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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The Looniest Department: Putting Infants in Nursing Homes?

By Carter Wrenn November 9, 2009

They’re a lot of things going on at DHHS that are just plain odd, even for a state agency. For instance, Governor Perdue put a health care lobbyist in charge of DHHS’ budget – which includes granting billions in health care contracts.    Then the lobbyist – Secretary Lanier Cansler – put a gynecologist in…

How to Survive in 2010

By Gary Pearce November 9, 2009

My old friend and North Carolina native Harrison Hickman, a Washington pollster, has written “a 2010 survival guide for Democrats”   He writes that, “Survival is possible even in the worst of climates, as many Democrats in 1984 and 1994, and many Republicans in 1986 and 2008 have shown.”   Here’s his first prescription:  …

The Looniest Department in State Government

By Carter Wrenn November 9, 2009

Over the summer I did TV ads and Internet videos for the Association for Hospice and Home Care and, in the process, got a close up look at the inner-workings of the Department of Health and Human Services – which has to be the looniest department in state government.   I guess the best example…

Getting it Backwards

By Carter Wrenn November 6, 2009

Over at the Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Lanier Cansler has been lamenting that he’s got to cut $4 billion or $1 billion (the number seems to change from day to day) from his department’s budget.   When you think about it it’s an odd thing – but the liberals in the Perdue…

The Virginia Dilemma

By Gary Pearce November 6, 2009

Democrat Creigh Deeds’ disastrous campaign for governor of Virginia may give North Carolina Democrats a foretaste of 2010.   Politico.com wrote:   “Faced with the choice of running as an unapologetic Democrat in a state trending toward his party or keeping his distance from Washington in the fashion of a generation of Southern Democrats, Creigh…

Post Election News

By Carter Wrenn November 6, 2009

  Since Election Night the pundits on Fox and CNN and MSNBC have been furiously pontificating, the Democrats declaring, Well, it’s not really all that bad, and Republicans arguing back the Democrats got drubbed and voters repudiated Obama.     But what really happened was a typical odd-year election.   President Obama hasn’t ended the…

Get Out of Jail

By Gary Pearce November 6, 2009

Governor Perdue didn’t need this flap about dangerous killers being let out of prison.   She’s done everything she can think of to protect herself politically – even saying she’ll go to jail before she lets them out.   That’s going a bit far, but it tells you how worried her team is.   Republicans…

Tony Rand

By Carter Wrenn November 5, 2009

Ole Tony ‘the Fixer’ Rand is hanging up his spurs and retiring from the legislature and it’s created quite a buzz in Raleigh. It’s like the Pope retiring. But what’s got everyone befuddled, the big question everyone’s asking is, Why on earth does Tony – at 70 years old – want to be Head of…

Rand’s Bombshell

By Gary Pearce November 5, 2009

Democrats who didn’t panic after Tuesday’s election might panic over Tony Rand leaving.   They can see the dominoes falling. Martin Nesbitt replaces Rand as majority leader. The campaign machine that Rand and Marc Basnight built sputters. Republicans win a Senate majority in 2010. Nesbitt becomes minority leader.   Raleigh is abuzz with conspiracy theories…

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…