Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
So this whole Libya flap is about what our UN Ambassador said on Sunday talk shows? That’s what has Senators McCain and Graham and the Republican Party in high dudgeon? Not security in Libya. Not what the American deaths portend for our role there. But talking points for a Sunday talk show. Let’s…
Was Governor-elect McCrory for Governor Perdue’s Dix plan before he was against it? A well-wired TAPster says yes. The source – whom I’ve always found to be reliable and knowledgeable – said Governor Perdue ran her plan by McCrory and Art Pope before announcing it. She thought she had their support. But Senator…
Tom sues Dick. Dick spends $2 million to elect Harry judge. Harry wins. And rules in Dick’s favor in the lawsuit. Sound rotten? Try this: The Democrats sue the Republicans to stop redistricting (and name Republican House and Senate leaders Thom Tillis and Phil Berger as defendants). The Republicans raise $2 million to elect…
Just three weeks after the election, Governor-elect McCrory is getting a taste of the story line he may be reading for a long time to come: Is he “Charlotte Moderate Pat” or “Tea Party Pat”? The first story comes from a national publication, Businessweek. The headline: “N.C.’s Gov.-Elect Shifts Hard-Right, From Transit to Tea…
A sixty-eight year old Oxford educated UNC professor gets an offer (from where isn’t clear but it sounds like the Internet may have been involved) to fly to Bolivia to meet Miss Bikini World. He lands in Bolivia; a middle-aged man meets him at the airport and says that he needs to fly on…
I’m always flattered to be quoted in Under the Dome, but this time I’m flummoxed. Dome took note of only three of the four rising Democratic stars I spotlighted last week (See “New Democratic Leaders” below). Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx was left out. Paranoid Charlotteans will not doubt take this as a sign that…
The party needs a new leadership pipeline for Governor. For decades, it was the Sanford-Hunt tribe. Then it was the Senate’s Basnight-Rand clan, which produced Easley, Perdue and Dalton. It was a good run, but has run dry. The party has talent in the legislature. But do the rising stars have the requisite political…
Years ago when I enrolled at the University of North Carolina, I arrived on the campus and to my delight I found I had been assigned to the first ever co-ed dormitory. Then, my first night on campus, at orientation the powers that be introduced us to the wonders of birth control. We were all…
Pat McCrory’s just captured the biggest tarbaby in North Carolina. State government has never been a paragon of efficiency but after twelve years of Mike Easley and Beverly Perdue and pay-to-play politics it’s become an unusually broad and deep quagmire. The state’s Medicaid claims processing contract is an example: Years ago when Mike…
The political sniping began even as chaos still reigned at the White House Correspondents Dinner. My…
A new nationwide poll shows that, if they could run against each other in 2028, Barack…
Senator Phil Berger was out of touch with voters in his district – and suffered the…