General
Not Agent Pierce
I’ve been absolved. Several people asked if I’m the “Agent Pierce” on N&O Executive Editor John Drescher’s blog. Apparently, they think I went undercover by changing the spelling of my name. Drescher absolved me this week. It’s not me. I’ve read Drescher’s frustrations about dealing with bloggers who fling vitriol and venom…
Read MoreCrab Pots, Mental Health and a Perdue Meltdown
Last week over on NC Spin Tom Campbell published a glowing interview with Perdue Cabinet Secretary Lanier Cansler – but even before the ink dried on the page the yarn Cansler spun Campbell was coming undone. You might think before the Governor and Secretary Cansler put someone in charge of caring for the state’s…
Read MoreHeard of Google?
Governor Perdue and Lanier Cansler didnât need the John Tote fiasco. Perdue has made strides putting her administration in order. Cansler has the thankless task of managing an unmanageable department. But he has Carter and the home-health hounds gnawing on his leg, and the mainstream media is starting to chew too. Then comes…
Read MoreCorrection
An alert reader caught this in my blog yesterday about Mark Critz, the Democrat who won the special congressional election in Pennsylvania: “I don’t think Critz voted for health care bill (he wasn’t in Congress then). He did say he would not have voted for it.” The reader is correct, and I thank…
Read MoreWhoops!
Last Friday Bill Randall published his ‘Charter of Principles’ on Facebook. Then, so more people would read it, he published it again a few hours later. And with reason. It is an impressive statement. Eloquent. Profound. Articulate. The problem is Randall did not write it. He plagiarized it. Fifty years ago, back in…
Read MoreA Primary Lesson
Democrats, Republicans, Tea Partiers, anti-Tea Partiers – everybody – found something to like in last week’s primaries across the country. I found a lesson in a special congressional election in Pennsylvania that applies to a congressional election in North Carolina – specifically, to the efforts by the State Employees Association of North Carolina to…
Read MoreAn Open Letter to Bill Randall – Part 4
Bill, Here is the fourth question. At the debate you were asked, Why are you the best candidate to defeat Brad Miller? You gave two reasons. Because, you said, no one could find any inconsistencies in your record and because you’d never pandered for votes. In your campaign video (on your website) you pledge…
Read MoreAn Open Letter to Bill Randall – Part 3
Bill, Here is the third question. At the debate you were asked, What would you cut to hold down government spending? Bernie Reeves answered that he would do what all small businessmen have learned to do when money is tight: Cut salaries – which promptly cost him the votes of any government employees in…
Read MoreA Bright Line
That didn’t take long. For all the Tea Party’s denials of racism, it took Tea Party poster boy Rand Paul about one news cycle to trip over race. The federal government, he says, has no business telling a business it can’t discriminate on the basis of race. Of course, he added, he…
Read MoreAn Open Letter to Bill Randall – Part 2
Dear Bill, Here is the second question about the debate. You were asked, Are you pro-life? Now most Republicans are pro-life – though they disagree on the best way to end abortion; some favor passing a Constitutional Amendment to make abortion illegal outright; others favor passing a Constitutional Amendment to let each state…
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