Speaker 1: What's going on. Thank you so much for listening to
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Speaker 2: Right now.
Speaker 3: I've held him through the break because he hit on
a topic that's near and dear to me, and that
has to do with you UNC system. We were talking
about Josh Dye, the now governor Roy Cooper out of
office for the first time in.
Speaker 2: Thirty seven years.
Speaker 3: I thought it was a little longer than that, but
I think it's thirty seven, is right, and he is
the state director of American Majorities. It was very active,
been very active politically for the past three decades or so.
We share the chagrin of being state fans. We do,
and we've known each other for many, many years. Dallas, welcome.
Thank you for staying through the break. And when we
went to the break, you had alluded to something about
the UNC system schools and what's going on there that
Josh Stein the legislature may find some common ground because,
and I'll add to this, we know that enrollment numbers
are down across the board. We know that they haven't
recovered since COVID. We know that you can get a
lot of college credit at the community colleges. So there's
there's a lot of things that were created that made
it easier for students to get an education through a
four year university without having to go to the university.
Speaker 4: Well, and I think, you know, kind of ref broadly,
I was thinking about this. You know, it is true
that you know, no excuse me. Roy Cooper was first
elected to the State House, you know, I mean he's
been in office thirty some years. He was first elected,
well it would have been in nineteen eighty six, so
he served in the state House the last two years
that Ronald Reagan was president. You know, went on in
the state House, serving the state Senate attorney general. And
if you look at that thirty seven years even now,
two thirds of his time, which all became at the
beginning of his career, Democrats controlled everything, right, I mean,
it was only in the two thousands, which was twenty
four years ago, when Shari Berry as Labor Commissioner broke
through and fined a count two governors up to that point,
you know, and it took another sixteen years before Republicans
captured a majority on the Council of State. I just
always had this sense that one of the problems that
Roy Cooper had is that when Republicans took over the
legislature in twenty and ten, and you know, they had
a you know, one term governor of McCrory. You know,
he was Attorney general during that time. His attitude was
that Republicans don't belong. That the national state of things
was that Democrats was supposed to run North Carolina in perpetuity.
Speaker 3: And the irony is that's on the heels of Mark
bass Night and Jim Black, you know, Jim Black who
went to jail and a horrific period of time, even
to where Mike Easley, you know, gets gets drummed out
in a way. So yeah, he even though there was
levels of corruption, Frank Ballance, the congressman, his son, Frank
Balance Junior, all these Democrats either went to jail, got
fined or in disrepute and yet still thinks Republicans shouldn't
be in office, whchim Or hated.
Speaker 4: The Democrats in North Carolina held on and is still
held on much much longer than other states in the
South that you know, you know, Florida, South Carolina, Georgia,
you know the Mississippi. All that you know is all
totally Republicans. But my point is is that you know,
Josh Stein was first elected in two thousand and seven
or two thousand and nine, so he has come up
when Republicans have been in charge of a lot more
in Raleigh and are going to continue to be I mean,
we have this very bizarre system. You know that we
don't have co equal branches of government. I have to
tell people all the time that Schoolhouse Rocket that you
watched about co equal branches. After federal system. The policy
making and the people that run state government are in
the legislature. The constitution, although eventually adopted by the people,
was written by the legislature. The governor in North Carolina
was so irrelevant at the turn of the eighteenth or
the seventeen and they seventeen eighteen hundreds that the term
of governor was one year and they just flipped it
back and forth between east and west. Now, the governor
has grown stronger over the years, but it is still
one of the weakest governors in America, and the legislature
is the strongest. So if you want to accomplish things
that actually make a long term lasting impact and go
beyond politics, you have to work with the Republican legislature.
You have no choice.
Speaker 2: Now, well, it's a.
Speaker 3: Good it's a good deal for patronage. Wait wait, wait, Dallas, Dallas,
who park? Now it didn't mean to be brewed there,
but I was just trying to get a question in
because we're trying to get to education, uh, the college stuff.
And also it's a great way to give people patron
his jobs. Though it's a lot of patron is Josh
from the governor's office too.
Speaker 4: We'll serve that's always been the case.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I wouldn't disagree with what you say.
