Posts by Carter Wrenn
Long Wars and Iraq
It took us four years to defeat Hitler, two years to defeat the Kaiser and it took the North four years to defeat General Lee. In a few days we will have been fighting the terrorists for five years. I know this is a new kind of war and people say we shouldn’t judge it…
Read MoreBlack and Decker
Last Spring, when the State Board of Elections held hearings into the pay-to-play scandals, the Board asked House Speaker Jim Black if he was paying Representative Michael Decker’s legal bills. (Representative Michael Decker later plead guilty to accepting a $50,000 bribe to change parties and vote for Black for Speaker). Black told the Board no,…
Read MoreThe TTA and the Little Engine that Could
Triangle Transit Authority trustee Nina Szlosberg doesn’t want the TTA to strike the flag on Lite-Rail – so when the other trustees arrived at their last meeting she gave them copies of the children’s fable The Little Engine that Could. Taxpayers have poured tens of millions of dollars into the TTA; we’ve paid for studies,…
Read MoreThe Democrats and Corruption
Sometimes you have to wonder if the Democrats in the State Legislature are really serious at all about cleaning up corruption. Attorney General Roy Cooper asked the Democratic leaders in the legislature to give him two weapons to fight corruption. He asked them to make “it a crime to lie to SBI agents, and to…
Read MoreEthics in State Government?
After State Senator Howard Lee was defeated for reelection in 2003 the governor appointed him to the Board of Education. Serving on the Board is an unpaid position and the Board only meets two days a month. But The News and Observer (8/14/06) reports Senator Lee also spends “a couple of days a week” on…
Read MoreThe Blue Ribbon Panel
Gary and John Hood of the Locke Foundation are having a little debate about the Blue Ribbon Commission. I recently read the Commission’s report. It says Wake County’s population is going to double in twenty-five years and, as a result, we’re going to have to spend a whole lot of money on schools, streets, sewers…
Read MorePicasso or P.T. Barnum?
Is the dingus Spanish impresario Jaume Plensa wants to build in the middle of Fayetteville Street the most brilliant work of modern art in the twenty-first century – or is it a good old-fashioned flim-flam? Is Mr. Plensa Picasso – or P.T. Barnum? The leaders of Raleigh’s art circles say Plensa has woven aircraft cables,…
Read MoreRepublicans at Bat – at Last
Republicans are airing their first TV ad about the pay to play scandals. State Senator Andrew Brock’s ad calls on “embattled House Speaker Jim Black to resign…” (WRAL-TV, 8/7/06). Brock also says the beneficiaries of the ‘pay to play’ scandals are Democrat House members who received thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from Black. A…
Read MoreCity Debt – Up, Up, Up!
According to the News and Observer (7/24/06), since Mayor Meeker took office Raleigh’s debt has tripled. In a few weeks, on September 30, for the first time the City’s debt will pass $1 billion. Five years ago it was $294 million. That puts the spending spree the Mayor has been on in perspective. Granted, some…
Read MoreBribes or Contributioins
Two politicians, a Republican, Mike Decker, and a Democrat, Jim Black, sat down at an IHOP in Salisbury. Black was there to convince Decker to switch parties and give him a key vote he needed to hold onto the House Speakership – and Decker was listening. And, in all likelihood both men probably suspected, one…
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