You forgot to mention that sneaky last minute trick passed in the last hours of the session. The vote to use the rainy day fund for a tax rebate and to prevent any further existence of a rainy day fund. This policy has been rejected by the voters of the State of Maine 3 times already. But then the radical Republicans running our current legislature have shown much disdain for voting. Well, within hours our credit rating has been downgraded due to lack of reserves. Only a rabid kool-aid drinker would call this sound fiscal policy. The radical Republican march to attack our schools, our infrastructure, our seniors, our jobs, our health care system, our environment and our safety is well on the way.

The party of bad ideas has struck again. Spending the rainy day fund on a tax break?? Really ?? What if it rains again? God forbid Maine should be spared the same political dysfunction demonstrated in California and other TABOR states. The flat tax is a bad idea because taxes represent the part of your income that you contribute to make your community a functional thriving place to live. Since our incomes are not flat neither should our contribution be. Those with larger incomes benefit more from infrastructure and development so they should contribute more. If a family needs to spend 80% of their income on food, shelter, medecine and childcare it is stupid to think that their fair share should be the same as someone spending 2% of their income on the same. It is also incomprehensible to me that people think they can wall themselves off from those in their community who are poor, sick and elderly . Sooner or later their plight will reflect on you and people will judge you for your greed and lack of compassion.

Pulling yourself up the ladder of opportunity sounds like a good idea if the game was fair. For the last 15 years corporate America has been knocking the rungs out of that ladder by sending their factories offshore for cheap labor, bribing our government officials to deregulate companies, and attack unions, and most of all investing in any inventions that will allow them to lay off workers. Remember the day when a man could support a family with a blue collar job? Gone. Remember when somebody could go to college and get a good job? Gone. Remember when we had a government that built the infrastructure that made all that manufacturing possible? Gone. Remember when our tax money went for GI loans and building dams, and railroads, and highways instead of fighting oil wars and fattening oil companies and agribusiness and bailing out financial gambling expeditions? Remember when American companies invested in their communities and their workers and in expanding their business instead of spending all their cash buying attack ads for politicians and hiding their money offshore? Most of all does anybody else remember when greed was considered a vice? Just looking at where the wealth has been flowing in this country will tell you the game is fixed and the class war was started by the winning side.

Instead of throwing out entire categories of people, why doesn't DHHS look to function more efficiently. I know it can be done. They could focus first on the 5 % of patients that incur the largest costs. Maybe something could be done to streamline that. Maybe they could focus on preventive care to prevent people from landing in that 5%. Maybe they could negotiate with hospitals, medical equipment people, pharmacies and doctors for better deals. Maybe they could step up fraud investigation. Maybe they could fix their computer problems so they are not paying out millions for nothing. Maybe they could stop the suit against the health care law. It would be more cost effective in the long run than dumping people onto charity care which is way more expensive to those of us who have private health insurance. It might also make the program sustainable in the long run instead of having these people they threw off show up later sicker than ever due to lack of care.

All you have to do is remember President Bush in front of that Mission Accomplished sign and the many times he posed in front of the World Trade Center site not to mention the many times we got to watch Bin Laden on TV just to remind us how they are the ones strong on defenseand the Democrats are weak to realize how ridiculous this criticism is. It is" Do as I say not as I do" The botton line is that under Bush we got 9/11 and under Obama we got Bin Laden. All this criticism just looks like envy and spin on the part of the Republicans. As for taking credit, I have seen the president praise the seals and the troops and thank them for their sacrifice more times than I can count. Just because they don't show it on Fox doesn't mean it didn't happen. .

I agree with you that community decisions made at a local level are way more palatable and much more likely to please a greater number of citizens. I think if you look at it closely most federal programs begin as state and local programs. Public schools, libraries, and the latest health care law all began in a state and worked well enough to be adapted at the national level. They were adapted nationally only because the problems they dealt with were national in scope. There are some things that towns and states are just not able to do alone. Take the interstate highway system, the air travel corridors, national defense, desegregation, protection of civil and employee rights, water and electrical projects, and lately disaster relief. Individual states could not do it and private enterprise would not take the risk. I heard this week about a private company that is in the business of space travel. They are sending a space ship to dock at the space station this year. Apparently there are other companies getting involved with this. I believe this would not have happened if we had not had a national space program first. The same goes for the auto industry who needed roads, the air and train industry who needed aiports and rails and the silicon valley industries and Las Vegas which needed the water and electricity provided by the dams out West. No individual state or town or private company could have accomplished this. It's true the federal government leaves a lot to be desired but it is still the best system around to get things done. Whatever is wrong can and will be fixed and more problems will also arise but I'm not seeing an alternative source of power that can get things done. And if we want to play an important role in the future we need to be able to get things done and to speak with a national voice..

