The deadly streets of Charlotte

Charlotte is the 17th most dangerous city for pedestrians out of 52 U.S. metro areas with more than 1 million people, a new report says.

Two hundred and eight pedestrians were killed in the Charlotte metro area in the decade from 2000-2009, according to the report from Transportation for America. Seventeen percent of all traffic deaths in Mecklenburg County were pedestrians, the report said.

The Raleigh metro area ranked 13th. The top four most dangerous cities for pedestrians were all in Florida. Raleigh and Charlotte were ranked more dangerous than Los Angeles (#27), Denver (#29), Washington, D.C. (#34) and New York (#50), among others.

Pedestrian safety grabbed headlines in Charlotte last month after two people were hit in two days, and one killed, at the intersection of Stonewall and College streets uptown. Transportation for America argues, rightly, that pedestrian safety is way down on the priority list for most government transportation planners. In 15 of the country's largest metro areas, pedestrian deaths have been going up even as the number of motorists' deaths has been falling thanks to campaigns on seat belts, child seats, drunk driving, texting while driving and other initiatives.

Transportation for America is a policy organization that backs public transit, biking, walking and environmentalism. You can read its full report, "Dangerous by Design," on a PDF here.

-- Taylor Batten

Is praying in Jesus' name OK?

Should people be able to pray “in Jesus’ name” at government meetings?

The U.S. Supreme Court says no. A federal court ruled that prayers endorsing a specific religion can not be offered at Forsyth County commissioner meetings, and last month the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal of that decision.

Now, N.C. House leaders seem to be ignoring that. Prayers backing a particular religion, almost always Christianity, are routinely offered in the House and Senate chambers. House Speaker Thom Tillis, R-Mecklenburg, and Majority Leader Paul Stam, R-Wake, see no problem with that.

“The same Constitution that prohibits government-sponsored religion also protects the right of individuals to exercise their faith as they so choose,” Tillis said in a statement that the Associated Press reported on Friday.

Said Stam: “Members volunteer to pray and do so at their own free will, and their prayers are not directed or censored by any government official.”

By that logic, Tillis and Stam should be fine opening the legislature with a prayer in Mohammed’s name. That, of course, would be wrong, too.

The ACLU is challenging the legislative prayers. Tillis is dismissing the ACLU as a far-left group. They may be, but that is beside the point. People on the left, middle and right should worry about government imposing religious views on the public.

Yes, individuals can exercise their faith, but doing so to open a meeting of a government that represents all people of all faiths is something else entirely. The Founding Fathers made clear that they wanted a separation between church and state. They had seen religious oppression in England, and so wrote freedom of religion into the First Amendment. Government could not favor one religion over another.

That means anyone is free to practice whatever religion they like. But the government is not allowed to push one religion over others. That violates what the Founding Fathers intended, which the Supreme Court has now confirmed. At public meetings, North Carolina’s leaders should pray in a more general way, or not at all.

-- Taylor Batten

A Marine's final letter: 'There is a greater meaning...'

Last month, much of America was appalled - and the world outraged - by a video that showed four Marines in Afghanistan apparently urinating on the corpses of Taliban fighters.

It was, again, a reminder of our weaknesses, and how the madness of war can lay bare the ugliness within us.

This morning, another reminder - of our strengths.
Sgt. William Stacey, a Marine, was killed Tuesday by a roadside bomb while on patrol in Afghanistan. Stacey, a member of the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, was stationed in Now Zad, a longtime Taliban stronghold that Americans were liberating.

Stacey, like many soldiers and officers, left a letter to be read if he were killed. The 23-year-old was the son of two professors at the University of Washington, and his parents gave The Seattle Times permission to publish the letter.

It read:

"My death did not change the world; it may be tough for you to justify its meaning at all. But there is a greater meaning to it. Perhaps I did not change the world. Perhaps there is still injustice in the world.

"But there will be a child who will live because men left the security they enjoyed in their home country to come to his. And this child will learn in the new schools that have been built. He will walk his streets not worried about whether or not his leader's henchmen are going to come and kidnap him. He will grow into a fine man who will pursue every opportunity his heart could desire.

“He will have the gift of freedom, which I have enjoyed for so long. If my life buys the safety of a child who will one day change this world, then I know that it was all worth it.”

Peter St. Onge

Mr. McCrory's Wild Ride

You could almost hear Pat McCrory exhaling his relief today when he learned that Erskine Bowles would not run for governor. McCrory has yo-yo'd in the last week from being the prohibitive favorite over Gov. Bev Perdue, to facing a possible death-match against Bowles, to being the big favorite again over any of the Democrats in the race or considering it.

After thinking about it for the week since Perdue announced she would not run again, Bowles announced today that he would not run in the Democratic primary. That was a shame, we thought, because Bowles would have brought to the race one of the most impressive resumes in recent history: Successful businessman, head of the Small Business Administration, White House Chief of Staff, president of the UNC system and co-chair of the national deficit commission. And while he's not a born campaigner, he has money and the ability to raise it in a hurry.

