Posts by Carter Wrenn
Perdue Launches Incumbent Protection Scheme
Bev Perdue’s gone back to being Miss Positive, setting up the Endowment for Positive Gubernatorial Campaigns – a $50 million trust fund – to pay for her next campaign for governor. But there’s one catch: To get his share of her fund Perdue’s Republican opponent must pledge not to criticize her: No negative ads. Now…
Read MoreSin, Murder and Trespassing
Last week I had dinner with Paul the theologian and Willie, who is a rosary-thumping Catholic and, for a moment, I thought the Reformation and the Seven Years War were about to start all over again. Oddly, what started the conflagration was Willie saying he’d just read Pat Buchanan’s new book; then he leaned across…
Read MoreThe Great New Debate
Back in Jesse Helms’ campaign in 1990 when we made the ‘infamous White Hands’ ad one of the handful of people sitting in the studio was Alex Castellanos; lately Alex has been spending time on CNN and the other night he was asked how the Republican Party could save itself politically – after Barack Obama…
Read MoreThe Central Cause of His Life
Horror of horrors, John Edwards is back in the newspaper the second day in a row. This time he has flown all the way to San Francisco to find a safe haven to debate Karl Rove. One thing Edwards is not doing is taking any risks by talking to the press. (I guess the National…
Read MorePoliticians Being…
Sometimes politicians just can’t help being politicians, which, most times, means they can’t help gilding the lily or coloring the truth, even when they don’t need to. Kay Hagan is dropping her lawsuit against Elizabeth Dole. Want to guess why? For the good of the people of North Carolina. Now, why couldn’t Hagan just say,…
Read MoreThe End of World-Class Schools
Back in 2005, when 90% of the students in Wake County Schools passed state achievement exams, the New York Times ran an article lauding our world-class schools, attributing their success to the School Board’s ‘diversity’ policy. Well, last week, our world-class schools vanished into thin air. It turns out for years, critics have been criticizing…
Read MoreWhoops!
The morning newspaper was a blow to Obama supporters and the legions of young people who just voted for change: Because in the Obama administration, lobbyists are in. Back during the campaign Obama excoriated lobbyists by saying, “They won’t find a job in my White House” – but his post-election transition team is welcoming them…
Read MoreHe’s Back
What’s the definition of penance in modern American politics? We now know exactly. It’s three months without speaking into a TV camera. Three months ago, John Edwards confessed to an affair with a blonde aide, did one TV interview, then announced he’d said all he had to say about that and pulled up the drawbridge…
Read MoreWait a While
Yesterday morning, lifting a stack of emails my eye fell on the note written across the top of the first page, ‘This one looks serious.’ It was from Richard the Intellectual. All it said was, ‘Has the world ended?’ Richard is what he himself describes as a ‘decliner’ which, I can tell you from experience,…
Read MoreSummation
Well, the hollering and screaming is over and instead of being amazed by the antics of politicians we can go back to the normal everyday rhythms of life that get disrupted every four years by an election. What went wrong for Republicans here in North Carolina? What didn’t go wrong is happier to contemplate: Half…
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