I don't believe there has ever been 100% agreement on anything that has ever occurred politically in this country. That would include the Constitution and the Bill of Rights as well as every war we have ever fought in. The system is written to provide for majority rule and minority dissent. If the majority is wrong in their assessment of what is good for the community then the minority will have the opportunity convince them to change their minds and to become the majority at the polls. No one will get their way all the time. If you hate having your tax money going to welfare , I hate having mine going for oil wars and corporate subsidies. The fact that we can discuss it and vote on it means that at least part of the time we have a chance to change things and even though there is always the sacrifice of some freedoms the other way is tyranny. You cannot live in a society without sacrificing some freedoms unless you are a tantrum throwing toddler. Adults who do whatever they please ignoring the rights and the safety of others end up in jail. The alternative is to live alone in an ice cave in Antartica. You could have all the freedom in the world there.

As long as people have walked the earth, in the absence of competent medical care, they have self-medicated with assorted chemicals, smokes, alcohols and superstitions. There is nothing new about that. And besides it tends to make poverty, hopelessness and mental illness a little more tolerable. As for why you should pay for them. I guess that would be the same reason we would pay for you should a major illness deplete all of your assets and leave you sick and homeless. It is more humane than leaving you out in the cold to die. A community with so little civic pride and moral responsibility that it makes no effort to protect its poor, sick and elderly from a life of squallor is the kind of hillbilly hellhole that most respectable people and businesses would avoid being associated with. Finally , to a hammer everything looks like a nail. If you stand at a store looking for someone to buy something you don't approve of you surely will find it. That doesn't nullify the need of thousands of people who just need a chance. Most of the people on public assistance have children. They are surely not to blame for having poor parents.

I can see where it would be tempting for an ex-teacher to want to punish all those lazy, uncooperative, mean and loudmouth students from the days of yore, but it also makes sense that some of them would later mature and realize the errors of their youth. Not funding the GED degree program makes no sense. Usually these are students who, because they could not or would not succeed in school, failed to graduate from high school. Without that degree they eventually learn that there is no possible way to have a decent job nor to qualify to get training at CMCC or Kaplan or anywhere else. To expect these guys to now pay for their education is not logical. It is the "I don't give a damn about you" kind of logic that is not seemly in an elected official who is supposed to serve an entire community. The more the community can do to help these guys out of the hole they have dug for themselves the fewer problems they will cause for the community later. Law enforcement, jails, welfare, non-payment of child support , vagrancy: none of these are free. And education is the only tried and true way to solve the problem. The same is true of ELL programs. The sooner these people learn the language the sooner they will become employed tax-payers. "I don't care about you" is not the answer.

People who are donating billions to political campaigns are not looking to weaken government. They only want to weaken the rules that prevent them from competing honestly or that prevent them from cheating the public, or abusing their workers or polluting public lands. They are aware that as individuals we are powerless to prevent their abuse but united behind a strong government we are extremely powerful, more powerful than drug cartels, terrorists and international corporations. Anyone who thinks voting for their candidates will result in less government intrusion or lower taxes is kidding themselves. Exxon and Haliburton are just as fond of government subsidies as is the welfare mom. They are looking to use the power of government for their own ends not to reduce it. Once they own our government they will have the power of government and we will have the power of an individual. And once they have that power I don't expect they will relinquish it voluntarily.

I was under the impression that the Supreme Court voted immediately after the arguments and that they are not going to revisit their vote. The president may have stated an opinion but it could not have been to influence their vote since it came after they had voted. It was more than likely calculated to influence the vote for the presidency something all the candidates and their money guys will be doing ad nauseam until the election.

For all the horrors we are told will happen when the health care law is in place, there is no evidence that similar horrors have happened anywhere else where government has imposed some order on the health care system. No one in Mass. or Canada appears to want to go back to predatory systems. Even in Europe they may complain but no serious legislative attempts exist to reverse their system. No one on Medicare or the VA is petitioning the government to eradicate their system. Even the Cubans get better health care. Someone needs to find a system to make health care available to the sick and to control the skyrocketing costs we are forced to pay to get even mediocre health care. If the proposed system is not perfect , it can be improved but at this point the current system is bankrupting our citizens and our economy and needs to be fixed and yesterday is not too soon.

This court has shown itself very willing to ignore the constitution and individual rights to promote its right wing ideology in the Bush vs Gore decision (who says we have the right to have voting counted), Citizens United ( let the bigger pot of money decide our elections) and their latest decision that gave you the constitutional right to be stripped searched by police for going through a stop sign or any other minor traffic incident as many times as they want without your even being declared guilty by a court. No one in their right mind would expect an intelligent understanding of our constitution or fairness or even a concern for the individual freedoms of American citizens from such a court. They should be impeached or at least someone should be elected who will change the corruption and partiality of this travesty of justice.

