An Issue from the East

Gary is taking a break from blogging. Here’s a guest blog from Joe Stewart, Executive Director of the NC FreeEnterprise Foundation; a nonpartisan non-profit organization that conducts research on candidates, campaigns and voter attitudes in North Carolina. Once the match up in the US Senate race was known on primary election night, a reporter asked…

Read More

Coming to America

Gary is taking a break from blogging. Our guest blogger is Tapster Joe Stewart.   I grew up in Raleigh, graduating from Athens Drive High School in 1982. The athletic conference (note singular) at the time was the Cap 8 and included (what seemed like) the remote outposts of Fuquay-Varina and Smithfield Selma.   I…

Read More

Among the Freshmen

  Gary is taking a break from blogging. Our guest Tapster today is Joe Stewart of JRS Strategy Group.   Part of my work as former Political Director at NC Chamber involved seeking out solid business-minded people to run for the General Assembly.   Someone I met in 2010 pursing this goal was Rick Catlin.…

Read More

Talking About (Their) Generation

Gary is taking a break from blogging. Our guest today is Joe Stewart.   Currently reaching their 18th birthday at a rate of 13,000 a day, the 80 million-strong Generation Y (those born 1982 – 1995) will be the majority of the US workforce and a full third of the voting population by 2015. This…

Read More

The Right Size of Government, More or Less

  Guest Tapster blogger Joe Stewart writes: People don’t want more government or less government, they want just enough government and no more.   I heard then-president Bill Clinton say that during his visit to North Carolina in the aftermath of Hurricane Fran in 1996, when I was legislative liaison in the NC Department Crime…

Read More

The Money Matters…

  Guest Tapster blogger Joe Stewart writes: In the same way my daddy has a saying that manners are not all that matter, but what they do matter matters a lot, the relative financial advantage of one candidate over their opponent, or one party versus their rival, doesn’t make all the difference but the difference…

Read More