Triad Today

Although many of us East-Coasters like to make jokes about the “Left Coast”, and its liberal tree huggers, the fact is that California is a forward-thinking trendsetter when it comes to taking a stand on social and environmental issues. In the past 20 years alone, the Golden State was the first to oppose federal restrictions on stem cell research, the first to pass a restrictive law on greenhouse gas emissions, the first State to mandate prescription drug discounts, and the first to de-criminalize the recreational use of marijuana. Earlier this fall, Governor Gavin Newsom pushed through legislation that will allow college athletes to be compensated for the use of their name and image, a move which prompted the NCAA to follow suit. And last month, California became the first state in the nation to ban the sale of animal fur products.

According to CNN, the bill, which goes into effect on January 1, 2023, will make it illegal to sell, donate, or manufacture new fur products, and that will apply to “all new clothing, handbags, shoes, and other items made with fur.” In addition to signing the fur bill (#AB44), Newsom also signed into law several other bills designed to prevent animal cruelty. Those laws will include a ban on the use of elephants and tigers by any circus that does business in the state. It also protects horses from slaughter, and bans the trapping and killing of bobcats. However, depending upon your point of view, the recent legislation isn’t exactly comprehensive. For example, according to the Associated Press, the new laws do not apply to “products used for religious or tribal purposes…and they exclude the sale of leather, cowhides, deer, sheep and goat skin, and anything preserved by taxidermy.” Despite those perplexing loopholes, the new protections are a welcome sight to those of us who abhor mistreatment of animals.

Not surprisingly, companies that make products from animals, are furious. According to the Fur Information Council, the retail fur industry brought in $1.5 billion dollars in sales in 2014. FIC spokesperson Keith Kaplan told the Associated Press, “The ban is part of a radical vegan agenda using fur as the first step to other bans on what we wear and eat.” In contrast, a number of design houses including Versace, Gucci, and Giorgio Armani, are fine with the new laws, and according to Recordnet.com, say they have either already stopped, or plan to stop using fur. And in somewhat of a surprise move, even Queen Elizabeth got into the spirit of things, coincidentally announcing last week that she will no longer wear fur.

Obviously people disagree about what should and shouldn’t be banned, but we cannot ignore the disturbing facts. According to the Humane Society of the United States, every year, over 40 million animals are killed for fur worldwide, 30 million of which are raised on fur farms, then slaughtered. The other 10 million are trapped and killed in the wild. However, a group called Last Chance for Animals puts the numbers even higher. According to their website, more than one billion animals are killed for their pelts each year. So kudos to Governor Newsom and the California legislature for recognizing a wrong, and then righting it. I just wish our North Carolina lawmakers would follow California’s example. After all, Berger and company should at least be more concerned with protecting animals than they are with protecting gerrymandered districts.

The Dalai Lama might have said it with more eloquence, but it was Rocky Balboa, in the movie Creed, who said it best: “You can’t learn anything when you’re talking.” That bit of wisdom should be inscribed on a large plaque at the entrance to every hearing room in the United States Capitol.

According to the website GovInfo.gov, a congressional hearing is a meeting of a special committee to obtain information. Yet, when it comes to public hearings where cameras are rolling, obtaining information takes a back seat to political grandstanding. Instead of asking concise questions designed to elicit information, most congressmen and senators use their allotted time to make speeches and badger witnesses. Last week, Ken Cuccinelli, President Trump’s acting director of Citizenship and Immigration Services, was summoned to Congress for a hearing about the administration’s policy of denying illegal immigrants with serious medical conditions the ability to remain in the United States for treatment. Cuccinelli, the former Republican attorney general of Virginia, is known for his homophobic views and blind loyalty to the GOP, but no one should be subjected to the kinds of attacks he endured at the hands of Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Schultz, you recall, is the woman who came under fire for using her position at the DNC to give Hillary an unfair advantage over Bernie Sanders during the 2016 primaries. Here’s an excerpt from her exchange with Cuccinelli.

DWS: You and Mr. Trump don’t want anyone who looks or talks differently from Caucasians, to be allowed into this country.

KC: That’s false.

DWS: Please don’t interrupt…you will pursue this heinous, white supremacist ideology at all cost.

KC: That’s defamatory.

DWS: There’s nothing defamatory about it.

Again, I’m no fan of the narrow-minded Cuccinelli, but Schultz’s calling him a xenophobe and a white supremacist was inappropriate. Unfortunately, this kind of grandstanding by Schultz is all too common, and both political parties are guilty. The website OneCitizenSpeaking.com refers to these made for TV hearings as “Kabuki Theatre, a stage-managed chance for members of Congress to play to their constituent audience and sound articulate, tough, or compassionate depending on the political climate. This is the primary reason why most hearings feature long and complicated questions that are more like miniature campaign speeches and a regurgitation of the party’s talking points.”