So his departure was a gift to McCrory, who we endorsed in 2008 and who is the presumptive Republican nominee. McCrory is back in control of the race, leading in the polls over every potential Democratic challenger.

The only two Democrats who have announced they're running -- Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton and state Rep. Bill Faison -- rank near the bottom of the list for favorability ratings among 13 Democrats measured by Public Policy Polling in Raleigh. And in a head-to-head matchup with McCrory, Dalton trails by 15 percentage points and Faison trails by 19. Those numbers would probably tighten up a bit once their name recognition goes up during a campaign, but they clearly start as big underdogs.

There aren't big threats sitting on the Democratic sidelines either. Former state Treasurer Richard Moore, former U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge, state Sen. Dan Blue, and U.S. Reps. Brad Miller and Mike McIntyre all trail badly in early polling.

One other big advantage for McCrory: About $2 million in the bank, far more than any prospective challenger.

Anything can change in a long campaign, but Democrats may have to sling mud and tie McCrory to an unpopular Republican legislature to have much chance.

-- Taylor Batten

Super Bowl chimp ads are no laughing matter

Op-ed: The writer, Dawn Forsythe, is the author of the blog, the Chimp Trainer's Daughter:

Watching Super Bowl ads is a lot of fun. Sometimes it is even more fun than watching the game.

Unfortunately, CareerBuilder’s use of live chimpanzees for a cheap laugh is no laughing matter. In fact, the company is hurting chimpanzees, both captive and wild, with its irresponsible exploitation of chimps in marketing campaigns over the years.

We love to see cute animals doing funny things. Advertisers have known for a long time that anthropomorphic chimpanzees – chimps in human clothes and in human situations – sell. During the Great Depression, a trained zoo chimp in a business suit and eyeglasses helped persuade Detroiters to donate to the Community Fund. As the daughter of a Detroit Zoo chimp trainer in the 1950s and 1960s, I watched my dad train chimps to ride ponies and play banjos for shows enjoyed by millions.

Advertisers and Hollywood paid attention to the oohs and aahs of the crowds, and soon baby boomers became accustomed to chimps on TV, selling products and entertaining the child in all of us.

Back then, the public was innocent about the harm being done to the animals. We didn’t know that the open mouth chimpanzee “grin” we laughed with/at is most often a grimace of fear.

It’s different today. Thanks to decades of research, and by using our own increased awareness, we can no longer claim innocence.

Unfortunately, CareerBuilder is still trying to claim last century’s naivete. The animals “were not harmed during the production of the ad,” their marketing department claims. Well, of course not. That happens before the cameras start to roll.

I saw how trainers turn a traumatized baby chimpanzee into a malleable entertainer. Baby chimpanzees destined for the stage are taken from the arms of their mothers, and the trainers put them into social isolation. The youngsters are forced to rely on their human handlers rather than develop normally with their own kind. And training a smart chimp isn’t like training a dog. My father beat the zoo chimps, and that “training method” is still used by commercial trainers today, although not for more than 35 years (thank goodness) by accredited zoos.

After the chimpanzees spend two, three, maybe five years in show biz, they become too strong to handle and are relegated to the trash heap known as retirement. No one pays for their care for the 40 or 50 years that remain in their lives. They are put into research programs or, if they are very lucky, they may be rescued by increasingly overstressed and underfunded sanctuaries. In a magnificent turn-around since my dad’s day, zoos are also rescuing entertainment chimps.

But the concern about the CareerBuilder ads goes beyond the welfare of these individual chimps. Using chimps in advertising actually hurts conservation education efforts. In a study published last summer, chimpanzee expert Steve Ross followed up on 2008 survey data showing that “the public is less likely to think that chimpanzees are endangered compared to other great apes, and that this is likely the result of media mis-portrayals in movies, television and advertisements.”

Dr. Ross’ new research found that people “seeing images in which chimpanzees are shown in typically human settings (such as an office space as shown in the CareerBuilder ads) were more likely to perceive wild populations as being stable and healthy compared to those seeing chimpanzees in other contexts.”

Wild populations are not stable, nor are they healthy. In fact, the United States has classified wild chimpanzees as an endangered species since 1996.

For many years, chimpanzee advocates have begged CareerBuilder to stop using live chimpanzees in its ads. We are trying again this year, and the company’s refusal is stunning.

CareerBuilder is not relying on chimp ads for their success as a company. Job seekers don’t think, “I need to use that chimp company to find a job!” CareerBuilder’s continuing intransigence isn’t even due to ignorance, because experts have been explaining this to the company over the years. No, it is exploiting chimpanzees for its own enjoyment, but it’s not funny. It is sad.

Why is this man smiling?

Well, wouldn't YOU, if you were Pat McCrory?

