The Privette circus is keeping its tent firmly pitched.

You might recall that Coy Privette last week announced his intent to resign as Cabarrus County Commissioner. It turns out that you're a fool if you believed him. Of course you're a fool if you ever believed him before, but I digress.
You see, the key word in his statement back then was "intent".
What it comes down to is that Mr. Privette will only resign if he gets to hand-pick his successor and if his home in Kannapolis gets sold.

In an article published in The Independent Tribune today, the Privette soap continues:

Privette, 74, said in a statement Tuesday that “a committee of non-partial community leaders” should be appointed to consider candidates for the seat he plans to vacate.

There's one problem. What Mr. Privette is demanding isn't even legal.
State statutes say there must be a vacancy on the county commission before the local Republican Party can begin seeking a replacement. The North Carolina General Statutes state:

If the member who vacated the seat was elected as a nominee of a political party, the board of commissioners, the chairman of the board, or the clerk of superior court, as the case may be, shall consult the county executive committee of the appropriate political party before filling the vacancy, and shall appoint the person recommended by the county executive committee of the political party of which the commissioner being replaced was a member, if the party makes a recommendation within 30 days of the occurrence of the vacancy.

Since Coy hasn't resigned yet, there is no vacancy.
As you can tell the statutes also clearly say that the executive Committee of the Cabarrus County Republican Party needs to recommend a replacement for Mr. Privette, not any other group or committee.

“The Cabarrus County Republican Men’s Club Executive Committee could be that vehicle to recruit such a group to seek out prospective appointees for the public to consider,” Privette said in his statement.

Contrary to Mr. Privette's "glory days", the Cabarrus Republican Party these days is run by a more moderate group. The last "bastion" of extreme right wing republicans is exactly the Republican Men's Club, so it figures that Mr. Privette would like to get them involved.

The second condition Coy cited for him to retire was that his house in Kannapolis would have to be sold. If he sells his home in Kannapolis and moves to a retirement community in Thomasville like he announced, he will have to resign because he will no longer live in Cabarrus County. The problem is that Mr. Privette's house doesn't seem to be for sale.

Privette’s home doesn't seem to be listed on the market, and there is no “for sale” sign in front of his home. I know, because I drove by his house this afternoon and took this picture:

Do you see a "for sale" sign?

In a reaction, his fellow commissioners are once again exploring their options to limit the activities of Privette as a commissioner. They had a "censure" item on the agenda of the last Commissioner meeting, but at the start of that meeting Mr. Privette announced his "intent" to resign, so his fellow commissioners dropped the censure debate. It seems now they will revive the debate at their next meeting.
So watch for the next episode of this soap then.

It's almost sad to see a guy that used to be a very influential politician turn himself more and more into a crazy, sad, embarrassing old man. Almost.

This story will, no doubt, be continued...

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Talking the talk and walking the walk - Privette resigns

As promised I showed up at the Cabarrus County governmental building this past Monday at 6 pm for my protest against Coy Privette. With me were 15 other folks. A smaller turnout than I had hoped for, but I guess it's better than nothing.
There was plenty of press around and you can catch our protest in a lot of the press coverage from that night.
In newspaper articles:

* Independent Tribune
* Charlotte Observer
* Salisbury post

On TV (please ignore my face, it's not a pretty sight):

* WSOC TV
* WCNC
* News 14

As you know, the Cabarrus County Commissioner meeting started at 6.30 in the building we were protesting at.
Mr. Privette snuk in through the parking garage and was intercepted there by Beth Feeback, a reporter from the Concord Standard newspaper. Mr. Privette said he didn't care about the protest, but proceeded to ask how many people showed up. When Ms. Feeback told him 15, he replied "15 people? That's some demonstration," and chuckled.

Of course Mr. Privette didn't know at that time that exactly one protester showed up to support him. That one protester was "Ric" Starnes.
He drove by as we were standing outside and was honking and hanging half out of his car while screaming at us in a rage.

At 6.25 pm we stopped our protest so I could head on in and participate in the public speaking opportunity during the County Commissioner meeting. I had prepared my 3 minute speech and brought the 105 emails I had gathered, through the coyresign@gmail.com address, from people who wanted Mr. Privette to resign. I had planned on handing all those emails to Coy himself after my comments.

Right before the Public comment moment however, Mr. Privette had planned a "preemptive strike".
He requested to speak and read a prepared statement.

"I believe it is important that I publicly disclose my intentions to resign as a Cabarrus County commissioner as soon as matters are resolved related to whom my successor may be."
"It has been very important to me that the citizens who elected me have a strong voice to speak for them and that my successor will be someone who will have the courage to speak out even when he or she may be in the minority on a particular subject."

Once that's resolved, Privette said, he'll submit an official letter of resignation.
In other words, Mr. Privette said he will resign but only if the Republican party can find a successor who's as much of a crazy ass conservative as he is.

"All Republicans talk about being conservative," Privette said. "But there's a difference between talking the talk and walking the walk."

When he made that last statement, I had a very hard time trying not to erupt in loud laughter. Keep in mind that this comment comes from a man who once sponsored legislation to require schools to teach sexual abstinence and the sanctity of marriage, yet was caught having sex six times with a crack whore.

