Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
My friend Bruce Thompson – a Raleigh lawyer and leading Clinton adviser here – thinks I’m reading the primary all wrong. (I predicted an Obama blowout.) Bruce believes Hillary Clinton will win here. He points to the crowds that came to Bill Clinton’s trip Down East last weekend – Bubba’s BBQ Tour. He told me:…
Bev Perdue once called herself ‘the coal-mine’s daughter.’ And there was some truth in it. Her father once worked in a coal mine. But unlike Loretta Lynn’s father he ended up owning it. Several of them. Not long after Mrs. Perdue arrived in the State House – in 1986 – a cohort of her fellow…
Politics is nothing if not full of surprises. First, the Governor’s office said Dempsey Benton fired Debbie Crane. For incompetence. Then Dempsey said he didn’t. And she wasn’t. That, of course, lead the newspaper reporters straight back to the Governor’s door, Who fired Debbie Crane? The governor’s chief-of-staff, Franklin Freeman, said the Governor had her…
The News & Observer wrote last weekend what Raleigh insiders have been saying for the last eight years: Mike Easley is – as Senator Tony Rand said – “weird.” Actually, Rand didn’t say Easley is weird. He said his working style is weird. But a Governor is his working style. The Governor says measure me…
Richard Moore – in his official role as state Treasurer – gave a company owned by a couple of his contributors the inside track to sell dental and vision insurance to state retirees. (He also gave his contributors company, free, a list of state retirees – but wouldn’t give the same list to their competitors).…
Well, Beverly Perdue has had enough of negative ads. She’s pulling hers. In an e-mail – unless it’s a hoax – she’s announced for the good of the state she’s pulling her negative ads and it’s all hearts and flowers from now on. Richard Moore must be counting his lucky stars. Maybe Mrs. Perdue had…
A lot of folks thought maybe the City Council had been out in the sun too long when it up and out of a clear blue sky voted to ban garbage disposals. Well, it turns out taking on the housewives of Raleigh is a lot tougher assignment then vilifying developers. The ladies of Raleigh have…
Bev Perdue’s positive-ad ploy is a blunder that could cost her the nomination. It sounds good today. But she will regret it. Especially if she ends up giving a concession speech the night of May 6. A candidate who unilaterally disarms usually loses. Moore will keep pummeling her with the ads that closed the gap.…
On “Good morning America” Elizabeth Edwards told Diane Sawyer she – and John – are neutral in the Democratic primary – but then, in the next breath, she added Hillary’s health care plan is better than Obama’s. In one breath she says she’s neutral. In the next she sticks the knife in Obama. From where…
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…