Archive for May 2013
BS on BCBS
A veteran business lobbyist takes aim at both The N&O and the legislature – and makes a noteworthy point about how government in Raleigh today works – or doesn’t: “The N&O’s story last week about Blue Cross Blue Shield’s diminished influence at the General Assembly was badly reported, unfair to BCBS and confirmed that…
Read MoreWhose Victory?
One word can say a lot. So it was with last week’s heated meeting between the Wake County commissioners and school board. Joe Bryan, chairman of the commissioners, told the N&O: “You’ve got some lingering tension over the victory we had in the Senate yesterday.” That “victory” was Senate passage of a bill…
Read MoreOn Jones Street
A TAPster and long-time legislative lobbyist notes that, in politics, you must sometimes rise above principle: “A pair of current debates in the General Assembly – when studied together – demonstrate that lofty political principles and high-minded ideals are quickly abandoned when they conflict with the reality of local politics. “Tesla, the maker…
Read MoreReal Trouble
You can easily flick aside a Republican witch hunt on Benghazi. After all, they’ve been at it since Mitt Romney popped off the first day. You can manage a controversy about the IRS targeting Tea Party groups – so long as, unlike Nixon, the White House wasn’t involved. But your Justice Department subpoenaed…
Read MoreMonday, Monday
Americans have a fine tradition of demonstrating, protesting, sitting-in and getting arrested when their government does something they don’t like. And we always have a great debate about whether the tactics help or hurt. Do they? Look at what we’ve seen over the years: suffragettes, civil rights, anti-Vietnam, gay rights. And the Tea Party,…
Read MoreNo Parking
When the Raleigh City Council abruptly and mysteriously fired City Manager Russell Allen, you knew there had to be some major urban policy matter involved. Yep: parking places. Now, politicians will put up with a lot. You can attack them, smear them, call them names, criticize their ideas and vote against them. That’s all…
Read MoreTax Winner
The N&O headline said “Tax plan creates more losers than winners,” but the only real winners and losers from the Senate tax proposal will be Phil Berger and Thom Tillis. As a wise Raleigh vet observed over breakfast, the plan won’t pass. Too many special interests gored, too many lobbyists working and too much…
Read MoreDon’t Stop ’em!
A group of Democrats was decrying the blizzard of bad bills they see from the legislature: cutting education, attacking renewable energy, making it harder for teens to get health care, loosening gun restraints, on and on. They were talking about what could be done to slow down the storm or persuade Governor McCrory to exercise…
Read MoreBig Three Collision
This week’s headlines tell a tale of the priorities and problems of North Carolina’s top three Republicans. Governor McCrory, like all new governors, is focused on getting his cronies into state jobs and frustrated that he can’t fire current state employees fast enough. (A TAPster noted that McCrory’s off-with-their-heads story came out on State…
Read MoreOn Mark Sanford’s Trail
The trouble with South Carolina, Robert E. Lee supposedly said, is that it’s too small to be an independent nation and too large to be an insane asylum. Which helps explain why Mark Sanford may win his congressional race tonight. The other explanation is our politics today. We are so deeply and bitterly divided…
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