Unanimous reviews for “The Nightmare on Jones Street” The reviews are still pouring in for this week’s special midnight performance of the “The Nightmare on Jones Street: The Tillis Berger Divide and Conquer Show,” and the critics seem almost unanimous. The Greensboro News & Record hails the performance as spiteful, bizarre, cynical, and [Continue Reading...]

It is hard to know where to start in describing the fiasco that was the North Carolina General Assembly Wednesday night and early Thursday morning. The word that comes quickly to mind is arrogance. And not just because the Republican leadership abused their power, went back on their word, cut off debate, and [Continue Reading...]

The 2012 governor’s race in North Carolina continues to draw a lot of national attention, constantly popping up on lists of the most competitive races in the country. Much of the focus is on the candidate who has supported tax increases, pushed hard for federal funds to support pet projects and programs, catered [Continue Reading...]

These are the days when pundits make their lists of the stories they expect to make headlines this year in North Carolina. Most are understandably talking about the 2012 election, the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, the ongoing battle between the General Assembly and Governor Beverly Perdue, and of course the economy. But [Continue Reading...]

(A last look at 2011 with numbers taken from the year’s Monday numbers) 0—–number of death row inmates that could be released under the Racial Justice Act that says the sentence for inmates removed from death row as the result of a finding of racial bias is life without parole. (“District attorneys vs. [Continue Reading...]

‘Twas the week before Christmas and all through the night, folks sought steady ground amid the state’s lurch to the right. It began down on Jones Street on a cold winter day. Tillis took the oath and promptly named his gavel Ray The Senate chose Phil after years of Basnight’s reign, Like Tillis, [Continue Reading...]

House Speaker Thom Tillis said recently it is almost a sure thing that the General Assembly will reverse itself next year and repeal a budget provision that added five days to the public school calendar. The extra days were touted by Senate leaders when the budget passed as part of their “education reform” [Continue Reading...]

The Legislative Oversight Committee on Health and Human Services convened Tuesday morning—which you would think would be a good thing. The state Medicaid program faces a $139 million shortfall that threatens vital services for the most vulnerable people in North Carolina. But the committee’s five-hour-long nine-item agenda didn’t include the shortfall at all. [Continue Reading...]

684,770—size of Latino population in North Carolina (NCLR State Fact Sheet—North Carolina) 11—rank of North Carolina among states in size of Latino population (Ibid) 47—percent of Latino population in North Carolina who are natural born citizens (Ibid) 7—percent of Latino population who are naturalized citizens (Ibid) 756 million—amount in dollars of state and [Continue Reading...]

Why the veto delay? It is not clear what Governor Beverly Perdue is thinking these days as she continues to drag out her decision about vetoing the recent repeal of the Racial Justice Act. Here’s what Perdue told the North Carolina News Network this week. “I’m moving in one direction. I know where [Continue Reading...]

This promises to an unusually stressful holiday season for 70,000 people in North Carolina who are not only out of work but stand to lose their unemployment benefits at the end of the year if Congress doesn’t extend them. Many of them are veterans and older workers. These are people who have been [Continue Reading...]

Here is some not so shocking news. House Speaker Thom Tillis, after saying Monday that the state is not doing enough to help young children, announced Tuesday that lawmakers would not be restoring some of the damaging budget cuts made to early childhood programs this year. Superior Court Judge Howard Manning has ordered [Continue Reading...]

Republican legislative leaders seemed more determined than ever to force state officials to cut health care services to the most vulnerable people in the state. And they would rather you not know about it, and certainly not blame them for it. That’s the only conclusion that can be drawn from the latest developments [Continue Reading...]

4.6—the number of unemployed workers for every job opening (Labor market will lose over half a million jobs if UI extensions expire in 2012, Economic Policy Institute, November 4, 2011) 70,000—number of unemployed workers in North Carolina who will lose their federally funded extended unemployment insurance benefits at the end of this year [Continue Reading...]

A bad decision and a waste of time Another week, another special session of the increasingly full-time General Assembly. This one had a new twist, a Sunday session. House and Senate leaders dragged legislative staff members and some incredulous lawmakers back to work early from their Thanksgiving holiday weekend to hold a Sunday [Continue Reading...]