Considering this is the court that gave us Citizens United, I don't have any hope at all that the individual mandate will survive. This is the most corrupt, ideological, activist court in the history of this country and judging by the questions they posed they aren't too bright either. Broccoli? Seriously ? Never mind that we have five conservative Catholics on a court where that hardly represents the make-up of the citizens of the country. When they do strike it down it will only give us incentive to work harder to elect people who will reshape this court.

Just because someone has a different idea doesn't mean it's right. These are challenging times and while the state will not thrive if it doesn't adapt to the times that doesn't mean that the only good ideas are those from 50 years ago. That is what these conservatives are offering us. No solutions just bring back the old problems. We do need change but we need creative ideas that take into consideration the needs of the people of the state of Maine and the times we live in. We are stuck with legislators who have no ideas or a whole bunch of bad ideas, who keep repeating the mantras of the national conservatives with no new ideas like the Heritage Foundation and who are only interested in serving the small percentage of citizens that make up their base. Once a politician is elected they should stop campaigning and serve the citizens of their state. All the citizens.

This decision by the Supreme Court has legalized corruption in our elections. It existed before but it was sort of regulated. Now we have unfettered corruption. The man who is funding the Gingrich campaign has been accused of connections with the Chinese mafia and Far Eastern gambling syndicates. Obama returned funds earlier this year that were from a Mexican drug cartel. This is the tip of the iceberg. The only people this decision helps are multi-national corporations, mega-billionaires, organized crime and terrorists none of whom have any loyalty to America or respect for our way of life. Is this who we want to fund our campaigns? Is this the loudest voice we want heard at the polls? Are these the guys who should be writing our laws? I think this is a bigger threat to our democracy than AlQueda ever was.

Actually I did invest in my retirement. For 40 years I paid into a retirement system and it cost me a lot more than $62 a week because I believed in the promise that my fellow Mainers made to me that I would have a certain retirement in my old age as a member of the Maine State Retirement System. Unfortunately, the current representative does not believe in keeping promises. I have a lot of sympathy for the folks in Millinocket who were lied to by a politician who knows nothing about honor and integrity. Neither of us are responsible for the situation we find ourselves in. It was not our decisions but others' thievery that left us where we are. As for your faithful devotion to putting aside money, well the financial debacle of 2008 in which $73 trillion of those retirement funds were stolen through the sale of bogus securities should make even you see that it is not always your personal decisions that determine where you end up. It isn't a safety net if it isn't safe.

The common folk in this country need to learn to see a scam when those folks who consider themselves to be more worthy of the good life hurl it at them. They promise to stop abortions but give us a lot of moralistic meddling and eliminate all the things that keep the abortion rates low like available birth control and pre-natal care, and support for the disabled. They promise to cut taxes and get the government off our backs and we get pennies in cuts, massive service cuts while the multi-national corporations, banks;, insurance and energy companies get huge subsidies, free access to public lands and the unfettered right to gouge citizens and workers alike by forming monopolies and conglomerations. In the end we get more and more wars, higher deficits, financial bubbles, fewer and fewer services and deplorable working conditions or unemployment. Having been fooled by these guys many times already I hope the common folk are ready to read the writing on the wall.

Nobody likes to pay taxes and the subject is especially noxious this time of the year. However, if people want a decent standard of living they have to invest in their community. To expect poor people to invest a greater percentage of their resources than rich people is ridiculous. The rich got rich as a result of community investments to begin with. It's only fair that they should invest more in education and infrastructure to guarantee future prosperity. Those folks who want no taxes ever are looking to turn the country into a hillbilly heaven where only a few people prosper while the rest suffer in ignorance and squallor. A few more years of them and we will be looking to Mississipi as "the way life should be". And as for the people who get money back it is usually because they paid too much in to begin with. There is no excuse for companies making huge profits to pay nada or even worse to pay nada and get subsidies besides thanks to loopholes. What they don't pay for you and I have to make up for while they lobby for government contracts and special exemptions.

If you mean Republicans would rather talk about mandatory transvaginal ultrasounds than their record on job creation then ya it is stage-managed. There are 3 states where this has already been voted into law and several other states where employers have been given the right to refuse to cover birth control in their health insurance policies so that is not a public stunt. It is in fact a reality that will impact the lives of thousands of women in this country. It may in fact affect men also. When women no longer have access to inexpensive birth control there may be a long line at the vasectomy factory.

Doesn't this make you wonder how many other rich landowners are using this tax dodge ? Shouldn't someone be investigating this and shouldn't there be some accountability? Aren't Republicans always looking for accountability, resposibility and investigations into fraud allegations?

Multimillion dollar snafu at DHHS along with obfuscation and disinformation and we get "Heck of a job Brownie" and a few thousand for a picnic at Maine Housing and the sky is falling. It truly is laughable.

