Former Wake County Schools Superintendent Tony Tata has been named today the new state Transportation Secretary by Gov.-elect Pat McCrory.

Tata was noted for his logistical skills during his long career in the U.S. Army, where he rose to the rank of brigadier general.

But Tata's critics will also point to the major problems that the school system experienced this school year with the buses. It's one of the factors that the school board's Democratic majority cited when they fired Tata, officially without cause, in September.

It is always a shock to some people when Republicans who run as conservatives actually look like they are going to govern that way. This may be particularly true in North Carolina, which had a Democratic-dominated legislature for a gazillion years and a Democrat in the governor's mansion - with interruptions for a couple of moderate Republicans - for a similar gazillion.
So I expect to hear some progressive exclamations and attacks of the vapors from Pat McCrory's latest appointments, Art Pope and Kieran Shanahan. Both gentlemen are real, bona fide, conservative Republicans. Pope will be deputy budget director. I expect his influence will be somewhat larger than traditional for that position. And Shanahan will be secretary of public safety. He promises to have a slightly higher profile than your typical public safety secretary, because Shanahan is no shrinking violet.

When I was a kid reporter in Virginia many years ago, the Democrats had the huge misfortune to lose the state attorney general's office to a Republican. I don't know whether there had ever been a Republican AG in the history of the commonwealth. Maybe in the years after the Late Unpleasantness, but I couldn't swear to that. One of the first things that the new attorney general did was switch all the highway department's right-of-way work from Democratic law firms to Republican law firms. The Democrats howled. Why, these fine (Democratic) law firms had done a phenomenal, efficient service to the Commonwealth for generations, and this ..... this Republican (spoken as an epithet) was putting the state's magnificent land-acquisition process at risk in the cause of rank patronage.
Now, the eons of Democratic attorneys general shoveling that lucrative work to reliable Democratic law firms was not considered rank patronage ever before, but never mind.

As the Democrats have lost the legislature and are now in the process of exiting the governor's mansion, there has been a lot of gnashing of teeth among progressives about the way the Republicans have been running things, and this gnashing will continue after McCrory is sworn in.

But this is why elections have consequences. For many years, the Democrats viewed elections in this state as a mild inconvenience that required that they expend a little energy. They viewed their locks on the branches of government as the normal state of nature. And they allowed a culture of corruption to flourish in some quarters. Their decline is not the result of some meteor hitting Jones Street. The Democrats had a big part in creating their current situation. What they should not do now is sit around and mope.

It is important for many reasons to have competition in politics. We need two strong parties in this state. Actually, the Republicans have a strong vested interest in a viable Democratic opposition. They actually have a lot to lose if, believing themselves invincible, they go off the deep end.
It is hard to keep yourself honest when the opposition is weak. It is hard to know if some of your ideas are short-sighted if there is no opposition prepared to point out their weaknesses. One-party control is great while it lasts for the party that enjoys it, but eventually it collapses after a run of bad decisions and abuses of power.

When he was Charlotte’s mayor, Pat McCrory helped implement a 25-year plan that set priorities for transit investment to guide the city’s growth.  Now the governor-elect says North Carolina needs a 25-year transportation and infrastructure plan “to send a clear signal to the business community of the state’s future investment in roads, railroads, bridges, ports, airports and other infrastructure.” (See John Frank's story for more on McCrory's promises and priorities.)

People in and out of government in Raleigh have been thinking along similar lines over the past couple of years.

“We’ve done a lot of work, and we’re happy to share that with the new governor,” said Gene Conti, who has served as outgoing Gov. Bev Perdue’s transportation secretary since 2009.  “And what he does with that is up to him. There’s a lot of stuff out there, and we’re certainly sharing it with his transition team.”

A business-government logistics task force, chaired by Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton, spent two years meeting in communities across North Carolina to assess the state’s long-term economic, mobility and infrastructure needs, and it reported its findings (PDF) in June. Recommendations included further looks at developing inland ports and investing in improvements to the Morehead City and Wilmington ports.

The state Board of Transportation updated its long-range look this year with a 2040 Statewide Transportation Plan, based on a survey of expected needs and priorities from residents and local governments.  The plan predicts that the state will need ... [MORE].

Terry Stoops is saying that his sources tell him that "former Wake County superintendent Tony Tata will not be appointed chairman of the State Board of Education."

