She’s lined up behind Raleigh’s biggest pork train – the Triangle Transit Authority’s light-rail boondoggle.

Specifically, she’s joined those who argue that this billion-dollar budget-buster should not have to meet new cost-benefit requirements set by the federal government.

While some of our elected officials push for a rail system that will never pay for itself, we keep hearing about badly needed highway projects in the Triangle being delayed.

The I-540 link from US 1 to US 64, for example, has been put off nearly a year. And we’re being told that the only way we’ll see the western and southern links of I-540 is to accept toll roads.

Something doesn’t add up here.

Scanlon is the Tom Delay protégé who is now charged with criminal conspiracy related to his ties to GOP superlobbyist Jack Abramoff. According to The New York Times:

Mr. Scanlon is in legal trouble for his business dealings with Mr. Abramoff, with whom he used his ties to the Republican House leadership to build a booming lobbying and public affairs business.

Mr. Scanlon and Mr. Abramoff collected about $82 million in fees from Indian tribes over four years. Their dealings triggered the investigation that led to the criminal conspiracy charge filed against Mr. Scanlon.

The irony is that Scanlon is one of those zealous, conservative young men and women who – until the feds started investigating – was certain of his own moral righteousness.

As Delay’s press spokesman in 1998, Scanlon had this to say about Bill Clinton’s impeachment troubles:

“You kick him until he passes out,” Mr. Scanlon wrote in an e-mail message that was published in the Clinton biography “The Breach.” “Then beat him over the head with a baseball bat, then roll him up in an old rug and throw him off a cliff into the pounding surf below!!!!!”

Mr. Scanlon certainly got around. According to some news accounts in 1996, he was the director of communications for then-Congressman Fred Heineman of North Carolina and vice president for policy research at Multimedia Inc., a Raleigh consulting firm.

These days, he keeps a lower profile. As The Times reported:

Except for one silent appearance before the Senate in 2004 - during which Republican members excoriated him for his treatment of Indian tribes and his refusal to testify - Mr. Scanlon has all but vanished from public view over the last year, retreating to Rehoboth Beach, Del., a summer resort several hours from here.

Documents, e-mail messages and interviews with his former colleagues suggest that Mr. Scanlon had an appeal similar to the title character in the film “The Talented Mr. Ripley” who drew people to his money-making schemes. “He certainly has a charm about him,” said John Feehery, the former spokesman for Speaker J. Dennis Hastert.

Mr. Scanlon, more than Mr. Abramoff, was flamboyant with his earnings. He owned several multimillion-dollar Delaware beach properties and rented a $17,000-a-month apartment at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Washington.

My problem on Iraq is I’m beginning to suspect we’ve gotten ourselves into a real mess. And the only thing that makes sense is to get out of it. But I also know I don’t know anything about the religious differences between Shi’ites and Sunnis or why Iran supports one and Syria supports the other and why Turkey supports the Kurds. The hard truth is I don’t understand the subtleties of what’s happening in Iraq or why. And I’m not smart enough to figure out what to do.

But the little I do know has me plenty worried. I know that, today, what the President said about there being weapons of mass destruction in Iraq was wrong. And his explanation – that he didn’t mislead anyone because the intelligence reports he got were wrong – doesn’t give me much comfort. That means he made a pretty awful mistake – believing false intelligence reports – and that mistake got us into a war. The President of United States shouldn’t make mistakes like that. Surely, he could have found someone in this entire country who could tell a false intelligence report from a real one.

Today, the Democrats are saying we should get out of Iraq.

President Bush is saying we should hold on and keep on doing what we’re doing and hope the tide is about to turn (which seems less likely every day).

And one man – Senator John McCain – is saying we should send more troops to Iraq and you’ve got to admire his courage for taking an unpopular stand and it’s for certain he’s one person who’s not ‘playing politics’ with the war.

Which brings me to Mr. Brooks’ advice to President Bush.

Mr. Brooks states, “On February 23, 1942, Franklin Roosevelt asked Americans to spread out maps before them and he described step-by-step, what was going on in World War II, where the United States was winning and where it was losing. Why can’t today’s President do that?” He added: “Since the President doesn’t give out credible information, it’s no wonder Republicans are measuring success by how quickly we can get out; it’s no wonder many Democrats are turning the war into a potential tool to bash the president…”

That’s not good advice, it’s great advice.