We’ve seen this “Kabuki Theatre” play out time and again over the past ten years, including with Republican hypocrites like Mike Pompeo grilling Hillary at the Benghazi hearings, and Lindsay Graham screaming at other members while attempting to discredit Christine Blasey Ford at the Kavanaugh hearings. And then there’s wild man Jim Jordan, who went off on Michael Cohen during the Mueller hearings. It is sad that our elected officials are allowed to lie about, defame, and accuse witnesses without fear of retribution or legal consequence. Not so for us regular folks. If we lie at a congressional hearing, it’s a federal crime, that could land us in jail alongside Felicity Huffman and Aunt Becky. Not only that, but neither a witness nor a committee member can even call out another member for lying. It’s a pretty good double standard for congressmen, kind of like when the government shuts down and elected officials still get paid while common civil servants are SOL.

But perhaps the worst part of these televised hearings, is that when congressmen spew unfounded and false information (what Kellyanne Conway calls “alternative facts”), millions of people accept their lies as the truth, and that can lead to an uninformed and misinformed electorate. Or, as playwrite George Bernard Shaw put it, “Beware of false knowledge: it is more dangerous than ignorance.”

Republican congressmen have been complaining of late that the House impeachment hearings are unfair because they have been held in private, which is yet another “alternative fact”, because Republicans have been included in every hearing. Ironically that hollow complaint and the grandstanding that goes on during televised hearings, do nothing but strengthen the case for closed-door hearings, where members of congress actually ask questions instead of making political speeches. It bears repeating: “You can’t learn anything when you’re talking.”

Over the past few months, public discourse in America has been hijacked by talk of impeachment and scandal. That’s why when 13^th district Congressman Ted Budd and 6^th district Congressman Mark Walker agreed to sit down for a half-hour discussion, we focused on a number of issues that have taken a back seat to partisan politics. On October 9, while on break from their duties in D.C., Budd and Walker stopped by the studio to tape a special edition of Triad Today, which will air this weekend. The following are excerpts from our unrehearsed conversation.

GUN VIOLENCE

Jim: Just since the two of you appeared on this program in March, there have been another 260 people killed in mass shootings. Is Congress doing anything to address this problem?

Ted: There are a couple of bills I’ve co-sponsored, one of which is the TAPS Act. It trains law enforcement personnel to make behavioral threat assessments, and to look for problems before they happen.

Mark: We’ve passed multiple pieces of legislation, including the Stop School Violence Act. We’ve also got the Fix/Nix Act that cleans up some of the background checks. And, just recently, in Guilford and Rockingham counties we saw a $500,000 grant go to protecting schools.

SECURING ELECTIONS

Jim: Are you doing anything to secure our 2020 elections?

Ted: One bill that’s already passed the Senate is the Deter Act, and it would deport anyone who is a non-US citizen who’s here trying to infiltrate or overturn our elections. There are also other measures related to “Blockchain” security, which is the future in terms of preventing cyber hacking.

Mark: We’ve designated $380 million dollars back to the electoral commission system to make sure that older voting machines are not vulnerable, like maybe they have been in the past.

CONGRESSIONAL RE-DISTRICTING

Jim: Who should be responsible for drawing up Congressional maps?

Ted: The state legislature. That’s what it’s been historically, and that’s what it should be in the future.

Mark: The state legislature should be able to draw those lines because they are the representatives of the people of that state.

CAMPAIGN DONATIONS

Jim: Both of you and many other elected officials have been touched in some way by the case involving former Congressman Robin Hayes. What do you do with campaign donations which you later discover to be tainted in some way?

Ted: In cases like that, the best practice is to give the money to a charity, and let them benefit from that, and just distance yourself from it.

Mark: The maximum somebody can give to both campaigns is $5,800. With the gentleman involved in that case, we gave the money to charity.

HEALTHCARE

Jim: It doesn’t seem as though we have a cohesive healthcare plan. So where do we stand?

Ted: One of the things I’ve done is introduce the Flex Act, which codifies some of the administration’s efforts to allow associations to offer healthcare plans to small businesses.

Mark: Obamacare is still the law of the land, but evidently it isn’t good enough. The bottom line for me, is it about choice for the individual? Or, is it about more control? If it’s about more choice, then let’s go down that path as opposed to more government involvement.

During the half hour discussion, Budd and Walker also talked about how to curb illegal immigration, what kinds of legislation they are proposing to strengthen education and workforce development, and whether we’d be better off without the Electoral College. I also asked them if they were afraid to criticize Donald Trump for fear that he would campaign against their re-election. This special edition of Triad Today airs Saturday at 7:30am on abc45, and Sunday at 11am on MY48.

This past weekend, Winston-Salem Mayor Allen Joines appeared on Triad Today to share his thoughts on a wide range of topics affecting the City that he has presided over since 2001. We began by talking about job growth.

