General
$51 Million
This is a strange story – the national debt’s $37.8 trillion. Our annual deficit is $1.9 trillion. We’re in debt up to our eyeballs. But, at the same time, the government’s spending more than anyone in the U.S. to run ads – political ads. How much? $51 million. Who’s in the ads? Kristi Noem, Trump…
Read MoreA Piano and a Whorehouse
“My choice early in life was either to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician. To tell the truth there’s hardly any difference.” – President Harry Truman “Politics is supposed to be the second…
Read MoreAn Odd Tale
Hard face, narrow eyes, Tom Homan looks tough. The day Trump took office he gave Homan a nickname: The ‘Border Czar,’ put him in charge of ICE. A cloud floated over the horizon. Down the street from the White House, in the Justice Department, Trump Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove found out the FBI was…
Read MoreDemocrats’ Country Road
Rural North Carolina is unfriendly territory for Democrats, but we can gain ground there – and that will help us statewide. That’s my takeaway from a recent poll of 684 voters in 46 rural counties. By 63-27%, those voters had an unfavorable view of the party: When they hear “Democratic Party” they think about Democrats…
Read MoreA Picture of Politics Today
Growing up in Brooklyn, after college she worked two years in New York City, then went to law school – working for Ken Starr during the Clinton scandal she deposed Monica Lewinsky. She married, settling in Portland – George Bush made her a U.S. Attorney. Dark-haired, practical, leading prosecutors, sitting in courtrooms she made it…
Read MoreA Raid
An old man sitting at home in his apartment at night heard explosions, voices shouting in the hallway; soldiers wearing combat fatigues broke down his door, surrounded him, handcuffed him using zip-ties – only it turned out they weren’t soldiers they were ICE agents. He told them he was an American citizen – puzzled, asked…
Read MoreMAGA Golf
A reader, an avid golfer, was struck by the boorish behavior of American fans at last weekend’s Ryder Cup – and what it says about Trump’s America. He wrote, “I’m surprised no one has commented (at least that I’ve seen) on the embarrassing Ryder Cup debacle from the perspective of what it reveals about the…
Read More1884
‘There is nothing new under the sun.’ Was Solomon right when he said that? Does history repeat itself? After ruling Washington for a generation, from the Civil War through the Gilded Age, in 1884 Republicans ran James Blaine – the epitome of a Washington insider – for President. Democrat Grover Cleveland grabbed an issue he…
Read MoreWho Expected to See This?
It came as a surprise. Followed by another surprise. Saturday, Trump posted on Truth Social the FBI had placed 274 agents in the crowd on January 6 who were ‘probably acting as agitators and insurrectionists’ – laying the blame for the riot on the FBI. What happened next was a bigger surprise: The same day,…
Read MoreOcracoke to Harvard
It’s not easy to get to Ocracoke from Raleigh. It’s even harder to get from Ocracoke to Harvard. But Katie Kinnion (photo) did it – thanks to North Carolina’s public schools. I read about her during our two-hour-plus ferry ride from Swan Quarter across Pamlico Sound to Ocracoke last week. You have to take a…
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