North Carolina

The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction is in the process of overhauling the curriculum for North Carolina Public Schools. The DPI has asked for feedback on the proposed curriculum through February 15, 2010. I reviewed the proposed curriculum. There is a glaring problem with the proposed history instruction in North Carolina high schools. The proposed curriculum eliminates the teaching of United States history prior to 1877 in North Carolina public schools. A few pre-1877 concepts are covered in other parts of the curriculum, but the proposed curriculum would not teach children:

Who came to the Americas and why
The states were once colonies of England
We fought a war to free ourselves from an imperial crown
We had a lot of discussion of how people in a democracy best rule themselves, culminating in the Constitution.
Western Expansion
Death and Displacement of Native Americans
Wars of U.S. Territorial Expansion
Slavery
Civil War
Reconstruction

Our motivation was simple: we wanted to get the word out to the leaders in DC that loan modifications have been slow. We wanted to let people hear the voices of housing counselors. HAMP is not working! Housing counselors are the foot soldiers in the battle against foreclosures.

CRA-NC took more than 50 North Carolina housing counselors on a bus to the nation's capital in November. We met with two North Carolina Congressman as well as policy leaders from HUD, Treasury, the Federal Reserve, and the OCC.

This post includes a link to a documentary of that day.

The North Carolina Coastal Resource Commission just finished the first study of sea level rise in the United States. The most significant part of the study was what the report said about what the market has decided about sea level rise.

... even if the public and governments drag their feet on reacting to a changing coast, others aren't waiting to adapt. State Farm, for example, announced this week that it will no longer write or renew insurance policies for structures on barrier islands to reduce its exposure in areas prone to catastrophic events like hurricanes.

More than ever before, the people of Haiti desperately need your help.

The Institute for Southern Studies has launched NC Haiti Action, a campaign to mobilize the North Carolina community to raise at least $1,000 in 24 hours for critical medical and other relief. Join North Carolina and the Institute in providing much needed assistance to the people of Haiti.

If someone has already brought this up, then I apologize for the redundancy. I ran across this section from Article I of the NC Constitution this morning while being my usual nerdy self:

"Sec. 34. Perpetuities and monopolies.
Perpetuities and monopolies are contrary to the genius of a free state and shall not be allowed."

The North Carolina Constitution quite explicitly states that monopolies are not allowed in the state. If you know of a better term to describe BCBS's stranglehold on the NC healthcare market, let me know.

So what do you think? Can legislators use our state's own constitution to correct the state's private health insurance monopoly? And if so, why hasn't someone already done it?

Cross posted at Daily Kos:

It was eleven o’clock just yesterday morning in the board room of the North Carolina Association of Educators’ offices in Raleigh. Twenty or so community leaders were gathered for a press conference calling for meaningful healthcare reform on a day that would include a vigil by supporters outside of NC Senator Kay Hagan’s office.

Just as the press conference was about to begin, Rhonda’s right hand began to shake.

“I’m going to have a seizure. Call 911.”

This can’t be happening. Not here. Not now.

Seeing that my chair had wheels, I helped Rhonda onto it and pushed it past the twenty or so community leaders gathered to promote meaningful healthcare reform and past the media representatives with their cameras and notepads out of the NCAE Boardroom and into the lobby.

“Call 911!”

ACCESS DENIED. (Health Insurance). For a healthy 17 year old college student who runs 5 miles a day, doesn't smoke or drink. Really.

This blog is about my phone call today to my local "XXXX-XXXX Insurance" Agent to get health insurance for my 17 year old daughter. She is a 1st year college student. (Her school does not offer health insurance.)

I thought that "XXXX Insurance Co" would always be on my side, just like in the TV commercials. "XXXX-XXXXX covers my house, cars for me and teenager, so it seemed logical that they would love to provide health insurance for that teenage driver too. (Silly me.)

Here's rough notes of the call - it didn't work out as I had hoped. The irony appears at end.

Me: I need a health insurance policy for my daughter, she's 17 and this is her first year of college. Can you help us?

For immediate release
Joyce McCloy, North Carolina Coalition for Verified Voting 336-794-1240

Please join the NC Coalition for Verified Voting
for our
Annual Voting Integrity Meetup
In celebration of the fourth anniversary of SL-323
the Public Confidence in Elections Law

Wednesday August 26, 2009
6:00 - 7:30 PM
at the Busy Bee Cafe in Raleigh
in the upstairs room
225 South Wilmington Street
(plenty of FREE Parking nearby)

The NC Coalition for Verified Voting invites you to join other election integrity supporters in celebrating the fourth anniversary of the Public Confidence in Elections Law, SL 323.