Speaker 4: And and the governor has an important role, but it's
just when it comes to the power dynamic, the policy making,
and so the direction of the state is largely set
by the legislature, especially they are of opposite side. I mean,
I think, I think, I think Josh Stein can accomplish
a lot more than Mary Cooper did, who will largely
be forgotten in the history books. I mean, you know,
Pat McCrory has been gone for a long time, served
one term, but you know has policy accomplishments. Now, granted,
he had a Republican legislature to work with, but it
came to tax cuts, it came to school choice, that
came to reforming the unemployment system to workers' compensation. I
mean stuff that North Caroline is still operating on and
will be for decades. You know, Cooper not only did
he not end up with any of that, he didn't
even really try in a lot of ways because it
was politically good just to beat up on the Republican legislature.
He was re elected by easy numbers. Uh, he paved
the way for Josh Stein to come in and fairly
easy fashion. But again, Stein has a choice. He can
oppose the Republicans, and and he should when he believes
it's of critical importance, when it's the most important thing
and it's a dividing line between the parties.
Speaker 3: But what do you think happenstalls it on the uncle.
Speaker 4: Let me just say that one final lesson Josh Stein
should learn with Roy Cooper never did, and that is,
for the most part, you can delay what the Republican
legislature want, but eventually they get it.
Speaker 3: I mean, what happens. What do you think you had
ended the last hour on UNC. What do you think
happens there with the erosion of students?
Speaker 4: I don't know, because and there's some really smart people
that are on the UNC board. I just think we've
got to find a way to make the universities can
thrive again. If they start putting a product out that
educates people, gets the wokenness out of the university, that
gets a quality, classical, liberal based education back in the classroom,
and provides a product that people want to buy.
Speaker 3: That's a good way to say it.
Speaker 2: I would agree with that.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think that that's what they've got to
get back to. There's so many different things that happened
through COVID and since and the way people look at
this and the wokeism and the DEI stuff. I mean,
it was iconic to see Chapel Hill students. You and
I were both amazed when they got up and put
the American flag back up on the campus. We were like, hey, wait,
that's beautiful. We never would have expected that, but Dallas.
Speaker 4: Ultimately, really we should be in a situation where that's
not even news or not even.
Speaker 3: Right surprise, true, you got it.
Speaker 4: And the other thing is long term is the university
has got to probably look at some you know, consolidations.
I mean, you know, it's very politically you know, difficult,
and I don't know that you'll ever get over to politics,
but I mean, would it would it make more sense
to consolidate you know, you and ce Assville and and.
Speaker 3: And Western Carolina. But you've made three they've they've they've
made three of them. They took three of them and
made them basically free. They had an opportunity to get
rid of Elizabeth City and do something with Pembroke and
Western with Elaina, but there's nothing, not many people want
to go there. And they made it five hundred dollars
like a year, and those universities are just still not
doing well.
Speaker 2: So you're right.
Speaker 3: I hope they have the temerity to do that. But Dallas,
thanks for being a part of the broadcast. Man Dallas Woodhouse.
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Speaker 3: I do want to comment on one thing that Dallas said,
and though I love having disagreements with Dallas, always have
and of particular import though, was his observation about our
new governor Josh Stein. The difference between Josh Stein and Cooper,
and this is worth repeating, is that Cooper came through
a time when Democrats it was, it was that Republicans
were an afterthought. So Cooper comes into office in the eighties,
Republicans are irrelevant. Most counties don't even have an organized
Republican party. They've had a governor in Jim Martin, but
that's about it. That Holsauser in the early seventies during
the Nixon time, and then Martin, but that's about it
until you get to Governor McCrory. Democrats dominated from Jim
Hunt through you know, Bev Perdue and Mike Easley and all.
Speaker 2: Of them, and then this one.
Speaker 3: So Democrats just owned the state. They did what they
wanted to and which is why the level of corruption
became so intense when you had people like Jim Black
that you know, this pay for play politics stuff goes jail.
Mark bass Knight most people now remember, you know Mark
bass Knight building a four lane highway right to his
restaurant on the Outer Banks. It's just hard to believe
that kind of stuff happened, and it happened with the
kind of wink wink, nudge nudge of the News and Observer,
Charlotte Observer and WRAL Capital Broadcasting.
Speaker 2: They all kind of like, oh, this is normal.
Speaker 3: But that's where Cooper. Cooper came in from eastern North Carolina,
from Governor Jim Hunt world not too far Hunt from
Wilson and Cooper from the Nash County Rocky Mount area
right next door Barbecue Country and these, you know. So
his never never believed that Republicans should be having a
seat at the table, not believing that Republicans should be
relevant in state politics. That was his world. I mean,
so when he came in, the biggest shock to Cooper
had to be they didn't have the House or the Senate.
