Perdue has party fretting

Recent polls lead some Democratic activists to worry about the governor's race

ASHEVILLE -- Democrats are increasingly bullish about the chances of their presidential and U.S. Senate candidates in North Carolina. It's the governor's race that worries some.

"I wouldn't say nervous, I'd say a little bit concerned," Charlotte Democrat Tom Chumley said Saturday.

He was among several hundred North Carolina Democrats in Asheville for the party's annual Vance-Aycock gathering, a flurry of receptions and events highlighted by a gala dinner Saturday night.

Presidential candidate Barack Obama made a surprise speech at Saturday night's dinner, praising party candidates all the way down the state ballot.

"I heard there were a bunch of people here who decided to turn North Carolina blue," he said, to roaring applause. "I hope you don't mind me crashing the party."

The party's superstar has scheduled a rally today as he prepares for Tuesday's debate with Republican John McCain. It is his third visit to the state in two weeks and underscores his push to make North Carolina a battleground.

Some surveys show Obama running even in the state and Democrat Kay Hagan with an edge over Republican Sen. Elizabeth Dole.

But in the governor's race, a WRAL News poll last week found Republican Pat McCrory had erased Democrat Bev Perdue's lead from August. McCory had 50 percent to Perdue's 46 percent.

Other surveys have shown the Charlotte mayor running strong in many urban areas.

"Obviously, there is some concern," state Democratic Party chairman Jerry Meek said Saturday. "On the other hand, Bev is a seasoned campaigner. Plus we have a ground operation of a magnitude we've never seen before."

The Obama campaign has registered thousands of new North Carolina voters. Last weekend, it boasted of knocking on more than 100,000 doors. Regardless of whether Obama wins the state, Democrats are counting on that effort to help Perdue and others.

"In my gut, I think we're winning," Perdue said last week. "Everywhere I go, I think we're winning. I'm working hard, and I believe the people of North Carolina are going to elect me the next governor."

Some Democrats grumble privately that Perdue's campaign has yet to hit on an effective message to counter McCrory's mantra of change and reform.

"I don't believe at this point in time that she's exposed herself for what she is," Senate Leader Marc Basnight of Manteo said last week. "She's a much better candidate than has shown up at times in these [TV] ads. I believe her handlers have not done the best job. But they're turning it around."

Perdue, a two-term lieutenant governor, has argued that she -- not McCrory -- is the candidate of change.

"Anybody who knows me knows pretty clearly that I've taken on the status quo for a hundred years, and will continue to do it," she said.

Perdue has stepped up her campaign in McCrory's backyard, opening a Charlotte headquarters and making several appearances in the city recently. Because she is from New Bern in Eastern North Carolina, she could face a geographic hurdle.

Democrat Davy Lowman, a teacher and state House candidate from Cleveland County, said he has talked to voters from both parties who believe western parts of the state get short shrift from Raleigh. Gov. Mike Easley grew up in Rocky Mount and lives in Southport.

"So many people don't know who to vote for," he said Saturday.

"Do you vote your region or do you vote your party?"

The Democratic-leaning Public Policy Poll found that most voters who haven't made their minds up tend to vote Democratic.

"Perdue hasn't done enough yet to excite her base voters in the way that Obama and Hagan have," Public Policy spokesman Tom Jensen wrote last week. "But she should at least start out with a leg up in winning over these voters."

He predicted anywhere from a 10-point Perdue victory to a 10-point win for McCrory.

(Staff writer Mark Johnson contributed to this report.)