We went to war to stop Saddam for building weapons of mass distraction and to stop Al Qaeda. The American people supported the war because those reasons made sense. Today, those reasons are gone and I don’t know what terrible threat we are stopping by staying in Iraq.

The President should tell us. He should say to the American people, ‘All right, here’s where we stand. Here’s the good news. Here’s the bad news. And here’s the threat we will eliminate by winning this war.’

Until he does that it is going to seem like there is no threat and that getting out of Iraq is the only alternative that makes sense.

I suspect the problems will fade once the lottery gets started, apparently by next April. Then people will see money going into the schools.

But I hope the Republicans will do what it sounds like they want to do: refight the battle over whether to have a lottery at all.

That’s the best thing that could happen for Democrats’ hopes to keep a majority in the state House and Senate next year!

It reminds me of Zell Miller, who as Governor of Georgia started that state’s lottery.

He got elected in 1990 by advocating the lottery. Then he got reelected in 1994 over a Republican who wanted to get rid of it.

They say Zell is the only man in America who won the lottery twice.

Keep an eye on the political cartoons. Notice how small the drawings of Bush have become. They get tinier and tinier. Now, he barely occupies an itty-bitty corner of the cartoonists’ panel.

I first noticed this phenomenon during Jimmy Carter’s administration. As Carter seemed more and more overwhelmed by the Presidency, he shrank in the cartoons.

It’s a sure sign of the space a President occupies in the mind of Americans.

No, not who done it. Or why. Or which reporter got the leak first.

Have you seen a picture of the agent?

Her name is Valerie Plame. Now, get this picture in focus: She was an undercover CIA agent, apparently a crack shot with an AK47. But she posed as an unassuming PTA mom who worked as a business consultant.

On top of all that, she’s a knockout blonde.

Now here’s the real mystery: Why hasn’t someone made a TV movie about this woman?

The battle is over whether Congress should set a deadline for the withdrawal of American troops. Republicans say this amounts to a “cut and run” strategy.

But don’t worry, if you’re against the war.

Thanks to all the Republicans who are anxious about the political impact of the war, there actually is a rock-solid, guaranteed date by which you can count on America beginning to withdraw troops.

It’s Election Day 2006

How is it doing that? By showing “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.”

And who paid for Exploris’ IMAX movie theatre? Well, taxpayers. By giving the museum $11.9 in tax money to build it and an annual subsidy of $1.7 million.

That’s our tax money at work.

Meantime, local theatres will be promoting ‘global understanding’ at no cost to the taxpayers by showing “Harry Potter and the Circle of Fire” on their own nickel.

For some reason I don’t pretend to understand this has provoked a ‘dam war’ between the environmentalists and the beavers. The newspaper described – in lurid detail – how environmentalists donned knee high waders and tramped into the Eno River to obliterate two beaver dams.

But you’ve got to give the beavers credit. It turns out they’re more than a match for the environmentalists. The next morning they’d built both dams back.

Myers cited conflicts of interest because he owns stock in Ingles Stores which may want to sell lottery tickets.

Myers is also director of the North Carolina Economic Development Group. Last week federal authorities subpoenaed the groups correspondence with Meredith Norris, who apparently lobbied for Scientific Games which wants to bid on the N.C. Lottery Contract.

And finally, a federal grand jury began to meet yesterday in Raleigh to start hearing testimony in a criminal investigation that has included subpoena’s of lottery related documents.

If nothing else, so far, the lottery has been entertaining.

Rep. Brubaker – who missed more than 10% of the days when the legislature was in session – took per diems for 25 days when he was not in Raleigh. He says he was “working on legislative business or attending conferences,” so it’s okay. Convenient.

Rep. Steve LaRoque of Kinston was more blunt. LaRoque missed 20 days and part of five other days and still took his per diems. He said: “It cost me money to serve – bottom line.” He added, “I hired somebody to help run my business while I’m in Raleigh, and I pay her more than I get paid to serve.”

Maybe Representative LaRoque would like to run for reelection on that platform next year: that taxpayers should pay him enough so he can pay someone to run his business while he’s in Raleigh.

Just before the city council voted to approve the hotel Ms. Kane set forth her views in an opt-ed in the News & Observer.

Unlike the politicians – like Mayor Meeker – who criticized the hotel (but then voted for it) Ms. Kane did not pussy-foot around. She said flat out in her view the hotel should be built downtown: “Landmark buildings, including any extraordinarily tall ones, should be located downtown.” And she added even more bluntly that downtown “will suffer if the Glen-Tree Tower is approved” at Crabtree Valley.