The entire time he's in office, he's largely irrelevant. He
came from the legislature, he knew the power of the legislature,
and he had been made largely irrelevant because the citizens
of North Carolina put Republicans in place. By the way,
under maps jerrymanderd by Cooper and his colleagues.
Speaker 2: There's the irony there.
Speaker 3: So Josh Stein comes to power as the Attorney General.
Later on he gets into the General Assembly as Republicans
are taking over the state. So his view of Republicans
is very different. I mean, some of his time was
spent while in the majority. Then he becomes Attorney General
eight years ago and moving on, he basically was hired
by Cooper into the Attorney General office. They aligned the
dominoes so you could take over Morgan Jackson. Dawast referred
to Morgan Jackson by the way, and I had done
a number of TV appearances with Jackson on Spectrum Cable
with Tim Boy and really at stellar individual. Morgan Jackson
also a UNCW alum like myself undergraduate side of things.
But Jackson is a very pragmatic guy who knows how
to read the tea leaves, how to strategically and if
you ever watched I don't know The Good Wife, a
TV show, you can get it on Prime now. I
think it's more popular now that it was on TV
that the character of Eli Gold could have easily been
modeled after.
Speaker 2: Well, Morgan Jackson easily.
Speaker 3: Eli Gold could easily have been modeled after Morgan Jackson
is kind of interesting, so just worth knowing there. So
he's very pragmatic, he's extremely strategic, and he doesn't hate
the Republicans the way Cooper did. And so I do
do think that Josh Stein will find a different path
than Roy Cooper did. Just my observation worth knowing you
may have a different opinion of that seven oh four five,
seven to eleven ten if you do, or you want
to comment on what happened in New Orleans.
Speaker 2: I just thought it was worth mentioning that those two
things had happened.
Speaker 3: Now, excuse me for a pardon me for the hesitation
there for a second, but a deer had walked by us.
So I was just kind of completely distracted by that
for those out of the blue in the middle of
the day. Not a sick one either, it was a
really healthy one. I think was a I think it
was ordering. It was ordered on DoorDash. I think it's
getting some food from door dash.
Speaker 2: It's a deer become very advanced these days.
Speaker 3: By the way, Josh Stein should be holding a press
conference about right now. It should have started probably about
ten minutes ago. Most people believe his first executive order
will be something to do with Hurricane Helene relief. I
think Roy Cooper is taking on the chin with a
lot of criticism, especially from the right, about his actions
toward what happened in western North Carolina. I think Josh
Steinel will strike a different cord. There's still a lot
of need for help. You heard that here at WT
raising money trying to help the folks in western North Klina.
It is a third World country in many parts, and
it's weird if you travel through that area.
Speaker 2: Because what you will find.
Speaker 3: You will go through one area and you know, one
side of the mountain, it looks just remarkable. I appreciate
the staff, thanks for the commentary. On one side of
the mountain, you'll look up and it looks normal, it
looks like it would have in any january heading to
the mountains. And yet you take a turn and the
other side because of the where the water fell and
how it just rolls down the hill, it's just completely destroyed.
And so it is this hid and miss beautiful third
it's beautiful and then a third World country, roads, bridges
under just destroyed. So it is still difficult to get
around parts of western North Calop. I still predict the
resiliency will amaze folks at when it does come back
and how strong it comes back, and how many people
are still going to want to go, whether it's a
biltmore or the ski resorts, you know, sugar, getting up
to Grandfather Mountain and getting to all areas of the mountains.
Speaker 2: I think the tourism will come roaring back and.
Speaker 3: Still be a remarkable place to go.
Speaker 1: All right, hey, real quick, if you would like to
get your product or service in front of about ten
thousand people multiple times a day, send me an email
at Pete at the peteclendarshow dot com and ask me
about advertising. It's super affordable, it's baked into this podcast forever,
and podcasts have a higher conversion rate than other social
media platforms, making it the best bang for your buck.
Send me a message Pete at Thepete calendarshow dot com
and I can show you how it works. Run the
numbers with you again. That's Pete at the peteclendarshow dot
com and.
Speaker 3: As always looking forward to Pete Calender being back at
the Helm does a stellar job.
Speaker 2: WBT the the talk station.
Speaker 3: In North Carolina, that the best that has persisted, the
best that has overcome obstacles, the best of having a
diverse audience in spite of being conservative.
