If you are convicted of a crime, the government can punish you. If you are arrested but never convicted, the government can’t punish you.

New research by two North Carolina State University professors has brought into stark relief the following facts: America is in a debt crisis, our economy is suffering as a result, and politicians of both major political parties bear responsibility.

Did you know that manufacturing employment in North Carolina has gone up more than 10 percent since 2010? I didn’t either, until I took a recent dive into economic statistics.

After Durham businessman Greg Lindberg, state Republican Party Chairman Robin Hayes, and two of Lindberg’s business associates were indicted in an alleged bribery scheme, advocates of government-funded campaigns scurried to restate their argument. But the latest incident doesn’t make it any more persuasive.

As a policy analyst and opinion journalist, I have spent much of my career advocating the expansion of choice and competition in education. I purposefully use both of those terms, because I think that families making choices and schools competing for students are distinct but mutually reinforcing mechanisms for improving educational outcomes.

Health care costs too much. Are we agreed? Great. Perhaps now we can discuss the more interesting question of what policymakers should do about the problem.

While election scandals, national issues, and candidate announcements for 2019 and 2020 races have dominated the political headlines, North Carolina is continuing to head in the direction of greater freedom. That’s welcome.

In the twilight of his political career, Ronald Reagan made the media rounds to discuss his administration, legacy, and unfinished business. During several of these interviews, Reagan went out of his way to criticize the longtime practice of gerrymandering electoral districts for partisan advantage.

If you own it, you control it. That’s what it means to enjoy a property right, in a nutshell. It is a right safeguarded by North Carolina’s constitution as well as the 14th amendment to the federal constitution, among other provisions.

Arguing that GOP-tiled districts had rendered elected lawmakers “usurpers” who “did not represent the people of North Carolina,” Wake County Superior Court Judge Bryan Collins has struck down two constitutional amendments approved by state voters last fall: one requiring a photo ID to vote and the other capping North Carolina’s income-tax rate at 7 percent.