Now, why is it ‘landmark buildings’ can’t be built in North, West, South, or anywhere else in Raleigh? Why are they only to be built downtown?

I’m afraid what Ms. Kane had the honesty to say – right out loud – is, in fact, pretty close to exactly how Mayor Meeker and some of his close allies on the City Council really feel. That downtown merits special treatment.

If not, why are they spending a billion dollars – as the city boasts – of taxpayers’ money on downtown rehab? And $190 million on a downtown convention center that appears ready to join a long list of convention centers across the nation that lose money? And $20 million to build a hotel downtown? It also looks like we may spend close to a billion dollars if the Triangle Transit Authority ever gets its Light Rail project (that goes downtown but not, say, to North Raleigh) off the launching pad.

No doubt a booming downtown would be fine. But what sense does it make to subsidize building a hotel with taxpayers’ money because it apparently can’t make enough money to pay for itself?

Mayor Meeker’s law firm received $75,000 in legal fees for work related to the new convention center but I suspect the mayor’s focus on downtown goes deeper than that. I suspect Mayor Meeker – and Ms. Kane – with all their talk of promotion and investment downtown have the best of intentions.

But it’s the taxpayers’ money they’re spending and they’re spending a lot of it. They wouldn’t be the first people to make a mistake with good intentions.

The story told of a curious development: it seems politics has brought three Democratic Congressmen to Jesus. In fairness to Congressmen David Price, Bob Etheridge and Brad Miller they probably found the Lord years ago and I expect that what they might say is that the federal budget just led them to decide it was time they started talking about it. ‘After all’, I can hear them saying, ‘Republicans have been doing that for years and the current political wisdom is it’s worked out pretty well for them in elections.’

So this sudden eruption of religious fervor may have more to do with politics than theology.

Which brings us to an interesting question. Why now?

For years, Democrats have generally taken the stand that Republicans introducing religion into politics is a bad thing. They have generally praised the virtues of ‘pluralism’ and denounced the vices of ‘theocracy.’ Why the sudden change?

Now you may or may not agree with Democrats about where to draw the line when it comes to the separation of church and state. But where to put that line is a legitimate debate that’s been going on for a couple of hundred years. And it’s an important debate.

My suspicion is that some Democrats have concluded they’re arguing the short end of the political stick – and they’d rather switch than fight.

So now we have the spectacle of one set of politicians saying they’re as sincere – or more sincere – as Christians than another set of politicians. (I can hear David Price saying, ‘But, Carter, that’s what you Republicans have been doing for years,’ and my answer is, ‘Yes, David, there’s some truth in that.’)

But what’s worrying me is not politicians ‘getting religion’ – it is them ‘using religion’ to get elected.

What Democrats really need to decide is where they want to draw the line between church and state. Then they ought to take their stand and make their case.

Events in the month since the election make me think we’re about to get a real debate for the next two years – and into the next election.

One debate will be over who decides the shape of the city: government or the market?

As a proud liberal Democrat, I once would have said government. But not now.

I like the vision Sanjay Mundra and Dicky Walia have for the new Soleil Center at Crabtree Valley. I like what John Kane has done at North Hills.

That’s what the market is doing.

But I’m not sure I like what city government. Especially using my tax money to subsidize the Marriott hotels and the light-rail boondoggle instead of better schools and better roads.

Raleigh didn’t have a debate on that issue this year. But I’ll bet we do now.

Sanjay Mundra answered his 42-story tower’s critics this way in the N&O’s front-page article Sunday: “If we’re wrong, there’s no need to punish us. The market will punish us.”

If the politicians and bureaucrats are wrong, the political market will punish them.

Confession is good for the soul and it’s always a pleasant surprise to see a politician admit he made a mistake. But former Senator Edwards’ contrition may deserve a second look. The political winds were blowing in one direction when he cast that vote in 2002 to go to war – and they were blowing in the opposite direction when he decided that vote was a mistake three years later. The fact is both times Mr. Edwards voted the way the wind was blowing and if you’re suspecting his latest change of heart might have something to do with polls and running for President in 2008 – you may have a point.

Alright, let’s agree President Bush didn’t mislead anyone.

Where does that leave us? It leaves us with one troubling question.

Now, let me get this right, Mr. Hadley, we’re in a war in Iraq not because President Bush misled anyone but because someone made a mistake and believed a false intelligence report?

Well, everyone makes mistakes and being President is a pretty big job but blundering into a war by mistake – that’s a helluva admission.

