Opinion Roundup: Legislative heavy-handedness; redistricting redux; vaping, opioids; spiked CBD oil and more

Monday, Sept. 16, 2019 -- A round up of opinion, commentary and analysis on: legislative heavy-handedness; redistricting redux; Trump wants you to vote; schools and poverty; vaping; opioids; spiked CBD; and more.

TOMMY TOMLINSON: Another Hollow Victory For The North Carolina GOP (WAFE-FM column) -- The thinking of the Republican leadership in the legislature is clear. They have come to the conclusion that if the game is fair, they can’t win. The latest and most obvious example happened the other day, when the GOP leaders in the House engineered a surprise early-morning vote to override Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of the state budget.

Picking deception and trickery over democracy and debate (Winston-Salem Journal/Greensboro News & Record) -- Have they no shame? Republicans chose last week to override Gov. Roy Cooper’s budget veto by any means necessary. So they took a vote while nearly half of the members of the state House were absent. The override was approved 55-9, over impassioned protests from the few Democrats who were there. That means only 55 out of 120 representatives passed the state’s two-year spending plan. This is not how democracy is supposed to work. Instead of debate and compromise, Republicans elected to steamroll a vote in a Sept. 11 ambush. Instead of open discussion, they chose trickery and deception.

Moore ditches trust with win-at-all-costs override vote (Elizabeth City Daily Advance) -- One of the most significant findings of the 9/11 Commission — the independent panel that studied how ill prepared America was for the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks — was that America’s leaders dramatically underestimated the ruthlessness and ingenuity of those who wished to do this nation harm. What U.S. leaders ultimately suffered, the report’s authors famously said, was “a lack of imagination.” We were reminded of that finding last week on a different Sept. 11 following a different failure of imagination and a different underestimation of an adversary.

Rotten legislative pork? Local opposition to Civil War museum could kill $46 million in state funding (Fayetteville Observer reports) -- The General Assembly is on the verge of approving $46 million for a new Civil War museum in Fayetteville. But some local officials are waffling in their support of the project, which could jeopardize the North Carolina Civil War & Reconstruction History Center project, museum officials said.

RICHARD CRAVER: Analysts say House GOP leadership may have overstepped ethical boundaries with veto override tactics (Winston-Salem Journal reports) -- The tactics used last week by state House Republican leadership to override two high-profile vetoes by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper may have been within legislative boundaries. But holding a vote when the bulk of Democratic leaders were not present may have done lasting damage to the legislative process, according to ethics experts and political analysts.

Legislature on track to OK new maps this week (AP reports) -- New electoral boundaries for North Carolina General Assembly seats demanded by state judges are on track to be finalized by this week's court deadline.

PEDER ZANE: Ruling won’t untangle districts and partisanship (Durham Herald-Sun column) -- I held my nose and voted for Roy Cooper in 2016 because of the stink of gerrymandering. Defeating Gov. McCrory was the best way I knew to tell Republican legislators they had gone too far in doing what politicians always do: using public power for partisan advantage. I get it guys, but come on, dial it back. Instead, they dug in their heels, leading to last week’s unanimous decision by a three judge panel throwing out existing state maps and demanding new ones by Sept. 18.

ALEX GRANADOS: What happened while we all focused on veto override (EdNC reports) -- All attention this week was on the controversial and sudden budget veto override vote that happened earlier this week. But while everybody was focused on that, a few other notable education matters were happening.

ZEKE MILLER, SARA BURNETT & ALAN FRAM: Don’t vote? The Trump campaign would like a word with you (AP reports) -- Less than 14 months before Election Day, the president’s team is banking his reelection hopes on identifying and bringing to the polls hundreds of thousands of Trump supporters such as Ashley Arentz, a 28-year-old Marine from Jacksonville — people in closely contested states who didn’t vote in 2016. The Trump campaign is betting that it may be easier to make voters out of these electoral rarities than to win over millions of Trump skeptics in the center of the electorate.

THOMAS GOLDSMITH: As NC inmate needs persist, a $6 million long-term care facility sits empty (N.C. Health News reports) -- Legislators voted in 2015 to turn a former mental-health treatment space in Central Prison into a long-term care facility for sick inmates. Renovations of the center ended in March, but it remains vacant.

Low-wage workers to discuss strategies at summit in NC (AP reports) -- More than 100 low-wage workers plan to meet in N.C. to develop strategies to help working people in the state and across the South.

GARY PEARCE: Results pose dilemmas for both parties (Wilson Times column) -- Last week’s special congressional races in North Carolina show that both Republicans and Democrats face big dilemmas in 2020. The difference is that Democrats have a choice about what to do,

Demonstrators line up over Confederate monument in Chatham County (AP reports) -- Police officers and barricades were in place as people for and against the removal of a Confederate monument in a Chatham County stood on opposite sides of the street in Pittsboro.

Protesters argue whether Pittsboro Confederate monument should come down (WRAL-TV reports) -- A Confederate monument in the center of Pittsboro is the center of an emotional argument: Should it stay or go? Groups of demonstrators gathered around the statue Saturday, standing on opposite sides of the street.

CELIA RIVENBARK: An offer I hope we can refuse (Wilmington Star-News reports) -- Hons, I’m as terrified as a clutch of sorority girls hearing about the nationwide shortage of White Claw. Yes, there is fear deep in my marrow because Donald Trump’s campaign manager, Brad Parscale, recently told a group of enthusiastic supporters in California (!) he believes “The Trumps will be a dynasty that lasts for decades.” Great.

