Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
Imagine this. Obi-wan Obama the zen-master sitting Buddha-like, voice a calming balm, is giving an interview. Interviewer: What about the war on terrorism? Obi-wan: We can save the planet. Interviewer: What about the war in Iraq? Obi-wan: We can end a war. Interviewer: What about corruption and rising unemployment and soaring gas prices and…? Obi-wan:…
I read in one of the newspapers awhile back (I can’t recall exactly which one) the governor likes to leave Friday for his beach-home, return Monday, and in between spend as much time (after hours) as possible on his hobby, woodworking in the basement of the Governor’s Mansion. Don’t get me wrong, one of the…
When he gets back from Italy, Governor Easley needs to end this no-win email war with the media. The fight has poisoned his relationships with the media, especially The News & Observer. It led to a lawsuit. And he’s been put on the defensive. The longer this goes on, the more distractions he will face,…
Let’s suppose you agree with Bev Perdue’s sudden conversion to campaign ads that are all positive, all the time. You believe candidates’ ads should be about themselves and never, never, ever even so much as mention their opponents. Now let’s suppose you are an adviser to Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama for the fall campaign…
Dr. Bert Coffer of Raleigh, who died last week, was one of the finest people I ever met in politics. I feel that way even though Bert was one of Jesse Helms’ best friends and strongest supporters. I got to know Bert working on a health-care issue several years ago. He was a friendly, unassuming…
Representative Joe Boylan has gotten himself in a big mess. A year ago Joe passed out on the House floor and said it was a bout of flu and dehydration. Which sounded fine. And made sense. But, then, the newspapers reported Boylan, who’s married, had made “a drunken pass at a female legislator” in a…
Bev Perdue’s campaign manager is filling Internet Inboxes with messages from people praising Perdue, pounding her on the back, for renouncing negative ads. In one email he quotes Priscilla and Kathy and Donna as gushing, “Way to go… you very well may have earned my vote… Mr. Moore’s negative ads have totally turned me off.”…
A political campaign, by nature, is born in chaos. Think of it this way: In twelve months Barack Obama has created the equivalent of a mammoth $200 million corporation, employing hundreds of people who’ve, mostly, never worked together before. Add to that fierce competition and you can see why most campaigns become not well-oiled machines,…
You could see this train wreck coming. Less than a week after Bev Perdue promised a positive campaign, the N&O headline says: “Mailer contradicts Perdue’s message.” It turns out the National Education Association “had already sent 10,000 glossy attacks on Moore to retired educators in North Carolina.” So Moore is holding a news conference this…
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…
A reassuring lesson from our trip to Germany and Czechia is that dictators, despots and tyrants…