The biggest issue
What’s the biggest issue facing North Carolina today? That was the question posed at a recent lunch with Leslie Boney, the newly named Director of the Institute for Emerging Issues. Boney wants to... Read More
My Spin by Tom Campbell
Can government force behavioral change?
In the late 1970s, I was appointed to the Economic Development Board. At the time I lived in Northeastern North Carolina and believed rural areas deserved to get their share of the economic growth and... Read More
The Six Word Story
Celebrated novelist Ernest Hemingway was once reported to have made a bet with companions that he could write a novel in six words. He asked each to put $10 in a pot, saying that if he could construct... Read More
Is history about to repeat itself? Burr's opportunity
In 1973, Senator Sam Ervin, a self-described “country lawyer” from Morganton, was chosen to head the Senate Select Committee investigating the Watergate break-in. That investigation ultimately led... Read More
Learning more about learning more
The most important function of state government is education, as evidenced by the fact that North Carolina spends 57 cents of every tax dollar on primary and secondary education. Better-educated... Read More
Right problem. Wrong solution
Too many North Carolinians lack confidence in our courts, according to a recently concluded 15-month study initiated by Mark Martin, Chief Justice of our state Supreme Court. 53 percent of the public... Read More
Budget uncertainties
If you’ve ever put together a jigsaw puzzle you can understand the task of assembling a state budget. Like a puzzle, one piece of the spending and tax plan builds upon another as lawmakers construct... Read More
Broken records
When Republicans were in the minority in North Carolina’s political power structure they frequently complained that Democrats were like a broken record. Times are good? Spend more and expand. Times... Read More
Which do you want?
The current harangue over repealing and replacing Obamacare brings to mind the sign that hung in the auto repair shop in my hometown: YOU CAN HAVE GOOD. YOU CAN HAVE CHEAP. YOU CAN HAVE FAST... Read More
