Change in North Carolina Politics

I've never really bought some of the pundit chatter that Pat McCrory is doing well because people are looking for change across the board. I think McCrory's polled surprisingly well because Bev Perdue has run a cruddy campaign, until recently.

This month's Civitas poll provides some evidence to back up what I've been thinking. They asked which candidate for Governor represents the change you want to see. The result? 43% said Perdue and 41% said McCrory. Perdue's standing on that account is actually a little better than her standing in the horse race on this poll, which shows the race tied.

When it comes to bringing change to the Legislature, 44% say the Democrats are the ones to do it while just 34% say the Republicans are. Is the Senate really going to flip this year? Not with those numbers. And I think we'll see Democratic gains in the House.

I am sure there are some of our 90th percentile voters- the most informed ones- who know that the Democrats run Raleigh and the Republicans run Washington and want to kick out those in charge on both fronts. But I think there are very few voters who pay enough attention to state government and things like DOT reform for McCrory, running as a Republican, to really get a lot of people to think he's the change candidate.

Bev Perdue's been saying a lot lately that the economy is the only issue in this election. She's right, but her campaign didn't reflect that until very late in the game. They're on the right track now though. She's gained seven points over the last three weeks, and it'll be interesting to see how that one stacks up this weekend.