This evening the wonderful, progressive website BlueNC hosted Democratic challenger for North Carolina Lieutentant Governor Dan Besse in a live blog forum.

Dan spent a couple of hours discussing topics like health care, transparency in government, climate change and the environement, and military affairs, as well as answering questions posed by BlueNC readers.

If you are a resident of North Carolina, or just interested in state politics, check out the full text of the blog here.

If you are as impressed as I think you will be, you can check out Dan’s website to volunteer, make a donation, or share with a friend.

Here are some highlights from the event:

On health care:

Improving access to health care in North Carolina is one of my top personal priorities. Serving as chair of the Health and Wellness Trust Fund Commission is one of the Lieutenant Governor's best openings to press that priority forward.

On higher education:

It means keeping tuition rates as low as possible, ensuring that grants and loans are availble for students who need them, and providing public service opportunities for as many students as possible as an alternative method of repaying student loans.

On government transparency:

I will cheerfully support expanding live internet coverage of the legislative process, both floor debates and committees.

On mental health disparity:

The mental health system crisis in our state is straightforward. A well-intended effort of mental health treatment reform was launched a few years back, to move patients out of full institutionalization and into community treatment programs whenever possible. Good in theory.Then it wasn't funded.

On electability:

The 2008 elections will channel an enormous reservoir of public disquiet over the direction our nation is taking. People want change. They're ready for a message calling for positive change, a government that will attend to their concerns, not the inside-the-beltway lobbies in Washington...or in Raleigh.

At the state level in NC, that's going to translate into a positive response to candidates who have real experience in public service outside the Raleigh beltway. Candidates who have taken their own public positions and worked on community problems as independently elected officials, walking the neighborhoods where they live. In short, candidates who wear work shoes, not wingtips.

On the environment:

this may be the most critical issue facing our state over the next 20 years.

A predicted effect of global warming for much our state is a drier climate. The current historic drought may well be merely a foretaste of future patterns, not a passing weather blip.

At the same time our demand for water is going up. Our state's population is projected to grow by 50% between 2000 and 2030--in effect placing numbers equivalent to the entire population of SC on top of the folks already here in NC.

We must do two things:

1) Protect the quality of our water supply.

2) Get smarter about how we use it.

On military affairs:

Our active service troops are inherently limited by the realities of military service in their ability to use the political process to speak up for themselves. As citizens who care about them, and who depend on their protection, we must speak up for them. Our National Guard and reserve personnel, and their families, also must have our active community support.

That includes telling Washington when it is not doing its duty to our troops and our veterans, and their families. Like now, in my opinion.

On why he's running:

It seems to be the perfect opportunity to take my combination of local and statewide, hands-on policy work experience, and put it to work on the needs I care most about: environmental stewardship, and equal opportunity for all.

With the current generation of statewide elected Democrats either running for governor or holding onto their current posts, the LG office is the premier chance to bring a fresh voice to Raleigh. And, looking at the demographic trends in our statewide electorate, I'm convinced that this is the year when a genuine progressive Democrat, coming out of a citizen-action tradition, can break through the glass ceiling into a statewide post.

Remember, the full text of the blog can be found here.

Thanks for listening.

Dan Besse for North Carolina Lieutenant Governor

www.danbesse2008.org