Carter Wrenn
Gary Pearce
People will say just about anything about a politician they disagree with, say, on the war in Iraq. Anyone from the head of the Moral Majority to the Pope is fair game too. But when the Pope, ever so gently, raised the question of the role of violence in Islamic theology all of our free-wheeling…
Ronald Reagan won the presidential debate – and probably the election – by famously asking a simple question in 1980: Is America safer, stronger and more respected in the world today than four years ago? This election bears asking the same question. We know now that North Korea has the bomb. Here is what President…
Mayor Meeker’s Triangle Transit Authority has been having a bit of trouble with its buses. The TTA runs an express bus everyday from Chapel Hill to Raleigh. According to the News and Observer the bus has been plagued by a series of mechanical failures. The air-conditioning goes out, one morning ten minutes after it left…
Here’s a nugget about the lottery trial from the Raleigh Chronicle (9/28/06) and NBC-17. So far, Kevin Geddings’ trial has focused on his failing to disclose his ties to lottery venders. Now NBC-17 reports a member of Governor Easley’s staff was paid cash to set up a meeting with the Governor and representatives of a…
Senator John Warner, Virginia Republican, is former Secretary of the Navy, now chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and a reliable supporter of Bush’s policies in Iraq. So when he says the situation there is “drifting sideways,” Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Rice have some explaining to do. I didn’t see Warner’s comments in the…
Watching the lottery trial is like being invited to go behind the curtain and see how legislative politics really works in North Carolina. Democratic House Speaker Jim Black has said for months he came up with Kevin Geddings’ appointment to the Lottery Commission, more or less on his own. Now, we learn from the prosecutors…
For us Republicans, I’m afraid, pretty bad. The Foley scandal is a microcosm of what’s wrong with Congress: Arrogance, Hypocrisy and Venality. And it has two elements that make it politically lethal: It’s simple. And it’s sex. There are no clandestine deals with lobbyists. No labyrinthine money trails. Just sex and instant messaging. There are…
Governor Easley didn’t know about Kevin Geddings’ ties to lottery companies. He didn’t know his chief political aide orchestrated ads attacking three senators opposed to the lottery. But when he testified at the trial he did know how he felt about the press. “Easley spent less than 15 minutes in the courtroom, offering perfunctory testimony…
The newspapers are reporting more good times in Governor Easley’s administration. Last summer the Governor’s folks at the Department of Transportation arranged a $30,000 ferry cruise with lobster, hors d’oeuvres and a band so they could enjoy seeing the tall ships. Now, two of the Governor’s appointees to the ABC Board have taken an excursion…
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…
Gwyn and I just returned from a 12-day journey through 1,000 years of history in Germany…