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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“Say a prayer for our country”

By Gary Pearce July 14, 2024

The night Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, April 4, 1968, Senator and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy spoke to an audience in a Black neighborhood in Indianapolis, Indiana. This is part of what he said: “In this difficult day, in this difficult time for the United States, it is perhaps well to ask…

Media Mania

By Gary Pearce July 12, 2024

The political media’s feeding frenzy over President Biden is an extraordinary development in this campaign. Their arrogance will be studied and scrutinized in political, journalistic and academic circles for years. Washington reporters and commentators seem genuinely angry – even personally insulted – that Biden hasn’t acceded to their judgment, or demand, that he exit the…

Mirrors

By Carter Wrenn July 12, 2024

Are Trump and Biden a pair of giants shaping what Americans see, think, believe? Or are Trump and Biden simply mirrors, reflections of what Americans believe? Not long ago if a politician got caught telling a lie he went down in flames. Lies were taboo. Did Trump convince people lies don’t matter? Or is Trump…

A Twisted World

By Carter Wrenn July 11, 2024

Democrats all over the media are saying it’s time for Biden to step aside. David Axelrod said Biden ‘can’t beat father time…it’s likely he loses by a landslide.’ James Carville said ‘the jig is up’ – Biden can’t win. The New York Times called on Biden to get out of the race. Times columnist Maureen…

Switching Horses

By Gary Pearce July 11, 2024

Since 1968, political parties that changed horses in midstream have ended up drowning. That year, antiwar Democrats forced President Lyndon B. Johnson out of the race. Robert Kennedy ran and was killed. Vice President Hubert Humphrey and Gene McCarthy fought all the way to the convention in Chicago. There, police battered and bloodied protesters in…

Trump 2025 vs Climate Change

By Gary Pearce July 10, 2024

As you swelter through the heat, see 120-degree-plus temperatures in the Southwest and follow the first-ever June Category 5 hurricane (photo), look at what Trump’s Project 2025 says he would do and why: “Break Up NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) …which houses the National Weather Service, National Marine Fisheries Service, and other components…. “Together,…

I’ve Heard Enough

By Gary Pearce July 7, 2024

I’ve heard enough from a media lynch mob that obsesses over President Biden’s senior moments and overlooks Trump’s lifetime of lies and crimes. I’ve heard enough from Democrats who would give in to the mob, give up on the President and give Trump and MAGA Republicans a huge psychological victory four months before the election.…

Jim Martin vs Trump

By Gary Pearce July 3, 2024

North Carolina’s only two-term Republican governor wrote this week that, if Donald Trump wins, America “will be willfully ripped apart.” Jim Martin, who was governor from 1985-1993, wrote in a McClatchy newspapers column that Trump is a “clear and present danger” to the nation. Martin panned President Biden’s debate performance and said: “If I thought…

Risky Business

By Carter Wrenn July 3, 2024

Born in Moscow, Boris Epshteyn came to America when he was 11 years old, settled in New Jersey, became a lawyer, worked on John McCain’s presidential  campaign against Obama, worked with Trump – Steve Bannon calls him Trump’s ‘Wartime Consigliere’. After Biden won, Trump charged into a grey area trying to do something no one…

Getting the News

By Gary Pearce March 13, 2026

How do you get your news? Our statewide poll asked North Carolina voters what their primary…

MAGA-gator

By Gary Pearce March 12, 2026

Thom Tillis and Phil Berger fed the MAGA alligator. Then it ate them. Thomas Mills wrote…

Enough is Enough

By Gary Pearce March 11, 2026

Exactly 80 years ago, in 1946, Republicans took control of Congress with a simple message: “Had…