The defacto Governor caught with his ideological pants down:

In several interviews this month, Pope said he did not think the Rural Center grant had any effect on the lease terms – and he suggested his company did not know about the Rural Center’s aid as the deal came together. “There was no knowledge and no involvement of how the work was done on that (shopping) center owned by the developer and where his source of funding came from,” Pope said.

As I've mentioned before, in many cases, rural development projects simply won't happen in the absence of government grants, and this one is no different. There's nothing wrong with that, but there is something wrong with a man who would take advantage from that and then lie about it to save his much-lauded Libertarian reputation:

This is a regular feature on Daily Kos, and a great way to keep up with our fellow bloggers in other states. Check it out.

You won't find this on any of those nifty little brochures:

Theresa Terrelonge, another former employee, said loan officers were given restaurant gift cards and $25 cash awards for denying loan applications. The incentives moved workers to reject applicants improperly, Terrelonge said May 15 in a statement. “I witnessed employees and managers change and falsify information in the systems of record, and remove documents from homeowners’ files to make the account appear ineligible for a loan modification,” said Terrelonge, a loan servicing representative. This allowed managers to meet quotas for closed cases, she said.

Bank of America instructed employees to delay applications and mislead customers “as part of a deliberate practice of stringing homeowners along,” lawyers said June 7 in a filing.

I doubt these defrauded homeowners will get any sympathy from the GOP. If they couldn't afford the house, they shouldn't have signed the papers. And besides, let the market fix this. If the bank treats people badly, they can go somewhere else! Unfortunately, it doesn't matter who you get your initial mortgage from; the way they sell these loans back and forth to each other, you don't know who's going to be holding your note. Which is a perfect example of how an average person would fare in a totally free market. Like a leaf on the wind.

The tax "plans" for DAG McCrory and the Tillisberger appear to be converging to create a storm of epic proportions, one that will swamp our ship of state, throwing thousands of steerage passengers overboard. Meanwhile, the ultra-rich have reserved seating in the lifeboats.

And, of course, it's all about Pat. As governor, HE has to make sure the numbers ad up to allow HIM to operate the government. What a friggin' freakshow.

Back in April of 2011 I posted this:

"I thought folks might be interested to know how much we are spending on supplies for next year. I've been teaching for nearly 25 years so I've seen a lot but I've never seen a supply order allotment this small. Each year we are given a set amount we can spend and a supply list to pick items from. The county then orders our supplies and they are waiting for us when we return in August. I'm talking about pens, pencils, paper, paper clips, crayons, markers, pencil sharpeners, file folders, construction paper, rulers, index card and the like. I think when I started teaching we had around $120-140 to spend. This year we had $50 to spend. I got some red and black pens, a few #2's, some sticky notes, and a couple of dozen rulers and it was gone!

As a county we rank in the bottom 15% of the 115 lea's in local per pupil spending and as a state we rank 46th in the nation in per pupil spending. I haven't had a raise in three years and my advanced degree and board certification pay is being threatened. My school is already overcrowded and class sizes are set to increase even more next year. I don't have any money to chip in for what we don't have without hurting my own family."

Two years later we aren't getting any supply allotment at all. Teachers just go to the secretary and ask if there is any ___________ in the supply room. I didn't have a tape dispenser all year. There just weren't any left. I did get some paper clips though! I'll go to Wal Mart before school starts and load up on paper, pencils, pens, and composition books. When the electric pencil sharpener I bought this year breaks ( they don't last long when 100 or so 13 year olds are using it every day ), I'll head back to Staples.

Breaking something that was already fixed:

The system, in place for a decade now, has helped North Carolina avoid the highly partisan, multimillion-dollar judicial campaigns seen in other states. It has minimized the influence of special interests over our courts. Unfortunately, some politicians apparently want special interests and partisanship to play a bigger role in our system of justice. So, I'm going to take a guess at Berger's likely response to the judges: Who cares what you think?

I had a brief but energetic debate with Doug Clark a few years ago about judicial elections, which I'm pretty sure I lost. My position was that returning the partisan designation would give voters a little more information to help them decide, but by the end of the conversation I was no longer so sure that would improve the judiciary. The bottom line is, whatever other issues Doug and I may disagree over, he's usually spot-on when it comes to judicial matters, and this one is no different:

Some inspiring words from Mark Marcoplos, one of the 151 people arrested on June 3.

I got arrested at a recent Moral Monday protest with 151 others. The total number is now close to 400.

With the collusion of both parties, diseased politics and corporate corruption have been eating away at our society for a long time. Suddenly, the pace has quickened in North Carolina and voices of moderation are being willfully steam-rolled by a radical agenda that is right out of the playbook of out-of-state heavy-hitters like the Koch brothers’- funded Americans for Prosperity and the American Legislative Exchange Council known as ALEC. These efforts are amplified by the Koch brothers’ North Carolina ally, the mega-wealthy free-spender for ultra-conservative causes Art Pope – now ensconced as the state’s Budget Director. In the last election, Pope spent $2.2 million dollars on 22 state legislative candidates, winning 18 of them.

This current crop of self-serving representatives has unleashed an avalanche of bills that will result in the least among us being denied the basic necessities that good neighbors and strong communities have always provided for one another – food when they are hungry, care when they are sick, a quality education for our kids, and a little money to tide them over a tough time. All while screwing around with voting laws to make it more difficult for us to unseat them. Add to that cuts in mental health care that will cost more in social services, police protection, and prisons. They are fast-tracking fracking and off-shore drilling while spitefully attacking the healthy growth of renewables and energy-efficiency. It’s hard to imagine the nightmarish yet realistic possibility of losing the Outer Banks to an oil spill, especially when we don’t really need that oil.

What we are witnessing is the behavior of mentally ill people. By that I mean, if all of us were to follow the same philosophy in our daily life, society would disintegrate.

http://turnncblue.org is up and running. Very pleased!

A few minor glitches still need tending, but nothing major. Lots of work still to do, but that's coming soon. If you would, I would appreciate readers casting a critical eye over the site, both at the design and at the content (such as it is at the moment -- this site is still in its infancy) and commenting on elements you like and (even more importantly) think could be done better.

Next step once bugs are squashed: gobs and gobs of content. Plenty of room for volunteers to help with that!

Thanks so much to James and the BlueNC community for making this possible. This is just going to get better. McCrory and his Legion of Doof are going to HATE this. (Even more when we start kicking his minions out in 2014.)