So say the results of Public Policy Polling's latest tracking poll on the Republican presidential race. The latest numbers show that former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and McCain, the Arizona senator, are neck-and-neck in a survey Wednesday of 978 likely Republican primary voters.

That's a big leap for McCain, who was the choice of just 8 percent of those in the group's December poll.

THE LATEST NUMBERS:

Huckabee - 27 percent

McCain - 26 percent

Mitt Romney - 15 percent

Fred Thompson - 11 percent

Rudy Giuliani - 9 percent

Ron Paul - 4 percent

The survey has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.1 percent.

Governor's race tight

The group's poll in the Republican primary for governor shows that it also is a tight race.

The poll showed a slight lead for Charlotte mayor Pat McCrory, who is set to announce his candidacy Tuesday in Jamestown, although the numbers are within the margin of error.

THE LATEST NUMBERS:

McCrory: 18 percent

Fred Smith: 16 percent

Bill Graham: 13 percent

Bob Orr: 8 percent

Elbie Powers: 2 percent

"Republican voters have not been particularly enamored with their current choices for governor," said Public Policy Polling President Dean Debnam. "It looks like they want to give the new guy a shot."

The Raleigh-based Democratic polling firm surveyed 978 likely Republican primary voters Wednesday. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percent.

New counsel for UNC

The UNC system has a new top lawyer: Laura Bernstein Luger, who has been an attorney with Womble Carlyle Sandridge & Rice.

Luger was announced Friday as vice president for legal affairs and general counsel of the University of North Carolina system. She starts the job Feb. 1 at an annual salary of $225,000.

Luger succeeds Leslie Winner, who resigned from the post last month to become executive director of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.

How rumors start

The New York Post's Page Six gossip column failed to check its facts when it wrote last week about U.S. Senate candidate Jim Neal, who used to live in New York.

The column said that former North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms "will be spinning in his grave" if Neal, who is gay, wins the Democratic nomination and then defeats Republican U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Dole this fall.

Helms is alive.

Eyeing Cowell's seat

John M. Alexander Jr. is considering a run for the state Senate.

A native of Raleigh, Alexander went to Broughton High School and N.C. State. He now runs a family-owned business, Capital International Trucks, and is active in local nonprofits. He raised $2.5 million for the Hillsborough Street YMCA in Raleigh, which bears his family's name.

Alexander is considering a run for the Republican nomination for the District 16 seat being vacated by Sen. Janet Cowell.

On the Democratic side, former Wake County commissioner Jack Nichols and assistant to the state attorney general Josh Stein are running.

OVERHEARD

'I'm actually from North Carolina -- and not from Virginia.'

- Democratic gubernatorial candidate Richard Moore, in response at last week's debate to rival Beverly Perdue's assertion that he's 'from Wall Street' for taking campaign donations from New York investment firms. Perdue grew up in Grundy, Va.

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