Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
In North Carolina, the most in-demand Democrat on the campaign trail is my old boss Governor Jim Hunt. Nationally, the most in-demand Democrat is President Obama’s old nemesis Bill Clinton. In California, the next governor may be Jerry Brown, who was elected California’s youngest governor ever in 1974. In Iowa, the next…
For nine years we’ve been pouring billions into Afghanistan to prop up our hand-picked rascal-President Hamid Karzai. But it turns out our arch-enemies the Iranians have one upped us. For $2 million a year in cash – which they’ve been secretly delivering to Karzai’s office in bulging canvas sacks – they’ve bought our puppet. …
Time’s Joe Klein puts his finger on President Obama’s problem in an engrossing essay “Encountering Anguish and Anxiety Across America:” “Even among his most passionate supporters, Obama is something of a political mystery. He doesn’t challenge the Republicans; he doesn’t fight back; he doesn’t even tout his accomplishments….The Obama mystery is compounded by the…
The election is slowly bumping and grinding to a close and it’s been a lot tougher ordeal for Democrats than Republicans – while Republicans have been cruising along riding the headwinds of Obama-disapproval, the same national tides have been pulling Democrats downward like a remorseless undertow. Plus, since Democrats control almost everything that moves in…
Clerk of Court races generally don’t generate a lot of sound and fury but the other day in Raleigh Republican Jan Pueschel sent out an email about her opponent – Democrat Lorrin Freeman (the incumbent) – that set sparks flying. Almost everyone knows the story of Demario Atwater, who murdered UNC student Eve Carson…
I wish I had a dollar for every time a Democrat has told me over the last decade: “We need something like a John Locke Foundation.” Democrats don’t, because they don’t have an Art Pope: somebody who puts his money – big money – where his convictions are. You know he’s made it…
A friend of mine who has done well as a lobbyist in Washington told me this story about the unintended consequences of campaign-finance reform. Congress decided that the integrity our democracy is threatened by lobbyists buying meals – even a cup of coffee and a sandwich – for members. So a lobbyist now…
Every now and then a fellow stumbles across a fact so eye-popping the moment he sees it he feels the ground shifting beneath his feet. The other day in the newspaper a headline blared in big black letters that North Carolina’s unemployment rate had dropped, which sounded like good news until I read (in…
Ten days before the election, we learn there is a federal investigation into Governor Perdue’s 2008 campaign. It drowns out her push on state government reform. Which I seriously doubt was going to solve her political problems anyway. The first thing I heard from Democrats: Why is George Holding still there? Would a…
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…