Just when you thought you'd seen everything in politics comes a mailer from the N.C. Republican Party Executive Committee that portrays Democratic legislative candidate Chris Heagarty of Raleigh wearing a sombrero and supposedly mouthing the words "mucho taxo." It's evidently meant as a play -- a crude one -- on the Pedro character from South Carolina's South of the Border complex just off I-95. A headline says, "Bucky sez Heagarty loves high taxes!" and "We're giving a huge advantage to our neighbors South of the Border."
You can see a copy of the mailer on the Independent's website here.
It sad to think that the party of Jim Holshouser and Jim Martin has to resort to this kind of base, racist, emotional appeal, especially in an election when the party has so many other things going for it. I think the Republican Party is about to win a lot of legislative seats and may take over both houses of the legislature; why the party's elders would allow that potential success to be tainted by this kind of mailer is beyond my understanding, other than to recognize that this has become par for the course in Tar Heel politics. Sad.
