Senate Bill 464 — prevent racial profiling — is going to get a review by the House Juvenile Justice Judiciary Committee this week. (Remember the incidents in Alamance? )
Here’s the text:
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT to amend the law requiring the collection of traffic law [...]
Fair and balanced?
Paragraph One and Two
Imagine your power bill going up by $200 a month.
Progress Energy spokesman Mike Hughes said Thursday that it’s a possibility under President Barack Obama’s energy plan that narrowly passed the U.S. House of Representatives last week.
Then waaaaay down in paragraph Sixteen comes the [...]
Sen. Kay Hagan joined fellow Dems on the HELP committee in supporting a public option in health care reform. TPM has the story here.
Jame Hamser of FireDogLake has been on this story from jump street.
Betsy at BlueNC is ready to make nice.
My feeling on [...]
My eyes are still smarting from the headline and first paragraph of “conservative columnist” Deroy Murdock’s piece on health care in today’s Chapel Hill Herald.
Headline: Obamacare a poison prescription
(Obamacare? That sounds familiar.)
First paragraph: Betsy McCaughey reads massive health care bills so you don’t have to.
[...]
Cal Cunningham has a golden retriever named Davidson.
That, and other fun facts about the potential Senate candidate at his rather extensive Wikipedia page.
Roll Call says he’s thinking seriously about it.
Politico says Insider Advantage poll “finds Burr with just a 39 percent approval rating, with [...]
Legislature proposes sales tax changes, manages to get everybody in the state who uses the Amazon program shut down.
WSJ:
In an email, Amazon reportedly told marketing affiliates in the state that the move was a direct result of North Carolina’s push to levy a tax on purchases [...]
This lovely reminder of how things work from Bob Hall and our friends at Democracy NC: (link to report)
SPECIAL-INTEREST PACS GUARD TAX LOOPHOLES
A new analysis shows that three dozen of North Carolina’s biggest political action committees (PACs) donated $7 million to state candidates and political parties in the last [...]
Editorial from this week’s paper:
About 16 years ago, the state of Florida passed health care reforms that promised at least a beginning for universal coverage offering both public and private options. Pushing through those reforms, which were touted at the time as a possible model for national reform, was [...]
The House is preparing a continuing resolution for floor action today.
The budget is getting close. Appropriations is fixin’ to meet. Caucuses are happening, too. The House comes back at 3:15.
Stuff’s going down.
Pretty detailed and serious analysis by Nate Silver on Health Care Pac contributions and its influence on Senators such as our dear friend Kay Hagan, who is now waffling on the public option in the health care reform package.
The cover story for Hagan and others is that [...]
On the heels of the resignation of its chairman, Cooperative Bank of Wilmington makes the FDIC’s failed bank list.
From the FDIC page:
III. Acquiring Financial Institution
All deposit accounts, excluding certain brokered deposits have been transferred to First Bank, Troy, NC (”assuming institution”) and will be available immediately. [...]
The move comes one day after the Board of Trustees held an emergency meeting about a severance package Oblinger provided former provost Larry Nielsen that might have violated university policy.
Former UNC-Charlotte Chancellor Jim Woodward will serve as interim chancellor until N.C. State can search for [...]
2009: Can’t raise revenue because it will jeopardize Democrats chances in the 2010 election. A strong majority will pay dividends during redistricting.
2010: Status quo during the short session. Can’t rock the boat, but there will be a few crumbs here and there in tight races.
2011: No, can’t do [...]
The magnitude of what is before us is becoming more and more clear. Check out this breakdown of job losses and program cuts. 18,000 teachers?
Here’s the broadside from this week’s paper:
There has been an increasing drumbeat of late that this state cannot simply cut its way out of [...]
Cary Allred has sent a letter to Speaker Hackney saying Monday is his last day in office.
Story here.
Laura Leslie has a really intense interview.
Speaker Joe Hackey issued this statement this afternoon:
“I appreciate Rep. Allred’s years of service to this state and will remember him as [...]
The Fay-O’s poliblog has a post up that says Rep. Mike McIntyre is considering a Senate run against Richard Burr.
[...]I think when we look back at the last decade or so of politics in this state, we’ll remember most the corruption — the downfall of the speaker, the ag secretary and now the ex-post facto governor scandal. What makes this era different is that this is not machine politics [...]
