North Carolina's former governor

The big news in North Carolina politics has been the exposé series in the Raleigh newspaper about the sleaze surrounding our former governor, Democrat Mike Easley. It seems that the two-term governor had a history going back to his first term of accepting favors such as plane rides or the loan of an SUV for his campaign from generous donors who then got goodies in return such as plum appointments to boards. He then neglected to report the free plane trips in private planes on his campaign finance filings. One wealthy donor, in addition to his generous donations, got the governor's wife a cushy well-paid job at NCSU. And he got results.

In two letters to the partnership's land manager obtained by The News & Observer, Campbell bragged about his connections, writing that he had the "political presence" and "strong relationships throughout state government" to get developments approved "much quicker than any other developer."

Those contacts, Campbell wrote on Jan. 23, 2006, had just paid off: He asserted that he and a business associate had cut by nearly half the time to get crucial permits on a separate property in Carteret County. That property: a 285-acre Charleston-style neighborhood called Cannonsgate, where just a month earlier Campbell helped the governor buy a lot at a favorable price.

....Campbell got help from the Easley administration. He got quick action on the Cannonsgate development permits.

He twice won dismissals of investigations of his vehicle inspection station from the Division of Motor Vehicles, part of the Easley administration. DMV agents documented serious violations and in one case ordered the station closed. Once Campbell began appeals, both inquiries ended with little explanation.

And Easley twice placed Campbell on the board of trustees at Campbell's alma mater, N.C. State, a plum appointment as he was developing contacts in business and real estate.

It now has emerged thated on the News and Observer series, federal authorities have opened up an investigation, bas into the former governor's dealings with his donors.

There is also a federal investigation into whether or not John Edwards misused campaign funds in funneling money to his mistress, Rielle Hunter.

However, the federal prosecutor in charge of the investigation is a Republican holdover from the Bush administration. As is his privilege, Barack Obama can replace the nation's federal prosecutors and the state's Democrats are now preparing a list to recommend candidates to the President.

When two of the state's most prominent Democrats are under federal investigation, perhaps it would be advisable to keep the prosecutor on the job until the investigations are finished. Just as there is a feeling that Patrick Fitzgerald should be allowed to finish his work on the former governor Rod Blagojevich in Illinois, the President might want to avoid any hint of political interference with a federal investigation of two such prominent Democrats by keeping on the federal prosecutor, George E.B. Holding.