From a news release linked here:

It is an exciting time for North Carolina politics! As the 2012 campaign season heats up, Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin is ramping up his efforts to reach out to voters, colleagues and supporters.

Goodwin’s website has been redesigned to make it easy to find the latest news about his service to North Carolina, watch video messages on YouTube, or follow his updates on Facebook and Twitter.

Goodwin has made transparent and open government a cornerstone of his efforts in the office of Insurance Commissioner. Creating a clear and open dialogue with citizens is equally important in his campaign.

“I love to talk to North Carolinians about the issues that are most important to them,” Goodwin said. "North Carolina is a big state, but social media can bring us together almost instantly."

Learn more at www.waynegoodwin.org and/or follow on Twitter @WayneGoodwinNC.

I originally posted this diary at DailyKos, but James asked me to cross-post here, and I'm more than happy to comply. I just purged a few errors from the diary that DailyKos users pointed out.

Let's start with a short discussion of how North Carolina Politics worked: Then as now, both Republicans and Democrats had a strong presence in the state. Throughout the 80s, Republicans carried the state on a Presidential level, although Jimmy Carter came close in his national landslide loss to Ronald Reagan in 1980.

There is a disturbing trend happening across the country,and we can now add one more casualty to the list of Things-That-Shouldn’t-Be-Illegal-But-Are: condoms. Though condoms themselves are not illegal,in many cities they can be used as the basis for police harassment and arrest or as evidence of prostitution in court. In New York City, Washington DC and San Francisco, police are using the number of condoms women are carrying to justify profiling them as prostitutes, and even to bolster an arrest on charges of sexual solicitation.

With five simple words, Mecklenburg County Commissioner Bill James revealed the true purpose for a constitutional amendment filed in North Carolina’s legislature in 2011 that would ban all relationship recognitions for same-gender couples.

“We don’t want them here.”

The “them” the amendment proponent referred to with the Raleigh News & Observer was easy to identify.

The “them” was me.

Jeff Riorden has enjoyed quite a few interesting career paths, including police officer, paramedic, and a health practitioner in the U.S. Navy before deciding to study at the Duke School of Nursing in Durham, North Carolina. All these careers have one thing in common – concern for public health and safety – which is why Jeff is also a supporter of harm reduction programs that reduce the spread of disease in our communities.

Along with many of his fellow nursing students, Jeff has come out to volunteer with the North Carolina Harm Reduction Coalition on our outreach trips through drug user and sex worker neighborhoods in Durham where we provide education and testing for HIV and hepatitis C. On these trips, he’s spoken about his experience as a former police officer and how law enforcement could benefit from a better understanding of harm reduction programs. Programs such as syringe exchange are shown to reduce the incidence of needle-sticks to officers by 66%.

“From the brothels to the strip clubs, from the jack shacks to the streets, criminalizing, stigmatizing has been society’s way…there’s power in a sex workers union!”

So began the first Sex Worker Summit in the South with a rousing song composed and sung by Stella Zine (watch her performance on NCHRC’s vimeo webpage), a former strip club dancer from Georgia. The song captured the spirit and message of the summit, held December 2nd in Asheville, North Carolina, which aimed to address issues of criminalization and marginalization among sex workers and to bring interested parties together to look for common solutions. The one day summit featured a diverse array of speakers, including current and retired sex workers, advocates, religious leaders, nurses, harm reduction organizations, academics, social workers, law enforcement personnel and other service providers.

On October 18th I formally announced my candidacy for NC Labor Commissioner. With a united Democratic Party, we can finally take back this office!

My focus as Labor Commissioner will be protecting NC workers by ensuring there is fairness and transparency in the workplace safety inspection process and being a strong advocate and partner with the community college system to train and re-train North Carolinians for jobs. “Being Labor Commissioner is about showing up to work everyday to ensure that North Carolinians have good jobs and safe workplaces.”

“In a tough campaign season with limited resources, it is important for our Party to be united. With my early start and strong campaign structure in place, we have a plan and strategy to win.” Visit our webpage at marlowefoster.com to learn more about my candidacy. Please post follow-ups.

Bill Faison
North Carolina House of Representatives
Representative District 50 – Caswell & Orange Counties
300 N. Salisbury Street – Room 405
Legislative Office Building Raleigh, NC 27603-5925 (919) 715-3019 Fax: (919) 832-6362 Bill.Faison@ncleg.net

Raleigh, November 30, 2011 – The NC General Assembly spent another $150,000 on a three-day “mini” Special Session and achieved nothing at all worthwhile for the people of NC. Their plan is to spend $1.1 million in total on similar Special Sessions spread from July of 2011 through April of 2012. They continue to focus on radical social issues, not jobs or the economy.

Sex Work in the South, What's Up With That?

------------------------------------------------

“Everyone has human rights- including sex workers and people who exchange sex for money, favors or survival,” says Megan McLemore, Senior Researcher at Human Rights Watch. “This will be a great opportunity to discuss ways to improve the health, safety and dignity of people whose voices need to be heard.”