Agenda
Introduction - North Carolina passed one of the strongest verified voting laws in the country four years ago.
"Legislator of the Year" award.
Guest Speaker: David Allen, member of the Joint Select Committee on Electronic Voting will speak

Amidst the rancor and the tumult and the seemingly endless (and mindless) riveting punditry presented by mainstream media, somehow the narrative of meaningful healthcare reform in America has been reduced to covering tracking polls and the latest whopper or outrageous behavior of nutjobs living in their “miniverse.”

In the meantime, a neighbor just found out that not only will her insurance company not cover a biopsy for the lump in her breast, the hospital is requiring payment - up front and in cash. Cash that she does not have.

And Rhonda pays more for medication than she does for rent. She can’t get health insurance because of her pre-existing condition and struggles just to get by having to ration her life saving medication in order to make ends meet.

It’s time to put “faces and voices” back into the healthcare debate. And that’s what we are doing in North Carolina.

Hello?

For immediate release
Joyce McCloy, North Carolina Coalition for Verified Voting 336-794-1240

Please join the NC Coalition for Verified Voting for our Annual Voting Integrity Meetup
In celebration of the fourth anniversary of SL-323the Public Confidence in Elections Law
Wednesday August 26, 2009
6:00 - 7:30 PM
at the Busy Bee Cafe in Raleigh
in the upstairs room
225 South Wilmington Street
(plenty of FREE Parking nearby)

The NC Coalition for Verified Voting invites you to join other election integrity supporters in celebrating the fourth anniversary of the Public Confidence in Elections Law, SL 323.

Agenda

Introduction - North Carolina passed one of the strongest verified voting laws in the country four years ago.
"Legislator of the Year" award.
Guest Speaker: David Allen, member of the Joint Select Committee on Electronic Voting

In 62 of 100 North Carolina counties, visitor spending increased in 2008 according to Governer Bev Purdue. Mecklenburg County lead all other counties in increased visitor spending, not surprisingly followed by Wake County and then Guilford County. This is good news, as jobs were actually created and maintained by the record setting $16.9 billion spent by out of state visitors here in North Carolina.

A bold new voting hack uses machines decommissioned by a North Carolina county. This hack demonstrates how important it was for the North Carolina legislature to pass one of the strongest verified voting laws in the country.

August 14, 2009
For immediate release
Joyce McCloy, North Carolina Coalition for Verified Voting 336-794-1240

A new voting hack takes over the machine, is practical, and costs only $100,000 to replicate. Computer scientists from three prestigious U.S. universities managed to hack into and steal votes from an electronic voting machine that was designed to resist takeover attempts. The hack comes on the anniversary of North Carolina's law requiring paper ballots and regulating voting machines and vendors.The machines used in the research were decommissioned paperless voting machines from Buncombe County North Carolina.

{Originally posted at my blog Senate Guru.}

"Birther" has entered the parlance as someone who doubts or flat-out denies President Obama's natural born citizenship. It turns out that a sizable chunk of southern Republicans are birthers.

Public Policy Polling tested North Carolina voters to find out how prevalent the birther phenomenon was in the Tar Heel State. As for the results, wow:

Only 54% of North Carolina voters say with certainty that they believe Barack Obama was born in the United States, with 26% saying they think he was not, and 20% unsure. ...

Creating jobs and updating our infrastructure was at the core of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and both of those aspects of the stimulus package that President Obama and the Democratic Congress passed are greatly needed today here in our country and in our state of North Carolina.

For those of us that have travelled the corridor between Greensboro and Charlotte on I-85, we can point out one such project that truly needs to be addressed yesterday and that is the bridge spanning the Yadkin River at the Rowan and Davidson county line. It looks like the NCDOT and Governor Purdue agree with us, as just today news that the state has submitted a grant application for stimulus cash to fund that very construction project was released.

North Carolina seeks $300M for I-85 bridge replacement http://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/stories/2009/07/27/daily42.html

via California where I spent the most years of my life, via Illinois where I spent the formative years of my childhood. Yet, I'm a North Carolinian. I've lived in NC since October 1996 and have worked my butt off to see this beautiful state move forward into the new century as a force to be reckoned with. Because, this state IS a force to be reckoned with in so many ways.

The land.

From the mountains of western NC, to the rolling hills and lush river valleys of the Piedmont and on to the beach towns of the Atlantic Ocean, North Carolina has so very much to offer. From rural farming, ranching and small town businesses, to large cities and communities built on technology and business acumen.

The people