Ticket-splitting in NC (11-08-2024--Hour3)

[00:00:04] What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to 3 on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content, like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to thepetekalendershow.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support.

[00:00:28] I do have messages to read. I shall get to them. I want to start off, though, because I had this in the stack of stuff from right after the election, and I haven't gotten to it, so I want to get to it before the week is out because, well, I don't know if it'll be as much fun to talk about next week.

[00:00:46] But the deputy opinion editor for the Charlotte Observer, Paige Mastin, she's confused. And you know me. Right, I'm a giver. So I'm trying to help her through her understanding of what transpired on election night.

[00:01:12] So the headline on this piece was called NC voters rejected extremism on their ballot. So why did they still choose Trump?

[00:01:24] I don't understand. She sounds a lot like some of the some of the Republican and conservative activists and Twitterers that I see, too.

[00:01:35] I see there are calls now to burn down the North Carolina Republican Party. Has to be completely dismantled.

[00:01:43] Because we won five out of five or five out of 10 Council of State seats and all of the judicial races and the state went for Trump.

[00:02:00] And we won all of those House races and we kept a Senate supermajority.

[00:02:07] And we came within one vote of the supermajority in the House.

[00:02:13] Like, so that's failure.

[00:02:17] No, see, to the those conservatives, it's failure because Robinson and Bishop did not win.

[00:02:24] And no matter how many times you try to tell people that North Carolina splits their tickets, they don't believe it.

[00:02:32] I don't know why.

[00:02:35] You could recommend books.

[00:02:37] Paradox of North Carolina Politics, for example.

[00:02:42] It goes through the history of North Carolina politics over the last like 150 years.

[00:02:48] And.

[00:02:49] And.

[00:02:50] The roots of the political philosophies and the way that people vote are deeply embedded in this state.

[00:02:56] And.

[00:02:58] This is the norm.

[00:03:01] And I can say that as many times as people ask me this question, how did Trump win?

[00:03:08] But fill in the blank on any Republican for governor except for Pat McQuarrie and Jim Martin.

[00:03:15] How did they lose?

[00:03:16] How did any of these lieutenant governors or anybody?

[00:03:20] Let me think about that, too.

[00:03:21] It's usually the lieutenant governors who lose in the race for governor.

[00:03:25] Why?

[00:03:27] You know, Pat McQuarrie beat Walter Dalton.

[00:03:30] Who?

[00:03:31] Walter Dalton.

[00:03:32] That was his ad.

[00:03:34] Walter Dalton, the lieutenant governor of North Carolina, lost to Pat McQuarrie.

[00:03:40] And his ad campaign.

[00:03:42] Had to introduce himself to the voters.

[00:03:46] And they did it in this.

[00:03:49] This really corny, comical way.

[00:03:52] Or comically corny way.

[00:03:55] Hey, have you heard about Walter Dalton?

[00:03:57] Who?

[00:03:58] Walter Dalton.

[00:03:59] Who?

[00:03:59] Walter Dalton.

[00:04:00] They just kept saying it.

[00:04:02] I still remember it.

[00:04:03] But I, you know.

[00:04:05] I don't know.

[00:04:06] I remember those types of things.

[00:04:07] But nobody knew who he was.

[00:04:09] This is the sitting lieutenant governor of the state.

[00:04:12] And nobody knew who he was.

[00:04:14] Mark Robinson tried to run as lieutenant governor.

[00:04:19] Dan Forrest tried to run as lieutenant governor.

[00:04:23] Right?

[00:04:23] The attorneys general, they usually do a pretty good job.

[00:04:26] Because they can run, like, on this, you know, I care about crime platform, even if they can't clear out the rape kit backlog.

[00:04:34] Oh, which, by the way, Jeff Jackson, now going to be the attorney general in the state of North Carolina.

[00:04:40] Maybe he can clear out the rape kit backlog that Josh Stein cleared out.

[00:04:46] That Roy Cooper cleared out.