VAN DENTON: N.C. Lottery Responsibly Raises Funds for Education, Entertainment (Southern Pines Pilot column) -- Visit about any civic club in our fair state, including your weekly ones in Moore County, and chances are during the meeting you’ll find folks holding a 50-50 raffle or another fun game to raise money for a good cause.

JEAN FARMER-BUTTERFIELD: Employment equity: More than meets the eye (Wilson Times column) -- When you hear statistics about unemployment on the news, they’ve mostly been skewed positively for the country. According to the Bureau for Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate for N.C. was 4.2% for the month of July. If unemployment rates are low, that means more people are gainfully employed, right? However, that is not the case when it comes to these statistics. There are more stats that lie beneath that number. According to the N.C. Justice Center, more than 130,000 people in the state are employed part-time only but are seeking full-time employment. They are underemployed. They are still struggling in this marketplace and economy, but wouldn’t count as unemployed in the federal statistics.

WALTER HUSSMAN AND SUSAN KING: At UNC, a $25M investment to foster media trust (Durham Herald-Sun column) -- Integrity. Impartiality. Fairness. Values that we believe build trust. A recent Gallup poll shows that newspapers and television news both rank near the bottom in public confidence among important American institutions. A partisan tone has become common in influential media. There is a pervasive public perception of bias in the news. The need for reliable information and trusted media is greater now than ever before. The erosion of confidence is not only a serious threat to the news industry, it also weakens our democracy.

JOE KILLIAN: UNC trustees signal they could revisit issue of buildings named for white supremacists (Greensboro News & Record column) -- In August 2018, students and activists toppled “Silent Sam,” the Confederate statue that stood on the campus of UNC-Chapel Hill for more than a century. Now community members and students of North Carolina’s flagship university are taking aim at what they call another historical eyesore: campus buildings named for slave owners and avowed white supremacists.

School grades and poverty (Education Matters/WRAL) -- The A-to-F school performance grades for the 2018-2019 academic year, which were released last week, show a clear correlation between student test scores and the school's poverty levels.

REBECCA ANDREWS: Lunch debt a burdensome problem for schools, students (Carolina Public Press reports) -- When students don’t quality for free lunch but can’t pay, someone has to make up the difference, whether its donors, taxpayers or creative policy solutions.

Accreditation, Vidant meditation priorities for Health Sciences (Greenville Daily Reflector reports) -- The Brody School of Medicine is simultaneously preparing for re-accreditation and conducting ongoing mediation with Vidant Medical Center, the vice chancellor of health sciences reported to ECU’s Board of Trustees last week.

Sports medicine program to aid student athletes (Rocky Mount Telegram reports) -- Nash UNC Health Care, Carolina Regional Orthopaedics and UNC Orthopedics at Nash have teamed up to offer a sports medicine program for student athletes at Nash-Rocky Mount Public Schools. “The Nash UNC Health Care Sports Medicine Program is a collaboration.

Officials find spiked CBD sold in the state (AP reports) -- Authorities have encountered products marketed as delivering the cannabis extract CBD but that instead were spiked with synthetic marijuana.

TAFT WIREBACK: Triad governments seek damages for opioid disaster (Greensboro News & Record reports) -- Big Pharma manufacturers and distributors are on the hook for regional damages.

Get the Lead Out: Nonprofit pushes for testing of drinking water in NC schools (WRAL-TV reports) -- Parents and clean water advocates are pushing for more lead testing at schools and daycares statewide. Wake County has 161,000 students, and most of them use water fountains during the school day. But in March, nonprofit organization Environment NC gave North Carolina an "F" for being one of 22 states that doesn't require schools to test their water for lead contamination.

WILL MCDOW: Strategies for Weathering the Next Storm (Coastal Review column) -- As my fellow North Carolinians prepared for the arrival of Hurricane Dorian earlier this month, many were still reeling from the devastation that Hurricane Florence inflicted upon communities and businesses last year. And that’s to say nothing of the misery that Hurricane Matthew wrought upon residents two years before that – or the smaller flooding events that are now challenging folks with more regularity. As we work toward recovery, we need to think about how we adjust to this new normal and build resilience in the face of increasingly intense storms and sea level rise.

Now, more than ever, Floyd should be the measure (Greenville Daily Reflector) -- We would be smart to use this 20th anniversary of Floyd as a reminder of the damage it did and to use it as a minimum measure by which we make decisions for our community and future generations. It’s especially important to look back now because many of our residents and even some of our leaders were very young and living elsewhere when it occurred. It’s important now to remember because the chances of it never happening again seem much less likely. We need to look no further than Dorian, Florence or Matthew to remind us it could.

BETH BURGER: N.C. part of NASA mission (New Bern Sun Journal reports) -- When NASA launches its next mission taking astronauts to the moon and then to Mars for deep space exploration, N.C. will have had a hand in making that happen. At least 57 companies from the state, including All-Spec Industries in Wilmington, are among the roughly 3,800 suppliers nationwide that will equip NASA’s latest Orion mission, Artemis 1. The space agency plans to return to the moon by 2024 and embark on long-term lunar exploration by 2028.