Our friend Mr. Beckworth tells us that Roy Cooper is opting out of a run against Richard Burr.
“While I am honored by the encouragement I’ve received, I don’t want to go to Washington and serve as a U.S. Senator at this time,” Cooper said in a statement. “I am [...]
I guess if you kinda read between the lines of all these commencement speeches the meta-message for all you members of the Class o’ Ought Nine is that your new skills, your sense of adventure and discover and your unbridled enthusiasm mixed with your inventiveness and technological know how is [...]
Dear Mr. Editor,
I am not interested in the least whether or not Miss California keeps her and I certainly don’t need a teaser for it on the front page of a morning newspaper in a state thousands of miles away. You must be watching too much television. Or something.
[...]
Please don’t fall into the trap of yaking about:
• How Obama is not getting credit now that the market is coming back;
• That the rate of job losses going down is a sign the economy is coming back;
• That the market has bounced back and the banks [...]
This Supreme Court debate is tiresome and annoying already because it’s not going to be about the law. No, it’s going to be about big abstract terms like ‘emapthy’ and ‘hot-blooded.’
Jeesh.
Some people just aren’t ready for a president who uses the actual word for things. If he’d have [...]
The next Supreme Court justice will be named after a very public debate by people who have no idea what their talking about ‘interviewing’ people who have little idea what they’re talking about and rebutted by people with an ax to grind.
Anyone who knows what they’re talking about won’t [...]
The guv’s recent email included this one:
OK, then. I’m inspired. Although I’m a little worried that these new now-jobs will turn us into flying alien playskool people.
This has been another edition of strange government logos.
[...]Apparently the Obama administrations is turning us into a socialist banana republic by, uh, taxing corporate profits. That’s right, he’s a nationalizing some of their profits. OMG! Turn on Fox.
Via Reuters:
A central provision would prohibit companies from deducting expenses supporting their overseas operations until they pay taxes on [...]
The Senate endorses folly.
Via Chris’ Selling our sand and threatening our coast:
With virtually no debate, the Senate approved a change to North Carolina’s coastal regulations that could have disastrous effects on North Carolina’s shore. The bill would give the Coastal Resources Commission the ability to allow the construction [...]
No pork, but she is bringing shame and ridicule to her district. You got to do what your good at, I guess.
Via Human Rights Watch:
Human Rights Campaign Condemns Rep. Foxx’s Remarks Calling Matthew Shepard’s Hate Motivated Murder “A Hoax”
“Rep. Foxx should be ashamed of herself,” said Brad Luna, [...]
Yes, what the hell does the biggest tent of all is the tent of freedom mean? Good golly.
Hog lagoons may be source o’ the swine flu.
Hog lagoons? That sounds familiar.
Now where might I have heard the term hog lagoons before?
Also, Facing South points to a Grist article that says the location may be a hog operation owned by Smithfield.
Those Ruby Slippers musta worked.
Doles to speak in Kansas.
Evidence that unions have a long way to go with North Carolinians. Years of union bashing have done a job on the perception of what organizing accomplishes.
From the new Elon Poll released today:
North and South Carolina citizens are also averse to labor unions. Fifty-four percent of residents have [...]
Looking at the first hundred days, President Obama is frustrating efforts by intelligent pundits to set the agenda. He is also remaining too calm and speaking in complete sentences.
[...]Perhaps this will help in the future. (Saw this live at IU and really dug it).
[...]Senator Kay Hagan reminds a few folks in D.C. that she is indeed one of two U.S. Senators from North Carolina and that the NAFTA thing didn’t work out so swell round these parts.
[...]Read this blog post about the N&O layoffs.
A lot of the people headed out the door today in Raleigh were the people many of us turned to to try to better understand our government, our state, its people and places.
They contributed some of the best journalism ever [...]
Because now is not the time for higher taxes on our precious energy sector.
Besides didn’t their highly informative well-produced ads just tell you that’s what American believe?
Reuters:
Energy companies, buoyed by soaring prices earlier in 2008, dominated the top ranks. Chevron Corp again came in third at [...]
Some states aren’t doing much to track down food poisoning. NC seems to be among the group of slacker states. The feds aren’t so hot, either. Thanks Minnesota for protecting the nation. (And with only one senator.) NC should be ashamed, but, of course, in these tight budget times [...]
