Archive for 2017
It Wasn’t Always This Way
The one thing you prayed for and lusted after in a political campaign in the old days was to catch your opponent in a lie – because a lie (caught on videotape) was as close to sure death as there was in politics. Back in 1984 I thought we had a pretty good chance of…
Read MoreClicking the N&O continued…
My post Clicking The N&O got as many likes, clicks and comments as anything lately. As I understand today’s journalism, that means do another post on it. Here we go. One TAP reader was struck by John Drescher’s explanation of Barry Saunders’ departure. John wrote: “We’ve let go of some features that had a limited…
Read MoreQuick hits
So much is happening so fast. So let’s fire away at several juicy targets – er, topics. Trumped Just when you think he can’t get worse, he does. His 77-minute tirade in Phoenix was True Trump. The estimable Economist pegged him for who and what he is: “politically inept, morally barren and temperamentally unfit for…
Read MoreGeneral Lee’s Statue
A plump boy wearing a hand-made Confederate soldier’s uniform stood by himself alone at the foot of a statue of General Lee, standing straight at attention like a guard – surrounded by protestors waving their fists, index fingers raised, in his face. Immobile, expressionless, without making a sound, his lip quivered and leaning towards him…
Read MoreBob Havely
Bob Havely, who died August 9 at age 65, was a Jim Hunt alumnus, a multi-faceted political and public affairs consultant, and a good friend to many of us. Bob was the rare player who could hit from both sides of the plate: He could do both policy and politics. He was issues director for…
Read MoreClean Hands
The General Assembly is redrawing State House and Senate Districts and it’s like the circus came back in town: Six years ago, last time they drew districts, Republican legislators used ‘race’ as one criteria and Democrats sued them. This time Republican legislators said they wouldn’t even look at or go near ‘race’ and the Democrats…
Read MoreClicking The N&O
In these Trumped-up times, we need good journalism more than ever. Which is why readers of The News & Observer paid careful attention to the recent column by Executive Editor John Drescher on changes there. What he wrote told us three things: • How much journalism and The N&O are changing, • How much readers…
Read MoreThe Boy from Queens
The threats landed bam, bam, bam: Kim Jong-un was facing ‘fire and fury,’ we were ‘locked and loaded and ready to go’ and – if Kim uttered one more threat – he’d ‘regret it fast.’ It was pure Trump pyrogenics – and melodrama – but it’s getting old: When Trump walked onto the debate stage…
Read MoreA Carnival Air
The protests just keep getting crazier: Friday morning the attorney for the eight ‘Antifa’ protestors arrested for toppling a Confederate statute in Durham tweeted: First appearances are done. White supremacists arrive at noon. Hundreds of anti-Klan counter-protestors rushed to Main Street in Durham, blocking traffic, chanting, No KKK! No Fascist USA! At five minutes past…
Read MoreHave a Little Faith
The media may be in worse shape than we thought: Most of us have never laid eyes on a Neo-Nazi and who’d ever heard of an ‘Antifa’ before last week? So, can either be a deadly threat to America? Can CNN, the Washington Post and the New York Times be right when they paint a…
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