Speaker 2: Talk radio and and tolerating like I could.
Speaker 3: I can absolutely say I'm not a big fan of
people saying that the government was supposed to be secular.
Speaker 2: We saw that, you heard that advertisement. I completely disagree
with them.
Speaker 3: It was if you look at it, the people who
created this country, it wasn't it wasn't secular. It was
not at all, and in fact, they were more worried
about organized religion taking over. But it was extremely inspired
by a creator. And you know, in God we trust
and you are you're endowed by your creator with certain
inalienable rights. This is a big part of the creation
of this country. So people trying to reshape that they're
just wrong.
Speaker 2: And that's the I think.
Speaker 3: It's okay for folks to start pointing out when folks
are just wrong. You know, even economically speaking, we've seen
where people like Paul Krugman and a lot of these leftists,
they've just been wrong.
Speaker 5: We know.
Speaker 3: That's when they created the Poverty Center NC.
Speaker 2: We don't need to.
Speaker 3: Spend millions of dollars studying you know what causes poverty.
Speaker 2: We know what causes poverty.
Speaker 3: There's two or three big things, like, you know, not
getting pregnant before you get out of college and get
a job, not you know, not doing drugs. Now, there's
just certain things you know, if you don't do these things,
your odds on being successful in life are dramatically better.
Speaker 2: What we ought to be teaching, we ought to have
a U.
Speaker 4: N C.
Speaker 3: Wealth Center, uh And in other words, looking at ways
that people create wealth through themselves at a variety, in
a thousand different ways. It's not hard. I mean, it's challenging,
but not unachievable being being poverty stricten.
Speaker 2: We know the things. There's two or three just you
know that are that are basic.
Speaker 3: So and I had a listener during the break that
were actually while I was on the air. I just
didn't see it till that it asked me about Jeff Jackson.
He's the fourteenth from the fourteenth congressional district in and
around our viewing area here, the southern part of the
tier of Mecklenburg County, extending kind of east and west
from that center line. And he's now the new attorney general.
And he's been he's got like two million followers on TikTok.
He has done a he's fairly young, he is a veteran.
He is someone who has been very engaging. He ran
for the position he ran against, or they ran against
each other. Dan Bishom also in Congress, and he ran.
He's there's so many different ways to say this. Jeff
Jackson very engaging, not known for sweeping political rhetoric and
his voting record in spite of assertions to the contrary.
And it's gonna sound like I'm being very friendly, but
my job is to kind of be truthful. Excuse me
to always be truthful, especially with you. Jackson is on
the political spectrum. If you were to look to look
at all members of Congress, and several people have done this,
He's considered a purple Democrat. He is considered a center
moderate Democrat. In fact, they're only about see three for
about seven eight members of Congress that are Democrats that
are further to the right than he is. The rest
of them are way to the left compared to him.
He's much more aligned. In fact, they are at least
two Republicans that are kind of aligned to the left
of Jeff Jackson. He's going to be the next attorney general,
where he has sworn things, what he's said he will do.
He is, like I said the news and I can't
think of an attorney general we've really had in North
Glais Republican right off fan. I'd have to look it up,
but I don't think there's been one in my lifetime.
Maybe one back in the eighteen hundreds, I think. But
he said he wants to go after he wants to
go after public corruption. Now that's interesting because when he
came to office, you know, he was on the heels
of some of the largest political scandals in our state's
history west the modern times, where you had people like
Jim Black, and I mentioned it.
Speaker 2: I don't mean to delabor.
Speaker 3: This, but the corruption was very well known in the
General Assembly when Mark Bass Knight and Tony Ran ran
the Senate and Jim Black ran the House, and there
were high levels of corruption there. Frank Balance, who was
a judge, and his son, a congressman, Frank Bounce Junior.
I think they went to jail. That all of these
democrats were, you know, absolutely power had corrupted them at
the highest level, even Mike Easily with the Cannon's Gate stuff.
You know, he kind of left and went away and
wasn't even allowed to practice law after that. His son,
by the way, is now a US attorney prosecuting folks,
and now he's on a big hunt. I don't know
if it's a witch hunter or not, but certainly he's
looking at some goings on in the General Assembly. But
Jackson is trying to carve out a niche as a
fighter of public corruption. Do I believe that he is
trying to set himself up. I think that the term
aspiring governor is not an accident. We saw this with
Roy Cooper aspiring to know. We saw this with Mike.
