Raleigh
Signs
Their facts are the same. But they’re telling two different stories. The Governor’s folks explain how Graeme Keith got his $3 million state contract this way: The Governor met with Keith and Secretary Frank Perry and Keith made his case – that it would be cheaper for his company to provide maintenance for the state…
Read MoreCivilization With Its Pants Down
It was like a curtain parting and catching a glimpse of a backroom filled with politicians – there, sitting in the middle of the hearing, were two of the Governor’s aides testifying and doing their best to wriggle out of the pickle they’d landed in. A businessman – who’d given $12,000 to the Governor’s campaign…
Read MoreTurning Up the Heat
He flattened the Governor to get a $3 million state contract then like a one-man wrecking ball crashed into Senator Phil Berger to keep his contract and after the press chewed on the Governor the reporters made a beeline straight for Berger – who didn’t mince words. Yes, he said, Graeme Keith called him about…
Read MoreTemptation Strikes
When temptation raises its head politicians, like most folks, topple off their pedestals. Back when the Democrats ruled the roost in Raleigh the Republicans reviled them for their wicked ways like pork barrel spending and wasteful earmarks. Now the Republicans rule the roost and, according to the newspapers, temptation’s struck again, tying them in a…
Read MoreFollow the Money
It’s hard for a Washington politician to explain away a $300 million snafu but it’s even harder for a Raleigh Bull Moose without the opportunity to learn dissimulation first-hand by watching the masters in Congress. From the first day Phil Berger rapped the gavel his hand-picked Medicaid Czar, Senator Ralph Hise the Mountain Statistician, made…
Read MoreThe $300 Million Hole
There’s not a soul in the state who can match a Senate Bull Moose when it comes to bragging he’s a true conservative – that he’s more conservative than the Governor or any politician around. But then the Bull Mosses slipped. From the day the Senate came to town Phil Berger’s Medicaid Czar, Senator Ralph…
Read MoreDrunktown hangover
It’s always an honor when the N&O quotes my blog. But it’s annoying when they put words I didn’t say in my mouth. I’m afraid that’s what Colin Campbell did today in his story “Did the ‘Drunktown’ campaign ads work?” Colin is an A-plus reporter, but I give him a D-minus here. His story focused…
Read MoreVomit politics
Through the fog of over-analysis, misdiagnosis and total BS that comes after every election, one thing is clear about Raleigh’s vote Tuesday: the “Drunktown” ad didn’t work. Its main target, Mary-Ann Baldwin, led the at-large race. Why didn’t it work? Simple: voters didn’t believe it. They didn’t believe for a minute that a member of…
Read MoreA Tough Question
Ole Ned Barnett, the Editorial-Writing-Chief down at the News and Observer, is a fine fellow though like many Editorial-Chiefs he’s a bone deep liberal who frets over the vices of sexism and the virtues of gay rights and seldom finds an encouraging word to say about Republicans. Which is fine. The N&O’s spending its own…
Read MoreWebs
It usually begins with an evasion which leads to another evasion and soon, like a hapless fly, even for a Brigadier General (who was a paratrooper) the silken webs are inescapable: Tony Tata, explaining to the News and Observer about three affairs, an out of wedlock child, a forged court order, an army investigation and…
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