To some Duke professors and alumni, the North Carolina legislature’s recent rightward is a dismantling of Terry Sanford’s legacy. Originally published in Duke Magazine. UNDER A MOONLESS SKY in the North Carolina mountains, a Democratic gubernatorial candidate named Terry Sanford stood on the steps of the Henderson County courthouse and made a proposal that seemed […]
Free to Go
Suffering from advanced-stage ovarian cancer, Sue Otterbourg declined aggressive treatment to spend her last months living fully. Why can’t more people do the same? Originally published in Indy Week. THE FIRST TIME I MET SUE OTTERBOURG, she greeted me at her front door in Durham’s Forest Hills neighborhood dressed as anyone would for a business meeting: […]
Long Division
At the Republican National Convention, Ron Paul delegates find dissent is unwelcome within the party ranks. Originally published in Indy Week. IT WAS JUST A FEW YEARS ago that Bret McGraw began his political conversion. The 30-year-old cook, who lives in Durham and works at Whole Foods Market, once considered himself a liberal. In 2008 […]
RNC Day 5: Tossed from the Art Pope-David Koch cocktail party
Originally published in Indy Week. WHEN I LEARNED THAT Americans for Prosperity was hosting a cocktail party honoring Art Pope and David Koch during the Republican National Convention, it seemed like a natural event for me to cover. I used to write about Pope for Indy Week, back when he was a state legislator from Raleigh and often […]
RNC Day 3: Preparing for Armed Revolution
Originally published in Indy Week. I’VE COVERED NATIONAL POLICTICAL PARTY conventions since 1980. I know how amped-up the rhetoric can get on both sides. But I have never heard so much fear of an incumbent as I’ve witnessed during this week’s Republican National Convention. “Every election we hear that this is the most important election in […]
RNC Day 2: ‘All the laws we have today came from Judeo-Christian views’
Originally published in Indy Week. FORTY YEARS AGO, WHEN SHE WAS A TEENAGER, Miriam Aikens had an abortion. Then she had another. “I was young,” she says. “I was uninformed.” She was raised a devout Christian, and still “in the church” when she terminated the two unwanted pregnancies. Describing the aftermath, she mostly avoids the […]
Town and Country
On North Carolina’s Amendment One, the fault line was not racial—it was urban-rural. Originally published in The American Prospect. IN THE WEEK SINCE NORTH CAROLINA VOTERS adopted a constitutional amendment banning recognition of any “domestic legal union” other than heterosexual marriage, a consensus has formed among journalists about African-American complicity. According to this narrative, black voters let […]
The Morning After Amendment 1: Your World. And Mine.
Originally published in Indy Week. Reprinted in 27 Views of Durham (Eno Press). IF YOU DIDN’T PEEK AT THE NUMBERS ON THE TV INSIDE—where Amendment 1, North Carolina’s marriage amendment, was racking up a 22-point margin of victory—you might have imagined the scene outside Fullsteam brewery in Durham was a celebration Tuesday night. The air […]
Wealth for Everyone
Immigrants in Durham, N.C. had become easy targets for robbers. The community’s response: start its own wildly successful credit union. Originally published by One Nation Indivisible. NOT LONG AFTER HE ARRIVED in Durham, North Carolina in 1996, Marcelino Varela learned a lesson that would prove valuable in his adopted city: Always be ready to sprint. He […]
Map Quest
Marie Lynn Miranda, head of the Children’s Environmental Health Initiative at Duke, uses sophisticated modeling to tackle stubborn public-health problems. Originally published in Duke Magazine. LAST FALL, DURHAM COUNTY HEALTH DIRECTOR Gayle Harris faced a thorny question: How do you get a confused and suspicious public inoculated against H1N1 influenza? The much-feared flu strain had […]
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