Posts by Carter Wrenn
A Hard Fight
It started four years ago as an uneven fight: Five rural County Commissioners against a multi-national conglomerate with plants from Iceland to Arabia – so, losing ground, the Commissioners who’re Republicans turned to the Democratic Governor for help and got it in an odd way: The Governor helped but, at the same time, her Department…
Read MoreJust Plain Bad Manners
WRAL-TV put an Internet link on its website to a map that shows streets where concealed handgun permit holders live – the map doesn’t give the handgun permit holders’ names or addresses it simply reports, say, ‘two’ permit holders live on Maple Avenue. That didn’t sit well with the pro-gun lobby Grass Roots North…
Read MoreDigging the Hole Deeper
The State Medicaid Department has a Public Integrity Section to root out fraud which sounds fine only according to the State Auditor the department paid IBM and SAS $8 million to help find fraud but then only recovered $427,000 – so, at the end of the day, instead of fighting fraud the department compounded fraud…
Read MoreA Conundrum
Mitt Romney’s running an ad that shows Barack Obama saying, If you’ve got a business – you didn’t build that, and it sure looks and sounds and smells like the truth but Obama says there’s not a word of truth in it – that Romney edited a piece of video of his speech, took what…
Read MoreUnintended Consequences
Republicans in the state legislature cut Planned Parenthood’s state funding by $125,000 but, to give the devil its due, in the blink of an eye Planned Parenthood turned a cut into a three-fold blessing by persuading the Obama Administration to give it $426,000 – as one Republican legislator said, I guess we can thank our…
Read MoreOne, Two, Three
One: Representative Stephen LaRoque was indicted. Two: Speaker Thom Tillis advised LaRoque to resign. Three: LaRoque didn’t. Four: Tillis appointed a bi-partisan committee to investigate. Five: LaRoque resigned. One. Two. Three. No deals. No double-talk. No dodging. Scandal over.
Read MoreHow Government Works
Years ago, Congress passed a law saying able-bodied people who receive welfare should work for their benefits. That sounded fair. And reasonable. After all, sometimes even the hardest working folks land hard in a place but, when they do, requiring them to work in return for a helping hand is better for everyone. However…
Read MoreThe Missing Cash
The Democrats’ treasure chest has vanished. Year after year in elections, Democrats like Jim Hunt and Marc Basnight had war chests brimming with cash. Bev Perdue defeated Pat McCrory last election by outspending him by $7 million. But now the Democrats’ larder is empty. Phil Berger’s outraising Martin Nesbit (Basnight’s Senate heir) seventeen to one…
Read MoreHoover Adams
One hundred and eighty thousand people, from Maine to California, contributed to Jesse’s campaign when he defeated Jim Hunt in 1984 and about a month after the election, having dinner with Jesse, Tom Ellis said, “Let’s ask each of ‘em to buy CBS stock – then start a proxy fight to take over CBS.” Jesse…
Read MoreThe Second Most Watched Race…
The most watched campaign in North Carolina this fall will be the Presidential race but the second most watched race may not be the Governor’s race – it may be the race between Paul Newby and Sam Ervin for the lone Supreme Court seat. The way Republicans see it, sooner or later, the Democrats’…
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