186 jobs in March, April and June. Affected employees have been notified of the move, according to the WARN (Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification) notice.

Also from the Hickory Daily Record:

HICKORY -- A cost-cutting move at Thomasville Furniture Industries looks like good news for the Greater Hickory Metro, which will gain more than 160 jobs.

Thomasville parent company Furniture Brands International on Friday said it will close three Thomasville plants, consolidating their operations into plants in Hickory and Lenoir.

Closing this summer will be Thomasville’s Plant 3 and Plant 4 upholstery operations, both in Troutman; and its Plant C case goods factory in Thomasville.

The upholstery work will be moved to Plant 9 in Hickory. Case goods work will be moved to Lenoir.

A Thomasville official said approximately 164 workers in Troutman will be offered jobs in Hickory. Thomasville employs about 400 people in the Hickory area.

No jobs will be created in Lenoir, where Thomasville already employs about 650, he said.

Furniture Brands, which also owns Broyhill, Lane, Henredon, Drexel Heritage and Maitland-Smith, said approximately 150 jobs will be cut as a result of the Thomasville plant closings.

As part of the same manufacturing realignment, Furniture Brands said it will eliminate about 80 executive and administrative employees and eliminate approximately 100 manufacturing workers.

Gaston business leader lobbies for parkway funds

In the Charlotte Observer:

Elyse Hillegass, president of the Gaston County Chamber of Commerce, was among a half-dozen business leaders in Washington last week to discuss the region's needs with lawmakers and agency staff.She says her top priority was lobbying for funding for the Garden Parkway, the proposed road between western Mecklenburg County and Catawba.

"It's pretty obvious most of the transportation dollars go to the eastern part of North Carolina," said Hillegass, who was a guest of Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-Cherryville.

NC DOT website for what they call the Gaston County East-West Connector. 2003 announcement of original funding.

18 months and counting

It's hard to believe that six months has already passed since election day.

We now have 546 days until election day 2008. That's just under 18 months, which isn't very long considering a couple of other facts.

It will be another nine months before we're likely to know who our Presidential candidate will be. Then probably another three months after that until North Carolina holds its primary and we know who all our other candidates will be.

In other words, we basically have 12 months to plan, and then 6 months to campaign.

Considering we are trying to put some Democrats in the Electoral College for the first time in 32 years, we better get busy. If we're going to turn North Carolina blue on the presidential map we need to use our time wisely.

Over the next year that means engaging in strategic planning and establishing real relationships with our voters (through canvassing). We must create a solid foundation upon which that last six-month sprint to election day will be based.

Very few of our counties have a solid enough foundation now. With county conventions behind us, however, our leadership teams are in place.

We also have a tremendous head start in that our state chair has written a Guide to Strategic Planning for County Democratic Parties that is available free to county chairs. It walks the county party through every step in the planning process, and results in a blueprint and a timeline for the county party's growth. Then it's just a matter of following the plan.

In the blogosphere we're endlessly discussing who is ahead and who might run and every permutation and combination of this ticket or that one for this office or that. The point is, it doesn't matter who our candidates are if we can't help them get elected. Our county and district parties need to be well organized, with good plans in place, if we are to be of any help to our candidates.

And that work starts needs to start in earnest right now.

The great football coach Vince Lombardi used to yell at his players if they showed up ten minutes early for practice. "If you're ten minutes early you're five minutes late," he would say. He expected them to arrive fifteen minutes early so they would be well prepared when the practice began. His teams won championships.

18 months and counting.

A New Hybrid

These days the vehicles most in-demand seem to be the hybrids -- a combination of evolving designs with the best of new technology, fueled by a new mixture of energies.

What's hot on the highways also holds true for political parties.

With North Carolina's Democratic county party conventions now behind us, party builders are elated. Statewide, we have more than 50 new county chairs heading up our county parties. Most of these are folks who have been driven by their political passions to become increasingly involved. Many of them are technologically astute and are tuned in to new methods for communicating with our voters and turning them out on election day.

The county chairs who were re-elected carry a tremendous amount of institutional knowledge and experience. They, too, are deeply committed to improving our results at the ballot box and to building an infrastructure for the next 20 years.

Eighteen months from election day, county parties are energized. Although statewide results haven't been tabulated, turnout at county conventions probably surpassed any off-year total in history. A few examples I've heard about -- more than 150 turned out in Polk, more than 200 in Yancey, over 100 even in Wilkes, where we're outnumbered by R's 55-30.

With the national party's Vote Builder (an evolution of the VAN) ramping up to come on line, we'll have the tools we need to create an historic result in 2008. Now it's a matter of completing construction of our new vehicle (through strategic planning and trainings) and capitalizing on the new energy that is increasingly available.

What does all this point to if we create appropriate plans and keep our eye on the prize? Can you say Blue State in '08? North Carolina hasn't tallied any Democratic electoral votes since 1976. Let's never forget what's at stake.

Fallout from McHenry's tirade on MSNBC

Pat Go Bye Bye has already reported on McHenry's appearance with Chris Matthews on MSNBC last week.

You can learn what happened to the peeved Congressman afterwards from The Hill:

No doubt Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC’s “Hardball,” can be a blabbermouth.

So what’s a congressional guest to do?

Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) recently appeared on the show with Rep. Artur Davis (D-Ala.). Davis is passive and quiet when someone else is mid-tirade.

McHenry? Not so quiet.

The subject matter was the war in Iraq. But what’s important was the tone of the discussion.

At one point McHenry grew so exasperated by Matthews’s interruptions that he snapped, “If you’re going to fight me on your show, Chris, let me answer a question for God’s sakes.”

Matthews momentarily let up, but never apologized for the testy moment. “Chris is an equal-opportunity interrupter,” said Davis.

McHenry wasn’t so sure. “Normally he’ll allow you to finish a sentence,” he said, adding, “Chris is great because he’s in your face.”

After the show, McHenry and his spokesman, Aaron Latham, went to meet their driver, as arranged by the show’s producers, to take them back to Capitol Hill.

But where was their driver? After no driver would admit to belonging to them, McHenry again grew upset.

Finally, the driver of a black Town Car perked up when asked if anyone was there for “Hardball with Chris Matthews.”

“We cabbed it over,” said Latham, but “after an interview like that there was just absolutely no way we weren’t taking his car for ourselves.”

Latham reasoned, “At the end of the day, which is worse: to get berated on national TV or not get a ride home? In that sense we’re all even.”