Brutal jailers locked mentally ill prisoners in ‘isolation cells,’ took their clothes and mattresses, and left them to sleep naked on the concrete floor – it sounds like a prison in Bangkok or Rangoon only it didn’t happen in Bangkok it happened in Raleigh. The wardens at Central Prison called it “therapeutic seclusion.” Governor…
Read MoreDemocratic oppo researchers should be reveling in what Dome called Pat McCrory’s “shout out” to Heather Lusordo: “I just think unwarranted personal attacks against you hurt our democratic system. I feel for your and your family for what you had to go through. I commend you for the courage to stand up to it.…
Read MoreToday’s N&O story (“Data show fewer state layoffs”) puts pressure on Governor Perdue and legislative Democrats to show they weren’t crying wolf about Republican budget cuts. Republicans sounded delighted with the report that 1,630 people have been laid off: “’The wild allegation has been that 30,000 state jobs were going to be eliminated,’ said…
Read MoreThanks to encouragement from my young mentors Nation Hahn and Luther Snyder – a Democrat and a Republican – I’m on Twitter now. Here’s the link. Follow me (I’m advised to say) @jgaryp. Follow Nathan and Luther, too. Follow all of my followers. Follow the yellow brick road. Twitter makes the highest use…
Read MoreThere’s something about Mitt Romney that Republicans just can’t love. Their nomination fight is a series of anti-Mitts rising in the polls, then self-destructing. First there was Michelle Bachmann. She scared everybody. Then Rick Perry. But he can’t even remember his own proposals. Then Herman Cain. But he allegedly can’t keep his hands off…
Read MoreHere’s an interesting twist on the Wake school board outcome. A Republican friend (not the same one who contributed the item below; I actually have many Republican friends) says Ron Margiotta was an unintended victim of the Republican-run school board redistricting. Here’s the back story: Deborah Goldman demanded that the redistricting plan move…
Read MoreA Republican friend in Wake County offers this take on last week’s election: “The Republicans were doomed from the start on this election for school board. It was over before it started. “Definitely they earned an ‘F’ in PR, Message, and Branding of their board. Us GOP’ers wished Tedesco would have just went…
Read MoreThis Veterans Day, I salute my stepfather, Joe Dickerson of Murfreesboro, N.C. Joe was a country kid who had never been farther than Richmond when the Army shipped him to England to train for D-Day. He was in the first wave at Omaha Beach. His regiment – 116th Infantry, 29th Division – lost more…
Read MoreA TAPster says Rep. Nelson Dollar this week in effect admitted that Governor Perdue was right about Medicaid: “Republicans in the General Assembly finally acknowledged their mistakes in the DHHS budget on Tuesday. Now they should reverse the damage their budget is doing to our schools too. “Their DHHS budget created a $139 million…
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