Two Things: Political fireworks and a star-turn for the Forsyth sheriff; AI dispatchers on the way (2024)

Mighty Fantastic Wednesday. What’re you going to do with your holiday?

Fireworks, it would seem, are the order of the day.

And not those cheesy fizzers and gee-whizzers on sale at the corner pop-up tents, either. Only honest-to-God firecrackers and Roman candles will do.

And once the smoke has cleared, some of us will turn our attention to loud noises and hot smoke created by another sort of all-American noisemaker: the standard-issue campaigning politician.

Yeah, we’ve still got weeks before the major parties start conventioneering and months before the mud begins to stick.

But that doesn’t mean it’s not already being flung. For about a month, maybe more, 30-second political ads have been proliferating on the airwaves.

And like you, I prefer looking away. I really would. Yet it’s a lot like passing a trooper giving some poor schlub a ticket.

You can’t not look. Or listen.

Particularly when a particular Josh Stein ad lighting up Mark Robinson with Robinson’s own words about abortion airs.

It’s about killing a child because you were not responsible enough to keep your skirt down. … It’s not your body anymore.

In its first iteration, the kicker line is audible, but just barely. It faded toward the end.

Subsequent airings, though, have turned the volume up just a bit.

IT’S NOT YOUR BODY ANYMORE.

It’s short, punchy and devastating. It serves to remind voters, women especially— 54 percent of the N.C. electorate is female— where Robinson stands on abortion in his own words.

The guess here is that the political pros running Stein’s campaign for governor have polls and focus group feedback which shows that using Robinson’s own words against him is having an impact and that as we move closer to election day, the volume continues to escalate as Election Day approaches.

IT’S NOT YOUR BODY ANYMORE

A second Stein ad, not nearly as memorable, could wind up having an outsized impact on Forsyth County should Stein win in November.

How’s that, you say?

In it, an reintroduction of sorts for Stein’s time serving as the state attorney general, Sheriff Bobby Kimbrough appears in full dress uniform, speaking on the candidate’s behalf

“Josh Stein tackled a rape-kit backlog,” Kimbrough says, “bringing justice to rape survivors and putting rapists behind bars.”

The sheriff’s appearance is notable for a couple of reasons.

First, as anyone who’s laid eyes on the man knows, Kimbrough is a sharp-dresser.

Given a choice between a crisp, tailored suit and stiff, formal dress uniform, he’s going with the pocket square and French cuffs.

Second, and far more important, is what it could mean should early polls showing Stein with a decent lead hold up.

Few things in this world come for free. And that includes endorsem*nts— even when the politicians belong to the same party.

So should Stein cruise to victory, do not be surprised if Sheriff Kimbrough winds up in Raleigh, perhaps serving as the secretary of public safety.

Guilford Metro 911 system upgrades

GREENSBORO— In a year or so, some 911 calls will be answered by an artificial intelligence rather than an actual human being.

The Guilford Metro 911 system, which routes calls for police, fire, sheriff’s deputies and EMTs, is getting a $3.6 million upgrade that uses AI to triage calls— and handle some nonemergencies itself.

Yeah. We know. George Jetson-type stuff.

A technology company called Hexagon is marketing the futuristic technology and touts the fact that Guilford County residents will be among the first in the nation to be served by such a system.

And that might be troubling to some people conditioned to look askance at gee-whiz, high-tech developments that sometimes don’t involve humans.

Exhibit A would be driverless cars. Not sure we’d hop in, say, an Uber without a chatty pilot behind the wheel.

Still, the “HxGn OnCall Dispatch” is expected to speed response times and give first responders the ability to see photos and video sent from accident scenes.

Guilford Metro 911 officials have told local news outlets that the new system can pinpoint exact locations and are careful to note that the AI is a tool to help human dispatchers rather than replace them entirely.

The new system is expected to be fully operational in 12 to 18 months.