A Michigan Focus Group

Chuck Todd’s anti-Trump to the bone but now and then surprises happen and one happened on Meet the Press when Todd played a video of a focus group of Republican voters sitting around a  table in Grand Rapids, Michigan;–––the moderator started by asking, ‘Do you think impeachment is too complicated to follow? and a white-haired…

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The Day They Impeached Trump

For an hour driving to a luncheon in Cary then driving back to my office I listened to the impeachment debate in the House on the radio; one Congressman after another spoke and their voices all sounded the same: Angry and scared. Republicans stood up railing against Pelosi and, with equal heat, Democrats branded Trump…

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Did Rudy Play Donald?

The way Adam Schiff tells it Trump wanted dirt on Joe Biden so he told the Ukrainian President to ‘Work with Rudy.’ Trump blasts back that Schiff’s full of hot air – it’s all baloney. But up in Manhattan a United States Attorney, who indicted two of Giuliani’s associates from the Ukraine, unearthed a different…

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Blind Passion and 3%

Tony grew up in the suburbs, attended college in Boston, graduate school in New York, was proud to be for Obama in 2008, for Bernie in 2016, and now he’s an all for impeachment Democrat. To Tony one thing matters: Trump must go. Sam lives in the rural small town he grew up in, married…

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Tucker Versus Tillis

‘Tillis Tanking, Tucker Rising Among Primary Voters,’ the headline read. The  poll by Public Policy Polling showed Garland Tucker had gained on Thom Tillis again, now trailing Tillis by just 7 points in the Republican Primary. (Tillis 38%, Tucker 31%, Undecided 31%). Worse for Tillis, his popularity with Republicans had plummeted for the second time…

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Infected

The newspaper, strapped for cash, heard about a ‘Rally Against Racism’ in a small town an hour’s drive away and thought, Click bait. After the rally a headline popped up on the newspaper’s website: ‘We cannot live in fear’: Activist condemns racism, gun violence at rally in Hillsborough – and every time someone clicked to…

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Joe Dickerson: a hero’s story

“I crawled along with my bayonet in my hand, sticking it in the ground ahead of me trying to find mines.” Joe Dickerson, describing the terrible 400 yards between the water and the seawall on Omaha Beach, D-Day, June 6, 1944. My stepfather Joe Dickerson, who died Monday at age 96, was a veteran of…

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Two Polls and Thom Tillis

Back in 1989, not long after John McLaughlin began doing polls, I asked him to poll for Jesse Helms’s campaign. 29 years later I asked John to do a poll to find the answer to one question: Could Garland Tucker defeat Thom Tillis in the Republican Primary for Senate? We found that – with Republican…

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The War on Public Schools

Teachers came to Raleigh Wednesday to teach politicians about the public schools. But what did the teachers learn about the politicians? They need to learn this: A lot of the politicians hate public schools. They won’t admit it, especially around Election Day. But look at what they do. And who they listen to. They don’t…

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Victories for the Swamp

State Treasurer Dale Folwell got whacked by the Swamp. It turns out the State Employees Health Insurance Fund has been spending $3 billion a year, costs have been going up 7-9% a year, and the fund is billions of dollars in debt – so Folwell decided to cut spending by the state paying hospitals the…

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