The appointment of John Drescher as Executive Editor of The N&O means the paper will be led by a newsman who knows North Carolina politics and government.

Drescher wrote a great book about the 1960 Terry Sanford-Beverly Lake race for Governor. He is the son-in-law of Phil Carlton, one of Jim Hunt’s oldest friends.

Drescher’s appointment is a good thing for the N&O – and for those who care about its political-governmental coverage. I confess I don’t understand the difference between Executive Editor and Managing Editor, which was John’s former job. Maybe he doesn’t understand either, since he’s not sure he’ll name a Managing Editor. Regardless, on the news side, John is now The Man.

The N&O has changed a lot since I left it in 1975. The news staff today has over 200 people. Back then it didn’t have 50. And we didn’t have to worry about the Internet, 24-hour news cycles and the dramatic decline in classified-ad revenue. Drescher will be losing sleep over all that now.

I was struck by what Drescher told the news staff after his appointment was announced:

“There are a lot of people who want us to fail. There are corrupt politicians who would like for us to go away. There are overzealous prosecutors who would like for The News & Observer to go away. There are blind surgeons, truck drivers driving overloaded trucks, 100-mile-an-hour speeders and even the five city employees that it takes to paint a fire hydrant. … I have news for all of them: We are not going away.”

He sounded like a cross between John Edwards and Jonathan Daniels.

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