[00:04:49] Right?

[00:04:50] Maybe.

[00:04:51] This will be.

[00:04:55] So, yeah.

[00:04:56] North Carolina splits their tickets.

[00:04:58] And Paige Mastin at the Charlotte Observer.

[00:05:01] She's young.

[00:05:02] I understand.

[00:05:02] Like, she got.

[00:05:03] She was.

[00:05:04] Remember, like, they made a big deal of the fact that she was, like, right out of college or something.

[00:05:08] And then they put her in this position at the Charlotte Observer as, you know, a youth voice.

[00:05:12] The child shall lead us.

[00:05:14] Well, sure.

[00:05:15] Okay.

[00:05:15] Yeah, I mean, she's 21 or 22.

[00:05:18] What doesn't she know?

[00:05:20] Well, apparently she doesn't know that North Carolina splits their tickets.

[00:05:23] So, she says, here's the good news.

[00:05:27] Voters in North Carolina were not pleased with what the most extreme candidates on their ballots were selling.

[00:05:34] And yet, those same voters who handed Mark Robinson and Dan Bishop and Michelle Morrow losses.

[00:05:42] She was the superintendent for public instruction candidate.

[00:05:45] The same voters who handed them losses in key races will cast their vote for the man who is responsible for it all.

[00:05:52] Donald Trump.

[00:05:55] So, you've heard me say, I'm sure, when you don't understand the results, reassess your assumptions.

[00:06:02] Right?

[00:06:03] Right?

[00:06:03] You obviously are running off of some false assumptions in order to get to a conclusion.

[00:06:12] But that conclusion is not squaring with reality.

[00:06:16] And that has you confused.

[00:06:18] Well, if you go back and reassess the assumption, say, okay, maybe you were wrong in some of these underlying assumptions that prompted you to draw the erroneous conclusion.

[00:06:29] Because, obviously, the conclusion you drew was, in fact, erroneous.

[00:06:33] Because reality turned out to be something else.

[00:06:36] Right?

[00:06:38] She says, that means there are hundreds of thousands of voters who rejected Robinson, Bishop, or Morrow, or all three, but still voted for Trump.

[00:06:49] And she doesn't know why.

[00:06:50] Well, Paige, I would submit maybe that your Democrat voters that voted for Jackson and Stein and Green for those races, I have to believe that they're racists and sexists and xenophobes and Islamophobes and basically Hitler.

[00:07:15] Right?

[00:07:15] Right?

[00:07:15] That explains it, does it not?

[00:07:17] See, if I come from the assumption that baby Jesus, a.k.a. Jeff Jackson, is Hitler, then it makes sense.

[00:07:25] Right?

[00:07:25] Right?

[00:07:28] Oh, no, that's not true.

[00:07:30] That can't be true.

[00:07:31] See, that cannot be true because I know Jeff Jackson's not Hitler.

[00:07:36] He's not Hitler-rejacent.

[00:07:38] Not a fascist.

[00:07:39] Not an extremist.

[00:07:41] He's not any of those things.

[00:07:43] Okay?

[00:07:46] What might the other assumption be, then?

[00:07:52] Maybe some of the people you think are extremists are not.

[00:07:55] Right?

[00:07:55] See, that would be a logical thought experiment to run.

[00:08:00] But it is the Charlotte Observer, so.

[00:08:04] She says,

[00:08:05] It's not particularly surprising that voters would shun the most extreme group of candidates for statewide office in North Carolina's history.

[00:08:12] The kind of visceral hate they espouse has never resonated well with the voters of our purple state.

[00:08:18] And there was really never a reason to think it suddenly would now.

[00:08:22] See, this is all just, this is projection that she's doing.

[00:08:25] She's projecting onto millions of people.

[00:08:29] I mean, and just think about the hubris necessary to do that.

[00:08:32] Right?

[00:08:33] That you know how every voter in North Carolina, rather, thinks about all of the candidates.

[00:08:42] Right?