After Mr. Privette's comments it was My time to speak. Of course my prepared speech at this time didn't serve any purpose anymore, So i just told Coy that i had received 105 emails and thanked him for getting people interested in politics again (snark).
I closed off by saying that I wholeheartedly agreed with Mr. Privette when he said that there was a big difference between "talking the talk" and "walking the walk".

After the meeting Privette gave an interview to WCNC TV in which he claimed that his announced resignation had nothing to do with the prostitution charges against him or all the protests against him, but that he and his wife have just decided to move to a Thomasville retirement community. They had planned to retire there for years and decided recently to make the move now.
Right.....
If you believe that, I have some waterfront property in Arizona that i want to sell you. Hearing him say that made me even happier with the fact that he will resign. A person that can tell a bald-faced lie like that without even blinking doesn't need to be making any political decisions again. And even if you believe him to be speaking the truth, which he wasn't, he totally cheated his voters less than a year ago by running for re-election. Because why would you do that if you had been planning to retire in Thomasville for years?

The Republican party executive committee will now have to come up with someone to succeed Mr. Privette. This person will be in office until next years' election and not until 2010 like Mr. Privette was supposed to. So next year there will be 3 County Commissioner seats up for election instead of the 2 that were already planned (Bob Carruth and Joni Juba). Commissioners' Chairman Bob Carruth said he's heard four names unofficially mentioned as possible replacements -- former commissioner Robert Freeman; Mark Smith, a former commissioner candidate; and David Black and Larry Griffin, both former chairmen of the local party.

I look forward to seeing who they will come up with.

For Mr. Privette I have 2 words left: good riddance.

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My case against Coy

Ever since I started my protest asking for the resignation of Coy Privette, I've talked to dozens and dozens of people on this issue. Most are positive about what I'm trying to do, but every now and then I get a reaction from a Privette supporter (yes, they still exist), asking if I never made a mistake, if I'm not a "forgiving person" etc...

What they don't seem to get is that for me personally this isn't about the hiring of a prostitute. If any other person had done this (including any of the other County Commissioners) I wouldn't make such a big stink about it.
For me this is all about the kind of person Mr. Privette has portrayed himself to be and about how this "mistake" has made his whole carefully crafted image crumble to the ground.

So let me sum up the reasons why I personally believe Mr. Privette should have resigned as a County Commissioner already:

1. Total hypocrisy

What bothers me most about this case is not the details of what was done, but the total hypocrisy behind it.
Mr. Privette has built most of his political career by persuading his voters that he was a sound religious man with high moral believes. He also never hesitated in the past to judge other people over their “moral decline”. Now we find out that Coy Privette’s public image was all a lie.
If the foundations of your whole political career seem to be a lie, how can we ever believe you again?

2. Lack of sound judgment and common sense

What Mr. Privette did was really bad, but the more disturbing aspect of it is his total lack of judgment and common sense. Most of his actions in this case were just plain stupid, e.g. renting rooms in your own name, paying a prostitute with (blank) checks and posing for pictures with her. If you lack common sense in silly things like hiring a prostitute, how can you possible be entrusted with things as important as the well being of our community?
If his judgment is that poor how can he represent us in a reasonable way?
How can we believe that Mr. Privette will make sound political decisions that will affect our daily lives for years to come?

3. Lack of respect

Doesn’t Mr. Privette think his community deserves the same respect as the various Christian organizations he immediately resigned from even before he was convicted of anything? Wouldn't he expect any other elected official in Cabarrus County to step down under the same circumstances?

I want to close by saying that I believe this also wasn't a one time mistake (he admitted to 6 counts) and if you believe what several people have told me, including several high ranking republicans who should know, this allegedly has been going on for years.

I hope to see you at the protest meeting in front of the County Governmental building on Monday at 6 pm!

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Want to ask Coy Privette to resign?

This is what you do:

Send an e-mail to coyresign@gmail.com.
Your mail can be as short or as long as you want. Try not to be rude.
I will gather all emails, print them off and hand them over to Mr. Privette himself at the next County Commissioner meeting.

Then join me on September 17th at 6 pm outside the County governmental building (you can find directions to that right here), to show Mr. Privette and the media that there is a big group of people from Cabarrus County who no longer want Coy as a County Commissioner.
The protest will last less than half an hour, so it shouldn't take too much time out of your busy day. At 6.30 pm the County Commissioner meeting will start and I plan on handing Mr. Privette all the reactions I have received during the public speaking opportunity at the beginning of the meeting.

Thank you!

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What's your name?

Hi, nice to meet you! My name is Thierry, what's yours?

From today on it will be impossible to post anonymous comments on my blog, sorry about that. Since My name is all over this place I thought it was only fair for me to know your name as well.
Everyone was just posting comments anonymously and I have no clue who you all are. Before the place turns into an anonymous shouting match i thought it was wise to get to know each other, maybe we can keep our manners that way :-)

All you need to post comments from now on is a Google or Blogger account. It is very easy to get and is of course completely free. So go ahead, click on "post comment" after any blog post of mine and you'll find a link to sign up for your free account if you don't already have one.
Don't let this stop you from participating, I always like a good argument.

I look forward to getting to know you all!

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