Now, I’m no expert in foreign policy and when all this talk about spreading democracy started it sounded pretty good to me. But now I’m beginning to suspect it may be like what Professor Walter Williams once said about Lyndon Johnson’s ‘The Great Society’ welfare programs. ‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions.’ And I’m beginning to ask myself, if we’re going to set our sights on spreading democracy all over the world where are we going to stop?

China could use a little democracy. Are we going to give it to them? Spreading democracy sounds good, and it probably polls pretty good too. But as a practical matter it seems to be a stickey wicket in places like…Iraq.

I guess any politician who wants to get elected to anything higher then dog catcher who says he’s not for spreading democracy hasn’t got a chance. But I’m also beginning to think if we try one or two more experiments in spreading democracy…that may change.

I started out in politics just after Watergate. Nixon resigned, people went to jail and it scared the blazes out of the rest of the politicians and for a few years – relative – honesty reigned.

But today government has become a gaggle of competing financial interests – corporations, conglomerates, lobbies – that want Congress or the State Legislature to give them a legal advantage over their competitors, write them a check from the Treasury (called a subsidy or incentive), or give them a government contract.

RJ Reynolds, just to pick an example, decides it deserves a little help from the government so they ask the legislature to pass a bill – an incentive dressed up with the frills of keeping jobs in North Carolina – that will give them taxpayers’ money or exclude them from taxes other corporations pay.

Is it a coincidence they also give the Democrat Party or the Republican Party or both, say, $100,000?

There is a ‘missing link’ here. The public sees – usually – when an individual or group gives money to a politician. But they seldom see the rest of the picture – what may have been the reason for the gift.

I think it’s time that when anyone with a lobbyist gives a contribution to a politician – they be required to disclose any bill they are lobbying for.

That would show the missing link between money and legislation. And it would turn that kind of thing into an issue in political campaigns. Let Congressmen and Senators explain why they voted to give one financial interest an ‘incentive’ – and then took a contribution from that same group. That’s where this debate should be fought. In public. But to do that we have to drag these ‘deals’ out of the backrooms and into the light of day.

Gary, I get a little ‘itchy’ about overzealous prosecutors too – but if they help do that fine. And what about ‘underzealous’ prosecutors? Does anybody really expect Attorney General Roy Cooper to jump into the lottery scandal ‘hammer and tongs’ in pursuit of justice if it means putting the heat on some of his old political buddies in the State Senate? Attorney General Cooper may surprise me but so far he’s been silent in seven languages.

The issue of corruption in politics is as old as the Republic and it seems to run in cycles. Let’s hope we’ve reached the point where public disgust is about to boil over and puts an end to this one.

Senator Bill Frist (and Congressman Dennis Hastert) have called for Congress to investigate the ‘leak’ of classified information to the Washington Post about “a web of secret prisons being used to harass and interrogate terrorism suspects” (News and Observer, 11-09-05). If this sounds like a Republican response to the Valerie Plame case – it just may be. But I suspect Democrats will be more than glad to hold hearings on those prisons and that they are going to ask a few questions like, ‘What was going on in there?’

And Senator Frist and Congressman Hastert think they can say, ‘No. We’re going to investigate the leak – not the prisons,’ they’re mistaken.

Representative Christopher Shays – a Republican from Connecticut – has already said investigating the leak is “acceptable, as long as Congress investigates the prisons themselves.” Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was blunt. He said, “Talk about not seeing the forest for the trees. The real story is those jails.”

There may be a perfectly good reason for the CIA to be operating covert prisons in foreign nations. And there may not have been a single abuse in any of them. But what if there was? Senator Frist may think he just ‘one-upped’ the Democrats on the Valerie Plame case but what he may have done is opened the biggest can of worms yet.

Far be it from me to criticize anyone for running a negative ad – but the people who make political ads, and the campaigns and candidates do get a little carried away at times.

In Virginia, Republican Jerry Kilgore ran an ad attacking Democrat Tim Kaine, saying, “Tim Kaine says Adolf Hitler doesn’t qualify for the death penalty.”

And in New Jersey, Republican Doug Forrester ran a TV ad quoting Democrat Jon Corzine’s ex-wife as saying, “All I could think was that Jon did let his family down, and he’ll probably let New Jersey down, too.”

Corzine ran a negative ad of his own with a nineteen year old boy in a wheelchair saying, “Doug Forrester doesn’t support embryonic stem cell research, therefore, I don’t think he supports people like me.”