The changes in the role of government were brought about by very real changes in the state of medical care in this country. A massive increase in the cost of prescriptions and medical care accompanied by a 200% increase in health insurance premiums have resulted in a crisis that cannot be ignored by a government that promises its citizens life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The leading cause of bankruptcy in this country is being sick and even the leading proponent against the national health care law went bankrupt last month because of medical bills. Not only that, recent surveys show we pay more than other moderns countries for worse care. All of this points to a problem, which, by the way, was seriously compounded by the collapse of the economy, that calls for a solution. Just letting people die from curable diseases because they aren't rich doesn't sound like a viable solution to me.

Don't you just wonder though why those folks who consider themselves to be morally superior, smarter ( in a commom sense kind of way), and more patriotic than the rest of us would be taking their marching orders from a four times married, drug addicted, viagra lovin loud mouth who has never served a day in the military or in political office. It makes you wonder what they could possibly be thinking with. Oh, and for the ladies who work for companies that provide health insurance benefits that include contraception coverage, he wants videos of you having sex. Be sure to send them in.

I recall that during the last year of the Baldacci administration there was mention that a large amount of debt in the DHHS budget was actually computer error and that they were withholding payment to the hospitals until they could figure out exactly what the state really owed. I recall the article saying that MaineCare was being billed for things they didn't cover. I also recall that in the last round of budget talks it was mentioned that a part of the debt was carried over from 2010. I'm not sure if the current computer glitch is the same computer glitch as the one mentioned before but I thought it strange that there would be two instances of this in so short a time and I recall being surprised that the hospitals were paid at the beginning of the Lepage administration with no mention of the overbilling issue.

No one is forcing churches to go into business. What the government requires is that churches who go into business need to provide the same insurance coverage for their employees that all the other businesses do. Religious institutions and schools are exempt from this requirement already. What the government is saying is that if you are going to charge your employees for health care coverage you need to provide health care coverage. You cannot give yourself a financial edge by claiming that certain coverage interferes with your values. Any business could deny coverage for anything following that principle. Another business might claim that covering cancer or diabetes interferes with their values because it's expensive. The goal is to provide coverage for as many people as possible and to end the financial drain on our health care system that are the uninsured.

I'd like to point out that when I taught students with computers, I was able to watch every keystroke they did from my computer. That was not only in my classes but when they were in the library and during study halls. It was a huge teaching advantage to be able to watch students work and be able to give instant feedback as they worked from my monitoring station. No one was looking at porn or doing email while they were in class. The most important reason to have computers in the classroom is that students need to learn how to use it as a tool for work and research because that is what they will be using it for in college and in the workplace. They already know how to use it as a toy but that doesn't mean they know how to use it for work. That's what school is for.

I can't believe we are even having this discussion. Some of the folks here should consider joining the Taliban. They have the mindset of a medieval war lord. What's next chastity belts? Funny how men never want women to have sex unless it's with them. Women, in this country, have had control over their own reproductive systems for the last 50 years. That bell has been rung and it won't be unrung. According to the latest surveys 100% of non-catholic women have used birth control at one time or other and 98% of Catholic women have also. The question is do you want to restrict birth control for women who are too poor to buy it, or too irresponsible, or crazy or drugged out? Are they the ones who should be getting pregnant? The law, by the way, exempts churches and religious schools. It only applies to chuch run BUSINESSES. In my opinion they should not only be non-exempt they should be taxed like other businesses. Why should religious instituions have special rules for running BUSINESSES?

Health insurance premiums paid from tax money for low income or poor citizens does not add to the cost of your insurance premiums because their care is paid for by premiums paid for by tax dollars. What is adding a huge amount to your health insurance premiums is the cost of the uninsured. They are hugely expensive because their care is not managed. They end up in the emergency room for stuff like earaches or sore throats or problems from unmanaged diabetes or they don't get health care at all until they have advanced cancer or heart disease or catastrophic accidents. All of this is unnecessarily expensive and the costs get passed on to hospitals and insurance companies. They in turn pass in on to you in your premium. It is worth noting that the recent cuts to DHHS will be adding 30,000 uninsured people in the State of Maine alone. Hospitals and insurance companies have already added up the costs and you can bet they will be passing it on.

Have you seen the population figures for India? If that is planning save us from it? There is no medication available today that does not have side effects. Unless you want to put up with with your heart attack, diabetes or cancer you weigh the risks and look to the best outcome. Normally your doctor would be the best judge of what that would be, not your priest or local politician. Personally, when I go to to the doctor's, I want the best medical advice I can get for my physical well being. I don't want to have to guess if the doctor is practicing Catholic medicine, or Hindu medicine or Seventh Day Adventist medicine or Islamic medicine. And I have even less desire to be guessing if he/she is practicing conservative or liberal medicine. Just the Hippocratic Oath is fine by me.

