Persons interested in North Carolina politics have been all abuzz over the last two weeks about the surprise decision of Senate Majority Leader and uber-lawmaker Tony Rand to retire.
Equally surprising – and yet still related to Senator Rand – is the most common reason for visitors [...]
First the good news: North Carolina state government has more than $600 million to close any budget hole this fiscal year.
Now the bad news: Revenues are $95 million less than what lawmakers projected when they passed a $19 billion budget last summer. Adding to the problems, the state’s unemployment rate [...]
Recent overpayments to hospitals by the state health plan are more evidence of the need to put the plan under new management, said the State Employees Association of North Carolina.
A preliminary audit last week showed six hospitals owe the state $2.5 million for overcharges.
"Overpayments in those amounts are [...]
N.C. Senate President Pro Tem Marc Basnight told the state’s congressional delegation today that North Carolina doesn’t need any more study about a Navy outlying landing field.
The Navy, he wrote, can save its money.
“I am pleased to inform you that these studies and their significant costs are [...]
Generally speaking, folks don't like taxes.
But North Carolinians seem divided on the question of tax fairness, according to a new poll by Elon University.
Almost half (48 percent) of North Carolina residents polled Nov. 16-19 say the current state tax system is either "not at all fair" or "not too [...]
And the only inkling of job growth is from….government jobs. Ta-da!.
We are well on our way to permanently crushing private sector job creation in much of the country — including North Carolina.
But I’m more convinced than every that we will stay on this path unless and until 1) [...]
The Asheville Citizen-Times reports that Buncombe County lawmaker Susan Fisher has joined Ellie Kinnaird, Pricey Harrison, and the Pitt County commissioners in calling for an investigation into anti-health reform mailers and robocalls produced by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina.
The elected officials are calling [...]
New data released today by the Bureau of Labor Statisticsshows that North Carolina’s unemployment rate climbed to 11% in Oct., up from 10.8% in the previous month.
The 11% places NC with the nation’s 8th highest unemployment rate – topping the list is Michigan at 15.1%. The national rate stands [...]
Joe Coletti, fiscal policy analyst for the John Locke Foundation, doesn’t mince words about North Carolina’s staggering unemployment rate — we’re now 9th in the nation — or what to do about it.
“The governor has pledged to seek every ‘recovery’ dollar she can get for the state,” Coletti added. “But [...]
My prior post on Julia Boseman’s impending retirement from the state senate reminded me to look over the Civitas Institute’s handy North Carolina Partisan Index, which uses prior votes for federal and state offices to determine the partisan lean in each of the state’s 120 House and 50 [...]
If creating commissions with long fancy titles were solving the greenhouse gas problems, North Carolina might lead the nation.
At last count, at least three boards are charged with identifying ways the state can reduce carbon emissions and thrive in the emerging green economy.
When one of those panels—the Legislative Global Climate [...]
I’ve mentioned this bit of political scuttlebutt in these parts before, but now it’s official: New Hanover’s Julia Boseman will retire from the state senate at the end of her current term, creating an open seat for the 2010 election cycle in one of North Carolina’s most competitive [...]
I realize that budgets are tight all across America and all but I need someone to explain to me why taxes can't be raised on the rich, and only the rich for once, instead of cutting education funding. North Carolina has been run by Democrats for as long as I' [...]
According to the national policy blog, Think Progress, North Carolina’s most embarrassing member of Congress is at it again.
“Foxx: Republicans ‘Passed Civil Rights Bills back in the 60’s without Very Much Help’ from Democrats
During a debate on the House floor today over designating 21 [...]
Gov. Bev Perdue was in Charlotte this afternoon to announce a state partnership with Microsoft to offer free technology training.
The governor appeared on the campus of Central Piedmont Community College to announce that North Carolina will receive 10,500 vouchers for Microsoft Windows and Office online [...]
The cost of bigotry idiocy
If NC state Senator Jim Forrester had his way, North Carolina taxpayers would be over $5 million poorer this November.
As he does every legislative session, Senator Forrester filed a bill this past February to write discrimination into the state constitution -- even though marriage [...]
The federal debt now tops $12 trillion. That’s a 12 plus 12 zeroes. You would have to earn a million dollars a year for 12 million years to accumulate that much money. $12 trillion also works out to $87,000 for every U.S. worker (as of Oct.)
North Carolina has a bit [...]
