By Martin Dyckman • Guest Columnist | Two heart-rending articles occupied the front page of the Florida newspaper that I was reading online two Sundays ago. 

One told the stories of people who had survived the 9/11 attacks 20 years ago. The other followed a nurse through a 12-hour shift in a hospital’s intensive care ward for COVID-19 patients. Three had died the day before. More will this day. Most of her patients, including a 36-year-old mother of two, are not expected to live. An older woman codes seven times before her suffering ends. The one patient who is recovering is the only one in the ward who was vaccinated.

Known mostly to the current generation as a political pundit and frequent television/radio/newspaper commentator, Karl Rove has roots in Republican advocacy that predate the Nixon administration. 

As the second Republican to enter the 2022 Congressional Primary field, Bruce O’Connell is certainly looking at a David versus Goliath scenario, but that’s OK — he’s used to it. 

A House bill proposed by Western North Carolina reps. Mike Clampitt, R-Bryson City, and Mark Pless, R-Haywood, includes significant changes to a judicial district that is larger than the states of Delaware and Rhode Island combined.

As North Carolina Republicans seek to maintain dominance across the state and in the 11th Congressional District, they’ll do so under new leadership after electing Hendersonville Republican Michele Woodhouse as their new district chair on April 10. 

By Martin Dyckman • Guest Columnist | A political party that stakes its future on allowing fewer people to vote does not deserve a future. A democracy that accommodates such a party will not have a future.

That is our nation’s present crisis, 234 years after the Constitutional Convention created a government with no prescribed role for political parties.

He hasn’t even been in office for a month, but Western North Carolina’s Republican Rep. Madison Cawthorn is already starting to see groups forming to oppose him over his conduct leading up to the Jan. 6 insurrection. 

Madison Cawthorn, rolling himself around the Longworth House Office Building, draws attention from around every corner and down every straightaway of the labyrinthine tunnels that underlie Washington D.C.’s Capitol Complex, greeting passersby with their first name. 

Round two of the Haywood County Republican Party’s candidate screening process is now complete, and after fielding more than two hours of questions on everything from COVID-19 to homelessness and needle exchange programs, it’s becoming apparent that there are few — if any — differences in viewpoints among the candidates. 

By Steve Wall • Guest Columnist | On Sept. 10, 2020, Donald Trump greeted a cheering crowd in Freeland, Michigan, with these exact words: “We brought you a lot of car plants, Michigan! We brought you a LOT of car plants. You know that, right!”

This was greeted with excited cheers. So I have to wonder — did many of the people in the crowd realize there were no new car plants built in Michigan during the Trump administration? Were any aware that over 3,000 workers in the Michigan auto industry had lost their jobs since 2017?