Opinion roundup: Sept. 16, 2016 -- HB2 , the NCAA and the ACC

Repeal HB2 now! It's unenforceable and is hurting state (Wilmington Star-News) -- We encourage you to contact your senator and representative and ask them to push for repeal and at least get us back to where we were. Then, if needed, legitimate concerns can be addressed in a new bill. If you support this bill, please understand that, as written, it serves no purpose and is damaging our state’s economy and reputation. If people in bathrooms do need some sort of protection, this law does not provide it. The Republicans are in charge, and they need to act before the state is hurt even more. The ball is in their court.

North Carolina sidelined by HB2 (Norfolk Virginian-Pilot) -- This is an economic and cultural disaster entirely of the GOP’s own making. Gov. Pat McCrory and the Republican-led General Assembly have whiffed on countless opportunities to amend or repeal the discriminatory legislation. The outrage that followed the law’s passage should have been an opportunity for reflection and reconsideration. Instead, Republicans – especially McCroy – steeled themselves against the howls of protest, relying on the laughable argument that the legislation was necessary to protect public safety. North Carolina Republicans, given every opportunity to reverse themselves, can complain all they want, but they made this bed and must now lie in it.

NCAA steps up (New York Daily News) -- In keeping with its principles and business interests, the NCAA is moving previously scheduled championship games out of North Carolina in response to the state’s enactment of a law aimed at limiting the rights of gays and transgender people. The association’s stance is a powerful statement in favor of tolerance and against fearmongering and demonization.

State continues to suffer because of HB2 (Rocky Mount Telegram) -- Whatever your personal feelings about N.C. House Bill 2, which dictates which public bathrooms transgender people are allowed to use in North Carolina, there can be little doubt the state has paid a heavy price for its micromanagement policy.

SUSAN LADD: HB 2 makes N.C. a cautionary tale (Greensboro News & Record column) -- With the announcement Monday that the NCAA would be pulling its championship events out of the state because of House Bill 2, North Carolina reached a new low. We’ve become a cautionary tale. This is what happens when voters sit out elections.

HB2 fallout threatens North Carolina's relevance (Greenville Daily Reflector) -- Not long after Gov. Pat McCrory declared House Bill 2 to be “irrelevant,” the NCAA announced it pulled seven athletic championship tournaments scheduled in North Carolina this year.

Final call on reset on HB2 (Sanford Herald) -- When Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam and Boston elected to cancel concerts earlier this year to bring attention to the passage of HB2, The Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, the ripple effects were hardly noticed. When PayPal and Deutsche Bank elected to pull back their intentions to expand their businesses in the state and take nearly 650 jobs elsewhere because of HB2, the effects were once again minimal to an economy with a gross domestic product of $510 billion.

Devastating loss (Greensboro News & Record) -- North Carolina’s Republican leaders have done too much damage already but won’t stop.

The new form of madness (Winston-Salem Journal) -- March Madness is overrated. Just a bunch of attention on some of the best college athletes in the country playing NCAA championship basketball games in our state, with a bunch of screaming fans and their money following them. Ditto, albeit to a lesser degree, for NCAA soccer golf, tennis, lacrosse and baseball championship games.

Even after NCAA hit, McCrory unmoved on HB2 (Charlotte Observer) – It’s not us, it’s you, Gov. Pat McCrory and the entire N.C. Republican apparatus say, over and over. … We are all about common sense, HB2 backer say. The rest of the world is about political correctness run amok. Enough.

Time to write a law that does more good than harm (Fayetteville Observer) -- It has turned into the gift that keeps on giving. But for the givers, it's mostly dispensing pain. Yet despite the growing and expensive trail of carnage, the governor and legislative leaders are doggedly sticking with their "Bathroom Bill."

HAROLD LLOYD: $5 billion Pat Mccrory (Huffington Post column) -- No reasonable person (conservative or liberal) wants to waste millions of dollars in legal fees (not to mention the awful continuing collateral damage to the state) to defend a bill that provides no remedy for “wrong” bathroom use to which they object. In the early aftermath of Pat McCrory’s hasty signing of HB2, some projections of the potential damage to North Carolina’s economy ran as high as five billion dollars per year. Though this might have seemed hyperbolic at the time, the current onslaught of such disasters as the loss of NCAA and ACC events on the heels of earlier losses make one wonder if such horrific projections are hyperbolic after all.

HB2 speech McCrory needs to give (Charlotte Observer column) -- Pat McCrory is the governor of a thriving state with a robust economy. He should be leading by six or so percentage points in his race for reelection. He is losing by six or so, and it’s mostly because of one bad law.

Losing much March Madness, McCrory and co. replace it with new craziness (Winston-Salem Journal) -- March Madness is overrated. Just a bunch of attention on some of the best college athletes in the country playing NCAA championship basketball games in our state, with a bunch of screaming fans and their money following them. Ditto, albeit to a lesser degree, for NCAA soccer golf, tennis, lacrosse and baseball championship games.

Painful but necessary (Greensboro News & Record) -- It’s unfortunate that the Atlantic Coast Conference has decided to withdraw nine championships from the state of North Carolina, including its women’s basketball tournament in Greensboro.