JL: What’s the current state of the City’s economy?

AJ: Well Jim, last year we created more jobs in our community than we have in decades. We’ve got a goal of creating 5,400 net new jobs per year for five years in a row, and if we do that, we’ll be one of the top 50 metro areas in the country. Last year we created 5,300 new jobs, so we’re feeling good about that. Also, unemployment is low, and we’re making progress in our entrepreneurial development programs, so I feel like we’re moving in the right direction.

JL: Let’s talk about Renfro, a sock manufacturing company with headquarters in Mt. Airy. Both the City and Forsyth County have offered Renfro hundreds of thousands of dollars in incentives to relocate over 200 jobs to Winston-Salem, but, to be clear, you didn’t recruit them.

AJ: That’s a good point, Jim. We don’t fish in other people’s pond around us here. But they indicated to me that they needed to move. They said where they are now they can’t attract the talent they need for a growing corporate headquarters, and they were going to move to one place or another. So I said, “We’d love to have you in Winston-Salem.”

JL: So, are they coming to Winston-Salem?

AJ: They haven’t made a final decision, but I think it will come fairly quickly, and I’m feeling very positive about it.

JL: Bring us up to speed on what’s going on with the Whitaker Park site.

AJ: As you know, R.J. Reynolds donated 1.7 million square feet of space to a non-profit we created. We’re making great progress there, for example, we were able to keep Cook Medical here in the community, and they’re going to invest about $55 million dollars, and probably grow their workforce from 650 to 1000 jobs. We also just announced that Chris Harrison, a developer from Baltimore, is going to do about an $80 million dollar project, with residential, hotel, and retail going in there.

JL: It was on this program last year that you announced a new program to reduce poverty in the City. How’s that going?

AJ: We’ve seen poverty rates come down from 26% to 21%, and I won’t take credit for that because we’ve only been in business for about a year, but we’re moving in the right direction. And, we’ve got a lot of other really neat programs that we’re going to make some major announcements about in the next two to three weeks, one which will help with young people graduating from high school, and being able to go to college, hopefully for free.

JL: Your friend, Mayor Nancy Vaughan is having a problem with gun violence in Greensboro, so now, her city council is allocating a half-million dollars to an anti-violence program. In the wake of similar violence in Winston-Salem, is that something you’re looking into, or have you done so already?

AJ: We’re looking at a number of things. We’ve got a task force that we’re operating within the police department, and we just received a large federal grant for something called a “shot locator”, in which we’ll be locating monitors all around various parts of the community, so that if a shot is fired, it triangulates where it was, and we can get immediate response to it. There are also some other things we’re looking at in terms of social programs as well.

JL: It sounds like Winston-Salem is doing pretty well, so what challenges still lay ahead?

AJ: As always you can’t ever let up. We need to keep pushing hard because the worst thing you can do is to sit on your laurels.

Syndicated media critic R.D. Heldenfels once proclaimed that 1954 was television’s greatest year, in part because of its literate, live dramas and innovative comedies. But 1954 was great for another reason. It was the year that 19-year-old Diahann Carroll made her TV debut, winning first prize by singing on the talent show, Chance of a Lifetime. That led to a supporting role in her first motion picture, Carmen Jones, and a starring turn in the Broadway musical, No Strings, for which she won a Tony Award. In 1974, Diahann snagged an Oscar nomination for her dramatic performance in Claudine. Along the way she would also become a Vegas headliner, author of two books, and founder of a group that helped disadvantaged women. But Diahann was best known for her role as a single mom and registered nurse in 1968’s groundbreaking Julia. It was the first primetime program to star a woman of color in a professional career, and it won her a Golden Globe. In 1976, she starred in her own variety series, and in 1984 she joined the cast of Dynasty. Diahann also appeared as Jasmine Guy’s mother in A Different World, and her last regular series role was in support of Matt Bomer on White Collar, from 2008-2014. In 1997, Diahann was diagnosed with breast cancer, but stayed free of the disease for 22 years until it returned several months ago, and took her life on October 4. Diahann was 84. She is survived by her daughter Suzanne and two grandchildren.

I first met Diahann Carroll in 2008 when she participated in my “Salute to TV Moms” event at the Television Academy. Our discussion that night was wide ranging, and began with Diahann talking about her parents.

Diahann: My parents were very middle class, and very old fashioned, and anything having to do with show business was out of the question. They said that was for ‘racy ladies’. I even did the thing my father hated most, I performed in nightclubs, where he said, “They even pluck their eyebrows!” This man was really old fashioned.

I also asked Diahann about how she shaped her character and the scripts on Julia, including the time when producer Hal Kanter wanted Julia’s son Corey (played by Marc Copage) to idolize John Wayne.

Diahann: I said, “Hal, are you crazy? You can’t do that with this little black child. Do you know any black people, Hal?” And he said, ‘I know you now’, and I said, “then you see what a pain in the ass I am.”