If we are going to be imposing Catholic Sharia law on everybody then we should all remember that the Catholic Church forbids birth control and abortion but it also forbids divorce, the death penalty and most war. Should we make those illegal also? Jews and Muslims have a thing about pork and working on Saturdays. Should we be violating their consciences by having government subsidies for pork farmers and making people, like policemen, soldiers and airline pilots work on Saturdays? Seventh Day Adventists don't believe in medecine Should they be allowed to impose that on their workers? Freedom of conscience means you get to forgo the use of birth control or abortion services but it does not give you the right to violate other people's conscience by imposing your values over theirs. In a democracy we are all equal under the law.

I think the Republican Caucus gave us a good preview of what Libertarian government would be like. We don't know for sure because there is no such thing as a libertarian government anywhere in the world. I'm inclined to think the term "libertarian government" might be an oxymoron like "a tall midget". When you have a society with no rules, no morals, no care for anyone other than yourself you have the perfect Ayn Rand world; a "libertarian government". The only people who would benefit from this in my view are bullies, terrorists, and organized crime. They would be free to do whatever they want to anybody they want. It wouldn't matter except that the same thing happened in Idaho, Missouri, Florida and now in Texas. Sure they recounted the votes but it really is impossible to know if there was hanky panky there. For example some places gained votes in the second count all of them for Romney. How did they miss these people in the first count? Strange!

If I am reading this correctly the US Bureau of Labor Statistics indicated a job growth of 7,100 jobs in Jan of 2011. This was incorrect apparently. Why was it incorrect? Where did those figures come from? Then the numbers declined every month so that at the end of the year there was no job growth and the numbers were back to where they started but somehow there were 3,000 jobs added and 1,000 jobs pledged to be added. This is the most convoluted tap dancing I have heard in a long time.

I'm not against discipline at all if it is age appropriate and loving but there are sometimes issues, the parent's or the child's, of addiction, abuse, mental illness, retardation, or sexual orientation that cannot really be fixed with discipline alone. That's what a counselor has to sort out. The best way to fix things. I have not noticed that jails are really good at this sort of thing. If it is solely a matter of discipline sometimes the military does a good job at giving a person a sense of direction.

While teen-agers are notorious for making really bad decisions, I'm inclined to think that they would not give up three squares and a warm, safe bed lightly for any length of time. Most of the time there are serious issues that are best handled by family counseling if they can be handled at all. Certainly, no disinterested observer is in a position to help. It is important though for the community to know that we do have among us teens who are being left behind. And I believe we have hundreds of them in our community living in abandoned apartments, cars, with friends etc. These kids think they are leaving home to become adults but in reality they lose out on acquiring any of the job skills, communication skills, negotiation skills that could make them successful as adults. Sadly, unless someone like the Rev. Taylor,or school counselor intervenes, that shelter may very well be the best address this kid will ever know.

Where were all those people who are complaining about the government forcing them to violate their values on birth control when the Pope came out against the war in Iraq and against torture? Where are they when the Pope is supporting unions and a higher minimum wage? Where are they when the Pope is calling for immigration reform? And where are they when the Catholic church is calling for universal health care and better living conditions for the poor? When you start cherry-picking your values and morals it causes people to suspect it is really politics hiding behind moral principle and it makes you look hypocritical.

The real emergency here is that for the first time in my recollection Maine has come in dead last in job creation. We not only had a loss of jobs but we had the greatest loss of all the states. Regardless of what Democrats have done in the past or what this administration is doing now this is an honor we need to get rid of pronto. If this administration can't govern in a way to produce the jobs they promised they should get out of the way and let people who know how to govern do it. The only job growth we have had in the past year is in health care jobs and this Maine Care flap will succeed in killing that off. At this rate we will be in recession longer than Greece.

The problem with austerity measures in a recession/depression is that people end up out of work. They have not money so they don't buy. Then businesses shut down and neither businesses not citizens pay taxes. Then the government has even less money to pay its debts and has to invoke more austerity measures and the entire economy spirals downward. Europe is a perfect example of this. After the economic collapse of 2008 they put in severe austerity measures and they are deeper into recession than they were back then. Here in the USA, the president resisted republican attempts to do the same and instead stimulated the economy. True the debt went up but the economy is recovering and the debt will be paid off in a few years. It would have recovered faster had the president succeeded in having a larger stimulus package. For the most part the debt is money that we owe ourselves. As if you decide to put a certain amount of money in the bank each week. Then the car breaks down and you take out that money to fix the car. Then you get a second job and put in extra money and soon the money is replaced. It only becomes a problem if you lose your job.

I tried the farmer's market for the first time last month and I was blown away by the variety and quality of the food there. If you go, go early though the place was mobbed.

