In a Nation book review John Powers writes about "All Governments Lie!": The Life and Times of Rebel Journalist I.F. Stone, by veteran reporter Myra MacPherson. Powers writes about "I.F. Stone's Weekly" the paper Stone started in 1953:

"boasting such early subscribers as Bertrand Russell, Eleanor Roosevelt and Albert Einstein. (J. Edgar Hoover read it compulsively, in order to be outraged--he downed Stone's words like Red Bull.)"

I often wonder if the Pope political empire is located along Morgan Street so that the name Morgan can act "like Red Bull" to the many Pope operatives, a constant reminder to eschew bi-partisanship and to persist in divisiveness with renewed vigor.

Federal Judge James Dever removes himself from Jim Black's sentencing
     N & O | C O

Wilmington Journal has strong words:
     Open Letter to the NC Black Legislative Caucus

Charter School 100 cap should remain according to NC Center for Public Policy Research:
     AP @ CO | WLOS | NBC17

Charter schools performed about the same or slightly worse than traditional schools

UPDATE: Read the full report from NCPPR

It's no secret that North Carolina's population is growing rapidly. With that growth comes a need for additional services and bricks, mortar, asphalt, steel and concrete to deliver those services.

When my wife wants to fall asleep she asks me to explain how a telephone works. Explaining growth and infrastructure has the same effect. Mention taxes and the average person will wake up but upon hearing the trigger phrase "tax base", eyes will glaze over and deep sleep sets in. Call me a somnambulist chaser if you will but I'm trying to raise awareness of the need for local government funding options.

That's why I've created this video: Support Transfer Tax or watch below the fold:

If you ever want to understand the significance and insidiousness of James Arthur Pope and John Hood in framing political debates in North Carolina there are some articles that reveal motivation and methods in undermining progressive policies.

...perhaps it can be undermined, in the original sense of the term of creating breaches in the walls by digging underneath and using fire to collapse the tunnel.

The Pope model is a war of attrition, death by a thousand paper cuts followed by a bonfire of vanity publications to immolate the institutions against which Pope et al chafe but which bond and serve us in a free society, however flawed.