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Monday, October 14, 2013

Hickory United PAC and Carlton Huffman

Many people probably read the Letter to the Editor in Saturday's Hickory Daily Record submitted by Carlton Huffman of Hickory United. Carlton was placed in charge of running Rudy Wright's creation "The No Steps Backwards Coalition" last year that stood in opposition of the Referendum on Ward Specific Voting. Now this year, he has become the contact person and spokesperson of the Political Action Committee called "Hickory United" that has endorsed Incumbents Jill Patton, Hank Guess, and the Hickory Arts Commission's David Zagaroli. Information has also been provided that shows that this group also supports Mayor Rudy Wright, but for some reason they have held off on publicly announcing their endorsement of the three term incumbent mayor.

Like Carlton Huffman, I do not live inside Hickory's City Limits. I have stated that several times before on this blog. I am actually surrounded by Hickory's City Limits. The property across the street is in the city limits and the properties adjacent to my back yard are in the city limits. Before I moved into my house, I lived in an apartment in the city limits for 15 years. Except for a few years as a teen and my college years, I have been a resident of Hickory my entire life. I aimed to put this house in the city limits long ago, but my income and expenses along with the cost of putting my house in the city has caused me to have to delay that move.

There are a lot of people in Hickory's Extra Territorial Jurisdiction (ETJ) that are in the same boat I am. What do we get for our investment in Hickory? The city would take our property tax dollars and pump them into the areas towards the center of the city. How would that benefit us. What does all of this mean? It means that I do not have a vote in the City of Hickory Municipal Elections. It doesn't however mean that I cannot or should not participate in elections that have direct consequences on my life.

Unlike myself, Carlton Huffman lives and votes in Granite Falls.  In Hickory United's original letter, we see that most of the people who announced their connection to Hickory United have one agenda in mind. The agenda is the support of a Status Quo Hickory and doing everything they can to ensure that Democrats never raise their heads above ground level. That is the reason why they have chosen to go after Dr. Jody Inglefield so hard in his run for Hickory City Mayor. They also don't want anyone who has a different opinion than the current Status Quo Cult-like culture to have a voice in the direction and policy making apparatus of Hickory City Government. It's non-partisan until the Powers That Be choose to make it partisan.

The person at the tumblr site devoted to Rudy Wright has gotten down to the nitty-gritty about Carlton Huffman today, pointing to links that show someone that has some very extreme views when it comes to people of different backgrounds. What Carlton hasn't figured out is that most of us aren't afforded the luxury of being a trust fund baby like he has been. He can afford to jump around from political position to political position as the hatchet man for various candidates and political interests. The rest of us have to have some kind of real employment in order to pay our bills.

Carlton was actually paid a few thousand dollars last year by the No Steps Backwards Coalition. He likes to brag constantly about how he defeated us -- the supporters of the referendum. Well, congratulations... you barely held on to a status quo culture that has always ruled Hickory. You actually didn't win anything, what you showed was that there is an ever increasing number of people that are growing more and more tired of the Old South Culture running Hickory into the ground.

This is no joke. Carlton Huffman actually likes to call himself  The Unreconstructed Southerner. You know Un - Reconstructed as in Reconstruction of the South after the Civil War. That war was fought 150 years ago. Reconstruction brought the South back into the United States and apparently Carlton isn't happy about that. Hey Carlton we lost that one buddy. You really want to refight that battle 150 years later?
 
I was sent links that pointed all of this out to me by an anonymous concerned citizen. One of these links takes you to a site called Stormfront.org. This is a White Supremacy site that promotes a moniker "White Pride World Wide."

I was also told that Carlton was dismissed from a job in the North Carolina State House of Representatives after a second incident in which he breached the public trust. There was a first incident in which he was rebuked for sending out e-mails making fun of 3rd and 4th grader's spelling and grammar when they had sent letters into the legislature expressing their concerns about Charter School legislation pending in the State House. Carlton was sending these e-mails around with the children's names on them and making negative comments about the children.
In another exchange, Carlton Huffman, a legislative aide for GOP state Rep. Jonathan Jordan, forwarded a student’s email to the legislative aides for Republican House members with the comment, “More great grammar results from the public school system.” -  NC Policy Watch 3/25/2011
The second incident involved him going into the North Carolina Senate Chamber and placing  an unsigned letter denigrating former Governor William Holden on each senator's desk on the day the Senate was scheduled to debate pardoning the Reconstruction Era governor. Only State Senators are allowed to place things on one another's desks. Carlton was a staff aide of a State House member and he was in the Senate Chamber when it was closed putting these letters on the desks. He had no business being in the Senate Chamber and so he was trespassing in this act. (Holden critic Huffman unrepentant - WRAL (Raleigh) - Laura Leslie - April 11, 2011)

After the second incident, Carlton was shown the door by his boss at the behest of the Republican leadership in the North Carolina Legislature.


And here is a list of other interesting viewpoints of the Unreconstructed Southerner:
                                            > Unreconstructed Southerner - Council of Conservative Citizens <

It is Orwellian for these people to talk about Uniting Hickory.  Although I am a Republican, Carlton certainly doesn't represent my point of view -- or most others. Does he represent the points of view of Hickory United supporters????

I'm by no means perfect, but I like to think I am an adult who accepts people of all backgrounds. Carlton needs to get out here and meet some people from other backgrounds and broaden his horizons, because what he espouses does not represent the real world. Is this really what we want Hickory to be?



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