I'm not sure what maturity has to do with it but as I see it it is an issue of fairness. The law is saying that when employers provide health insurance it needs to cover certain things. Those things are already provided for by everyone's employer (not the tax payer by the way) except for some Catholic employers. Some already provide the type of coverage mentioned in the compromise. I know people who have had this type of coverage for a long time. Since these employers hire people of many different faiths to work in their various agencies it is discriminating to provide different insurance to them. Paying for birth control is a health issue because it covers health issues not always directly involving sex just sex organs. Also there are times when someone's health requires not giving birth. I'm making the assumption here that you are not against women having sex? You just feel it is wrong that an insurance company should pay for contraceptives? Would you also be against insurance paying for prostate exams or fertility treatments?

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone". Ever heard of that one. Or even people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

You left out sinner and keeper of abominations. Just because you call someone names does not make it so and it makes you look a little unbalanced. The government is not your private church. It is made up of people of many different values and beliefs and in a democracy all of those beliefs have to be accomodated otherwise you call it a theocracy. We do this by separating church and state. All the Republican candidates have signed a pledge to support a law that would ban all forms of birth control other than condoms. This is the same law that was recently defeated in Mississippi by a 70% vote. I would think this makes it a law with very little popular support. In your church you can shove this onto people but in a democracy it probably won't fly so you have to call it something else. Like violating people's religious beliefs. The compromise that Obama reached with the Catholic bishops is exactly what they are already doing in many Catholic institutions. All their bluster is simply to cover up the fact that their main objection was that they didn't want to pay to insure women's health.

Just so you know bad teachers get fired all the time and put on probation in the public schools. At least they did where I worked. The only thing the union did was guarantee you a hearing and a representative if you were tenured. The untenured teachers are simply not rehired at the end of the year and no reason is given. However, as in other professions the better teachers and more highly trained teachers tend to go where they will be better paid. You can fire the bad teacher but if your salary is not competitive the next one you hire probably won't be much better. Unions are constantly advocating for better training for teachers and to allow people to collect both Social security and the state pension. As it is now, someone who worked for many years under Social Security who decides to become a teacher has to forfeit one of the pensions. There are many scientists and engineers, and technology workers who would love to come to teaching near the end of their careers but don't because of this. No one has more to gain by improving academic standards than the teachers or their unions.

We were better off last week when the governor was going to close the schools. Ms. Rhee and her program were phased out of the DC schools because it did not succeed in providing better education, cost more, and created huge divisions between the stakeholders because of her penchant for massively closing schools, firing people arbitrarily, and a whiff of a scandal regarding cheating on tests. But in light of her close association with Gov Walker of Wisconsin I guess all of that is OK. They sure would know what's best for Maine schools over there. When the governor gives a family money to attend a private school does that mean the school has to provide the same curriculum, services, proficiency testing that the public schools have? Do they have to have "Highly qualified" teachers like the public schools do? If not, then you are playing a shell game with the students that is dishonest. In any case the state has no money, we are constantly being told, and I don't see that we have money to spend teaching kids about religion or pay consulting fees to Ms. Rhee and her group.

I was very surprised to read this week that the Koch brothers are actually paying people to write in to columns like this to support their point of view. So if you are doing it for free you should probably look them up. Just sayin.

The number of private schools is on the rise mainly in communities where the public schools are underfunded. You also see a lot of private schools that are religious in nature and some people send their kids to private schools for social and racial motives. The good thing about this country is that we have the freedom to do that. I can tell you from personal experience that many of these private schools go out of existence and when they do students return to the public system because it does not close down. Also private schools are not required to report their proficiency or even to test it and sometimes that can cover up a lot of deficiencies and when that happens the public schools often end up those students in the later grades with huge academic deficiencies. It's difficult to foresee that if you don't test or if your focus is primarily religious or social and you are not monitoring progress. On the other hand I have seen students who were home schooled or who came from private schools who were advanced. Mostly though, private schools have difficulty offering the same services as the public schools especially for the learning disabled. Usually they only accept the smartest students and offer only one kind of academic preparation. That is way less expensive than what the public schools are required to do and it looks really good when all of your graduates get accepted to prestigious schools. Again this is comparing apples and oranges. Public schools are about creating an opportunity for everybody to develop whatever talents God gave them. Private schools are about making money. They usually end up being more expensive, accomplish fewer goals and are less dependable.

