Dinner with Dave?
If Dave opts for a southerly route on his cross-country jaunt, he could come through NC. Anyone up for a Tar Heel bloggers' dinner here in Greensboro? We could put together a really good group. It's less than a two hour drive for Saltire, less than 90 minutes for Mark Pilgrim and Eric Muller, and of course I'm writing this from the political weblog capitol of the known world. As long as it's not between March 16 and March 23, when the Cones will be enjoying a vacation, I promise to buy the first round....
Political Battle Grows Around Coble Remarks
GOP congressman Richard Burr, who looks to be running for John Edwards' senate seat, has stepped forward to defend Howard Coble after Edwards criticized him for his remarks in favor of interning Japanese-Americans during WWII. Our state's senior senator made headlines yesterday for saying the Greensboro congressman has compromised his ability to shape homeland security policy.
Edwards' remarks also infuriated Guilford County GOP chairman Marcus Kindley, apparently to the point of brain-lock. On this morning's Dusty Dunn radio program, Kindley lit into Edwards, then spent a long time talking about internment as a terrible thing done by FDR. Right, Marcus, it was terrible...that's why Coble shouldn't have defended it.
Meanwhile, a coalition including the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus has called on Speaker Hastert and Judiciary committee chair Sensenbrenner to repudiate Coble's comments. And the Democratic National Committee also wants Coble to step down from his subcommittee post.
Coble may be getting the wrong message from all those supportive letters to the editor in the News & Record. For the last time, people, we know the war was fearsome, but the folks who got locked up were Americans, not Japanese soldiers...and the US apologized for it already. Coble should, too.
More Race Problems for Local GOP
As I discussed in my Sunday column, a Guilford County commissioner, Republican Billy Yow, just can't stop saying dumb things about the NAACP. Here was another chance for Marcus Kindley to say something smart, and again he punted; when asked on the radio if he repudiated Yow's remarks, he didn't. This is Howard Coble's home team...
Back in Business
Well, that wasn't much fun. First my laptop croaked. And although I had blogged my pleasure at Radio's new backup feature, I hadn't yet used it.
Then we and a few hundred thousand of our fellow North Carolinians spent a couple of days without electricity, courtesy of the winter's second nasty ice storm. That kept me from improvising over the weekend.
Finally, word came down from ZD tech support in New York: my hard disk was a goner--nothing could be saved. Fortunately, Userland tech support has once again bailed me out, and now I'm blogging again.
Just Win, Baby
On Saturday the family drove to Chapel Hill for the UNC-Georgia Tech game. Bonus: the DeanDome had power. After the Tar Heels had stolen a win at the buzzer after getting outplayed for almost all of the game, Elijah and Syd and I were jubilant. But Lisa, unblinded by loyalty, was a little troubled. "I didn't feel like the better team won," she said. Right. We weren't rooting for the better team--we were rooting for Carolina.
As we were last night, but yelling at the TV didn't do them much good against Wake Forest. Can you spell NIT?
10:12:11 AM 
|
