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.

CarterWrenn200x271

Carter Wrenn

Gary Pearce 2024

Gary Pearce

Archives

Categories

Pass to Play

By Gary Pearce 2009-03-23

State Senator Charlie Albertson has a bill guaranteed to get people talking. It’s simple. Just one page. It prohibits any participation in athletic competition by “schools in which a majority of the students are below the 50th percentile on end-of-course and end-of-grade tests for two or more consecutive years.” In other words, if schools don’t…

Read More

Budget Cuts?

By Carter Wrenn 2009-03-20

It’s right there on the front page of the newspaper: The governor’s got a $3.4 billion hole in the budget to wrestle to the ground and fill – so she’s cut spending $1.3 billion a year. But there are two other numbers in the newspaper that are peculiar. $21.4 billion – which is what the…

Read More

Where Were Axelrod and Gibbs?

By Gary Pearce 2009-03-20

The blabbering classes are taking up pitchforks and torches over the AIG bonuses. The AIGate question now becomes: What did the President/Secretary of Treasury/Fed/Congress know and when did they know it? My question: Why didn’t David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs see this coming? Team Obama would not be the first winners to go to the…

Read More

A.I.G., Alcoa and Taxes

By Carter Wrenn 2009-03-19

Well, Obama’s after A.I.G. hammer and tongs. Which is fine. More than fine. But there’re also a couple of overlooked questions worth considering: Like why didn’t the Washington genius (and it’s beginning to look like it was Treasury Secretary Geithner) who poured $170 billion into A.I.G. have the good sense to tell A.I.G. up front,…

Read More

Bev’s Budget

By Gary Pearce 2009-03-19

I give Governor Perdue and her staff an A+ on message management. They pulled off a neat three-step strategy: Spend weeks warning people how awful the budget cuts are going to be. Then devote her State of the State speech – and the next week’s media events – to saying education would get more money.…

Read More

Obama’s Stock

By Gary Pearce 2009-03-17

I could never predict what will happen to the stock market. But I can predict that President Obama’s numbers will go down – soon. It’s inevitable. And it’s no reason for Democrats to panic. They just need to prepare themselves. Here’s why he is headed for a drop – maybe a precipitous one – in…

Read More

Unintended Consequences

By Carter Wrenn 2009-03-17

President Obama says flat out that his stimulus bill is going to create 3.5 million jobs – is that a fact or a political fiction? Can President Obama (or, for that matter, a team of Nobel Prize-winning economists) actually predict precisely that spending two trillion dollars is going to reignite prosperity – or will he…

Read More

The New Populists

By Gary Pearce 2009-03-17

Since the November election, I’ve been telling business people that the election marked a new cycle in politics: from pro-business government to pro-government – and potentially anti-business – government. That cycle has dominated American history since the Civil War. Government was pro-business in the 19th Century, leading to great fortunes and the Industrial Age. Then,…

Read More

Walter Davis Sends Some Fish

By Gary Pearce 2009-03-16

News coverage of Ned Cline’s new book about Walter Davis – and his “bags of cash” – reminds me of my two encounters with Davis. The first was in the Senate Dining Room in Washington during one of Governor Hunt’s first two administrations. I don’t recall the occasion or anything else about the meeting. But…

Read More

For Our Schools: Mo Green

By Gary Pearce 2024-04-18

A teacher I know, who happens to be our daughter Maggie Pearce Dill, said it better…

Read More

The Least Harm

By Carter Wrenn 2024-04-17

Siena College took a poll, Biden crept up, gaining 4 points: Trump 45%, Biden 44%. The…

Read More

Post-Christian America

By Carter Wrenn 2024-04-16

‘8 in 10 Americans Say Religion Is Losing Influence in Public Life,’ the headline roared. The…

Read More