Posts by Carter Wrenn
Old-Fashioned
Four separate reports – two done for the State Medicaid Department, one done for federal Medicare, and one by the non-profit Community Care of North Carolina filed with State Medicaid – all said CCNC saved taxpayers millions of dollars by reducing Medicaid costs. So what did the Old Bull Mooses in the Senate do? They…
Read MoreThe End of Bullying
The rhubarb had a keystone cops air but what started it was deadly enough: A combination of a bully and power. By nature he wasn’t particularly unkind and, in the past, he hadn’t enjoyed bullying but he had the power and he’d used it before to punish Congressmen who’d crossed him and he’d gotten away…
Read MoreTwo Religions
His father was a carpenter and his mother a five foot blonde with hair down to her ankles and they’d divorced three years before he was born. His father remarried, abused his second wife, and divorced again when he was fourteen. After the second divorce he dropped out of school in the 9th grade, drank…
Read MoreThe Stars and Stripes
He’d been doing business for thirty years and if what he’d been doing wasn’t illegal like selling moonshine it also wasn’t quite the same as being President of the local bank or owner of the corner drug store: When someone got into a bind he’d pay them cold hard cash on the barrel head for…
Read MoreThe Obamacare Subsidy
When a fellow goes on the Obamacare Exchange to sign up for health insurance he’s asked: Do you qualify for a subsidy? Click here. 515,000 lower-income North Carolinians clicked and qualified but any day now the Supreme Court may decide – in the King vs Burwell case – those subsidies are illegal. And, if it…
Read MoreA Mistake
Despite being heavily outnumbered by the Iraqi Army ISIS rolled right into Ramadi and after the Iraqis skedaddled the Secretary of Defense told CNN it sure looked like our allies had lost the “will to fight.” Then Baghdad announced it had stopped retreating and was counter-attacking – then Baghdad announced it had Ramadi surrounded –…
Read MoreA Quagmire
The Senate Bull Mooses have locked horns with the Opossum Drop Caucus over in the State House;—for years the Bull Mooses have hollered Medicaid spending was out of control and soaring but that turned out not to be so – that the Bull Mooses were simply spinning a yarn to accommodate their friends the MCOs…
Read MoreStraightening Out the Mess?
Former Ambassador John Bolton said the state of Iraq no longer exists and Chris Wallace shot back , One, what does that mean? Two, what are the ramifications? You could go back four thousand years and not unscramble all the knots in what used to be Mesopotamia – the Sumerians were conquered by the Assyrians…
Read MoreDangerous Places to Stand
There are patches of ground that are innately dangerous: Edges of cliffs. Rivers of ice. Railroad tracks. No man’s land. After the State House passed its budget at 1am in the morning, eight hours later up popped an ad on Facebook lambasting Chief House Budget Writer Nelson Dollar for raising spending a billion dollars. Those…
Read MoreA Dust Up
It’s unusual to see a dust up in front of the TV cameras on NC Spin but when Brad Crone said Medicaid spending has been stable for three years the usually soft-spoken John Hood shot back, Brad’s incorrect. Crone leaned back, told Hood he needed to look at the audit reports that showed Medicaid spending…
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