Conventional Politics

The State Democratic Party convention is in Fayetteville this weekend. If you go, you can see how much politics has changed in a lifetime.   State party conventions used to be a big deal. Huge crowds, lots of enthusiasm and a good chance to take a party’s temperature for the upcoming elections.   The latter…

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Capital Buzz

So let’s talk about what Raleigh’s buzzing about this week:   Is there some kind of statutory deadline in the Mike Easley case this month – that is, tomorrow?   Is something coming from the U.S. Attorney?   Is this investigation ever going to end?   Is George Holding holding on until President Obama’s second…

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CC’d

“Controlled choice” is all the buzz now in the Wake schools debate.   This has the whiff of one of those oxymoronic (with the emphasis on “moron”) political/policy phrases that sounds great but never quite works out in practice.   Remember George W. Bush’s “compassionate conservatism”?

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Inside the Press Corps

My blog about the capital press corps – and how its coverage of the Alcoa story might have been influenced by UNC-TV’s Eszter Vajda – brought this response from Scott Mooneyham of The Insider/Capitol Press Association. I think it’s worth reprinting in full.   Background: I had quoted a blog by Laura Leslie about how…

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Be Careful What You Wish For

A Republican lobbyist friend has some advice for GOP legislators if they win the House and Senate this year: demand a recount.   “They’ll inherit the worst budget mess in history,” she says.   Two years spent wrestling with that mess – and making the cuts that would be required to read their lips: no…

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The Forgotten Man

Let’s pass on talking about politics today and talk about something I know nothing about:  Economics.   My friend Richard, who’s a banker, just sent me a book called The Forgotten Man about the Depression.  Now, normally, I’d run from a book about economics but Ms. Amity Shlaes has written a fascinating story about New…

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What Do Voters Think?

Have I missed it? Or has somebody done – and released – a poll of Wake County voters on the school debate?   Most people I run into take it as a matter of faith that the board’s new direction reflects a minority opinion in the county.   True, it was the election for just…

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Failure of Leadership

There are two kinds of political leaders: uniters and dividers.   Barack Obama is a uniter; Sarah Palin, a divider. Jim Hunt was a uniter; Jesse Helms, a divider. Ronald Reagan was a uniter; George W. Bush, a divider.   Dividers can succeed in politics. But they don’t leave lasting legacies of accomplishment.   The…

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Marshall and Agents

There’s an old joke that the most dangerous place to be in an election year is between a politician and a TV camera.   This year, the most dangerous place may be in any group regulated by Secretary of State Elaine Marshall.   Her Senate campaign got big headlines today by promising to investigate sports…

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The Gang of Eight

Laura Leslie of North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC is a great reporter and one of my favorite bloggers. She recently had a post about the capital media that is worth attention.   Since 2004, she wrote, the legislative press corps’ ranks have dropped from 20-something to, at the end of this year’s session, eight. That brought…

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