A Blessing in Disguise

According to PEW Research, during the past two Congresses 19,709 bills were introduced – and only 3% were enacted into law. Which sounds pretty abysmal. But stop to think about it: How much more harm could Congress have done if they’d passed, say, 4%?

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Since Little Bighorn

Since Little Bighorn The President trooped over to the Pentagon to work on his plan to whip ISIS then came out of the meeting and announced: We’re leading a 60 member coalition against ISIS.           Huh? Who’re the other 59 nations? That ideas – not guns – defeat ideologies.           You go to Ramadi and…

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Playing with Fire

Like him or not, Phil Berger’s about the most powerful politician around; last year, just so no one got confused about who rules the roost in Raleigh, he and the Senate Bull Mooses put the kibosh on the Governor’s pet ‘puppy mills’ bill and, this year, they’re creatively discovering ways to expand their power no…

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How Obama’s Whipping ISIS

The Kurds are about the only folks around who’ve whipped ISIS on a battlefield and Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the Gulf States want to send them guns so they can whip ISIS some more but President Obama says No. He says the arms ought to be sent to Baghdad which, theoretically, in turn, will send…

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A Transformation President

President Obama’s Commander-in-Chief but he has an unusual way of fighting wars. No soldier marches near a battlefield. Three out of four airstrikes return to base without dropping a bomb. And if you’re a general who thinks using overwhelming force makes sense, well, forget about it. It also looks like the President’s negotiating strategy is…

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The Jewel in the Crown

When the scandal broke five years ago – after a ‘tweet’ by a tackle on the football team – the wise men at UNC faced a choice: Fess-up or cover-up. They covered-up. And eight media organizations sued because they wouldn’t make public records available to the press. Three months later, skating on thinner and thinner…

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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…

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The 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…

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Two 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…

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The 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…

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