My point is negative ads have their place and purpose – but they do get a little bit ‘whacky’ at times. We’ve come a long way since George Bush senior’s ad in 1988 showing Mike Dukakis driving a tank wearing a leather helmet. At least that was funny.

But alert bloggers knew what Edwards was going to say more than a month ago.

His wife Elizabeth posted a blog on the Orangepolitics website last month. It was mostly about their move to Chapel Hill. But she added at the end:

“John has said that the war was wrong and that his vote for the war was wrong. His taking responsibility for that vote, his direct statement that he was wrong (instead of watering it down with excuses) makes me very proud of him.”

Nobody reported his change in position at the time. So why did it take a month to become front-page news? It may be that the mainstream media is looking for news in all the wrong places.

· Nationally, Democrats hope the stench of corruption around the White House and Tom Delay will help them retake Congress next year.

· In the state, Republicans have been warning darkly for years now of indictments against Speaker Jim Black.

· Two North Carolina elected officials (both Democrats) have gone to prison – Frank Balance and Meg Scott Phipps. A third, Republican John Carrington, is to be sentenced soon.

· The North Carolina lottery has spawned a criminal inquiry by the SBI. FBI agents showed up when the Lottery Commission interviewed potential directors.

Is politics more corrupt today than ever before? I don’t know. But I do know that the pressures – and temptations – that go with raising millions upon millions of dollars for campaigns is bound to lead somebody to step over the legal line.

But am I the only one who worries that zealous and politically ambitious prosecutors – whether in Texas, Raleigh or Washington – can be just as dangerous as zealous political fundraisers?

After all, quite a few prosecutors later turn up as office-seeking politicians themselves.

All I know is this: When I was advising Governor Hunt in the 90s, he always resisted my urging that he push harder for a state lottery. Now I’m glad he did.

Governor Easley gave us a first class example of how that works at his press conference about the lottery scandal last week. According to the Winston-Salem Journal, the press asked:

Question: “Given the level of exposure that the lobbying system has gotten in the last several weeks…do you think the lobbying bill needs to be strengthened and all gifts need to be banned?”

Answer: “Maybe so. The problem you run into is that almost everywhere I go, they’ll give you a T-shirt or a hat…You go to a second-grade class or More at Four…they give you a More at Four T-shirt. You don’t want to turn around and say, ‘I’m sorry, I can’t take this. Y’all are bad for giving it to me.’ So it puts you in a bit of a bind. I think you ought to report it. … I think having to report it is fine. We would all be better off it there were no gifts…so there would be no suspicion on the part of people out there.”

Now that’s called dancing the two step with the press. Instead of answering the question he asked – about Scientific Games paying a lottery commissioner $10,000 the day after he was appointed – the governor waxed eloquent about More at Four T-shirts.

The Governor wasn’t done.

Question: “Should Scientific Games be removed from the list of potential vendors for a lottery contract?”

Answer: The Governor said he has confidence in the lottery commission and added, “I think they’ll delve into this and find out more. You know, most of what we know now came from Scientific Games. Once they filed their report that they had the relationship with Mr. Geddings, paying him the $24,000 or $25,000, that’s when we knew this guy’s got to go. I’d look into Scientific Games and find out how deep this went. Was this just one person, or was this the culture in the community…of the entire corporation?”

If Geddings had ‘to go’ for taking $24,000 from Scientific Games how come Scientific Games doesn’t have ‘to go’ for giving it to him? Dodge two for the Governor.

Question: “When you signed the lottery bill, did you have knowledge that Scientific Games had a hand in writing part of it?”

Answer: “Did not. But let me be completely honest with you. I have never seen a lobbyist over there that I can recall that didn’t offer some sort of language. … The first thing you generally tell them is, ‘Give me some language. Show me what you’re talking about.’ … So I don’t think that is at all unusual that they would ask for some language. The press association is always giving us language. … The sheriff’s association gives us language. Nothing wrong with that. Having said that, there may be something inappropriate about the vehicle that was used, i.e., was the person who submitted the language as a lobbyist registered as a lobbyist?”

Red flags went up as soon as I read that line, “let me be completely honest with you.” Here’s what the Governor said: He ‘didn’t know,’ but it happens all the time and there’s ‘nothing wrong with that’ but it may be ‘inappropriate’ this time. That about covers all the bases.

Question: “Should lottery tickets be sold at businesses that also have video-poker machines?”

