Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
House Speaker Thom Tillis landed himself in a mess by picking the worst time on earth to pass out $30,000 a person pay raises to his staff. The whole thing, given the timing, looks just plain crazy. On one hand Tillis is telling voters the legislature’s so flat-on-its-back-broke it has to cut budgets to…
Two members of Governor Perdue’s staff took issue with my view that Republicans have successfully minimized the differences between their education budget and hers. I invited them to spell out the differences. They obliged with an analysis headed “Setting the Record Straight: Perdue Budget Would Invest More Than a Half Billion Dollars More in Public…
I just knew there was a pony in the pile of manure that is the new state budget. And, thanks to Laura Leslie at WRAL, I found it. From the start, let me confess: This is all about self-interest. You see, we own a small condo at Nags Head. And one of my…
When I fled the country just before Memorial Day, Governor Perdue had the upper hand in her PR battle with the GOP over the budget. But she lost it. She lost the battle – at least in the short term – because she couldn’t get the votes to sustain her veto. In politics, like…
John Edwards should have taken the deal. He could have pled guilty to misdemeanors – not felonies. The circus would be over. There would be no trial – and no risk of a worse result. There would be no more leaks, no more tabloid headlines and no more sordid disclosures. Yes, there might…
President Obama’s visit to the Triangle today is a taste of what’s to come: a presidential race that turns on jobs and North Carolina. (I told one TV reporter he’s in for a good year: “You’ll have a lot to cover, and your station will sell a lot of ads.” It will be a…
It’s the biggest contract in state government. The $265 million Medicaid claims processing contract. And it’s awarded by Secretary Lanier Cansler’s department. For years the contract was managed by EDS Corporation, but during Cansler’s first stint at DHHS (when Mike Easley was Governor) the contract was awarded to another corporation – ACS Corporation. Which…
Here’s what I gleaned from two days of catching up with the news of the past two weeks: John Edwards got indicted. And promptly dug himself a deeper hole by jumping in front of the cameras. The aptly named Anthony Weiner imploded online. Newt Gingrich imploded at sea. (“Imploded” may be to 2012…
Probably nobody ever cares what you did on your vacation. But here it is anyway. We spent a week in Paris and saw most everything, including Notre Dame, the Louvre, Shakespeare & Co. bookstore, the Marais, the French military museum (I didn’t know it was DeGaulle who won the war!), big crowds at the…
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…