Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
Gary is taking a break from blogging. Our guest blogger today is Nation Hahn. In recent weeks North Carolinians have heard two inaugural addresses. One, from Governor Pat McCrory spoke to “Unlimited Opportunity.” The other, from President Barack Obama, was a call for the “country’s reasonable majority” to act. For North Carolina Democrats,…
Gary is taking a break from blogging. Today’s pinch-hitter one of our Tapsters. The choice of a press secretary is a blip on the personnel radar of North Carolina’s new governor, but this choice provides insight into the kind of governor Pat McCrory may become. McCrory’s choice for media mouthpiece has plenty of…
The other day one of my more peculiar Jesuit friends emailed me an article written fifty years ago by Bishop Fulton Sheen who, contemplating the sharks and villains of his era, had lamented, ‘Our country is not so much overrun with the bigoted as it is with the broad-minded.’ After glancing at the opening…
It was a very serious man who stepped up to the podium in front of the Capitol to give his Inaugural Speech but what he said wasn’t nearly as earthshaking in the reeling world of Republican Congressmen as what he’d already done. Barack Obama raised $1 billion in his reelection campaign and built the…
Gary is taking a break from blogging. Today’s pinch-hitter is Thomas Mills. Pat McCrory and some of his Republican allies are now saying they are ready to compromise on voter ID. Compromise with whom? With super-majorities in the state house and senate, Republicans can pass whatever bill they want without any Democratic support.…
Last month up in the hallowed halls of Congress, Speaker John Boehner slipped on a banana peel – deciding it was time to flex his muscles he stripped four Republican Congressmen of their blue-chip committee assignments – which, in Washington, is the same as the army stripping off a general’s epaulets in public. Back then, watching,…
Gary’s taking a break from blogging. Pinch-hitting today is a TAPster with a long memory: Re your blog posting about Art Pope (“The Budget Pope”): A lot of people either aren’t old enough to remember, or simply don’t know, that another wealthy Raleigh businessman was indispensable to Jim Hunt in that role. John…
President Obama stepped to the podium in the White House at a press conference – with Afgnanistani President Karzai beside him – and said he’s bringing 66,000 American soldiers home from Afghanistan sooner rather than later (which sounded fine). Then he added, Because the Afghan Army is now ready to whip the Taliban all by…
This headline is off-message: “NC Republicans want tax hikes on food, services” (WRAL). At a time when Washington Republicans are cementing reputations as anti-tax hardliners, how did Raleigh Republicans get plunged into this morass? The answer: a member of their caucus, Senator Bob Rucho, dragged them to the cliff. Question: Will Governor McCrory,…
North Carolina voters don’t like either the Democratic or Republican parties. But Independent voters – who…
How do you get your news? Our statewide poll asked North Carolina voters what their primary…
Thom Tillis and Phil Berger fed the MAGA alligator. Then it ate them. Thomas Mills wrote…