Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
McCrory and Bush
Cullen Browder from WRAL-TV asked me if it helps or hurts Pat McCrory for President Bush to do a fundraiser in North Carolina. The answer is: both. McCrory has several hundred thousand reasons to bring in Bush: That’s how much money he’ll raise. But McCrory doesn’t want too much coverage. So Bush is coming at…
Good News, Bad News
The topic at breakfast downtown this morning was the cutbacks at the N&O – and consolidation with The Charlotte Observer. “Society and democracy took a hit this week,” one friend said. He believes the cuts mean less competition among the papers, less news coverage and less scrutiny of government. “But the papers have to face…
Bad News
The only thing worse than the cuts at The News & Observer was the way N&O executives handled the announcement. They sounded like the stonewalling government bureaucrats the N&O excoriates during Open Government Week. Jonathan B. Cox, who wrote the story, had the hardest job in North Carolina. Imagine writing about your employers while they’re…
The Female Brain
Yesterday was a red-letter day for enlightened modernists and a black day for the old-fashioned. Duke University hired its first Muslim chaplain, keeping pace with Princeton and Yale in the Ivy League. Gay couples were flocking to chapels and marrying in droves in California and a scientist in Sweden has discovered gay men’s brains resemble…
More Than a Head Fake?
The Obama campaign may be serious about targeting North Carolina. I heard last week they are sending 280 field organizers into the state. The Rasmussen poll on WRAL showed Obama behind McCain by only 45-43. Obama’s 43 percent is almost exactly what every Democratic presidential candidate going back to Dukakis in 1988 received here. Big…
Pols As Reporters
One reason Tim Russert was good at political journalism was that he started in politics. So he had an understanding and a love of the game that animated his interviews, reporting and analysis. Most political reporters I know are excellent. They work hard to understand politics. But there is nothing like having been in the…
The Dam Breaking
Albert the pollster’s just gotten back a national poll and he’s in a funk. Albert, as he says, has three levels of warnings when he’s advising a campaign. The first example is when the campaign wants to make a silly mistake, but one that won’t do a great deal of harm. When that happens Albert…
Trials for Terrorists
I had dinner last night with my old friend Will, the lawyer, and, right off, after the first beer he said, President Bush is as dumb as a post. Now, Will is an old Reagan man. He remembers seeing Reagan’s speech for Goldwater on TV in 1964 and he’s a purist. He still thinks of…
Perdue, McCrory Face Off
If one of my Reliable Sources is right, Bev Perdue’s partisans have much to worry about now that she has agreed to five debates with Pat McCrory. The Source reports that McCrory outshone Perdue at the N.C. Chamber’s Manufacturing Summit in Greensboro this week. The Source acknowledges that it was a Republican crowd. But added…