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/02/02/2979198/erskine-bowles-will-not-run-for.html

-- Posted by Kevin Siers

Donald Trump planning a surprise this morning?

The New York Times, the Associated Press and Politico all reported last night that real estate mogul Donald Trump would endorse Newt Gingrich this morning. But they may have jumped the gun -- or perhaps The Donald had a change of heart overnight.

The Drudge Report, which has sources inside the Mitt Romney campaign, is suggesting that Trump might endorse Romney, not Gingrich, at 11:30 this morning. That would align Trump with the frontrunner, but could also undercut any third-party run of his own.

Our question: Does it matter one iota? Trump's credibility as a political force plummeted with most thinking humans during his farce of a campaign late last year. Besides, Romney is coming off a 14-point win over Gingrich in Florida, and a new poll shows him leading Saturday's Nevada caucus by 2o points. Gingrich's last chance comes a month from now when 10 states, including many in the South, vote. By then, Trump's news either way will be long forgotten.

-- Taylor Batten

Uptown baseball? Yes. Publicly financed? No.

We love baseball. Major leagues and minor leagues. Last summer, we saw phenom Bryce Harper play in Kannapolis, and we drove down to Fort Mill for the Charlotte Knights, and we even made it to Fenway Park on a warm, August night.

We also like the idea of baseball in uptown Charlotte, as we've said before. But publicly financed baseball?

The Observer's Steve Harrison reports this morning that the city of Charlotte could help pay for a new uptown baseball stadium for the Knights. City councilman James Mitchell, chair of the city's economic development committee, said there have been preliminary talks about the city helping out with the cost of the stadium.

Already, the county has contributed to the concept of the uptown Knights with a long ago, tentatively approved $8 million worth of land and infrastructure for a Third Ward stadium. Now the city may consider doubling down on that investment with another $6 to $11 million for a stadium.

We get why it could be a good thing for Charlotte. Uptown baseball is another jewel in the satchel, another feature to tout when businesses and talent consider a move to Charlotte. There's the potential, too, that an uptown stadium could spur economic development on the streets nearby.

(The counterargument: A baseball stadium would host fewer than 80 home games a year, leaving an empty shell on most other nights. A 2004 study for the city concluded that other uses of the land - like a large park - would encourage more residential and office development, which is what Third Ward needs.)

More importantly, the Knights have thus far shown an inability to finance and sustain a stadium. Yes, the team was squeezed by the recession, along with several lawsuits from Charlotte attorney Jerry Reese, who continues to tilt at the windmill of Major League Baseball in Charlotte. But moving uptown brings no guarantee that the Knights will succeed. Charlotte already has its share of publicly financed failures, including the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Even if baseball is more popular, it comes with a real risk of being another boondoggle.

Last summer, the county granted the team another at-bat by extending its lease agreement a year. The team has until March to show that it has two top-tier sponsors, and we're hoping that we'll see even more - financial documents that show that the team can survive if the stadium costs more, or if attendance projections aren't realized.

What we have thus far is little evidence, from the team or from corporate Charlotte, that the Knights have the support they need to make baseball work amid the skyscrapers. If the franchise can do so, we'll be among those happily walking to Third Ward on summer nights. But let's not rely on public dollars to make it happen.

Peter St. Onge

Florida reax: The race is over, right?

Let's begin with the reasons it's not over:

After yesterday's Florida primary, only 5 percent of the 2,288 national convention delegates will have been awarded.

Also, each time Mitt Romney thrusts his chest out as the front-runner, a lot of his party starts to look to see what's left over his shoulder.

Also, the more conservative candidates - Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul - combined for 52 percent of the vote in Florida yesterday. If one (or two) dropped out ... OK, who are we kidding?

Mitt Romney has $20 million in campaign cash. He has the state-by-state organization. He's found his voice and his fire, thanks to the South Carolina primary. He has a cement-the-nomination month ahead that includes Nevada (neighbor to Utah) and Maine (neighbor to Massachusetts).

And also: He is the candidate with the best blend of conservatism and moderate pragmatism to give Republicans the White House.

But:

It's not over, says the Washington Post's Eugene Robinson.

The right still resists Romney, says the Post's E.J. Dionne.

Romney still has issues, says The Weekly Standard's Fred Barnes. (Including this: No big vision to frame his campaign.)

The fat lady hasn't sung, says RedState's Eric Erickson.

Maybe it's Santorum's turn, says Stephen Stromberg.

What's going on here? A few things. Some pundits, like the conservative Erickson, have never liked the idea of the insufficiently conservative Romney. Others, who like a good race to cover, tend to be among the last to declare that race no longer good.

Plus, once Gingrich's candidacy finally expires, that leaves the cool and measured Romney vs. the cool and measured incumbent, President Barack Obama. Frankly, we're going to miss the fundamentally fiery Newt. So there might be a bit of wishful thinking out there this morning. Because, yes, it's pretty much over.

Peter St. Onge