On that evening, I surprised each TV Mom by reuniting them with some of their co-stars. Appearing for Diahann were Marc Copage and Jasmine Guy.

Jasmine: You are so elegant, warm, and down to earth, and you’ve taught me a lot about growing up as a woman, a woman in this business, a mother, an actress. Thank you for having my back in so many ways.

Copage: Miss Carroll, I’m very lucky to have had the opportunity to play your son for three years. Having grown up without a real mother, you filled that void.

The day after Diahann passed away, I reached out to some of our friends who had worked with the great lady, among them was Marc, who echoed his thoughts from that evening 11 years ago. “Diahann was the only maternal figure I knew, and during that first season on Julia, I would beg her to take me home with her at the end of the day’s shooting. I took to her as if she was my real mother…I will greatly miss her.”

Joan Collins, Diahann’s diva rival on Dynasty, emailed me, and wrote, “I’m shocked and saddened to hear of Diahann’s passing. We had such fun filming Dynasty, and I have great memories of our time together.” And Linda Evans said, “Diahann was a powerful woman with the tenacity to follow her dreams. I admired her, and enjoyed working with her.”

And my friend Matt Bomer, star of White Collar, told me, “We were all so blessed to know and love Diahann. She possessed a grace and elegance that you just don’t see very often anymore. She was wickedly funny, self-deprecating, and lovely in every way. She was also a profound inspiration to me, and helped to give me the courage to be my most authentic self.”

Truth is, it was easy to be inspired by Diahann Carroll because she excelled at everything she did, and because she did those things on her terms. She even answered questions on her terms. During the “TV Moms” event, I asked all of the ladies if they had ever been asked to pose nude. After several of the actresses responded, I started to move on to another topic, when Diahann, said, “Jim, you didn’t ask if I had ever been asked to pose nude.”

“Were you asked?” I said.
“Yes,” she replied.
“Well what happened?” I asked.

“That’s all I’m going to say about it,” Diahann said with a mischievous smile on her face. I’ll always remember that smile.

Recently, PBS aired an eight-part, 16-hour documentary by Ken Burns, titled Country Music. For those of you who loved the mini-series and want to own it, you can purchase a DVD set for $66, or buy the Blu Ray for $86. For those of you who didn’t get to watch Country Music., I advise you to save your money.

In addition to getting some of his facts wrong, Burns was also guilty of omitting a number of country music pioneers who made a significant contribution to the industry. Instead, he used his time to expound on how country music is a blended art form which derives its roots from Europe and Africa, and how the country sound has inspired a number of rock bands and folk singers. That’s OK, and I get that Bob Dylan was friends with Johnny Cash, but the time spent on those kinds of anecdotes would have been better spent recognizing giants of country music who Burns left out, like Carl Perkins, Tennessee Ernie Ford, and Glen Campbell.

Carl Perkins is widely recognized as the King of Rockabilly, but you’d never know it from Burns’ film, in which Perkins received just two quick mentions as a guitar player for Johnny Cash. In truth, Cash, Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Perkins were part of the original Sun Records gang, but it was Carl who was the master songwriter and picker of the four. Carl wrote and recorded “Blue Suede Shoes” in 1955 which sold millions of copies, and when he and Elvis went on tour together it was Perkins who the audiences screamed for, not Presley. If you want to talk about people who shaped and influenced country music in the latter half of the 20^th century, and had an influence on other musical genres, just ask Paul McCartney who said, “Without Carl Perkins, there would be no Beatles.” How did Burns miss that?

Fourteen years before Loretta Lynn sang about being a “Coal Miner’s Daughter”, Tennessee Ernie Ford recorded “16 Tons”, a ballad about being a coal miner. It was the number one hit song in the nation in 1955, and sold over two million records in its first two months. A year later, his first album of country gospel hymns hit the Billboard charts, and stayed there for 300 consecutive weeks. Ford has three different stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and in addition to having a rich baritone voice, he was also an accomplished comedic actor, who went on to host his own primetime network show from 1956-1961. The Ford Show was must-see TV, and, despite blowback from his sponsors, Ernie insisted on ending each show with a gospel tune. In Country Music, Ken Burns led viewers to believe that Johnny Cash was the first country star to host a primetime series, and that the Man in Black insisted upon including gospel songs on each show. Sorry Ken, but Ford was the groundbreaker, not Cash, whose short-lived TV show didn’t premiere until 1969.

Speaking of getting the facts wrong, Burns failed to mention Glen Campbell, whose variety series bowed a year before Cash’s, and whose hit songs, (like “Gentle on My Mind”) made him the most successful country crossover artist of the modern era. Waylon Jennings once paid tribute to Campbell during a CMT special, in which he thanked Glen for always offering a spot on his show to country western singers whose careers were in a lull. Campbell is also acknowledged as one of the greatest guitarists of all time, so I am baffled by the Burns snub.