I see we have an Ayn Rand admirer. Well I would disagree that the top 50% benefits less. Mitt Romney earns $57,000 a day in interest as a reward for being one of the top 50%. I think he makes out better than any welfare case I ever heard of. As for the rest of us, at the very least we got an education. 12 years of sitting in a warm safe building getting the skills that enable us to write on this blog and earn a living and more importantly educate ourselves as adults and teach our children. And we didn't pay for it but someone did with their taxes. When our home catches fire, someone comes, when our babies get sick someone takes care of them whether we have money or not. I could go on but I'd say the top 50% benefits plenty even from an 8.3 unemployment rate. All the other things I mentioned are paid for with taxes no matter what you call them. The whole notion of rugged individualism is a crock. It made no sense the minute a second person walked on this planet. For me someone who lives in a community and enjoys the benefits that comes with it but doesn't want to support it is like someone who goes to a restaurant, stuffs himself then won't pay the bill. I would not argue that there is waste, and that many government programs need to be improved. That's why we have elections. As for Russian collectivism, I can't believe you really think we are communists. I think Russian totalitarianism had more to do with their downfall than collectivism. If that was the case how would you explain the fastest growing economy in the world :The People's Republic of China

I'm tired of hearing Obama is a socialist. What does that mean? That he believes in roads, schools, libraries, airports? That he believes that communities should care for their children, sick and elderly? That he believes in the United States of America and not a collection of un-united states. Everybody in this country has some interest in how the government works. Some people have a louder voice than others. Right now it is the people with the money and they are saying all sorts of things to scare voters into voting their interests. One such group is strongly advocating war with Iran, for example. Another group is virulently fighting congressional investigations of the financial debacle of 2008 and limits on offshore accounts,tax loopholes and regulations on hedge funds. They say that Obama is the worst president ever without ever getting specific about why that is so. We need to ignore statements like this and look to the money: who is spending it and what they want for it.

With all the millionaires and billionaires pledging their millions to support somebody the public airwaves and the internet will be wallpapered with the most noxious sludge you can think of between now and the November election. The only relief will come from Netflix and TIVO. Otherwise you may as well throw out your radio, TV, newspaper and computer. For some reason Americans respond to this. Look at the Republican primaries. The most money spent always gets a victory. And the more outlandish and inflammatory a candidate is the more he is likely to win. No wonder the goverment we have is non-functional. People need to read and think a lot more than they do. Otherwise we are likely to end up doing something like the "Heil Hitler " salute.

Information today changes, doubles and triples by the hour. The students of today do not need to know all the answers so much as where to find them. That involves the use of technology. Using outdated textbooks and research tools to find answers does not provide students with an education that meets their future goals. When I studied geography we looked at a large continent and called it Africa and the dark continent. Today's students need to be able to name the countries, presidents, capitals and probably can contact someone in Rwanda to find out if it rains there. As adults they will need up to date global knowledge and the skill to use communication devices in their work. Technology for today's students is the equivalent of textbooks for yesterday's students. They are not just shiny toys and the kids know it. When we use outdated methods to educate them they are aware they are being shortchanged. This impacts their motivation to learn a lot.

The problem with the DHHS budget is basically a bookkeeping bubble. It is not caused by increased participants nor by increased spending as is seen in the budget analysis but mainly by bills that were not accounted for therefore not paid for in last year's budget due to a computer programming glitch. Since this is a bubble it could be paid for with a temporary tax and it doesn't require permanent elimination of health care programs. The new health care law will also bring with it funds that will replace the stimulus funding gap. Or, since they simply ignored these bills last year and passed them on to this year's budget I suppose they could pass it on again and hope that the economy would improve next year and the problem would solve itself. They say suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem, so is the governor's budget.

Marriage when it occurs in a church is a religious ceremony in accordance with God's law but when it occurs as a result of a State issued license performed by a State employee and can only be dissolved by a State issued decree is a civil ceremony and right. The government in a democratic society should not discriminate against any of its citizens. They have every right to petition for equality. As for historical precedence, I am of the opinion that homosexuality is mentioned in the Old Testament so it has pretty much been around as long as heterosexuality. As for the argument that heterosexual unions produce children. It seems to me that we already have more people on the planet than we have resources to support. I think the human race has more than satisfied that edict. I doubt that anything we do in Maine can hurt the institution of marriage more than the religious right values voters in South Carolina standing with and electing a thrice married swinger to be our candidate for president. I believe it is in the best interest of Maine citizens to allow everyone the opportunity to have stable family units.

When I think of the miles I had to walk in one day in the classroom and the hours I had to stand on cement floors, I can say for certain that this will be a short lived fad. Even orthopedic shoes did not save me from arthritic knees and fallen arches not to mention the many feet stomping on my toes and a heavy student desk falling onto my foot. My advice, ditch the slippers and get steel toed boots.

I don't believe we are any more broke today than we were in the thirties, forties and fifties and yet Mainers found a way to help each other so that people did not die from poverty. What we have today is ideology that trumps people. Why would a rational person believe that everyone on public assistance is there because they are too lazy to work when there is plenty of evidence to suggest that the vast majority are either too young, too old , too sick or otherwise unable to work. If I were to suggest that we should kill disabled people as they are born so that we don't have to support them would that seem ethical? No? But its OK if they are older? Some people are lazy and maybe the cure is to cut off their food and shelter but my experience tells me that although they may be too lazy, unintelligent, or unskilled to work they are not unable to steal. When we are paying for their food, rent and medical care at the grey bars motel will we really be better off? Maybe there are better ways to help someone to acquire a work ethic and to learn job skills. I don't believe anybody wants to support the able bodied. What we disagree on is who is able bodied and how we get them to go to work.