One of the things I’ve always liked about listening to Dan Gillmor is his straightforward delivery. He seems more interested in technology and innovations as tools for better journalism — it’s not about wow, it’s more what can we — what can you — do with this?
At his [...]
Says head to the ATM, honey
Yee.
It’s like a bad joke gone bad.
The spin is awful. and lame.
The media — you know the monolith — seems to be really content to talk about itself and frame every major story around how that story is covered by the media.
One reason: It’s much easier to talk about how FOX or MSNBC is covering something than to actually, you [...]
More wonders from our flat earth.
Fly ash. Great. Just great.
Wilmington bank will open Monday under new ownership after FDIC steps in.
Bank officials had said the declining real estate market was the big reason.
Hope somebody digs into this a bit to see if there are particular projects that brought the bank down.
Some big names [...]
If the private sector can’t attend conferences then the public sector will have to step in.
[...]Services sales tax and some loophole closing seem to be boiling up from the Senate budget discussions.
Good overview at ProgPulse.
Heels win the national championship.
Awesome.
Senate takes a stab at Perdue’s budget
And, surprise, the tobacco tax won’t be as high as the Gov’s.
A pretty right-on-the-money metaphor — Nest Egg Hunt in Raleigh.
[...]I’m beginning to get the feeling that the state health care plan crisis and the secrecy surrounding the contracts are one end of a very long thread.
[...]George Stephanopoulos just issued a ‘hard wonder’ question in which he sternly asked the Secretary of the Treasury if we really can get back to the affluence of the ’90s — as if that is the goal.
Chuck Todd asks the president if people are suffering enough.
Is this all [...]
I’m starting to hear the names of the people McClatchy has discarded (talk about not knowing when to hold ‘em and fold ‘em). In addition to the many people who make the Char-O and the N&O go, there are some really key journalists who are now roadkill on the way [...]
The state constitution that is.
A new Elon Poll says half of the people polled don’t think we need about a proposed constitutional amendment to make marriage a special, special thing only defined by fundamentalists.
Sixty full-time, 22 part-time.
A total of 30 newsroom positions — 19 full-time and 11 part-time — will be eliminated, Observer Editor Rick Thames said. In addition, 14 full-time newsroom employees have been offered reduced hours, said Cheryl Carpenter, the managing editor. Editors expect to finish notifying all affected employees [...]
Here’s the link to the lovely budget page of Bev Perdue.
Happy reading. Story here.
Rep. Miller harshing the Treasury’s mellow.
This from Talking Points Memo:
Miller’s chagrin over Treasury’s lack of responsiveness and transparency signals a distressing trend for the Obama administration. As the nation seethes with anger over lavish spending at bailed-out banks — particularly AIG’s $450 million in bonuses to the same [...]
Sin taxes jump under the Gov’s new budget.
Via AP:
RALEIGH, N.C. — Gov. Beverly Perdue’s budget proposal released Tuesday seeks a dollar-per-pack increase in North Carolina’s cigarette tax and higher alcohol taxes to help narrow the state’s $3.4 billion budget gap for the coming year.
Perdue’s proposal would increase the [...]
A new focus on the State Health Care Plan and political contributions via Bob Hall and Democracy NC:
Dear Editors and Reporters:
With “Sunshine Week” upon us, we’ve been asked to use state and federal campaign finance disclosure laws to shed more light on the ongoing news story about Blue Cross Blue [...]
I guess I should be proud that my tax dollars are shoring up the automobile company that’s sponsoring the tourney.
[...]A very nice gentleman from the News and Observer Publishing Company resolved my subscription issue and had a double bagged (and knoted I might add) dray issue of the N&O in my driveway this am.
The Mrs. was very happy and I think after several years of mostly online [...]
I let my N&O subscription run out last year after Mrs. EJS and I decided to see if we could stand not having a printed paper around. This decision was spurred on by our collective disgust over the Obsession vid.
A month ago I decided to re-enlist. (While I’ve had [...]
Shuler says he’s not running for Senate.
That leaves Dean Smith and Roy Cooper.
Well, what can you say. After several shoes dropped last year and stories of big layoffs ahead this quarter, we got word this morning of a major round of cuts for McClatchy.
No word yet on the N&O newsroom including whether this is a new, new round of cuts [...]
