Fatcow Icon
Columns
No Dutch treat for education
If North Carolina were a country, our level of taxpayer funding for education would be near the top — but the performance of our public schools would be mediocre. These are among the findings of a new study by the John Locke Foundation’s education analyst, Dr. Terry Stoops. He looked at spending, student-assignment policies, test scores, and other data for North Carolina as well as for our chief European and Asian competitors. While many ...
full story
Romney’s take on US poverty
Although Mitt Romney has yet to win a majority in a Republican primary, he won big in Florida. After he and the pro-Romney super PACs flooded the airwaves with millions of dollars’ worth of ads in a state where nearly half the homeowners are under water, he talked about who he wants to represent. “We will hear from the Democrat Party the plight of the poor, and there’s no question, it’s not good being poor,” he told CNN’s Soledad O’Brien. “Yo...
full story
Blame yourself, not Paula Deen
Celebrity chef Paula Deen lustily massages salt into “a mighty fat hog” as the dogs circle the cooking island. For the yams, “I’m only using half a stick of butter,” she drawls before breaking into high laughter. Deen’s popular Food Network show does Southern cooking with no brakes on the pork fat, butter, sugar or other dietarily incorrect ingredients. Deen is plenty of woman in a land of plenty, and it has come as little surprise that she...
full story
Plenty of reasons to marry
The advice columns of newspapers are good windows into the conscience of a culture. There you will find a field guide to what is considered socially acceptable and unacceptable. One of the advice columnists for the Washington Post, Carolyn Hax, is consistently sensible and solid in her suggestions. Straightening out busybodies, drug abusers, interfering in-laws and ungrateful children with equal aplomb, she’s usually a pleasant read with the ...
full story
Getting nowhere fast by rail
California has a huge state debt and Washington has a huge national debt. But that does not discourage either Gov. Jerry Brown or President Barack Obama from wanting to launch a very costly high-speed rail system. Most of us might be a little skittish about spending money if we were teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. But the beauty of politics is that it is all other people’s money, including among those other people generations yet unbo...
full story
Obama’s silly Warren Buffet rule
President Barack Obama is making his re-election about raising the taxes of an Omaha billionaire who is volunteering for the honor. The so-called Buffett Rule to make millionaires and billionaires pay at least 30 percent in taxes is such an obvious exercise in poll-driven populism, it should come with cross-tabs attached. It shows that as an economist, David Axelrod is a hell of a political consultant. It is a nonsolution to a nonproblem, t...
full story
Taxes should pay for the government
Florida is the state that put the first man on the moon, NBC’s Brian Williams noted at the Republican presidential debate in Tampa. He asked the candidates, “At a time when you all want to shrink federal spending, should space exploration be a priority?” Of course it should be, Mitt Romney said. The former Massachusetts governor accused President Obama of having no vision for NASA, “and as a result of that, there are people on the Space Coa...
full story
Giffords brings power of empathy
The better angels of our national nature sometimes seem to take more time off than we can collectively stand. The assumed breaking up of the country into ideological opponents has created legislative constipation in Washington, and promotes an animus and a hostility that discourage seeing through ideology to the human beings who are thought to be either red or blue. Gabrielle Giffords was elected to Congress and nearly murdered in one of th...
full story
Romney: The ever-polite WASP
Mitt Romney summoned all the righteous indignation he could muster after a Newt Gingrich ad called him “anti-immigrant.” Romney blasted the ad shortly afterward in an interview: “It’s just inappropriate.” “Inappropriate.” For Romney, that qualifies as a stinging rebuke. He also regretted in the strongest possible terms the Gingrich ad’s “terrible terms.” The Republican campaign now pits, in Newt Gingrich, a man expert at channeling and expr...
full story
Late payment to bank victims
In his State of the Union address, many heard echoes of the Barack Obama of old, the presidential aspirant of 2007 and 2008. Among the populist pledges rolled out in the speech was tough talk against the too-big-to-fail banks that have funded his campaigns and for whom many of his key advisers have worked: “The rest of us are not bailing you out ever again,” he said. President Obama also made a striking announcement, one that could have bee...
full story
Center-Right paths to recovery
Almost everyone in the North Carolina political debate agrees that the state’s stagnant economy is the No. 1 issue. But that’s where the agreement ends. What should be done about it? There are many different answers to this question but some common themes are evident. Indeed, there are three distinct schools of thought about how best to promote economic growth in the state. For the sake of convenience, I’ll give them the familiar political ...
full story
Perdue shocker creates more work
When North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue rocked the political establishment Jan. 26 by announcing her plans not to run for re-election, she made history. Since the state constitution was changed to allow Jim Hunt to seek a second term in 1980, each North Carolina governor has served eight years at a time. In addition to making history, Perdue’s announcement will make state and national politicians do a bit more work this week than originally pla...
full story
Attack the media, and we bow
So the message South Carolina voters sent was — “Anything goes so long as you attack the media.” Whatever you think about Mitt Romney’s shortcomings as a candidate — and I agree with Mark Steyn, who said of his stump speech, “The finely calibrated inoffensiveness is kind of offensive” — embracing Gingrich is like bashing yourself in the face to relieve the pain in your foot. Certainly it’s possible that the voters have done all of us a fa...
full story
The real Romney tax problem
It’s no secret that Mitt Romney is rich. He was born rich and got mega-millions richer as a financier. Nor is it a secret that his income is mostly taxed at 15 percent, a far lower rate than middle-class grunts pay. Nor does he have any obligation to pay more in taxes than he legally owes. The problem releasing tax returns poses for the former Massachusetts governor is as that he apparently has no problem with what they reveal — a messed-up...
full story
Newt: The Republican’s Bill Clinton
The South Carolina primary ended the Thursday before the voting, at around 8:05 p.m. That’s when Newt Gingrich stopped berating CNN’s John King for asking him about his ex-wife Marianne’s allegation that he wanted an “open marriage.” Newt’s reply was a virtuoso display of bluff and indignation. He angrily dismissed Marianne’s account as false, even though the balance of evidence suggests it’s true. Whether he explicitly told Marianne he wan...
full story
Weather
Sponsored By:

Lottery
Sponsored By:

Stocks
Sponsored By:

Gas Prices
Sponsored By:

Featured Businesses
Recipes
Sponsored By: