Gravel, a former U.S. senator for Alaska, will come to Hickory this weekend to attend the N.C. Libertarian Party's convention. He is currently running for the party's nomination for president.

On May 6, he'll also be on the North Carolina ballot -- as a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

State Democratic Party spokeswoman Kerra Bolton said there's nothing the party can do about the double-booking.

"We have consulted with the State Board of Elections, and it is our understanding that current state law does not give the State Board flexibility to remove Mike Gravel from the ballot at this time," she told Dome.

Carolina Journal into club

Gov. Mike Easley says he'll ask his press staff to start treating the John Locke Foundation's Carolina Journal like other news media outlets from now on.

Easley said this week that he has told his senior staff and spokespeople to cooperate better with the state's news media to get information to the public.

And Easley said he would prod them to give equal access to the Journal, which routinely gigs him.

In a meeting Easley convened at the Executive Mansion with the head of the N.C. Press Association and the top editors of The News & Observer, The Charlotte Observer and the Carolina Journal, Journal Editor Richard Wagner asked Easley why his press office won't respond to the publication's information requests.

"It's been reported that we were at the top of the do-not-call list," Wagner said.

Easley said his press office's policy is not to respond to information requests from the Journal or other nonprofit advocacy groups, including its liberal counterpoint, N.C. Policy Watch.

But N&O Executive Editor John Drescher and Beth Grace, executive director of the N.C. Press Association, stood up for the Journal.

"I certainly view them as part of the press," Drescher told Easley. "They do a lot of good work. They're serious about what they do. They come after us sometimes, but that's fine."

Grace told Easley the Journal is a member of the press association, which admits only bona fide news organizations.

The governor asked Grace to send him a letter saying that.

"That would be helpful to me," he told her, "and then we'll start working on it from there."

Grace mailed it Thursday.

Meeker picks Obama

Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker has endorsed Barack Obama.

"Hillary Clinton's a very good candidate," he told Dome. "But Barack is someone who is particularly outstanding in terms of bringing a new generation around to change things and get the country back on track."

Meeker did not attend a recent Raleigh rally with Michelle Obama because of previous commitments, but he said he expects to have an event with other Triangle mayors who have endorsed Obama before the May 6 primary.

Employees' endorsements

The State Employees Association of North Carolina has announced its endorsements in legislative primary races.

The group, which represents 55,000 state workers, endorsed 13 candidates for the House and 12 candidates for the Senate through its political action committee.

Seven of the candidates are Republicans: Rep. Jeff Barnhart; House candidates George Shaeffer, Sidney Sandy, Nalin Mehta and Shirley Randleman; and Sens. Fletcher Hartsell and Jim Jacumin.

In two cases, it endorsed candidates running against each other: Sen. Vernon Malone and rival Ann Akland; and Senate candidates Jack Nichols and Josh Stein.

In the House, the PAC endorsed Reps. Angela Bryant, Edith Warren and Drew Saunders and candidates Robert Richardson, Greg Taylor, Charles Graham, Betty Mangum and Ric Marshall.

In the Senate, it endorsed Sens. Floyd McKissick, Ellie Kinnaird, Katie Dorsett and Steve Goss and candidates Shelly Willingham and Chuck Stone.

Perdue, Moore nearly even

A new poll shows Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue and state Treasurer Richard Moore about even in the Democratic primary for governor.

The Civitas Institute's April DecisionMaker poll shows Moore with 37 percent of Democratic voters and Perdue with 36 percent. Twenty-eight percent were undecided.

The survey of 800 registered voters was conducted April 9-10 by TelOpinion Research of Virginia. Voters had to have voted in either the 2002, 2004 or 2006 general election or registered since 2006.

The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 3.7 percentage points.

NCSU chancellor

President Bush has appointed Jim Oblinger, chancellor of N.C. State University, to serve on the board of the national Fulbright scholarship program.

Oblinger will serve the remainder of a term that ends Sept. 22. The board oversees the prestigious international Fulbright program.

'Hillary Clinton's a very good candidate. But Barack is someone who is particularly outstanding in terms of bringing a new generation around to change things and get the country back on track.'

- Charles Meeker, on his endorsement of Barack Obama