There are many other stars who should have merited at least a mention in Burns’ film, among them, Arthur Smith, whose “Guitar Boogie” sold 3 million records in 1945, and whose Charlotte recording studio was the first of its kind in the Southeast. But Smith is also famous for his groundbreaking lawsuit against Warner Brothers, who stole his “Feudin’ Banjos” and retitled it “Dueling Banjos”, which became a number one hit from the movie Deliverance. It was bluegrass music’s first major intellectual property fight, and Smith won big.

For me, Ken Burns’ Country Music was more notable for who it left out than for who it included, and, to quote a Barbara Mandrell song, that’s a crying shame.

When the CEO of a company resigns, it doesn’t usually make the front page. But it’s a different story when that resignation involves the state’s largest health insurer, serious criminal charges, and corporate cover-ups. Thus is the saga of Patrick Conway, who had served as president and chief executive officer of Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina since October 2017, before stepping down last week amidst a flurry of troubling developments.

On June 22 of this year, Conway reportedly became intoxicated, then loaded his two children into the family car, and went for a drive. After being pulled over by police for side-swiping a tractor trailer along Interstate 85 in Randolph County, Conway refused to take a breathalyzer test, so he was arrested for reckless driving and driving while impaired. He was also charged with two counts of child abuse, and his license was revoked for 30 days.

Early last week, after sitting on this information for over three months, the Blue Cross board finally decided to go public. Did they fire Conway? No. Did they dock Conway’s pay? No. Instead, the BCBS board issued a statement in which it praised Conway’s service to the company, saying, “Patrick’s strong leadership will continue to be an asset, and he will remain as president and CEO.” Are you kidding me? What leadership? You mean the kind of leadership in which a father endangers the lives of his own daughters and puts other motorists at risk? More likely, the board was referring to the kind of leadership in which a man spends his days figuring out how to increase our healthcare premiums, raise our deductibles, and deny our claims, so that he can improve the company’s bottom line.

In response to the Blue Cross board’s announcement, state Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey sent a letter to BCBS Board Chair Frank Holding, in which, according to Tribune News Service, he called the charges against Conway, “alarming.” Causey also wrote, “What is even more alarming is the appearance that the board and executive team worked to hide the arrest from the public’s attention…then was almost dismissive of the troubling charges when reported in the news media. One would expect the board and executive team to be much more accountable, responsible, and transparent to their policyholders and to the public at large.”

But Causey’s outrage grew when he began to learn even more details about the June arrest, which had been withheld from him by Big Blue’s board. For one thing, he wasn’t told of the accident, only the charges. Then came disclosure by WRAL-TV of the actual police report in which Conway told the arresting officer, “You had a choice. You could have let me go. You don’t know who I am. I am a doctor, a CO of a company. I’ll call Governor Cooper and get you in trouble.”

Causey then issued a new statement, saying “the Blue Cross board misrepresented to the Department of Insurance the actual arrest – telling me that [the arrest] was without incident, and was a routine arrest…the arrest was anything but routine…I cannot move forward with any type of trust and confidence in the CEO at BCBS NC.” Causey’s words were handwriting on the wall for Conway, who announced his resignation that same day.

Perhaps if Patrick Conway had worked in the mail room at Blue Cross, instead of the executive suite, then the charges against him wouldn’t have had as much public relevance. But the CEO of a health insurance company who endangers the health and lives of others, doesn’t deserve a second chance. Neither, by the way, does the Blue Cross board, who, along with Conway violated the company’s own Code of Conduct. According to the Blue Cross website, that Code requires “ethical and lawful conduct for every employee and member of our Board of Trustees.” So much for honoring a code.

Conway should have been fired three months ago and now he’s finally gone. But the Blue Cross board, who Commissioner Causey accused of a “cover-up”, is still operating, and that should be of great concern to every policyholder in the state.

There’s a particularly tense scene from the movie, Goldfinger, in which James Bond is strapped to a table, and about to have his genitals (and various innards) removed by a giant laser beam. “Do you expect me to talk?”, Bond asks the title character. “No, Mr. Bond. I expect you to die!”, Goldfinger replies. As a boy of 10, I learned two things from that scary scene. First, I never wanted to have my genitals severed by a giant laser beam unless the situation was absolutely hopeless. And second, only a man can play the part of agent 007, James Bond. At least that’s what I thought until recent reports surfaced regarding an impending gender switch of Her Majesty’s top agent.

Call me silly, but I tend to believe that a writer’s intentions and specifications should be honored when it comes to the big screen portrayal of his or her protagonist. Certainly, there’s such a thing as artistic or dramatic license when adapting a novel into a movie, but that should only apply to things like condensation of plot points in order to accommodate time constraints. It does not, however, give a film producer the right to change things just for the sake of change. Can you imagine, for example, changing Moby Dick’s name to Moby Denise? Or, casting Tom Cruise to portray Lara Croft?