It's part of a column today from Stoops, director of education studies for the conservative John Locke Foundation, in which he makes predictions about education changes to come in North Carolina now that Republicans hold the governor's mansion and the General Assembly.

Other predictions include expanding career and technical education, the director of the Division of Non-Public Education "is the most important education appointment that nobody is talking about" and "Pat McCrory will become a Jeb Bush/Bobby Jindal/Mitch Daniels-type education reformer."

Could the next job for former Wake County Schools Superintendent Tony Tata be chairman of the state Board of Education?

With Republican gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory leading in all the polls, it's expected that he'll dump Bill Harrison as board chairman. In an op-ed piece Wednesday, conservative columnist Rick Martinez writes that "among the more tantalizing rumors on a possible replacement is — you guessed it – former Wake County school superintendent and (and retired Army general) Tony Tata."

"Even though he was fired after only two years on the job, he oversaw some remarkable academic gains in the classroom," Martinez writes. "Wouldn’t that be sweet?"

Martinez happily speculates on the changes that could take place in education policy with McCrory making six of the state board's 13 appointments by 2013 and Wake County school board member John Tedesco potentially being elected state schools superintendent.

The saga involving Wake County school board members Debra Goldman and Chris Malone has been a frequent topic this week on the Talking ABout Politics blog maintained by longtime North Carolina political consultants Gary Pearce and Carter Wrenn.

In a post today, Pearce, a Democrat, points to all the times Goldman and her family have contacted Cary police to write that "the police may need to build a substation at her office" if Goldman is elected state auditor.

"Goldman ought to step down and let somebody else take her place," Pearce writes. "And all of us should agree that she has no business holding an important state office."

Republican gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory sounded more tonight like he was backing Beth Wood, the Democratic incumbent state auditor, than Debra Goldman, the GOP nominee.

When asked at tonight's debate if he still supported Goldman, McCrory said "it's extremely unfair to make a final decision based upon allegations which I don't have much information on." Goldman has been embroiled in a recent controversy over whether she had an affair with fellow Wake County school board member Chris Malone, a GOP candidate for the District 35 state House seat.

Unsolicited, McCrory went on to praise Wood, saying "she's done a good job." McCrory also said Wood "was the only member of the Council of State who did stand up to the broken government of both the Easley and Perdue administrations."

Claim: “The North Carolina Supreme Court and Justice Lake had a case, and they said when he was mayor pro tem he collaborated with his employer, Duke Energy, to have the city of Charlotte condemn part of a family farm in order to enhance Duke’s profit line,” Dalton said during the debate. “And they said he filed a sworn affidavit and didn’t tell the truth. He was looking after that special interest. He wasn’t looking after the people. He certainly wasn’t looking after the farmer.”

McCrory responded by saying, “This is the first I’ve heard of this. It is just amazing, this attack on the private sector. … I had 34 years of business experience with Duke Energy, which I am very proud of. I was employed by them the whole time I was mayor. Never was there a question of ethical indiscretion.”

Dalton later responded, “I think that is a pretty significant indiscretion.”

Did state Republican Party leaders gamble that Wake County school board member Debra Goldman could be elected state auditor without rumors about her alleged relationship with fellow board member Chris Malone derailing her candidacy?

As noted in today's article, Greg Dority says "senior" Republican Party leaders were worried that Goldman's character might emerge as an issue in the runoff. Dority, who finished second in the May primary, says those leaders pressured him into not requesting a runoff, which allowed Goldman a clear path to Election Day.

When he was considering entering the auditor’s race earlier this year, Dority said he was approached by Wake County residents who wanted to tell him about Goldman’s conduct so that he could use it against her in the primary. Dority declined to take that approach, but the idea arose again when he talked to out-of-state political consultants about whether to take part in a runoff.

The controversy over Wake County school board member Debra Goldman's 2010 police statements about fellow board member Chris Malone are turning into a statewide issue.

As noted in today's article, both major North Carolina gubernatorial candidates are speaking out about Goldman, the GOP candidate for state auditor. Republican candidate Pat McCrory is defending Goldman while Democratic candidate Walter Dalton is accusing McCrory of overlooking "Republican scandals."

In addition, state Republican officials are still publicly backing Goldman while behind the scenes distancing themselves from her.