Lobbyist's e-mails get a little too exotic

Maybe it's fitting that e-mail about exotic animals get caught in electronic quarantine.

E-mail from Roger Bone's lobbying firm about the dangers of exotic animals is being caught before it reaches legislators' in-boxes. The e-mail is routed to a quarantine file for messages the computer system software identifies as spam. Legislators can look through this file and let the messages through or delete them.

Bone is working for the Animal Protection Institute on a bill to ban private ownership of "inherently dangerous" animals, and his office has been firing legislators messages with "exotic animals" in the subject lines and text.

"The word 'exotic' caught them up," Bone said. He doesn't know of other e-mail from his office getting caught in the spam net.

Bone wasn't worried about messages getting lost.

"If it spams it out," he said, "we'll find another way."

Poll puts Dole ahead

A new poll out Wednesday has Republican U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole dominating a hypothetical race against Democratic U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge, but the numbers expose a few weaknesses for the incumbent senator, the poll's author said.

Dole, of Salisbury, has been dogged by rumors about whether she will run in 2008, especially in the wake of a catastrophic outcome for Senate Republicans after her term as chairwoman of the National Republican Senatorial Campaign.

Dole says she's running.

The poll, by Public Policy Polling, shows Dole running ahead of Etheridge, 45 percent to 30 percent, among likely voters.

But Dean Debnam, president of the company, pointed out that Dole enjoys more name recognition than Etheridge, a Lillington congressman known mostly in his district south and east of the Triangle.

"Dole is not necessarily in a very strong position," Debnam said.

Etheridge's name has been floated in the past as a possible senatorial candidate. His spokeswoman said Wednesday he isn't planning a Senate run in 2008.

"Right now his focus is on working on his committees on issues important to North Carolina," said spokeswoman Joanne Peters.

Dole political consultant Mark Stephens disputed the accuracy of the poll, which was conducted through automatic phone calls. Respondents signaled their choices by punching numbers on the phone.

"I don't know a campaign worth its salt that would utilize this kind of polling," Stephens said. "They don't even know who they're talking to on the other end of the phone. It could be a 12-year-old kid."

Debnam said the polling group will pit other hypothetical candidates, perhaps including U.S. Rep. Brad Miller of Raleigh, against Dole in future polls.

A poll by the group last month showed Gov. Mike Easley beating Dole by 44 percent to 41 percent.

The Dole-Etheridge poll was conducted Monday by automatic phone calls of 448 likely voters. The survey's margin of sampling error is plus or minus 4.6 percentage points.

Big pants, free lunch

You'd think a display of jumbo-sized pants would be an appetite killer, but the lure of free lunch was strong for dozens of people who lined up for sandwiches in the Legislative Building on Wednesday.

Meeting Jared Fogle, the former 425-pound college student who lost weight eating Subway sandwiches and gained fame pitching them, was a bonus. People snapped up his signed photos.

"You're the man who lost all that weight," lobbyist Roz Savitt told "Jared the Subway guy" as she approached the sandwich table.

Fogle filled the size 58 pants spread out on a table near him before he started eating Subway sandwiches twice a day as part of a weight loss plan.

His favorite sandwich -- sweet onion chicken teriyaki, toasted -- was not on the free-lunch menu Wednesday. Munchers had to make do with turkey, ham or veggie.