Posts by Carter Wrenn
An Education in Washington Politics
Election night, after the ten counties in her district reported their votes, Renee Ellmers led incumbent Congressman Bob Etheridge by 2,100 votes. (That number is crucial because under North Carolina law Congressman Etheridge is not entitled to an ‘automatic recount’ if he trails by more than 1% – or 1,888 votes.) Then the afternoon…
Read MoreElection Eve
Perhaps the essential truth about election days is their ambiguity. Today, of course, we Republicans are asking each other if the 2nd Coming, politically, is at hand. But even on Election Day the imponderables offer no answers. Realizing how we humans hate ambiguity the cable TV networks have fed us a steady diet of…
Read MoreA Small Problem
About a year ago, Governor Perdue’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Lanier Cansler, a former lobbyist, did a strange thing: He gave an exclusive $30 million no-bid contract to a company that had only been in existence for two months – Prodigy Diabetes Care. Naturally, the press, suspicious, started digging and soon found…
Read MoreCaesar’s Wife and Voting Machines
During my childhood my grandmother used to tell me ‘appearances matter. Julius Caesar, I learned later, felt the same way. One night his wife, Pompeia, found herself in a awkward encounter with a Roman gentleman bent on seducing her. By most accounts Pompeia was innocent but nonetheless her encounter with young Publius Clodius led to…
Read MoreOver in Kabul
There’s more bad news from Afghanistan. The “backbone of President Obama’s plan to start withdrawing troops” has hit a wall. Literally. Right now, over in Afghanistan we’re spending millions to build police stations so the Afghan Army and National Police can take over from our Marines next July. But, the newspaper reports, the Police…
Read MoreAmericans are United…on One Thing
WRAL released a new poll the other day. Senator Richard Burr leads Elaine Marshall by fifteen points but Marshall shouldn’t take it personally as the reason Burr leads has little to do with her. 54% of the voters are Unfavorable to President Obama – and it’s no coincidence Senator Burr is getting 53% of…
Read MoreBuying Kabul…
For nine years we’ve been pouring billions into Afghanistan to prop up our hand-picked rascal-President Hamid Karzai. But it turns out our arch-enemies the Iranians have one upped us. For $2 million a year in cash – which they’ve been secretly delivering to Karzai’s office in bulging canvas sacks – they’ve bought our puppet. …
Read MoreDon’t Change…
The election is slowly bumping and grinding to a close and it’s been a lot tougher ordeal for Democrats than Republicans – while Republicans have been cruising along riding the headwinds of Obama-disapproval, the same national tides have been pulling Democrats downward like a remorseless undertow. Plus, since Democrats control almost everything that moves in…
Read MoreA Bad File to Lose
Clerk of Court races generally don’t generate a lot of sound and fury but the other day in Raleigh Republican Jan Pueschel sent out an email about her opponent – Democrat Lorrin Freeman (the incumbent) – that set sparks flying. Almost everyone knows the story of Demario Atwater, who murdered UNC student Eve Carson…
Read More9600 to 500
Every now and then a fellow stumbles across a fact so eye-popping the moment he sees it he feels the ground shifting beneath his feet. The other day in the newspaper a headline blared in big black letters that North Carolina’s unemployment rate had dropped, which sounded like good news until I read (in…
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