Bowles, a Democratic candidate for Senate, met informally with party faithful from Moore and Randolph counties in the auditorium at Highfalls Elementary School. He has made almost 50 such town hall-style sessions across the state in the past six months.
“This is a race we are absolutely going to win,” Bowles said.
At the end of his formal remarks, a coatless Bowles answered questions ranging from his views on the U.S. involvement in Iraq to the concerns of teachers, veterans and employees in the poultry industry.
Bowles said he is learning from the people met throughout North Carolina. He said people are concerned about the direction in which the country is headed, about their own economic well being and finding good paying jobs.
“It’s not a recovery if you don’t have a job or the skills to do the job available,” he said of the recent slight upturn in the American economy. “The people in North Carolina are really hurting, and they want someone to go to Washington and stand up for them.”
Bowles cited illustrations from real life: a woman who has lost her manufacturing job after 20 years and worries about raising her children; a man with a family working for $14,000 a year without benefits.
He focused on his 43-page job plan, which he wrote himself, using the experience of more than 30 years in the business world.
“I’ve really put my heart and soul in this job plan,” he said.
During his years in business, Bowles said he encountered success and failure and learned from both.
“They’re not Democratic ideas, or Republican ideas,” he said. “They’re good ideas.”
He discarded the casual attitude of people who say “don’t worry about outsourcing” and said he does indeed worry about outsourcing.
“I can go there and make a difference,” he said. “I can take 35 years of experience and put it to work.”
Bowles told the gathering that the Democrats could win the election if the party can turn out the vote on Election Day. He reminded them that in the 2002 election for Senate, he received more votes than John Edwards received in 1998, but Republican voters turned out in larger numbers to give Elizabeth Dole a victory.
“I know I can make you proud,” he said.
After his introductory remarks, Bowles took questions from the public for about 30 minutes, then remained another 30 minutes to talk individually with Democrats.
Clifton Frye of Cameron, a veteran of active military service and now a member of the Air National Guard, said he did not have a question but wanted to make an observation about Democrats.
“We’ve got some flip-flopping in the Democratic Party,” he said, drawing laughter from the crowd. “We’ve got to flip the flop.”
On questions about medical and prescription drug costs, Bowles said there are good points in the prescription drug bill recently passed by Congress but said that legislation fails because the government relinquished its “marketing muscle” in negotiating with drug companies.
He said he speaks with some inside knowledge after serving several months on the Merck board.
Bowles said the public pays twice for drug research and development, in taxes that the government uses in distributing research grants and in higher drug costs.
Getting Out of Iraq
“How do we get out of Iraq?” asked Deirdre Newton.
Bowles replied that the United States was mistaken when it thought that the peace would be retained in the same manner that we succeeded in Germany and Japan after World War II.
“Baghdad ain’t no Paris,” he said.
Bowles said he supported the concept of going to war in Iraq when President Bush first proposed that as a way to topple Saddam Hussein, the former Iraqi dictator. He also supported the $87 million budget addition to pay for the extra costs.
Going back to his days as chief of staff in the Bill Clinton White House, Bowles said that there was reason to believe that weapons of mass destruction did exist in Iraq and that the country posed as imminent threat to the United States.
He cited three things we must do to get out of Iraq: turn administration over to the international community; reconstitute the Iraqi army and make sure the military is properly trained; and complete the rebuilding of the country.
This need will continue, he said, until we are energy independent, for security and economic reasons.
Bowles added that the United States must also quit treating Saudi Arabia with such delicacy because of its oil resources.
Education, Trade Policies
Concerns about the public schools were voiced by a teacher, who told of crowded schools, where trailers are used as classrooms and storage rooms are converted into classrooms.
Bowles said that education is one of the points emphasized in his job plan, and he added that more money must be available to help train people in the skills needed for a changing job market. He also cited the widespread shortage of teachers as an acute problem.
He scoffed at President Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” plan, a largely unfunded program that he said should be called the “No Child Untested” plan.
Although Bowles supported many of the trade policies adopted during previous administrations, he now says that some of these policies are not working, largely because of poor cooperation from other countries.
Rather than rewarding China and other countries for unfair trade practices, Bowles now says that all new trade agreements should be halted until Washington cracks down on illegal imports.
In the first proposal of his job plan, Bowles pledges that, if elected, he will not vote for any new trade agreements until the United States enforces the fair-trade laws already on the books.
It is one of 10 proposals outlined in his job plan. The others cover such issues as creation of new jobs and retention of existing jobs by focusing on small business investment; providing tax incentives to encourage business to create and retain jobs but to repeal tax breaks that encourage companies to move jobs overseas; help for businesses to provide affordable health-care plans; support for research and development in manufacturing; helping agribusiness, including facilitating a quota buyout for tobacco growers; support for tourism and the military; investments in school construction, infrastructure and Internet access; additional training opportunities and a cutback on unnecessary government regulations and litigation.
County Democratic Party Chairman Bill Newton introduced Bowles, who said he felt right at home in Moore County.
Bowles pointed to his “brother” Walker Morris, a former county Democratic chairman. Bowles said they became brothers when his widowed mother married Morris’ widowed father several years ago.
An investment banker based in Charlotte, Bowles is a native North Carolinian and a graduate of the University of North Carolina. He earned a master of business administration degree at Columbia University. He is married and the father of three grown children.
Bowles is a former director of the federal Small Business Administration and served as chief of staff in the second term of President Clinton.
Appearing relaxed and informal, Bowles entered the High Falls auditorium with frequent stops to shake hands with his audience. He came to High Falls from a fund-raiser in Asheboro and was headed for Burlington afterwards.
Local Democrats arranged the session in High Falls in cooperation with Randolph County Democrats.