[00:08:44] But also, then, what must she think of the people who voted for?

[00:08:49] Dan Bishop, Mark Robinson, Michelle Morrow.

[00:08:53] What must they think of them?

[00:08:56] See, part of the problem with, like, how Weatherman ran into, when he was running for lieutenant governor, he lost to Rachel Hunt.

[00:09:03] And I don't believe that it's her last name that did it.

[00:09:06] But I believe it's the fact that lieutenant governors are, it's a weak position.

[00:09:12] It doesn't get a lot of coverage.

[00:09:15] Right?

[00:09:16] Mark Robinson, trying to run for governor, had a lot of baggage.

[00:09:20] This is something that the Republicans that, you know, they don't believe any of the reporting about Mark Robinson.

[00:09:27] And that's fine.

[00:09:28] You don't have to believe it.

[00:09:30] But a lot of people did.

[00:09:33] That's not a problem with the North Carolina GOP.

[00:09:36] Well, they needed to fight for him, Pete.

[00:09:38] They don't know if it's true or not, either.

[00:09:41] And if it turns out to be true, right, if those stories do turn out to be true, and you can disagree that they're true.

[00:09:48] I'm not trying to convince you one way or the other.

[00:09:50] I don't know.

[00:09:51] I wasn't there with Mark Robinson and his laptop at 3 a.m.

[00:09:55] Like, I don't know.

[00:09:58] But a lot of people were not willing to take that risk on him.

[00:10:02] Now, maybe you think that they should have.

[00:10:04] That's fine.

[00:10:05] But they made a different decision.

[00:10:09] Well, they needed to stand up for him and stand with Mark Robinson and do that, right?

[00:10:13] That's what one side or an element inside the Republican Party is saying.

[00:10:18] And they're saying that the entire Republican Party now needs to be burned to the ground because of that, which is kind of stupid in my estimation.

[00:10:27] I mean, this is the Republican Party that has been in control of the state since they won in 2011 or 2010.

[00:10:33] They took office in 2011.

[00:10:36] Breaking the Democrat stranglehold on North Carolina that Democrats had enjoyed for like 150 years since Reconstruction.

[00:10:47] So, yeah, no, I don't want to go back to Democrat control.

[00:10:50] That's my own personal bias.

[00:10:52] I prefer Republicans be in control versus Democrats being in control.

[00:10:59] But there's a reason, Paige Mastin writes, that extremists keep appearing on the ballot North Carolina across the country.

[00:11:05] It's because Trump still dominates the Republican Party and its voters are apparently still willing to let him, no matter how much they dislike the fanatical acolytes that have spawned under his influence.

[00:11:18] She said, to be very clear, there would be no Mark Robinson, Dan Bishop or Michelle Morrow on our ballot if it weren't for Donald Trump.

[00:11:26] And that, my friends, is false.

[00:11:29] That is a lie, if not ignorance.

[00:11:32] Dan Bishop has been in elected office prior to the rise of Donald Trump, for one.

[00:11:39] Mark Robinson rose to fame because of why?

[00:11:42] Not Donald Trump because of a speech he gave at a Greensboro City Council meeting about gun control.

[00:11:48] It had nothing to do with Donald Trump.

[00:11:52] Michelle Morrow, maybe a little bit more on her case.

[00:11:56] But she won in a primary because her grassroots activism outworked the incumbent.

[00:12:03] And they lost in their races for several different reasons.

[00:12:10] If you think every single person that endorses Donald Trump can win because of it, you're nuts.

[00:12:18] There's only one Donald Trump.

[00:12:20] And I think that is a lesson that a lot of Republicans need to have drilled into their heads.

[00:12:24] There is only one Donald Trump.

[00:12:26] You did not have a TV show called The Apprentice.

[00:12:29] You were not in movies.

[00:12:30] You were not featured in rap songs and lyrics for decades.

[00:12:34] You are not Donald Trump.

[00:12:36] There's only one of him.

