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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A Better Road

By Carter Wrenn March 22, 2023

It used to be when we had a primary here in North Carolina and no candidate won 50% of the vote there was a runoff between the top 2 candidates. Politicians frowned on runoffs, changed the rule: If a candidate got 40% of the vote, and led, he won. Then politicians changed the rule again:…

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Parsing Words, Stepping Carefully

By Carter Wrenn March 21, 2023

Donald Trump’s in the crosshairs of the district attorney in New York, the district attorney in Atlanta, and a special prosecutor in Washington. Last week moving a step closer to indicting Trump the Manhattan D.A. asked Trump to testify in front of a grand jury. Does he have a case? Or is he fueling a…

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Stop the Steals

By Gary Pearce March 21, 2023

In 1968, Richard Nixon’s campaign told South Vietnam to reject a peace deal before the election. Nixon thought peace might help Hubert Humphrey. In 1980, we now learn from The New York Times (link below), John Connally sent word to Iran not to free the hostages before the election. The Reagan campaign thought their release…

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A Reason for Hope

By Carter Wrenn March 20, 2023

It was like traveling back in time, watching John Sebastian’s folk music documentary on PBS: An old black and white video of Judy Collins singing Turn, Turn, Turn, another video of Harry Belafonte crooning Jamaica Farwell, Trini Lopez singing If I Had a Hammer. Old songs rolled on: Where have all the flowers gone, Michael…

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Trump’s Carnage

By Gary Pearce March 20, 2023

Donald Trump likes to incite violence. He set a violent mob on the Capitol January 6, 2021. Now he’s riling up his supporters to protest if he gets arrested. When Trump was inaugurated, he said, “The American carnage stops right here, right now.” No. He was just getting started.

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Two Enemies

By Carter Wrenn March 17, 2023

During the Cold War America had one powerful enemy: The USSR. After the Cold War we faced no powerful enemies. Three decades later China started upping its nuclear arsenal, allied with Putin, Putin started a war. Fearing Russia, Germany started to arm. Fearing China, Japan started to arm. About the only thing Biden and Republicans…

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Hate

By Gary Pearce March 17, 2023

Nancy Pelosi once called Donald Trump “the most dangerous person in the history of our country.” And that was before he set a violent mob on the Capitol to overturn an election. Now he’s back. And he’s worse than before. He promises us “retribution.” After the 2016 election, I asked a Republican friend, no fan…

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You Have to Stand Up…or Lose

By Carter Wrenn March 16, 2023

The war’s started. Ron DeSantis flew to Iowa – taking off the gloves Trump tweeted: “Very small crowds for Rod DeSanctimonious. He’s against farmers, Social Security and Medicare, so why would people show up – other than fake stories from the Fake News!” Say what you will about Trump he’s a fighter. And, so far,…

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Kindness

By Carter Wrenn March 15, 2023

In America these days you see wokeness, political wars, media howling, crime soaring – and shake your head, wondering, Where did we go wrong? The other night my wife told me to watch David Muir’s news broadcast from the day before – and I got a surprise: A rail-thin, eighty-year-old, wobbly-legged man’s rent went up…

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Recessional

By Carter Wrenn November 11, 2024

The tumult and the shouting dies; The Captains and the Kings depart: Still stands Thine ancient…

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Mistakes and Miss-Takes

By Gary Pearce November 10, 2024

Bert Bennett of Winston-Salem, the legendary political godfather to Terry Sanford and Jim Hunt, had a…

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Don’t Give Up

By Gary Pearce November 6, 2024

This is bad. Bad for America and for the world. Bad for women, for immigrants, for…

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