Ken and Cal

Recently I blogged that, if Elaine Marshall gets in the Senate race, her candidacy should give pause to Ken Lewis and Cal Cunningham.   The reverse is also true.   Yes, Lewis and Cunningham are both unproven unknowns. But don’t overestimate how well known Marshall is. Or Richard Burr, for that matter.   In recent…

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Welcome to Modern Times

Good Lord: There’re terrorists in Johnston County. They’ve been sitting down there around a local fish pond for three years planning to go to Israel and blow someone (and themselves) sky high.    In the old days Johnston County was famous for Ava Gardner and world-class bootleggers but times have changed; now the home of…

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The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight

It’s a fact: One hand in Governor Perdue’s administration doesn’t have a clue what the other hand is doing. The Governor’s out telling everyone who’ll listen that if she doesn’t raise taxes a billion dollars she’s going to have to make terrible, terrible budget cuts – but the factotums in her administration seem determined to…

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Why Doctor O May Win

Barack Obama brought his health-care reform campaign to Raleigh just as polls suggest support is slipping for reform.   As always, Washington and the media are poised for a rerun of history. They see the story in terms of the death of Clinton Care in 1994.   But the story could turn out different this…

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Does Anybody Care?

The capital press corps and several editorial writers have whacked Governor Perdue and the Democratic legislative leadership for not getting a budget done.   But does anybody outside downtown Raleigh care?   Obviously, other people in government care. Like local governments. And school officials who don’t know how many teachers to hire.   But I…

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Senate Scramble

Elaine Marshall is telling people she’s in the 2010 U.S. Senate race. That should give Cal Cunningham and Kenneth Lewis pause. She has two big advantages: stature and gender.   Women have won three of the last five races for governor or Senator in North Carolina: Dole, Hagan and Perdue versus Easley and Burr.  …

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Dear Mike and Mary

  Please stop. Drop the grievance. Stop the bleeding.   On just one day last week, NCSU’s chancellor said your grievance proceeding is taking up too much of the university’s time and attention, the Democratic Party coughed up $24,000 because of you and the NCSU band cancelled a trip to Ireland because of you.  …

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Bev Blows It Up

What do you do when your poll ratings are as bad as any governor’s in the country, somewhere down in Bush-Cheney territory? When you’ve been outfought and outfoxed by June Atkinson, for Pete’s sake? And when fellow Democrats are calling you a lame duck in your first year?   Well, you could find something more…

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A Tall Tale

Alright. Follow this: The Governor rips into the House and Senate Democrats’ tax increase – saying she cannot abide their raising taxes on working people. Then (giving Mark and Tony and Joe another rap on the nose) she lets fly, again, saying they also cut education too much.   Of course that didn’t sit too…

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One Clever Liberal

Columnist Rick Horowitz may be the sharpest tongued liberal around. He probably doesn’t mean much harm but sometimes when he writes he sounds like he has the disposition of a water moccasin. The other day in a column he called Dick Cheney ‘greedy…vain…and scared’ then panned Cheney for ‘dishing the dirt.’ Now he’s aimed his…

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