[00:12:40] I know.

[00:12:41] I'm blasting away at all sorts of groups here.

[00:12:44] I apologize.

[00:12:44] It's not intentional.

[00:12:46] It's just where my mind goes.

[00:12:47] You know, stories are powerful.

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[00:13:50] Yes, yes.

[00:13:51] The deputy editor, sorry, the deputy opinion editor of the Charlotte Observer, Paige Mastin,

[00:13:59] covers stories that impact people in Charlotte and across the state.

[00:14:02] A lifelong North Carolinian.

[00:14:04] She grew up in Raleigh and graduated from Chapel Hill in 2021.

[00:14:09] So she may not know a lot of the history.

[00:14:13] Being a Chapel Hill grad and all, and being young, she may not know a lot of the North Carolina history.

[00:14:18] I don't know.

[00:14:19] But the, and look, a lot of people don't know.

[00:14:22] I didn't know it.

[00:14:23] I had to learn it.

[00:14:25] And the longer that you're covering North Carolina politics and such and elections,

[00:14:30] then you'll see familiar patterns emerge.

[00:14:33] And we have a lot of people that have come to this state, for example,

[00:14:38] that don't know anything about North Carolina politics.

[00:14:40] They don't know the history.

[00:14:42] They arrive and they think that it's been under Republican control forever.

[00:14:46] And, you know, it's all, you know, right-wing racist state and all of this stuff.

[00:14:52] And, like, no, the racists were always Democrats for, like, 150 years.

[00:14:59] They ran everything.

[00:15:01] Like, they literally, like, she works for a publication whose sister outlet,

[00:15:06] the Raleigh News and Observer, literally helped to foment a race riot and a coup d'etat in Wilmington.

[00:15:16] In 1898, I believe.

[00:15:18] The Wilmington riots where a Republican city council with the fusion,

[00:15:24] they called it a fusion government.

[00:15:26] Republicans and black leaders had gotten together in order to beat the Democrats.

[00:15:33] And they won.

[00:15:34] And Democrats then whipped up a mob, literally mobs,

[00:15:40] that ran through the streets burning down black newspapers and businesses and murdering people.

[00:15:46] And black people fled Wilmington.

[00:15:50] And then Democrats installed themselves in power.

[00:15:55] Like, they literally had, what were they called?

[00:15:57] The Red Brigade or something like that.

[00:15:59] I forget what it was called.

[00:16:01] And they would run, they would roll around the state and,

[00:16:04] and put down Republican rallies.

[00:16:07] Beat people up and such.

[00:16:10] So, that's the history of the state.

[00:16:12] You have a lot of people also who are still registered Democrats,

[00:16:15] but don't vote that way.

[00:16:17] Because they just can't bring themselves to disappoint Grandpa.

[00:16:21] Seriously.

[00:16:22] Like, out in the mountain counties, there are a lot of Democrats out there,

[00:16:25] and they haven't voted for a Democrat, like, ever.

[00:16:30] But everybody in their family is registered Democrat, so they're Democrat.

[00:16:33] Now, also, you have a lot of people that are registered Democrats

[00:16:35] because they had to or else they couldn't get their jobs.

[00:16:38] Because the Democrats wouldn't allow you to get a civil service job

[00:16:42] unless you were a Democrat.

[00:16:44] And then they would take money from you for their campaigns.

[00:16:48] That's how they ran this state.

[00:16:49] Let's go to the phone lines now and speak with Lori.

[00:16:52] Welcome to the show.

[00:16:53] Hey, Lori.

[00:16:54] Hey, Pete.

[00:16:55] How are you today?

[00:16:56] Hey, I'm great.

[00:16:56] How are you?

[00:16:57] Good.

[00:16:58] I just wanted to tell you a story.

[00:17:00] It's kind of funny.

[00:17:01] I do like funny stories, so let's hear it.

[00:17:04] Well, you're the best at telling them.

[00:17:06] You're the best.