Answer: “I think you’re going to find that the lottery will pretty much do away with the video-poker industry…I think it’s likely that you’re going to see all the retailers opt for the lottery, and I think you’re going to see consumers opt for the lottery. It’s a decision for the commission to make, unless the legislature acts on it. … I would expect if there’s an opportunity to put the lottery in and video poker out, they’re going to seize that, and I don’t think that would be necessarily a bad thing. And I think a hundred sheriffs in this state would be very grateful.”

The Governor said what the Lottery Commission can’t do, what the legislature can do and what the sheriffs want to do. But after reading that answer do you have a clue whether the Governor wants to ban video poker or not?

That’s called ‘Dancing the Two-Step with the Press.”

Three years ago, Morgan broke with House Republicans to form a coalition with Democratic House leader Jim Black. Morgan had his reasons for not supporting the Republican Caucus choice for Speaker. But nobody came out of that imbroglio with clean hands.

Since then Morgan has continued his alliance with Black. Even if Republicans win the next House election, as long as Morgan can persuade just four or five Republicans to follow him into a coalition with the Democrats, Republicans are faced with the prospect of finding themselves with no power or with Morgan and a Democrat as Co-Speakers.

If Mr. Boylan runs he will challenge Representative Morgan to answer a simple question, ‘If you are reelected will you pledge not to form a coalition with the Democrats?’ And he will keep asking that question until he gets an answer.

Granted, there are times when breaking ranks with the party line is right and proper. But by forming what appears to be a more or less permanent alliance with Democrats in the House, Morgan has raised a different issue from his refusal to support Leo Daughtry, the Republican Caucus choice for Speaker, three years ago.

This is an issue Republicans in North Carolina are going to have to face and a debate they are going to have – not just in Morgan’s district but across the state. The sooner they get on with it the better off they’ll be.

Two speeches by U.S. Senators frame the dilemma that will dominate next year’s elections – for Rove and for Democrats.

First, John McCain spoke out about what he sees as looming disaster in Iraq. But his solution is different: more troops, not withdrawal.

Then John Kerry weighed in to demand – as have a handful of Republicans, including NC Congressman Walter Jones – a deadline for troop withdrawals.

No matter what Rove does and no matter what the newly energized Democrats do, the 2006 elections will ride on what’s happening in Iraq.

But – right now – the American people don’t trust either party when it comes to what to do in Iraq.

Bush, Cheney, Rumfeld, et al are discredited because they led us into a war on the promises we’d find WMDs and be greeted as liberators.

But Democrats don’t have any leader with the credibility to offer an alternative.

In effect, Americans know what’s wrong with both parties’ solutions. They believe it would be a mistake to just pull out. And they believe it’s a mistake to stay put. But they don’t know what’s right.

John McCain certainly has credibility. But are voters willing to swallow his medicine?

That was a political lifetime ago.

Tuesday’s elections in Virginia, New Jersey and California have Democrats high-fiving. Democrats won governor’s races in Virginia and New Jersey, and Arnold got waxed in his California referendums.

Actually, the trend started a month ago right here in Raleigh, when Democrats swept the (supposedly) nonpartisan mayor’s and city council races.

You could feel it coming. Republicans were dispirited. Democrats smelled blood, as Bush’s poll numbers sank in the triple quagmires of Iraq, Plamegate and Katrina (or “Heckuva job, Brownie”-gate).

And Democrats have been boasting all week that they’re looking forward to next year.

Not so fast. Rove was saying the same thing last November.

Capstrat – the Raleigh Public Relations firm – will receive a $12,000 monthly retainer. French/West will receive $4,000 per month.

So, how about that? The Mayor’s Convention Center is still little more than a $192 million hole in the ground and he’s already got two PR firms under contract to promote it.

Whatever happened to, ‘If you build it they will come’?

City Councilman Philip Isley asked why the city needs to hire a consultant “when it has already paid architects to design a green [environmentally correct] building.”

Good question

Now, the newspapers are reporting Rand had more reasons to know Geddings than just the lottery. According to the press, the State Democratic Party paid Geddings “nearly $109,000″ to work on state Senate campaigns. And Lt. Governor Beverly Perdue – who chairs the State Senate – also paid Geddings a whopping $1.5 million during her 2000 campaign.

The News and Observer also reports Geddings has worked with Jay Reiff, Governor Easley’s campaign manager, in campaigns – not Easley’s – and that several members of Easley’s staff knew Geddings was doing radio ads for the NCAE attacking Republicans who opposed the lottery. But when the News and Observer asked Mac McCorkle, one of Governor Easley’s advisors, what he told Easley about Geddings’ ads – McCorkle said that was privileged information.