For some time now, there’s been talk that the next James Bond will be played by a man of color. In fact, ldris Elba’s name has been mentioned in that regard, and that’s fine with my wife Pam who met with the actor in L.A., and thinks he’s hot. But rumor has it that in the upcoming Bond flick, No Time to Die, Daniel Craig is called out of retirement for one last job, and he is introduced to a woman who is identified as “007”. She is played by British actress Lashana Lynch, who also happens to be black. This raises the question, “Is Lynch going to be the next Bond, or just the next 007, or both?” I’m now officially both gender and racially confused. Author Ian Fleming, on the other hand, was never confused about who James Bond is.

The character Fleming created is a white male, born in Scotland, approximately 6 feet tall, who achieved the rank of Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve. Despite the fact that six different actors have portrayed Bond on film, the producers have, thus far, selected “men” who generally fit the Fleming bill, but that may be about to change. The late Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli must be spinning in his grave at the thought of a female James Bond. That’s because, as producer of the Bond series from its inception in 1962 until his death in 1996, Cubby had always been protective of the brand, and careful to nurture the Bond image. In later years, Broccoli began to give his daughter Barbara and stepson Michael Wilson more responsibility in the family business. That was OK so long as Cubby was alive, but after his death, the kids began to tinker with the brand, up to and including casting Craig, and turning him into Jason Bourne instead of a refined British spy. That was bad enough, but now, the Broccoli kids may be about to ruin the franchise if they cast a woman as the iconic secret agent.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m fine with a female spy in any other venue. Heck, I’m fine with just about everything having to do with the opposite sex. But if a woman is cast to play the next James Bond, then you might as well just strap me to a laser table and be done with it. I simply wouldn’t feel right about having a set of “gadgets” that are no longer available to 007.

Voter suppression has been an ugly part of the American fabric for our entire history. Slavery, of course, was the ultimate method of suppressing votes, but it was just one example among many. Long-standing misogynistic societal norms, for example, kept women in the home and away from the polls for more than 300 years after Jamestown was settled. And let’s not forget that our Founding Fathers, many of whom married into wealth, also intended to keep non-land-holding white males out of the loop when it came to voting. Theoretically, passage of the 15^th Amendment in 1870 (which gave every citizen the right to vote), was supposed to end all forms of voter suppression, but Jim Crow got around that by implementing poll taxes and literacy tests as a means of disenfranchising poor whites, former slaves, and Native Americans.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were supposed to end voter suppression of African Americans once and for all, but it didn’t end voter intimidation, including the kind where white thugs would stand outside the polls and look imposing. It also didn’t foresee the extent to which racist politicians would gerrymander districts in order to dilute the black vote and, thus, limit the number of minorities who could be elected to state and federal office. In recent years, Republican lawmakers in North Carolina have been particularly brazen in their attempts to suppress the black vote, including eliminating polling sites, reducing the number of early voting days, and supporting a photo voter ID.

Earlier this month, the North Carolina legislature was ordered to once again re-draw our state’s legislative districts in a way that would not unfairly dilute Democrats and minorities from voting, so, at the very least, our judicial system is attempting to provide relief for disenfranchised voters. But now a whole new kind of voter suppression has reared its ugly head, and it has the potential to affect a wider population than any political maneuver we’ve ever seen before. As of last week, the Republican party in at least four states (South Carolina, Nevada, Arizona, and Kansas) announced they will suspend their 2020 presidential primaries and caucuses. Why? So that party officials can meet behind closed doors and award all of their convention delegates to Donald Trump. This despicable strategy prevents Republican challengers from getting on the ballot because there will be no ballot for them to get on. Moreover, these GOP officials are not in the least bit timid about admitting their motive. As far back as last December, South Carolina party chair Drew McKissick told the Washington Examiner that he would cancel the state’s 2020 primary if President Trump should face a serious challenge from a member of his own party.

As I noted in a previous column, cancelling primaries is not a new concept, but it is only supposed to be done when there is an incumbent president with no intra-party challengers. The South Carolina Democratic Party, for example, cancelled their primaries in 1996 and 2012 when no other Democratic candidate emerged to challenge Bill Clinton and Barack Obama for a second term. In contrast, McKissick and his Republican counterparts in other states, are preventing declared Republican candidates from being able to even compete with Trump. Concurrently, they are also effectively suppressing the votes of their own registered voters, and that is one for the history books.

To date, three legitimate Republican challengers have announced their candidacy, and, given the seriousness of this situation, those candidates must now join with voters in the offending states to involve legal counsel and the ACLU in proving that the Republican party is engaged in systematic voter suppression. Absent that, it’s possible we could see the cancellation of Republican primaries in all 50 states, and if that happens, Trump will have a coronation instead of a convention.