[00:17:08] Especially the COVID story and having to get the COVID test.

[00:17:11] Ah.

[00:17:13] One of my favorites.

[00:17:15] Just to reiterate where you were saying earlier is in 1991,

[00:17:20] I interviewed for Cabarrus County Sheriff.

[00:17:23] It was a part-time position.

[00:17:25] The sheriff was Sheriff Candidate.

[00:17:27] Great guy.

[00:17:28] Great organization.

[00:17:30] But I was just fresh out of the Navy.

[00:17:32] I just moved here.

[00:17:34] I was a Yankee.

[00:17:36] Now I'm a damn Yankee because I never went back.

[00:17:40] But no, in the interview, he said, I cannot legally tell you how you're going to vote, but I can tell you how you're going to register.

[00:17:50] And if you want to work here, you're going to register Democrat.

[00:17:54] And I said, oh, okay.

[00:17:55] I didn't know any better.

[00:17:56] I was like 21 years old.

[00:17:58] I said, okay.

[00:17:59] And then he also told me, and don't get your money and your honey in the same place.

[00:18:05] What?

[00:18:06] I don't even know what that means.

[00:18:07] Wait a minute.

[00:18:08] What does that even mean?

[00:18:09] Don't get your money and your honey in this?

[00:18:11] Oh.

[00:18:12] Don't date anybody in the workplace.

[00:18:13] Don't frat.

[00:18:14] Yes.

[00:18:15] Yes.

[00:18:16] I had to come home and ask my husband.

[00:18:18] I said, I'm not from here.

[00:18:20] I don't know what that means.

[00:18:22] But no, it's a true story.

[00:18:24] But again, they were a great organization.

[00:18:26] He was a great sheriff.

[00:18:27] I had no problem.

[00:18:28] I worked there for probably a year and a half.

[00:18:30] Mm-hmm.

[00:18:31] Right.

[00:18:31] So I.

[00:18:31] No, he did.

[00:18:32] He told me, if you want to work here, you will register Democrat.

[00:18:35] And when was this?

[00:18:36] Okay.

[00:18:37] 1991.

[00:18:38] Yeah.

[00:18:38] 91.

[00:18:39] Yeah.

[00:18:40] Makes sense.

[00:18:40] And that stuff still happens.

[00:18:42] It was still going on in 1991.

[00:18:42] 91.

[00:18:43] Yeah.

[00:18:43] I'm sure it still happens now.

[00:18:45] Probably.

[00:18:46] Because of the sheriff's offices being an elected office.

[00:18:50] Yes.

[00:18:50] Yeah.

[00:18:51] I have no doubt that's still the case.

[00:18:53] Where they.

[00:18:53] Especially, like, closer east.

[00:18:56] Like.

[00:18:57] Yeah.

[00:18:57] Down east.

[00:18:58] Yeah.

[00:18:58] Yeah.

[00:18:59] Yeah.

[00:19:00] I had a.

[00:19:03] My wife's uncle.

[00:19:06] He was a long time government employee for the state of North Carolina.

[00:19:10] Like 50 years.

[00:19:12] 40 years.

[00:19:13] Something like that.

[00:19:14] And.

[00:19:15] He was not at all politically a Democrat.

[00:19:19] But he was a lifelong registered Democrat.

[00:19:22] Because he never would have been hired.

[00:19:24] They told him.

[00:19:25] Like, you.

[00:19:25] We will not hire you unless you are a Democrat.

[00:19:29] Yeah.

[00:19:29] And I always thought it was funny.

[00:19:30] Because I was like.

[00:19:31] Well, how.

[00:19:32] How are they going to know how I registered?

[00:19:35] Oh, I can pull your voter card.

[00:19:37] Like.

[00:19:37] I never.

[00:19:38] No.

[00:19:39] I can go to the.

[00:19:39] You can pull it.

[00:19:40] Yeah.

[00:19:40] You can pull the voter registration.

[00:19:42] I can find.

[00:19:42] If I know your name.

