Throwing money blindly

According to The Associated Press, the federal stimulus package included $350 million for digital cartography: making a map of broadband Internet service in the United States. This amount, the AP reported, caught observers by surprise — many thought this could be done for less, like $35 million.

Law must change, not just charge

Maine's new distracted driving law went into effect on Saturday. It will be interesting to see how it is enforced, as this legislation is intended to address a whole new, scary suite of rampant misbehaviors.

Common sense must reign, for if this law is used to punish behavior that is either benign, necessary or otherwise justifiable, public support for it will disappear. Law enforcement must walk fine lines among punishing the egregious, encouraging the repentant and condoning the innocent.

Insanity, or matter of time?

Albert Einstein said the definition of insanity is "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." By this measure, then, the misguided souls who keep pondering the establishment of casino gambling in Maine must indeed be crazy.

Cleaning out the inbox ...

Cheers and jeers from around the news ... 

• Jeers to Charles Soule. The perennial fringe candidate and gadfly bowed out of the Lewiston City Council race because he says the city hasn't suffered enough to elect him.

He's right.

A tragedy, fading from memory

Conversation about the photo of fallen Lance Cpl. Joshua Bernard fell along two tracks: One, it was a harsh portrait of the reality of war; or, two, it was a needless, callous exploiting of a soldier's final moments, insulting to his family and country.

We didn't print it. The Sun Journal has a policy against publishing images of the severely injured or dead. National debate raged, though, after many national newspapers did, followed by outrage and denouncement from Bernard's family in New Portland and the Department of Defense.

After 20 years, OK to question

An unexplained irony of Oxford Aviation is this: if its business model is so promising, why does it need government investments to keep going?

As a recent investigative report in The Forecaster and republished in the Sun Journal detailed, the Oxford County-based aircraft refurbisher has consistently relied upon government to expand its business over the past 20 years, through several sizable grants and programs to provide tax incentives.

Tales for two speeches

Too much precious oxygen was wasted in protestations against President Barack Obama's back-to-school message to kids, delivered on Tuesday. Advocating hard work, responsibility, diligence and determination in academics is about as non-ideological as it gets.

Rejecting resolution was right

Normally, resolutions by trade associations don't dent the public's attention span. These matters are usually only relevant to the association, and since they're non-binding, only really important to the people who either support them, or detest them.

This is different, though, when it's the Maine Medical Association, and the resolution is about wind power and public health. Here, the resolution — which stated the MMA's belief about what regulators should do regarding possible health effects from turbines — carries a clear public importance.

Risky use of needed money

State budget shortfalls must be filled, but the diversion of funding from the state's 911 system to plug these gaps is a dangerous short-term tactic.

The Federal Communications Commission just reported to Congress that Maine was one of only a dozen states to use 911 money for its general operating budget this year, through transferring $2.6 million of the $6.6 million fund — or 40 percent.

The price of signatures is disclosure

The Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices is following the money, and we're concerned about what it's found.

For several months, the commission has been investigating Maine Leads, the public policy advocacy group that played a critical role in getting two questions before Maine voters this November — one to slash the excise tax and promote hybrid car buying, and the tax-and-spending limiting initiative nicknamed the "Taxpayer Bill of Rights II."

Cleaning out the inbox ...

Cheers and jeers from around the news:

• Cheers to Eric Bonawitz, the hometown boy who is suiting up for the Maineiacs this year. This is the season of local hockey we didn't think we were going to have, after all the controversy about moving last year, so we were already thankful. Now, we've also got a local boy to root for.

It should be a tremendous season.

Kennedy legacy is Snowe's

A rail-thin, raven-haired, pragmatic Republican woman of Greek descent from a hardscrabble upbringing in central Maine is about as far from a portly, leonine, patrician Irish-American playboy Democrat from Massachusetts as one can get.

Yet emerging from the shadow of Sen. Edward Kennedy is Sen. Olympia Snowe, whose growing influence and record of bipartisanship in the U.S. Senate is delivering her the opportunity to fill a leadership void created by Kennedy's recent passing.

Report on flights was low-level

A teacher wouldn't accept a report that lacked the author's name and cited Wikipedia as a source, so neither should the people of Western Maine.

