Re John and Elizabeth Edwards’ new home: The only thing they’re guilty of is over-answering. In situations like this, the less said, the better. Remember the first rule of getting out of a hole: Put down the shovel. It’s his money, he earned it and he can spend it like he wants. Click Here to…
Looking out the window as he gave his state of the city address, Mayor Meeker noted the four cranes hovering over his $221 million convention center, his $20 million downtown hotel and his $40 million underground parking lot. (News and Observer; 1-23-07). Then the Mayor proposed building a 28 mile adventure trail along the banks…
In his State of the Union Speech, President Bush laid out his vision of the war on terrorism, saying Islamic Radicalism is an ideology – much like Communism and Nazism were ideologies in their times, opposing everything we stand for and determined to destroy us. Democratic Senator Jim Webb, in his rebuttal, did not differ…
The right-wing, anti-school crowd lost in November when the Wake County school bonds won, but they’re taking aim again. One of our readers emailed: “Looks to me like the County Commissioners are trying to take over the school board – a Billion dollar school bond with 4 school board seats on the same ballot.” Bingo,…
I consider myself an expert on strengthening executive offices, though some cynics might call it power-grabbing. I learned from the master: working with Governor Hunt when he passed succession in 1977 (before that, Governors could serve only one term) and veto in 1996. So maybe Raleigh needs a stronger mayor. But Charles Meeker’s campaign for…
A study by a local government agency in Raleigh reports that over a 15 year period (1991-2005) Wake County paid “about $186 million” a year in transportation taxes – while the DOT only spent “$132 million per year” to build roads here. In other words DOT took $54 million a year in highway taxes –…
Some pollsters have a gift for reading hundreds of pages of statistics and finding a nugget of truth. Others have a different talent: Flexibility. They can poll one day and say with absolute conviction the public is, for instance, adamantly against President Bush’s plan to send more troops to Iraq. Then a month later, they…
A week ago the Mayor was saying he was going to run for reelection because he could do more as Mayor than as a United States Senator. Now (see Gary’s post below) he says the Mayor doesn’t have enough power. This proves one thing: Mayor Meeker’s lost control of the City Council. His solution is…
We hear that Raleigh Mayor Charles Meeker will propose changing city government to give mayors more authority. He wants Raleigh to abandon its long-time “strong city manager” government and replace it with a “strong mayor” system. Sounds great. Many Meeker supporters will like it. But beware the Law of Unintended Consequences. We might get Strong…
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