NORTH CAROLINA OPEN THREAD
Sunday, September 17th, 2023
WEEKLY EDITION #434
This blog is a weekly feature of North Carolina Blue. The platform gives readers interested in North Carolina politics a place to share their knowledge, insight and inspiration as we take back our state from some of the most extreme Republicans in the nation. Please stop by each week. You can also join the discussion in four other weekly State Open Threads. If you are interested in starting your own state blog, weekly to occasionally, I will list your work below.
Colorado: Mondays, 7:00 PM Mountain Michigan: Wednesdays, 6:00 PM Eastern North Carolina: Sundays, 1:00 PM Eastern Missouri: Wednesday Evenings Kansas: Monday Evenings
Following are links to a few stories of interest.
'We are the force for change': Student activists protest at NCGA for stricter gun legislation
The Daily Tarhill, Tori Newby, 9/13/2023
“Vote them out!"
Those were the words student protesters chanted at state Republican lawmakers on Tuesday as they stood arm-in-arm on the balcony of the N.C. General Assembly’s public gallery. The chant continued as security personnel escorted students out of the building, and it did not stop until they were outside.
As the students were escorted out, House Speaker Tim Moore (R-Cleveland, Rutherford) asked, "Are you all sure you're not from Duke University?"
This act of protest followed a rally in front of the North Carolina State Legislative Building where student groups, elected officials and activists demanded lawmakers pass stricter gun legislation.
“Today, we organized a display of power in which students made their voices heard because our legislators have been ignoring us for far too long,” Luke Diasio, vice president of March for Our Lives UNC, said.
March for Our Lives UNC, UNC Young Democrats and other student organizations planned the End Gun Violence protest after UNC professor Zijie Yan was shot and killed on campus on Aug. 28. A day after the protest, another lockdown was ordered after an "armed and dangerous person" was reported on UNC’s campus. No injuries were reported.
‘Vote them out’: UNC students rail against NC lawmakers as they demand stricter gun laws
News&Observer, AVI BAJPAI, 9/13/2023
Students from UNC-Chapel Hill and N.C. A&T State University advocating for stricter gun safety laws rallied in front of the state legislature on Tuesday and demanded that lawmakers take more action to address gun violence, or risk being voted out of office. The group of students spent the entire day at the Legislative Building, holding a press conference with Democratic lawmakers in the morning and rallying on Bicentennial Plaza a few hours later.
Many of them said the fatal shooting and lockdown on UNC’s campus last month wasn’t the first or second time they had gone through an experience like that, and that lawmakers had failed to address the issue of gun violence for too long.
“Why does this keep happening? We have had shooting after shooting after shooting for decades,” said Luke Diasio, an activist with UNC’s chapter of March For Our Lives. “For too long, we have been so blinded by gun rights that we have neglected our own human rights.” “The right to live in safe communities, the right to not fear for our lives in our schools,” Diasio continued. “We’ve tried doing nothing and it doesn’t work. It continues to not work.”
THE CONSERVATIVE COUNTERATTACK ON YOUNG PEOPLE IS AN EFFORT TO ENSURE MINORITY RULE
Politics North Carolina, Alexander H. Jones, 9/13/2023
Lockdown, a word most often associated with prisons, has become commonplace on college campuses. The horror struck UNC again on Wednesday when law enforcement reported concerns that an armed person may have carried a gun in the Student Union. State troopers with long-nosed rifles patrolled the campus, a startling sight. This has become a defining trauma of Generation Z’s coming of age.
In response to young people’s pleas to end the carnage, Republicans have become utterly intransigent. The party is more pro-gun than ever. Every time a shooting scars a campus, the unified response from virtually every Republican officeholder is to scapegoat mentally ill people, perhaps mixing in a preposterous jab at “woke society.” They are not only refusing, absolutely and without exception, to address an existential concern of young people in this country. They are aligning themselves more fervently than ever with a belligerent white-male tribe that demands an absolute right to the ownership of a gun.
This may seem puzzling, that a political party with a losing record should snub a new generation of voters. But there is precedent behind this seeming madness. In our history, politicians have reacted to the rise of new voters in one of two ways. They have either adjusted to the presence of enfranchised citizens, or they have, in effect, counterattacked. Conservatives are choosing the belligerent road.
Former US Sen. Lauch Faircloth, a political force for NC Democrats and Republicans, dies
News&Observer, Lynn Bonner and LUCIANA PEREZ URIBE GUINASSI, 9/13/2023
Lauch Faircloth, who worked for Democratic governors before serving a U.S. Senate term as a Republican, died Thursday afternoon. He was 95. He died from natural causes, said his daughter, Anne Faircloth. Born Duncan McLauchlin Faircloth in Sampson County, Faircloth became steeped in Democratic politics before he was old enough to vote, helping candidates for governor and working in their administrations.
The first time he put himself out as a statewide candidate, Faircloth lost a Democratic primary for governor but survived a campaign-trip plane crash. He changed his party designation in 1991 and won a term in the U.S. Senate as a Republican.
The Politics of the Clinton Impeachment and the Death of the Independent Counsel Statute: Toward Depoliticization
WVU College of Law, Marjorie Cohn, September, 1999
In the months leading up to the dismissal of Fiske, Republicans such as Senate Minority Leader Robert J. Dole (R-Kan.) and Senators Lauch Faircloth (R- N.C.) and Alfonse M. D'Amato (R-N.Y.) complained about Fiske's handling of the Whitewater investigation. 2 Many Republicans were critical of Fiske for asking the Democratic congressional leadership to substantially narrow the scope of the Whitewater hearings.3 They also refused to accept his conclusion about Vincent Foster's death.34 But Rusty Hardin, one of Fiske's senior staff attorneys, said, "Anybody who thinks Fiske was not a totally independent prosecutor is just flat-out wrong.”
Delicate delights: Drool at Durham's most decadent doughnut destinations
WRAL, 9/16/2023
With both nationally-recognized names and hole-in-the-wall hidden gems, Durham is a great place to go to get your donut fix.
Here are five of the best donut shops around the city, compiled with the help of WRAL Voters' Choice Awards and online reviews.
Thanks for reading, wishing all a good week.