[00:19:43] I can find out your voter registration.

[00:19:45] Yeah.

[00:19:46] And I thought that was funny.

[00:19:47] But no.

[00:19:48] True story.

[00:19:49] 1991.

[00:19:50] Yeah.

[00:19:50] No, I believe it.

[00:19:50] Lori.

[00:19:51] I appreciate the call.

[00:19:52] You have a great day, Pete.

[00:19:53] You too.

[00:19:54] Have a good weekend.

[00:19:55] Yeah.

[00:19:55] Like.

[00:19:56] I tell that story.

[00:19:59] Anybody who was around.

[00:20:02] I.

[00:20:02] Again.

[00:20:03] I understand people who are new arrivals within the last, say, 10 years, 15 years or so.

[00:20:08] You probably are not even.

[00:20:09] You don't believe this.

[00:20:11] It just sounds so crazy.

[00:20:13] But it's true.

[00:20:15] And.

[00:20:15] They would go around.

[00:20:17] So when you're in the office then.

[00:20:19] When you're working.

[00:20:20] You know.

[00:20:21] For this.

[00:20:21] And this happened at the city level.

[00:20:23] The county level.

[00:20:24] And the state level.

[00:20:25] That was all part of the machine.

[00:20:27] And so the political machine.

[00:20:29] And so.

[00:20:30] You wouldn't get the job.

[00:20:33] These are patronage jobs.

[00:20:35] Right.

[00:20:35] You wouldn't get the gig.

[00:20:36] Unless you were registered.

[00:20:38] And then on election day.

[00:20:40] You were responsible for going around and, you know, getting people to go vote on election day.

[00:20:47] And back then they would, you know, pay people booze, cigarettes, money, whatever.

[00:20:52] Um.

[00:20:53] And then you would have to donate to the party and the, you know, the, the candidates that the boss told you to vote for.

[00:21:03] And, and to donate to.

[00:21:05] They would walk around.

[00:21:07] They would, you know.

[00:21:07] So, I mean, if you think about it.

[00:21:09] So you get this job.

[00:21:11] You're getting taxpayer dollars for your payment.

[00:21:14] Right.

[00:21:14] For your salary.

[00:21:15] So you're getting paid in taxpayer dollars.

[00:21:18] You are then taking some of those taxpayer dollars and handing it over to a politician who then creates more jobs for more people.

[00:21:27] To then donate more money to the politician.

[00:21:31] But those, those dollars are coming from who?

[00:21:36] Taxpayers.

[00:21:38] Like this is essentially a money laundering operation.

[00:21:42] Now, laws have been passed since.

[00:21:46] So now they're, you know, the professionalization of the civil service core.

[00:21:52] However, most of the people that work in state government, you know, in Raleigh, they are Democrats.

[00:22:00] And they vote.

[00:22:01] They vote for people that are going to be their bosses.

[00:22:04] And they don't want people to not know that, you know, they, they want the Democrats in there because the Democrats are, you know, going to give them more pay raises and such.

[00:22:15] So that's why a lot of the ticket splitting still happens.

[00:22:18] But I also think it's interesting that in this op-ed at the Charlotte Observer, where the author, Paige Mastin, who is the deputy opinion editor for the Observer,

[00:22:35] I'm curious why the assumption is that these Trump voters split their ticket.

[00:22:41] Like, why would these fascist voters vote for these Democrats when maybe you should flip that around?

[00:22:51] Right.

[00:22:52] Why is it these awful Trump voters coming over to your guy?

[00:22:59] Maybe it's your guys who are awful that attracted the Trump voters.

[00:23:03] Why wouldn't you consider that?

[00:23:07] Right.

[00:23:08] I'm not making that case.

[00:23:09] I'm just saying, why not run the logical thought experiment?

[00:23:15] Michael, welcome to the show.

[00:23:17] Hey, Michael.

[00:23:18] Hey, how are you, sir?

[00:23:20] I'm good.

