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How can 11 county commissioners yak for two hours about who should change lightbulbs in the new jail and other minutiae ... then sit silently when they ought to be reining in $286,295 in excessive, unwittingly approved employee retirement bonuses?

Joe Killian will explain all in tomorrow's edition.

The Charlotte Observer frowns on state Democrats' strategy -- as voiced by one of their operatives -- to "eviscerate" Republican Pat McCrory during the gubernatorial campaign.

“There’s no way to prop up Dalton enough," Democratic pollster Dustin Ingalls told a party gathering in Fayetteville.. "We have to just slash McCrory – death by a thousand cuts ... It’s going to have to be a very negative campaign.”

I get a steady stream of emails from Democrats or related groups stabbing McCrory for this or that. Fact-checkers (WRAL's Mark Binker, here) have debunked the veracity of some of the attacks.

Meanwhile, Republicans have gone on the offensive against the Democratic nominee, Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton. One line of attack connects him to unpopular lameduck Gov. Bev Perdue. (Cartoonist Kevin Siers reinforces that impression.)

From what I can tell, however, Perdue and Dalton are not close. Over the last three years, they've appeared to have a distant relationship, at best. She hasn't assigned him any high-profile tasks, and he didn't give her much support in her battles with legislative Republicans.

I see both McCrory and Dalton as decent men who have served honorably in public office and deserve their parties' nominations. Both have pro-business records and may not be all that far apart on some other issues. Where they disagree, voters can decide whose views make more sense for North Carolina.

We don't need campaigns based on slashing, cutting and evisceration. We'll get all we can stand of that in the presidential race.

The Salisbury Post continues its excellent coverage of the North Rowan High School incident.

Staff writer Sarah Campbell reports today that:

* some current and former students are coming out in support of suspended teacher Tanya Dixon-Neely;

* Superintendent Judy Grisson reiterates in an email that "the kind of discussion captured in the video is not supported or tolerated in any of our classrooms”;

* the student who recorded the classroom discussion, Steven Sanchez, will be placed on an alternative schedule to minimize contact with other students because of a hostile response to his actions. He has not been disciplined, however, even though the code of student conduct "prohibits students from making video, audio or electronic recordings of any type while on school property unless they have the permission of a school official and the recording is for a purpose sanctioned by the school," Campbell reports.

Hunter Rogers, the student who engaged Dixon-Neely in the heated exchange, has withdrawn from school.

Has your church gotten its Small Business Health Care Tax Credit yet?

In other words, an Obamacare refund.

Say what?

I found it hard to believe, too. Yet here it is explained in an IRS advisory:

If you are a small employer. . .

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Addendum: If it accepted the refund, wouldn't a church have to cover whatever health-care services the government demanded?

Surely, the Iranians are ready to be reasonable on this whole nuclear thing, right?

Or, maybe not: "The Iranian nation is standing for its cause that is the full annihilation of Israel."

So says the military chief of staff.

Democrats have selected the party locations where various state delegations will be welcomed when they arrive in Charlotte for the convention, the Observer reports.

I wonder if there is some typecasting in the choices ...

At the NASCAR Hall of Fame: North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia and Tennessee.

At the Historic Rosedale Plantation: Florida, Mississippi and Alabama.

At the U.S. National Whitewater Center: California, Alaska, Idaho and Montana ...

... no, the Dems just want everyone to feel at home.

"A controversial wind farm proposed near the Pocosin Lakes Wildlife Refuge in eastern North Carolina could kill up to 20 bald eagles a year, according to a preliminary estimate by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service," the N&O reports.

Ridiculous, says Kelly Fuller, wind campaign coordinator at the American Bird Conservancy in Washington. Wind turbines have killed only four bald eagles, ever, in the entire U.S.

Who can say what might happen if the wind farm goes forward? But it's hard to take chances with endangered wildlife.

(Update, 10:30 a.m.: I just had a call from Kelly Fuller, who clarifies that she is NOT dismissing the Fish and Wildlife projection as ridiculous. On the contrary, it raises strong concerns.

The American Bird Conservancy already opposes this proposed wind farm, Fuller says. The issue with bald eagles reinforces that opposition.

She also notes that the wind industry is pushing into new places for wind-generation locations, and many of these places have known eagle populations, creating more conflicts.)

I remember when a tiny fish held up a TVA dam project for years. TVA ultimately prevailed, but we're not talking about snail darters here. There are some people who would resist sacrificing even one bald eagle for any development, even a wind farm.

And don't forget: Concerns about bird populations helped kill the Navy's plan to locate an OLF in Eastern North Carolina.

This is quite a dilemma.

I appreciate the recent post by Beth Scherer of Smith Moore Leatherwood on the firm's Appellate Practice Blog, "Article Asks: Is The North Carolina Supreme Court Busy Enough?"

The article referred to is one I wrote for our Ideas section back in March.

Scherer doesn't directly address the question raised but comments: "While I have personally worked on various projects with several current Supreme Court Justices and know that they work very hard, the bar has expressed frustration about the inability to get cases–especially conflicting Court of Appeals opinions–before the North Carolina Supreme Court."

That's what prompted me to write the article in the first place.

Scherer's post hasn't drawn any comments, but that's not suprising: Attorneys who argue cases before the Supreme Court are reluctant to voice criticisms.

From the Justice Policy Institute today:

"Despite crime rates being at their lowest levels in more than 30 years, the U.S. continues to maintain large and increasingly militarized police units, spending more than $100 billion every year, according to a report released today by the Justice Policy Institute. Police forces have grown from locally-funded public safety initiatives into a federally subsidized jobs program, with a decreasing focus on community policing and growing concerns about racial profiling and 'cuffs for cash,' with success measured not by increased safety and well-being but by more arrests."

Also:

“'With an increase in police surveillance - from traffic cameras, to police video equipment monitoring certain neighborhoods, to the use of drones - as well as the continued presence of over 714,000 police officers, the U.S. has become too reliant on punitive approaches to public safety and not enough on alternatives,' stated Paul Ashton, a primary author of the report. 'And with the combination of dropping crime rates and performance measured by number of arrests, police are devoting more and more time to arresting people for drug abuse offenses.' Ashton also pointed out that with the number of laws criminalizing various behaviors skyrocketing – there are about fifty percent more offenses in the federal code now than there were in the early 1980s – police often feel compelled to enforce a variety of laws that may or may not have a real impact on public safety."

Is that a reference to the John Edwards trial?

Maybe not.

The question posed here is why aren't arrests tailing off with the crime rate.

But is it possible the crime rate has dropped because more criminals have been arrested, convicted and imprisoned?

When crime rates were higher, it seemed police were overwhelmed. Beefing up law-enforcement agencies helped even the score.

But we are still far from achieving a low-crime society. Certainly not in Greensboro, where shootings, stabbings and other assaults are daily occurrences and home and business security systems are a necessary precaution.

I don't buy the argument that, in essence, our policies are meant to make work for the criminal-justice system. Criminals are making work for the criminal-justice system.

Again, this time from The New York Times:

"Judge Eagles is a mix between a hip Aunt Bea and an austere schoolmarm."

That's Aunt Bee, but nevermind the spelling.

Does every Southern woman of a certain age have to get the Aunt Bee treatment?

Eagles isn't even that age, anyway (she was born in 1958).

At least this story doesn't compare Greensboro to Mayberry.