Last December, Drew McKissick, chairman of the South Carolina GOP, told the Washington Examiner that he would not rule out cancelling that state’s 2020 Republican primary if President Trump should face a serious challenge from a member of his own party. Last week he made good on that promise. As radical as that seems, keep in mind that South Carolina did the same thing in 2004 when incumbent President George W. Bush looked vulnerable after having invaded the wrong country the year before. Instead of letting folks decide a primary winner, Luke Byars, then serving as state chairman, convened a private meeting of the South Carolina Republican state Executive Committee, and passed a resolution which endorsed the President for re-election. Sadly that wasn’t the first time a political party had made an end-run around it’s own voters. The same thing happened in 1992 when the Iowa GOP cancelled their caucuses, for fear that challenger Pat Buchannan would embarrass George H.W. Bush early on. That brings us back to 2020 and Donald Trump, whose tariff policies are starting to erode his base, while folks like former Illinois Congressman Joe Walsh, former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld, and Ohio Governor John Kasich wait in the wings for a possible primary challenge. It could be a long wait, according to former South Carolina Republican chairman Matt Moore, who told the Examiner, “Pigs will fly before the South Carolina GOP allows Trump to have opposition.”

Flying pigs aside, what Iowa did in 1992 and South Carolina did in 2004 is nothing short of voter suppression because their actions denied Republicans and independents the right to vote. But, in fact, what they did was legal. Those state’s parties were merely playing hardball politics, something modern day Democrats don’t seem to know how to do. For example, an overwhelming majority of Democratic Congressmen want to impeach Trump, but Nancy Pelosi says the Senate wouldn’t convict, so no action is taken. Meanwhile, some Democrats say they are waiting for the Southern District of New York or other plaintiffs to run Trump out of office, but that probably won’t happen. Still other Democrats are content to just see what happens next November, but that’s way too risky. If Democrats really want to rid the nation of Trump, they don’t have to wait until next fall. All they have to do is be creative and play hardball ahead of the primaries. Here’s how.

In most states, if you are a registered Democrat, you must vote in the Democratic primary, and if you are registered as “Unaffiliated”, you must declare which party’s primary you want to vote in, on the day of the primary. But guess what? You can switch your party affiliation ahead of time, and vote in the opposition primary. Here in North Carolina, for example, you must switch your party affiliation within 25 days of the primary, which is on March 3, 2020. In other words, a Democrat can vote in the Republican primary by simply changing his registration in accordance with deadlines established in each state. So how is this a strategy to deny Trump a second term? It’s simple. You switch your party affiliation, walk into the booth on primary day, and vote for one of Trump’s leading Republican challengers.

Let’s take North Carolina as an example. There are just over 2 million registered Democrats in our state, and about that many unaffiliated voters. If a majority of them cast their ballot for, say, Bill Weld in the primary, then President Trump won’t have enough delegates to win the state. If Democrats in every state do the same thing, Trump would be denied a second term before he even gets to run for a second term. True, by switching parties, you forfeit your right to vote for your favorite Democrat, but the overwhelming majority of likely Democratic voters in the United States tell pollsters that any Democrat would be better than Trump. If that’s true, then what’s stopping you Democrats from becoming a temporary Republican during your state’s primary?

Of course, some Republican leaders could counter a Democratic Party-switching ploy by canceling their state’s primary, but, South Carolina aside, I can’t see today’s more engaged conservative electorate accepting a mass movement to disenfranchise themselves from the process. So Democrats, stop your whining and lamenting, and get ready to play hardball. I’ve even got a slogan for your end-run movement: “Pigs will fly in 2020!”

Each year, over 1.5 million shelter animals are euthanized nationwide, and North Carolina is, unfortunately, among the leading states who contribute to that statistic. In fact, according to a recent report by the NC Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, public animal shelters in our state euthanized over 71,000 cats and dogs in 2018 alone. The good news is that one Triad area agency is making great strides in significantly reducing the number of euthanized pets. Just last week, the Forsyth Humane Society received national recognition and a cash award from Best Friends Animal Society, for having increased its save rate from 28% to 81%.

Much of the Humane Society’s progress has occurred since becoming a contract partner with Forsyth County last year. At that time, FHS assumed responsibility for managing intake, care, and disposition of cats and dogs at two shelters, which can accommodate a total of 300 animals. I spoke with executive director Sarah Williamson about the Humane Society’s success, and where we go from here.

JL: How have you been able to improve the save-rate so quickly and so significantly?

SW: It’s because of our two, difference-making programs: Foster care and Transfer. Our community has really stepped up and opened their homes to foster animals. On any given month we have between 300 and 500 animals in foster care. We also partner with about 50 breed-specific rescue organizations, and we transfer animals to them that fit their programs. We also routinely transport animals to “no kill” shelters in northern states, who are seeking rescue animals. These programs open up kennel space in our shelters, making room for the next animal that comes to us.