Mike Easley was the age who becomes governor. We see
this with Josh Stein, who's the age aspiring governor becomes governor.
We've now seen it with Josh Stein. The aspiring governor
attorney general becomes governor. And Jeff Jackson is young enough,
he's he's going to have the resume, and as long
as he doesn't have a significant fall, he's going to
be in eight years. Should Josh Stein remain, it's very
difficult to unsee the governor. And I don't know four
years as a political millennia. As far as elections go,
the Democrats are doing in the state of North Carolina
a remarkable job of carving themselves into office. They've got
relatively young people, they've got gaining good experience, building resumes,
and the Republicans are kind of back up against a
wall on this because Tim Moore leaves. Tim Moore had
created a path in the legislature.
Speaker 2: That I think made him unviable statewide.
Speaker 3: I mean, there were a lot of people and some
of the stuff he got involved in made him look
less than stellar.
Speaker 2: Still does.
Speaker 3: Some of those court documents are just unbelievable about him.
And yeah, I don't see Phil Berger running for governor.
He's probably the most powerful politician in the state running
the Senate. And as Dallas Woodowse said earlier, we are.
Speaker 2: A legislative state. The legislature is all powerful.
Speaker 3: But on the executive side of things, lieutenant governor is
a Democrat, the governor's a Democrat.
Speaker 2: The Attorney General is a Democrat.
Speaker 3: They've set themselves up, They've set themselves up to have
a good reign, and they've got a lot of folks now. Nationally,
I think the Republicans are doing a much better job
of this. The gerontology side of things, the aging orthopedic
side of Congress is definitely Democrat heavy on the age thing.
A lot of people in the national stage look good
and appealing and charrismatic for Republicans, after Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: But in North.
Speaker 3: Carolina there is a unless somebody starts rising to the
occasion with respect to charisma and name id. Democrats have
got a lock on a lot of the executive's branch
for a long time. Now, Dennis, you've been on hold.
If you're still there, I hope you are. Thank you
for calling in today. How the heck are you?
Speaker 2: And welcome to the show.
Speaker 5: Thank you very much. I was going to give you
a prime example of what people when people don't do
what they said they were doing. I was a county
commissioner in Union County, which is right to the south
of y'all. We have what we considered to be one
of the best sheriff departments in North Carolina, Tarifetti Cathy,
And when I went into office, we could only take
ten you know, one of his advertisements was he cleared
the rate kates back law. When I went in, we
could only take ten things for the crime lab ben
Raleigh to solve per month, and you pay six hundred
dollars each for this. And so we solved the problem
there and we fixed it. Our sheriff came to us
with a plan. We have our own crime lab in
our shift's department. Now we have nationally certified CRAM analysis
working on it, and you know it pays a big
dividend because it clears our court calendar quicker. But my
whole point there, Roy Cooper was attorney general before Josh Stein,
and they just they only hurried up when it benefited them.
And then we also ran into a problem. We used
to take all our bodies for autopsy to Charlotte. Well,
Charlotte was so overworked, we got bumped and we was
having to take on to Raleigh and it involved a
deputy having to carry it up there because you have
to be real careful about chain of custody. So Union
County is also through the sheriffs now doing all topsies too.
I mean, Raleigh just basically waned this off of everything
that they could do for us. And if Josh Stein,
you know, he's the leading law enforcement officer in North Carolina.
He has as much power on crime when he was
attorney general than the governor does. And he sure did
when he could. So I don't believe that he thinks
he don't.
Speaker 3: No, I'm not trying to cut you off as trying
to respond a little bit, and that as you're right.
I think Roy Cooper, who was Attorney General for a
much longer period of time and had that rape blog
problem when he was there, acted like he did something
about it.
Speaker 2: He didn't, He really didn't.
Speaker 3: He becomes governor of the media doesn't pay any attention
to anything that he did as attorney general. He just
ascends to the throne on the heels of HB two.
This this bill that if it were trying to be
passed today, would be very popular, but back then it
was controversial and horrific, and the woke crowds of North
gone and went ballistic. And that's Roy Cooper played it
beautifully to become governor while no one was paying attention
to what he actually accomplished. So then josh Stein becomes
the age gets the rape backlog, claims he cleared it,
which had a lot to do with legislative things that changed.
But you're right, did josh Stein really alleviate a lot
or did a lot of law enforcement agencies, especially sheriff's
departments across the state, who have had to assume a
lot more power in the past one hundred years. I mean,
they were supposed to serve papers and run the courts,
you know, when they were originally designed, but they've become
huge law enforcement agencies across the state.
