Politics
There are 1,050 posts filed in Politics (this is page 56 of 105).
As I picked up my dry cleaning yesterday, a man smelling of alcohol wandered into the store and leaned forward to me.
“Hey man,” he said as he extended his fist for a fist bump, “you vote?”
“Beg your pardon. Am I broke?”
“No,” he mumbled, trying to focus his eyes on me. “Do you vote?”
“Yes, I do,” I said.
He nodded. “Well, I vote, too!”
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I was disappointed that a majority of North Carolinian voters voted to enshrine discrimination to the state constitution Tuesday. Many pointed to the Bible as their justification.
The way I see it, God gave some people blue eyes and some people brown eyes. God made some people black, some white, some Asian, and so on. Likewise, God made some people straight and some people gay. It is not for us to question God’s wisdom! I’ve always wondered how some can claim to know God better than God Himself. Let he who is without sin …
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I have to say I’m totally flabbergasted by the North Carolina Democratic Party’s SEC vote to reject David Parker’s resignation. It’s a total farce.
As my friend Perry pointed out, never before has the party held a vote to reject a resignation. On the face of it it seems to me that the motion would be out of order.
I am concerned that Parker appears not to be keeping his word to step down. I’m also concerned that the vote of 269-203 show a deep division in the party. How could anyone in the party choose to support such a divisive leader (and I use that term loosely)?
As time passes, my thoughts on Parker’s trainwreck of a press conference have only been reinforced. As I said before, I have no idea whether or not sexual harassment took place. What I do know is that Parker’s explanation was so much bullshit. At best, he’s an aloof leader who failed to properly vet and supervise his employees. At worst he’s a baldfaced liar, a loose cannon who perhaps even protected a sexual predator. Neither option evokes confidence.
And for the Parker supporters to claim that others are attacking him is ridiculous. He’s the boss of the party; the buck stops with him. He’s the captain of the ship and with that authority comes responsibility. If the ship wrecks, it doesn’t matter whether he was paying attention or not, it’s his fault, period. There is no one else to blame.
Bernie Sanders is spot on. The American middle class won’t take kindly to shouldering the lion’s share of the economic recovery while the ultra rich get richer.
The backlash has already hit Europe. I would not want to be an incumbent when it hits America.
Sen. Sanders has it nailed. The American people don’t like extremism. Since the 2010 elections, Republicans have been pushing fiscal extremism, and the bill is about to come due in 2012. The Republican Party is out of step with what most Americans really want. They want their Social Security and Medicare left the way they are. They want taxes to be raised at least a little bit on those who can afford it the most, and they want the social safety net to be strong and left in place.
via Bernie Sanders Warns Republicans that Sarkozy’s Fate Will Soon Be Theirs.
So, uh, tell me again why our governor took the state jet to Greensboro, a city an hour’s drive from Raleigh even without a highway patrol escort? Does she have a clue about how much jet fuel costs nowadays? Is this good stewardship of our tax dollars?
Gov. Perdue’s plane made a safe emergency landing at Raleigh-Durham International airport this afternoon after a plane malfunction, her spokeswoman said Friday. No one was injured.Her plane was on the way to make to make a job expansion announcement when her plane exhibited unusual vibrations in connection with the retraction of the landing gear, and a decision was made to return to RDU, according to Chris Mackey, her press secretary.
via Perdue makes emergency landing at RDU | newsobserver.com projects.
Update: Here’s a state auditor report on the state aircraft operations, undertaken by then-state auditor Ralph Campbell, Jr. in 2005.
Update 2: My friend Warren has pointed out that Greensboro is closer to a 90 minute drive from Raleigh. Guess I’ll cut our governor some slack after all.
I watched the press conference by North Carolina Democratic Party chairman David Parker yesterday and thought it was surreal. I’ve read all the speculation swirling around the claims of alleged sexual harrassment by former executive director Jay Parmley and was quite shocked by it. I’ve tried to keep an open mind about it all but Parker’s defense of it just didn’t add up.
How can Parker say he “didn’t supervise” the staff and also claim that he witnessed the alleged incidents and deemed them completely innocent? Which is it? Parker has a point about the sworn EEOC statement being different than the December letter, but at some point the excuses he has to make to justify the alleged incidents become a bit too heavy to stand up to scrutiny. Grown men do not pretend to hit each other in the crotch.
I don’t know exactly what may or may not have happened between staffer Adriadn Ortega and Jay Parmley, but I do know that to believe Parker’s explanation of them requires a huge leap of faith. Also, Parker’s claim that he doesn’t know where the settlement money came from either shows he is an aloof, out-of-touch leader at best or a liar at worst. Either way, yesterday’s press conference did little to convince me he should stay.
Parker should resign immediately for the sake of the party.
Mrs. Kravitz
I love my neighbors and would do anything for them. It doesn’t matter who they are, what they look like, how much money they make, or anything. It doesn’t even matter if they don’t see eye-to-eye with me. If you’re my neighbor, you’re my people. It’s as simple as that.
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Recycling bin
My issue with recycling theft stemmed completely from seeing men in pickup trucks systematically scouring recycling bins, never with the homeless people trying to get by. Perhaps Raleigh’s recycling theft ordinance should be adjusted so that those taking smaller quantities might not be unfairly targeted.
One suggested adjustment the ordinance I’ve heard would simply make the contents of the recycling bin the city’s property and make it a crime to remove them, omitting the spelling out of any penalty. Raleigh could then choose how to respond based on the level of the theft. It’s definitely worth considering.
There has been a lot of discussion in Raleigh’s neighborhoods regarding the Treyvon Martin tragedy in Florida, specifically about the proper role of community watches. I thought to email Chief Dolan, Raleigh’s chief of police, today to see if he and his staff would be interested in participating in a forum delving into the role of community watches and how we can keep our communities safe while still respecting everyone’s civil rights. I initially thought this would be a good discussion at April’s RCAC meeting but the interest and audience might be bigger than that.
I think this is something that the community needs to discuss so I am hopeful we can hash things out to clear up any confusion.
I’m a big fan of open government, having seen what closed government gets us. When I was chair of the East CAC, I offered streaming video of our meetings so that as many people as possible could see them. But some in the CAC became concerned last year when City Attorney Tom McCormick’s deemed that CAC chairs’ email are public records.
I’ve blogged before about how I thought Mr. McCormick was wrong about CACs, but I agree with him (and the N&O editorial page) that new social media technologies present a challenge to the Open Meetings Law. Do I think the law can ever keep pace with technology? No, not a chance. So what is one to do?
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