By JOHN NORTH

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WEAVERVILLE — Amid bone-chilling winds, about 30 people staged a one-hour informational picket here Dec. 15 against North Carolina Budget Director Art Pope, contending that the owner of Variety Wholesalers is using his wealth to push extremist policies in state government that are hurting the working poor, which, they contend, include Pope’s employees and customers.

Variety’s holdings include Rose’s, Super Dollar, Super 10, Maxway and several other discount store chains.

The picketing — including waving anti-Pope signs and chanting slogans — began in front of Rose’s, just up the hill from Weaver Boulevard. About 10 minutes into the action, the store manager emerged, said the protesters were on private property and asked “politely” for those at the rally to move off the property —and they did at once, several protesters told the Daily Planet.

Specifically protest organizer Vickie Meath said that the Rose’s manager told her that he respects her group’s right to picket, but “that it is private property and that he needed to ask us to move... The manager politely asked us to move, about 10 minutes into the protest.”

She added, “He addressed me. My response was: ‘We will move.’ And that this informational picket was not aimed at the employees of Rose’s and that we will move down to the street” — to Weaver Boulevard. Meath noted that the group contacted the Weaverville Police Department in advance, to let it know of the planned informational picket.

“We completely anticipated that we’d be asked to move,” Meath said. “It was done in a very non-confrontational manner (by the Rose’s manager), which was very much appreciated.”

As for the picketing, she said, “It was mostly holding signs and a little chanting.

Among the chants heard by a Daily Planet reporter — arriving mid-protest — were “Who owns Rose’s? Art Pope.... Whose money is negatively impacting North Carolina? Art Pope.”

Regarding the public’s response to the protest, Meath said, “It seemed to be all positive. One guy in a car might have said, ‘Art Pope is good.’ Most of it was positive (toward the protesters, though). A lot of honking in favor. I think we maybe printed up 200 informational flyers. I came back with 25, so we came back with only a few.”

Meath, who also is executive director of Just Economics in Asheville, said, “It’s important for us as North Carolinians to know where the money” that is being used to support legislation “is coming from.” She contended that it favors the interests of the wealthy over the poor. 

“Our  protest was part of a larger statewide effort to educate North Carolina individuals where that money is coming from.” The state NAACP and Forward Together Moral Movement is spearheading the statewide movement, she said.

As for the protest turnout, Meath said, “We anticipated a small effort ... 10 to 25, so we were pretty happy with the turnout (of 30), especially on such a cold day.”

She emphasized, “Our informational picket, which is what this was today, was not intended to hurt the manager or workers at Rose’s, who often are low-wage workers.

“It was an informational picket to let folks know about it (Pope’s activities) and not planned to be an act of civil disobedience. I’m director of Just Economics and part of the larger movement, Forward Together. The Forward Together was started by the Rev. (William J. Barber (II) and NAACP ... We are initiating a local coalition in Henderson and Buncombe counties.”

Regarding her specific criticisms of Pope, Meath said, “Everyone’s human. I don’t necessarily look at anyone all bad or all good... but the way he is using his money... Significant amounts of money ... He’s high up in the (Gov. Pat) McCrory administration... It’s been devastating for North Carolina residents.”

Further, she said of Pope, “His work and his money are hurting so many of the people in the communities where he has stores. He’s exploiting the people working for him, as well as his customers. His employees do not make a living wage, so many of them are depending on federal and state programs — and those programs are being cut” with his support and actions.

Meath added, “Well, I think the Forward Together movement, with a larger agenda, can use a variety of tactics to point out and expose the negative influence (of Pope) on our state... I think it’s important for us to educate North Carolinans who don’t see behind-the-scenes where there money is going. And Art Pope is very behind-the-scenes ...It’s extremely useful” to bring his efforts out into the open.

“I’m very pleased and I’m thankful that there’s so many individuals in Western North Carolina to show up on short notice on a very cold day to illustrate their concerns with the direction of North Carolina. I’m also very pleased that our crowd of folks was very diverse, in terms of race and class... Its representative of this larger movement.”

Meath, who is white, noted that she also a member of Asheville branch of NAACP and part of leadership committee of Foward Together in the Mountains.

Meanwhile, a press release from Barber, head of the state NAACP, noted, “Throughout the holiday season, the NC NAACP and the Forward Together Moral Movement will hold statewide informational pickets outside of Budget Direct Art Pope-owned stores.

Local Republicans air views on protest(s)

What do local conservative leaders think about Mountain Moral Monday? Well, they try not to.

Buncombe County Soil & Water Conservation District Supervisor Jeff Foster, one of the few Republicans holding local elective office, says first and foremost, “Whatever their perspective, right or wrong, whether I agree with it or not, we need to work together to protect that opportunity to exercise free speech. I support that 100 percent.”

The problem, if there is one, would pertain more to self-respect than due process. The protesters appear to, for whatever reasons, be exercising someone else’s free speech, and not articulating their talking points very well.

Much like protesters at Occupy rallies, MMM participants express a jumble of reasons for coming, many of which are misinformed. MMM, which has plans to go national, recently made The Nation’s “Progressive Honor Roll of 2013.”

Asked if he thought the movement was deserving, former 11th District Chair Steve Duncan quipped, “Sure . . . I think we should honor any organization that creates a regular protest where those at the rally cannot offer any answers to any questions asked of them about the very subject they are there to protest. We need to recognize those that try to answer questions where they contradict themselves without enough knowledge of the subject to realize they just contradicted themselves. Sometimes your greatest support is created by those that scream at you the loudest.”

Matt Hoagland, vice chair of the North Carolina Federation of Young Professional Republicans, attended the Aug. 5 rally in Asheville.

“I’m particularly frustrated, and my sensibilities are offended, by the entire Moral Monday scheme,” Hoagland said. The MMM protests are not a spontaneous grassroots uprising. Instead, they are merely follow-through with Blueprint N.C., he said.

Blueprint NC has been described as a “shadowy, left-wing hydra.” An expose from a leaked memo published earlier this year in the Charlotte Observer disclosed plans to “Eviscerate, Mitigate, Litigate, Cogitate, and Agitate” Republican leadership. Copies of the “not for distribution” memo, with its two- and ten-year visions for discrediting Governor Pat McCrory and other Republicans with means fair and foul, may still be found online.

Hoagland and local Young Republicans interviewed and videotaped several at the rally.

Calling themselves the League of Informed Asheville Residents (LIAR), they circulated a petition to return state education spending levels to those of the last Democrat budget. They collected pages of signatures without a single challenge. Although a clever statistician can cherry-pick and parameterize any set of data to say anything, Hoagland stands behind his initial claim that state Republicans increased education spending this year to $7.9 billion from $7.3 billion in the Democrat’s 2009 budget.

Since he was engaging in guerilla politics at the time, he didn’t try to probe anybody’s mind. He just let people talk. The escapade confirmed suppositions that attendees were not familiar with the facts. MACPAC community organizer Robert Malt used Bill Bonner’s term “zombies” to describe the scene. “Basically, a zombie attacks when his free lunch is taken away,” explained Malt. Zombies, he said, are the same thing as Ayn Rand’s moochers and looters.