Speaker 2: They had to be creative in dealing.
Speaker 3: With, like you said, big city autopsy problem backups. Greensborough
had some of that, Rawley's had that, and then deal
with the Attorney General's office and find workarounds to get
stuff done. And so now we have Jeff Jackson and
we'll see. But the media ignores the accomplishments of the
Attorney General's office and just I don't want to say
they sweep it under the rug. I don't think they
fully understand what goes on there.
Speaker 5: Well, that's why I wanted to call in the sheriff
in Union County. He had a problem and he fixed it.
You know, he got his own crime lab and it
takes a lot of effort on a sheriff part. Now,
I want to tell you something that's amazing. We actually
got some equipment donated to us from Ourdale County, brand
new equipment and their Republican controlled board up there. But
they've got a democratic attorney general, I mean d a
district attorney, and the district attorney told the sheriff's department
she wouldn't accept anything that came out of his crime
lab to the sheriff. I mean, that's how sick it
is that the average we got over two hundred thousand
dollars worth equipment from Ardale County. Now, I'm sure our
sheriff will be mindful of that when he's starts doing
crime kids or Ourdale County. In other words, they gave
us something, we owe them something back, you know, right,
But for the district attorney to say you can do
all the crime labors you want to, I won't accept
your findings in Ourdale County court.
Speaker 3: Well, Dennis, I appreciate you calling and sharing that, because
you're right, a lot of this stuff it doesn't get covered.
Speaker 2: People aren't aware of it happening.
Speaker 3: That was an.
Speaker 2: Interesting note about cooperation.
Speaker 3: Between Irodale and Union that I was unaware of with
respect to to moving resources. That's highly unusual for counties
taxpayers to say I'm okay with you moving resources to
another county without some kind of blow up down and
there are parts of the world down east where Republicans,
you know, waste a lot of money on helicopters and
all sorts of fancy toys and hovercrafts and everything else
without a lot of accountability. There is rarely a great
deal of accountability at the local courthouse.
Speaker 2: And that's that's sad.
Speaker 3: But that's also because we have so many places where
media doesn't that that there. There are dark media holes
throughout North Carolina where there's just nobody that has the
resources to cover what's going on at the local courthouse.
But Dennis, you just reached a huge audience, and I
appreciate you calling in.
Speaker 5: Hey, one more thing I want. I don't yes light
Cabarras County. We have great cooperation with them, uh Stanley County,
Lincoln County and uh Guesston County. They all, you know,
anything that needs to be done. When we need some
area of counties to push for, they're right there for
us and we've been right there for them.
Speaker 2: So you just made a donut.
Speaker 3: You just went all the way around Charlotte Mecklenburg County
in the name of the county there geographically.
Speaker 2: So I appreciate that.
Speaker 3: So, Dennis, thank you for the phone call, Thanks for
sharing your thoughts there, And yeah, it is it is
a sad reality. I can remember back in the nineties,
late nineties, maybe even early two thousands, you could go
to the General Assembly and.
Speaker 2: There was a room.
Speaker 3: There was kind of these two odd shaped rooms that
were they almost looked like hallways, but they weren't. They
were in office in a way. It was long, kind
of skinny, and that's where all of the local newspapers
across the state and some radio stations they had. It
was the media center. So all of them had their
Raleigh correspondent, their Raleigh government related reporter that could go
there and use that office. And as things went forward,
a lot of legacy media at the local level was dying.
Newspapers were finding it hard to compete, hard to stay
in business, and so you would go and you would
see fewer and fewer in By two thousand and eight, nine, ten, eleven,
somewhere there there was hardly any reporters in that press
pool because local newspapers didn't have the ability to send
somebody to Raleigh to cover what's going on.
Speaker 2: Even Charlotte and Raleigh, you.
Speaker 3: Would think these have huge news opportunities, but from a
print standpoint, the Charlotte Observer and News Observer are the same.
They're won in the same paper, owned by the same
people and run with a skeleton crew relative to what
they used to have from a prominence and media standpoint,
so there's very little that gets covered. And democracy. When
they say democracy dies in darkness, you see a lot
of that happening in North Carolina, and unfortunately, so many
counties just do not have an accountability to the public
about what they're doing.
Speaker 2: I'm talking about Republican and democratic counties. It's not just one.
Speaker 1: All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you
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