Yet this is what the Air National Guard presented for its Environmental Impact Study of low-level fighter jet flights across its Condor training areas, which stretches across the skies of Oxford, Franklin, Piscataquis and Somerset counties.

Target the gatherers, not signers

Everything a paid signature gatherer does is explainable, as long as they're furthering your cause.

It's cynical, but true. Democrats are upset about misinformation from signature-gatherers who are circulating petitions to repeal tax reform. Republicans, who support the repeal, shrug off these complaints as political posturing, a distraction from the real issue.

Too much shielded in privacy bill

Call it an exercise of good intentions, yielding a bad result.

A little-known bill, LD 1183, was enacted earlier this year to protect kids from predatory marketing, particularly through the Internet, definitely regarding health. There's justifiable concern that children are easy pickings for companies purveying miracle cures, or prescription drugs.

A spin on the bottled

Is bottled water a "scam?" If so, we're all suckers.

Scam is the word used by the Boston Globe columnist Derrick Z. Jackson, who wrote Tuesday about the declining thirst for bottled water. The recession has sent water sales southward. Nestle, which owns Poland Spring here in Maine, has said its sales are off 5 percent

Identity theft can happen to you

When the chairman of the Federal Reserve becomes the victim of identify theft, then you know the rest of us should be worried.

Chairman Ben Bernanke's personal checking account was looted, the Associated Press reported Friday, after his wife's purse containing her driver's license and Social Security number was stolen from a Washington coffee shop. The theft was later found to be the work of a ring responsible for more than $2.1 million in losses involving 10 financial institutions.

Cleaning out the in box ...

Three cheers and a jeer:

• Cheers to the Citizens Commission on Lewiston-Auburn Cooperation for continuing its important work, despite the fact that Auburn turned its back on the group and Lewiston did nothing to resurrect the commission's efforts. Commission members carried on, meeting Thursday to approve their final report, trustfully fulfilling their mission to identify savings through consolidation efforts between the Twin Cities. 

No easy answers to detainees

There are clearly differences between George Bush and Barack Obama. But on at least one issue, the detention of terror suspects, Obama is gradually coming to some of the same reluctant conclusions as his predecessor.

Pointless visit to tragic scene

The tragic death of a 7-year-old New York City girl visiting Maine's Acadia National Park has saddened and troubled us all.
But what possible purpose did Gov. John Baldacci's helicopter fly-over of the area near the famous Thunder Hole on Wednesday serve?

Does the governor hope to assure tourists to Maine that this won't happen to them? Will he intervene or investigate the next time a tourist or even a regular Mainer dies at a popular attraction?

Real cost of clunkers still to come

Say about three months, or so.

That's when "cash for clunkers" should be revisited, to weigh its success or failure as a policy. As a government program, it's an absolute smash, as U.S. consumers and automobile dealers burned through $3 billion in taxpayer dollars faster than AIG planning a weekend retreat.

As a policy, though, its reverberations for the American economy are still to be felt. Real concern should remain that the clunker incentive has pushed people into buying cars they cannot afford, through the assumption of new, burdensome debt.

A citizen panel is not needed

Last week, the Lewiston City Council clashed again, this time over who has authority to name a citizen committee to review applicants for the city's top job. Mayor Laurent Gilbert says it is his, while his fellow councilors say they should have a choice.

Why are permits a problem?

Last week, the state of Maine and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission signed an agreement to streamline the permitting process for tidal energy projects off the coast, a move hailed as a signal to industry that Maine is serious about its future here.

Laptops instead of Tommy guns

Meet the face of cybersecurity.

He's Albert Gonzalez, the 28-year-old criminal wunderkind who is the alleged mastermind behind the information breach at Hannaford Bros., plus many others. For years, he served as a FBI informant into the world of cyber-criminals, showing authorities how easy it is to steal another's identity.

Then, almost to show off, he's accused of going and doing it again — with style. In court papers filed in Miami, Fla., Gonzalez's hometown, he's proclaimed as the perpetrator of the country's greatest cybercrimes.

Correction

Two letters in the Friday, Aug. 21 edition of the Sun Journal were printed without their author's names attached. This error occurred in our Franklin, River Valley and Oxford Hills editions. The letter titled "A public option won't work" was written by Elbert Derick of Wales. The letter titled "Cannot wait for option" was written by Paulette Dingley of Auburn. It was an editing error, which we regret.