Privileged information? Is Mr. McCorkle an attorney or a political consultant? Mr. McCorkle added innocently that “he didn’t know they [the ads] had run until last week.”

Think about that. Mr. McCorkle was told they would run last summer. August, the News and Observer reported they were running. But now Mr. McCorkle says he didn’t know they had actually aired. More amnesia?

According to phone records obtained by the N&O, another Easley aide – Scott Anderson – called Geddings forty-six times while Anderson worked in the Governor’s office. Mr. Anderson has now decided – months after the fact – that those were personal calls and he has reimbursed the state. And finally, Easley aide Dan Gerlach, called Geddings twice on September 19, just three days before Geddings was appointed to the lottery commission.

So what does Governor Easley say about all this? Well, at his press conference, the Governor had his own attack of amnesia. The press asked (Winston-Salem Journal, 11-09-05), “When did you first hear the name Kevin Geddings, and what interactions have you had with him and Scientific Games?”

Easley said he knew Geddings was chief of staff to South Carolina Governor Jim Hodges and added, “I did not have a relationship with him like say, a Scott Anderson would.”

Now that’s called an evasion. The Governor told us what kind of relationship he did not have with Geddings. But he told us nothing about the relationship he did have.

And what about Scientific Games? The Governor said: “All the venders pay a courtesy visit…they pay a courtesy visit to our office. And I do remember meeting briefly with Scientific Games.” Then amnesia struck: “I don’t recall who was in the meeting…I met with them as well as others…and I am told that one of the people in the meeting was Alan Middleton…quite honestly I wouldn’t know him if he walked in here now.”

So Senator Tony Rand was ‘fuzzy,’ and Mr. McCorkle ‘didn’t know’, and Mr. Anderson’s calls were ‘personal calls’ and Governor Easley can’t recall who he met with.

Pretty soon, nobody is going to be able to remember whether the lottery passed or not.

How appalled? Not appalled enough to say that anyone – like Scientific Games – who paid a lottery commissioner $10,000 the day after he was appointed – should be banned from bidding on a contract.

Instead, Mr. Sanders says Scientific Games is “still a potential bidder.”

Here is a simple fact: Scientific Games paid Geddings $10,000 and Geddings kept it a secret. If making payments to a lottery commissioner doesn’t disqualify you from bidding on a contract – what does?

This just gets ‘smellier and smellier.’

Now that Kevin Geddings, Scientific Games hand-picked lottery commissioner, has resigned all’s right with the world and North Carolina can roll on to lottery heaven. Right? Wrong.

The News and Observer just threw a wet blanket over Act II of the lottery. The News and Observer reports “in one of his final acts as a state lottery commissioner, Kevin Geddings helped determine a list of finalists for the most important job at the new state lottery: its director…among the potential candidates are ‘two men in charge of the South Carolina Lottery, which Geddings helped create.”

The two candidates from South Carolina for the top lottery job told the newspapers “they barely know Geddings.” But then it turned out they served on South Carolina Governor Jim Hodges ‘transition team’ with Geddings – who then went on to be Hodges chief of staff.

Did it trouble Lottery Czar Charles Sanders that Geddings may have left a ‘ringer’ behind?

Not at all. Sanders said, “Kevin had virtually zero impact on this.”

No impact? Geddings was one of three commissioners who voted on the nominees.

You think that’s something? Sit down. Last year the foundation gave the museum $370,000. And on top of that the state legislature gave it another $400,000.

The foundation – its board is appointed by Governor Easley, Senate Leader Marc Basnight and House Leader Jim Black – spent almost as much on teapots - $220,000 – as it spent for scholarships to Community Colleges ($300,000).

That’s what passes for common sense in politics.

No, he wasn’t running. But his lieutenant governor – an anti-death penalty Democrat – was. And he won.

So Warner now moves to the top of the 2008 White House speculation list. He’s smart, articulate, rich and has a proven record in business and as Governor.

But don’t get carried away about Democrats winning two Governor’s races in a row in Virginia. Democrats have won four in row in North Carolina – and none by as close a margin as the Virginia election.

South Carolina already does that. North Carolina now bans lobbyists from making campaign contributions during legislative sessions, but not between sessions.

North Carolina’s legislature passed a law this year that will require lobbyists to start reporting “good will” entertainment expenditures in 2007.