JL: What role has the Humane Society Board and your staff played in the success of the agency?

SW: We could not perform this mission without the support of our volunteers, our donors, everyone who adopts, everyone who fosters, and everyone who donates supplies. We have a hard-working, dedicated staff and board that makes it all come together.

JL: Other than caring for animals and facilitating adoptions, what other services does Forsyth Humane Society offer?

SW: We offer subsidies that help people afford spay or neuter surgeries for their pets. We help fund about 200 of these important surgeries each year. We also manage a pet food pantry in partnership with five, faith-based organizations which help people in need to be able to keep their pets at home.

JL: Forsyth Humane Society was one of only eight agencies recognized nationally by Best Friends for your high save-rate, but they also awarded you $16,000. How will that money be used?

SW: In addition to the Best Friends grant, we also received a $16,000 grant from the James G. Hanes Foundation, and together, those funds will enable us to purchase a new vehicle with which we can safely and comfortably continue our life-saving transports to rescue organizations and no-kill shelters.

JL: I realize that you can never achieve a 100% save-rate because of animals who come to you, having been severely injured or with terminal illnesses, however, you have said that your goal is to reach 90% by 2023. What will it take to reach that goal?

SW: The last stretch, closing the gap between an 81% save-rate, and a 90% save-rate, will be hard. The gains will be smaller and harder-won. We will need to increase our community’s capacity and commitment to spay and neuter feral cats, and at the same time, work on saving animals with difficult behavioral and medical issues. It will take the support of our entire community to continue to save even more lives.

To inquire about adoption, make a donation, or purchase tickets to this year’s Furr Ball, visit www.forsythhumane.org.

I admit it. I was taken with Kamala Harris even before she announced her run for the presidency. I wrote a column in which I praised her prosecutorial record, and predicted she would be the first woman to sit in the Oval Office. She still might, but not in 2020. During the first round of debates with nine of her Democratic rivals, she attacked former Vice President Joe Biden for his stand against school busing in the early 1970s. Biden was unprepared for the attack, and subsequently stumbled his way through the rest of the debate. That, plus some verbal gaffes along the campaign trail, convinced me that Joe might be fading.

However, shortly after that first debate, it was revealed that Kamala’s busing attack was nothing more than a disingenuous ploy to raise her poll numbers, eat into Biden’s support among African American voters, and raise money for the campaign. Unbeknownst to debate watchers at the time, Harris’s team had already produced promotional t-shirts with a photo of her as a little girl, being bused to school. During the second debate, Harris ran out of gimmicks, and Biden performed much better. Since then, Harris has dropped 12 points in the polls (down to 5%) and Biden, at 29%, has maintained a double digit lead over Sanders (15%) and Warren (14%).

Last week, Biden’s wife Jill said out loud what everyone has been thinking. Speaking to a group of fellow educators, Jill acknowledged that a lot of folks may like other candidates more than her husband, and may even favor their healthcare policy over Joe’s, but the former VP has the best chance of beating Trump in 2020. Certainly a lot can change between now and next summer. For example, Sanders might throw his support to Warren at the convention, and Biden could find himself an also ran. Barring that, a surprise in New Hampshire or, God forbid, a serious health scare, Biden appears to be well on his way to the Democratic nomination. If that’s so, then Joe’s pick for a running mate could be especially significant in the upcoming election. That brings me to Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard from the great state of Hawaii.

Strangely enough, Joe and Tulsi would compliment each other’s strengths and weaknesses. For example, Biden received a student deferment during the Vietnam War, while Gabbard is an Iraq War veteran. Biden supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003, while Gabbard is opposed to such “regime change wars” which unnecessarily cost human and financial resources. Gabbard supported Bernie Sanders in 2016 and was critical of the DNC’s favoritism to Hillary. Biden is a get-along-go-along politician who works and plays well with the Democratic establishment. Gabbard has come under fire for her earlier opposition to gay marriage, while it was Biden who pushed Obama into supporting same-sex marriage. Joe avoids political confrontations while Tulsi wades into them, as evidenced by her attack on Harris for locking up thousands of marijuana users while joking about smoking weed. Biden and Gabbard also compliment each other in terms of age. Joe would be 78 during his first year in office, and Tulsi, as his vice president, would only be 40. That’s important because, if elected, I don’t think Joe will seek a second term, and his stepping down could give Tulsi a chance to break the glass ceiling in 2024.

Joe Biden’s driving ambition is to right the ship of state by restoring dignity to the office of the president, and civility to public discourse. He wants to curb domestic terrorism, and rid our nation of assault weapons. And, he wants to restore our image abroad, by dealing with our allies and adversaries in a mature manner. I believe Congresswoman Gabbard would serve him well in that mission.