Carter is a Republican. Gary is a Democrat.

They met in 1984, during the epic U.S. Senate battle between Jesse Helms and Jim Hunt. Carter worked for Helms and Gary, for Hunt.

Years later, they became friends. They even worked together on some nonpolitical clients.

They enjoy talking about politics. So they started this blog in 2005.

They’re still talking. And they invite you to join the conversation.

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Carter Wrenn

Gary Pearce 2024

Gary Pearce

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Bad Outcome for Democrats

By Gary Pearce August 4, 2011

Democrats hoped the debt-ceiling narrative would play out like this: Tea Party extremists nearly drive America over the cliff.   Instead, it went like this: Government is broken and doesn’t work.   That’s a big problem for Democrats. Because voters see them as the government party and Republicans as the anti-government party.   Democrats always…

Battling Extremism

By Gary Pearce August 3, 2011

The headline and teaser on Politico today read: “W.H. counter-radicalization plan due: The administration plans to roll out its new strategy for countering extremism in the U.S. Wednesday.”   Given how the debt-ceiling fight turned out, it’s about time the White House came up with a strategy for combating the Tea Party.

Holden On

By Gary Pearce August 3, 2011

Can Holden Thorp escape being sacked by an all-out Rams Club blitz?   Even worse, he’s catching hell both ways: from people mad he fired Butch Davis and from people mad he didn’t fire Davis earlier.   No good deed goes unpunished.   Here’s the story I hear: Davis’ firing was Thorp’s doing, not new…

Moody’s and the Meltdown

By Carter Wrenn August 2, 2011

Barney Frank may be more liberal than Harry Reid or Obama combined but he doesn’t mind marching right into the lion’s den at Fox News and taking on any anchorman in sight.   The other day in an interview Neil Cavuto put Frank on the spot, asking if the Democrats’ brinksmanship on the debt ceiling…

Chickens**t

By Gary Pearce August 2, 2011

Front-page headlines and much gnashing of teeth greeted the news that a Ukrainian billionaire pulled the plug on the jobs of 1,000 North Carolina chicken plant workers last week.   But the stories missed the irony that a TAPster caught:   “If, instead, a Ukrainian billionaire announced he was building poultry processing plants in central…

The Glass Debt Ceiling

By Gary Pearce August 2, 2011

A TAPster passes along a link raising the question: What if Congress was more than 13 percent women?   A NPR commentator is quoted as saying: “In experiments, when men feel there are lots of other men around, they tend to pose more, they tend to talk tough, they become shortsighted, they take bigger bets.…

Super Power

By Gary Pearce August 1, 2011

If reincarnation is real, I want to come back as a credit-rating agency. They apparently are the most powerful beings on the planet.     They even forced Congress to act!

Is the Center Right?

By Gary Pearce August 1, 2011

If both Tea Party Republicans and Democratic liberals don’t like the debt deal, does that make it a good deal for America?   There is a line of thinking today that what is missing in politics is a “vital center” – those supposed wise men and women who find the right answer to our problems…

Two Facts about the Debt Ceiling Deal

By Carter Wrenn August 1, 2011

It’s pretty hard to sort through all the facts and figures and the rhetoric and posturing about the latest debt ceiling deal – but two facts seem clear.   President Obama, Speaker Boehner, Mitch McConnell and Harry Reid all say the latest agreement will raise the debt ceiling $2.4 trillion in exchange for $2.5 trillion…

We’re Moving to Substack

By Gary Pearce May 28, 2026

Carter Wrenn and I are moving to Substack. That’s where you’ll find our blogs in the…

Political Shots Fired

By Gary Pearce April 28, 2026

The political sniping began even as chaos still reigned at the White House Correspondents Dinner. My…

Obama 48-Trump 39

By Gary Pearce April 26, 2026

A new nationwide poll shows that, if they could run against each other in 2028, Barack…