Archive for May 2011
The Education of Phil Berger
Contrary to what some people think, I believe the most powerful weapon in politics isnât a negative ad. Itâs a positive message. And Senator Phil Berger seems to have figured that out. He realized the Republicans were losing ground by having to defend their education cuts â including laying off teachers. So last week…
Read MoreA New York Ménage à tois
Itâs âdéjà vuâ all over again. A couple of years ago up in New York they had a Congressional Race where a liberal Democrat was running against a liberal Republican and then a CPA â whoâd never run for anything â jumped in the race as the candidate of the New York Conservative Party and…
Read MoreBest Commencement Line Ever
My daughter and her 87 classmates lucked out at their St. Mary’s School Commencement Sunday: Their speaker was Betty Ray McCain. Betty, a 1950 St. Mary’s Junior College grad, is not only a pioneering example for young women and one of the state’s most accomplished leaders, but also one of the funniest people in…
Read MoreEditorial Boards
The CIA has water-boarding. The N&O has editorial-boarding. I sat in on an N&O editorial board meeting Wednesday that starred Dr. Bill Atkinson from WakeMed (full disclosure: my client) and Dr. Bill Roper from UNC Health Care. I felt like I was back in a campaign debate. The N&O story stressed the…
Read MoreThree Egyptian Mobs
The first Egyptian mob chanting and demonstrating a month ago on CNN was out to get rid of Hosni Mubarak and President Obama, figuring the mob was a sign of a ‘fledgling new Democracy’ being born in front of his eyes, gave Mubarak a shove. The second Egyptian mob about a week ago wanted…
Read MoreA River in Egypt
Like the British Empire before us and the Roman Empire before them we’ve been living high on the hog for so long it’s hard to imagine the good times ending. But, right now, there are a fair amount of economic prognosticators who say our current Recession isn’t a hiccup or another one of our…
Read MoreBirthday Blooper
I take great pride in my fact-checking, proofreading and copy-editing. After all, my first grown-up job at the N&O was as a copy editor. (I started out as a copyboy, which is newsroom-speak for errand boy.) And I had taken great pride that, since its publication in November, no one had found a typo…
Read MoreBack Benchers…
There’s a story floating around the legislature: A couple of weeks ago when the House budget writers sent their budget over to the Senate Leadership the minute Senator Richard Steven’s saw it he saw red. Stevens, the rumor says, erupted over how much the House was cutting UNC’s budget and grabbed Speaker Thom Tillis…
Read MoreClosing the Post Office
Congress is in debt up to its eyeballs and if the government isn’t quite flat-broke it’s just a couple of steps from being flat-broke but it looks like most Americans (and almost all Congressmen) have gotten so addicted to spending it puts Charlie Sheen on a bender to shame. Take the latest flap here…
Read MoreAfraid of the Voters
It’s revealing when politicians – specifically, Republican legislators – clearly believe they are better off when fewer people vote. That’s the conclusion you have to draw from their efforts to suppress early voting in North Carolina. (See Jim Morrill’s story in the Charlotte O and N&O.) Actually, the Republicans are right. The GOP…
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