Why not go all the way and ban both contributions and entertainment?

Truth is, a lot of lobbyists would like a blanket prohibition. They privately complain about being hit up by legislators for contributions and fundraising help. But they’re in a position where it’s hard to say no.

In effect, lobbyists become unpaid fundraisers for the politicians. That’s bad government.

The amount of money spent in Raleigh on “good will” entertaining (that’s where, supposedly, no specific legislation is discussed) is enormous. So much that I expect this idea to be vehemently opposed by the city’s finer dining establishments.

Legislators could still have lunch, dinner or drinks with lobbyists. They would just have to pay their own way. They might end up eating and drinking less. That would be not only ethically, but also physically healthier.

Scientific Games is one of the mega-gaming companies that run lotteries. It wants to run the North Carolina lottery and 1) it got language inserted into the Lottery Bill (by an amenable legislator ) apparently, to give it a ‘leg up’ over competitors; 2) it got its own man on the Lottery Commission that awards the contracts; and 3) did it all secretly.

In fact, according to the Raleigh News and Observer, Scientific Games even paid its ‘friend’ on the Lottery Commission, Kevin Geddings, $9,500 the day after he was appointed. And Mr. Geddings didn’t report that money – or another $15,000 he received from Scientific Games – on his ethics report.

Stacking the deck to win the lottery by getting your man on the Commission that awards the contracts has to rank right up there with the “Black Sox Scandal”– ‘fixing’ the 1919 World Series – as one of the most purely brazen maneuvers of all time.

One of the things Scientific Games paid Mr. Geddings $5,000 to do was coach Senator Tony Rand – the Democrat Majority Leader – for a debate on the lottery. When it comes to his role in all this, Senator Tony Rand, the Democrat Majority Leader has had an almost complete case of amnesia.

Senator Rand says he only ‘vaguely’ recalls ever meeting Mr. Geddings. He says his recollections of dealing with Geddings are ‘fuzzy.’ He says Geddings, lobbyist Meredith Norris and ‘maybe’ someone else dropped by his office before that debate – the one paid Geddings to coach Rand for – but it was no big deal. They just sat ‘around shooting the breeze.’ As for Geddings ‘coaching’ him, Rand added, “Oh, hell no, I didn’t need any coaching.” Rand also only ‘vaguely’ remembers having dinner with Geddings after the debate. And he says he didn’t know whom Geddings represented.

Think about that a minute. The Senate Majority Leader, the man who steered the lottery through the Senate, met with three lottery lobbyists and had no idea who they represented?

What’s more, the third man in that meeting with Geddings and Meredith Norris – the one Rand can’t remember his name – appears to be Scientific Games Vice President Alan Middleton, who wrote language that was inserted in the Lottery Bill with the intention of helping Scientific Games. Want to guess who the newspapers report may have put that language in the bill? Tony Rand. (Mr. Geddings also turns out to have been a political consultant to Lt. Gov. Beverly Purdue – who cast the deciding vote for the lottery in the Senate).

There’s one other puzzling question here. Where are House and Senate Republicans? They have been strangely silent. And it’s time they started speaking out. Republican legislators should do two things. First, they should call for a bi-partisan House-Senate Investigation. Second, they should demand Scientific Games be banned from bidding.

And if Democrats want to oppose either proposal, let them defend that in the next election.

I beg to differ.

Prosecutors may find the coverup easier to prove. Politicians might find the coverup easier to use as a bludgeon on their opponents.

But the crime is even worse than the coverup.

The crime in Watergate was that Nixon’s crowd was paying for a sophisticated operation to spy on and disrupt his political opponents.

The “crime” in Monicagate was that Clinton was getting oral sex in the White House from a woman young enough to be his daughter.

The crime in Scootergate – it seems to me – is that the Bush/Cheney crowd was willing to unmask and endanger a covert CIA agent as a way of retaliating against a critic of the Iraq War.

Democrats in Washington want to go two ways:

•Attack Bush’s people for lying to a prosecutor. At least, they wanted to do this until Karl Rove, the Big Enchilada, seemed to skate away from indictment.

•Make the story that Bush, et al lied about WMDs. Problem is, the Democrats swallowed that WMD line, too. They even helped sell it at the time.

Where’s the outrage of supposed patriots when high federal officials apparently conspire among themselves to out a secret intelligence agent – just to get back at somebody who’s criticizing them publicly?

Some might dare call it treason.