The ruling conspiracy

By Mark Barroso
Posted Tuesday, April 29, 2008

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Pittsboro, NC - I understand and respect differences of opinion. If you like a candidate after hearing all the pros and cons, I won't waste either yours or my time trying to convince you otherwise. However, some of you are being either disingenuous, or even intellectually dishonest.

But one of the dumbest, facetious arguments I hear going around is that the Chatham Coalition is trying to rule the county. How would that work, really? If you've been saying this, you owe it to us this explanation. Some of you remember that this was the knock against John F. Kennedy - that as a Catholic, he would take orders from the Pope (as in the church, not the hardware store).

Many of you who are knocking the Coalition now were content, and even supportive, of the idea of a PAC that evaluated candidates based on their progressive scorecard. "What a great concept!" you said. Now that the Coalition doesn't support your personal favorites, the concept must be bad. Slates are bad (except your slate, of course).

The Chatham Coalition is but one group trying to get their candidates elected. The Hicks/Legrys/Fox group, which doesn't have a
name but has been intact and at it longer than the Coalition, is another. I respect both groups, and was once on the steering committee of the Coalition.

So if you're going to argue this "who will rule" nonsense to the Coalition, you must also apply it to HiLeFo. Of course, there's no
political mileage in it so you probably won't.