Grass Roots North Carolina has issued its assessment of the current candidates for political office in North Carolina. We've reviewed their report, which can be found at: www.grnc.org .
In summary, here are some highlights:
• Senate District 1 candidate Bill Cook received a 4-star rating, the highest, indicating that based on his response to the GRNC survey, his voting record and endorsements by other gun organizations, such as the NRA, he could be expect to vote "pro-gun rights" 90%+ of the time. His opponent, Stan White received no stars.
• In House District 6 Mattie Lawson also received a 4-star rating, while her opponent Paul Tine received no stars.
• In House District 3 Mike Speciale received a 4-star rating while his Democrat opponent, Bob Cayton got no stars.
• Walter Jones garnered a high rating with 4-stars while his Democrat opponent got no stars.
• In the First District G. K. Butterfield got a no-star rating.
• In the state-wide races Dan Forrest, candidate for Lt. Governor, led the pack with a 4-star rating while Pat McCrory pulled 3 stars over Walton Dalton's 1-star. Libertarian Barbara Howe, who is running for Governor, got 4 stars.
Editor's note: We are not publishing the NRA ratings. We investigated their candidate evaluation process during the primary and found it to be very unreliable. When we confronted the Washington NRA officials they at first tried to defend the process but the information they furnished us did not check out. When we discovered what they had told us was not true we confronted them again. They refused to respond after they found out we were checking out what they told us. We therefore are of the opinion that the NRA ratings are neither valid nor reliable. Moreover, we went to Raleigh to cover the committee hearings on several gun-related bills during the last session of the Legislature. Our observations were that Grass Roots North Carolina was a much more effective representative of gun owners than was the NRA. We urge our readers to check out the GRNC at www.grnc.org
While I agree with you totally about the reliability of NRA endorsements, essentially because they prostitute themselves to incumbents, often with mediocre records on gun rights, it is also worth noting that the NRA endorsed both Cook and Lawson, as well. I trust Grassroots NC, and its national affiliate Gun Owners of America, a lot more than the NRA, but for these races, they are both on the same sheet of music.
What is particularly significant, given that NRA is heavily prone to pander to incumbents, is that the 1st District is the only Senate district in the state where the NRA has endorsed a challenger, Cook, over an incumbent, White. That says something about how bad White is on gun rights.
I tried several times to contact the NRA-ILA about their ratings. They have not returned my calls. My opponent, who has a voting record, received an AQ rating, which means he got an A rating based solely on his questionnaire because he is not an elected office holder. He IS elected, has a voting record as he is on the BC Board of Commissioners. I, however, received a B rating, which indicates that I have a voting record which indicates that I am not at least 90% supportive of gun rights. The problem is I have never held elective office, so it appears that they posted our scores backwards. I am a VERY STRONG SUPPORTER OF GUN RIGHTS! I am a Retired US Marine, I am Honor Graduate of the Basic Law Enforcement Training program, I have my conceal carry permit, I am a LIFE MEMBER OF THE NRA, I taught my Wife, children, and Grandson how to shoot, and I am a Constitutionalist who understands that our right to keep and bear arms is for the purpose of protecting our Liberty from a tyrannical government. The NRA folks who put these ratings out are morons!
To show you how inept the NRA-ILA ratings are, besides all of my qualifications previously listed, I fought the Craven County Board of Commissioners when they tried to pass an ordinance banning all conceal carry from all county buildings, and the law was not passed. The NRA's Freedom Magazine even printed an article about it. I guess they don't read their own magazines...
Please accept our thanks for so clearly elucidating what Grass Roots North Carolina candidate evaluations are all about: Giving gun owners accurate, objective information on candidates to help them defend the Second Amendment.
We started the "Remember in November" project in 1994 in response to perceived problems with NRA ratings.
Instead of subjectively endorsing candidates, we compile votes on gun-related legislation, survey scores, bill sponsorship and a measure for chamber leadership we call "bill support," then enter the data into a database which estimates the percentage of time a given candidate can be expected to agree with a control group of conservative gun owners.
I hope people will not only use the evaluations (and GRNC Political Victory Fund recommendations based on them), but will also support the project by joining GRNC and/or making a donation to the GRNC Political Victory Fund.
F. Paul Valone President, Grass Roots North Carolina
The NRA has a long history of supporting incumbent anti-gun Democrats rather than their pro-gun Republican challengers. I learned long ago to dismiss the NRA's rating, they are too unreliable and as one responder correctly noted have been "prostituted".
Conversely, GRNC's ratings are reliable and accurate.
as a fairly new member of grnc, i appreciate the voting list provided. its very confusig to try to cut thru all the hype frome the candidates. i went by this voting list and i hope all other members did also. we realy kicked butt in north carolina. i hope all of north carolina law makers are aware of this.
gary merriner
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