[00:23:20] What's going on?

[00:23:21] I had the same sort of situation that the lady said about the sheriff or whatever, you know, how to register.

[00:23:34] Same thing, probably within two years after she did it.

[00:23:39] And this was in the county north of here.

[00:23:47] So you had to, in order to get a government job, you too had to register as a Democrat.

[00:23:53] It was put to me as, you should register Democrat if you have a notion you want to do this job.

[00:24:02] Right.

[00:24:02] And I did all the paperwork and all that kind of stuff.

[00:24:05] And, you know.

[00:24:07] Right.

[00:24:08] Never did it get it.

[00:24:09] You know, that was at the time when those old guys.

[00:24:14] Well, I mean, that's not that long ago.

[00:24:17] That's what you're saying a couple years.

[00:24:18] So what, 92, 93, 94?

[00:24:21] Yes, sir.

[00:24:22] Yeah.

[00:24:22] Yes, sir.

[00:24:24] Yeah.

[00:24:24] Yes, sir.

[00:24:25] Yeah, I appreciate the call, Michael.

[00:24:27] Have a great weekend, sir.

[00:24:29] I mean, that was the norm.

[00:24:31] That was everywhere.

[00:24:34] There.

[00:24:34] And this is also why I talk about election fraud, because that, too, occurred.

[00:24:39] There used to be, what was his name?

[00:24:41] R.L.

[00:24:43] Oh, I forget his.

[00:24:45] Drawn a blank on his last name.

[00:24:46] He was a Republican who kept running for office.

[00:24:49] And, in fact, he got at an auction one of the ballot boxes that the Ponder brothers had stuffed in an election against him.

[00:25:00] Out in Western North Carolina.

[00:25:02] I mean, this was the norm.

[00:25:06] It was the norm.

[00:25:08] If you found a place that was running clean elections, that was unusual.

[00:25:15] So, yeah.

[00:25:16] Again, I know this is shocking for people who have just arrived within the last 20 years, but highly recommend you, you know, read some of the history of this state.

[00:25:24] Some of this stuff will make a lot more sense.

[00:25:26] Thank you very much.

[00:25:28] Somebody called in and gave me the name.

[00:25:31] R.L.

[00:25:33] Clark was his name.

[00:25:35] R.L.

[00:25:36] Clark.

[00:25:37] He was a former state senator, and he was a Republican, and he fought, man, he fought Democrats out west in all sorts of election fights and stuff.

[00:25:50] And he used to call into the show when I was on the air in Asheville, and we would talk about this.

[00:25:56] Because he was, I mean, he grew up in it, and, like, he talked about his, like, he had a business or his family had a business or something.

[00:26:05] I'm trying to remember.

[00:26:07] And, oh, they got so much crap from the local Democrat machine.

[00:26:12] Oh, man.

[00:26:13] Yeah, just R.L.

[00:26:15] Clark.

[00:26:15] That was his name.

[00:26:16] Stayed long.

[00:26:17] Like, I think he won.

[00:26:18] He was appointed to fill a term, I want to say.

[00:26:24] Yeah.

[00:26:24] I'm sorry.

[00:26:25] I don't remember.

[00:26:25] I was not planning on talking about him today.

[00:26:27] That's where we just ended up.

[00:26:28] And I think he passed away.

[00:26:29] But I remember they did a big story about him when he bid on and won at auction one of the old ballot boxes.

[00:26:40] And, I mean, there weren't votes stuffed in it.

[00:26:43] Although that's what I would have done with it.

[00:26:45] Like, if I got a ballot box, one of these old, I mean, it was a big wooden box, right, with a lock on it and a little slot up at the top.

[00:26:52] And it was one of the boxes that were used in the elections that were rigged by the Ponder brothers.

[00:26:57] All right, that'll do it for this episode.

[00:27:00] Thank you so much for listening.

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[00:27:15] Again, thank you so much for listening.

[00:27:16] And don't break anything while I'm gone.