The governor says the economy is turning around in Maine but in 2011 we lost over 7,000 jobs. Apparently taking down the mural and putting up a sign was not enough to convince Kestrel or most anyone else to open up shop here. He praised his tax break but if you have a minimum wage job you got a whopping $17 worth of relief but the 6,000 or so 1%ers got about $2,800. You could almost heat your house with that. As for saving the pension fund. Well if you call cutting the pension amount and increasing health care costs saving it, you have to ask saving it for who? Certainly not the present retires struggling to survive. As for saving us from the huge welfare demon that is eating us alive well it turns out to be pretty much a clericalissue as in switching from one computer system to another and a decrease in stimulus funds that is the culprit since there has been a very small increase in claimants and the funding has been mostly flat for the last few years. It pretty much amounts to demonizing the poor to cover up mismanagement. Otherwise it was right on the mark.

I call this the right to work for nothing law. As if we don't have enough jobs in Maine that don't pay a living wage. The folks who advocate this remind me of the boss who tells you that you have to take a cut in salary because times are tough and the business is on the verge of going under then after cutting your salary and hours takes off for his Caribbean vacation. Oh, and the reason we have lower wages than New Hampshire is that most of that state is within commuting distance to Boston. Aroostook County, however, is not.

First of all you cannot say that Obama is a Muslim and complain that he has been brainwashed at the United Trinity Church of Christ at the same time. He has to be one or the other. Perhaps you meant that he is a muslim sympathizer. Well Osama Bin Laden and most of his lieutenants might disagree with that one since they are all dead at Obama's command. As for the pipeline, what prompted Congressional Republicans to give the president a deadline ? Was that not politically motivated? Was it really necessary? Why? The oil from that pipeline was always destined for export as is much of the oil we drill in this country. Our greatest export last year was domestic oil, look it up. Given the BP mess in the Gulf of Mexico, I think it would be unwise to take the word of the oil industry that that pipe line is safe. Since the president has chosen to rankle his own union support in this decision I think his concerns go beyond the political. When it comes to drenching our prime farmlands in pipeline oil, I would say it is better to be safe than sorry.

I have no problem with legitimate authorities or even the press looking into this. And if malfeasance is found, then the proper consequences should ensue. I do object to all this drooling over a potential scandal and media smear which in my opinion is not only premature but kind of suspicious given the issues surrounding it. I guess I'm just an old fashioned girl longing for the days when people were presumed innocent until proven guilty and when guilt by association was considered to be unfair.

I'm in no position to decide whether the actuary or the CBO is better at guessing (and that's what all these projections are). As for forcing healthy young people to have health insurance I say they should. They are precisely the ones wrapping their motocycles around a telephone pole with no helmet and no health insurance because they aren't sick leaving the rest of us with their million dollar health care bill. And even if they don't they will get older and someday need health care or have babies who will need it. It seems inconsistent to me to see a national health care program as a bad thing but interstate health care as desirable. If anything will standardize rates it will be a national program. If the health care program counts for 1/6 of the economy, I have to wonder if you added up all the doctor, hospital, pharmaceutical, medical equipment, nursing home, therapeutic, psychiatric and health insurance bills being paid in this country what fraction of the national budget it would cover. I'm betting it would be a whopper. Right wing radio loves that remark by Nancy Pelosi but I'm pretty sure it is taken out of context. As I recall it referred to the many last minute changes that occurred in the bill but not to the bill as a whole. I don't think this law will be carved in stone. It will be amended as better solutions are found but you need something substantial to change something as far reaching as national health care.

I am very sure that all the economists who have studied the health care law as it is written have said that it will not add to the deficit. If you eliminate the individual mandate, however, then the costs are huge. I'm sure that's what all the hue and cry about the constitutionality of it is all about. If you can show the so called "Obamacare law" creates a deficit then you can get rid of it and the health care industry can go back to its profligate ways with no controls on cost or quality. Solving the problem of the uninsured is only a small part of the whole rotten mess we call our health care system. There will also need to be tort reform, and the cost of educating a doctor will have to be addressed and the question of elective procedures and of course the big one, women's health needs. A lot of folks have a finger in this pie so it will be contentious for a long time. As far as I'm concerned it's only a first step. That's what is really scaring people.

Getting a straight story out of this administration is like trying to nail a glob of jello to the wall. He says the government is broke and he is spending 4th quarter money in the 3rd quarter but last month his budget director announced the budget was in the black so far. He says he is creating jobs but how can creating a six million dollar loss for St. Mary's not result in a bunch of lay-offs there and throughout the health care industry? He wants to put in a fifth year of high school one day but now he is threatening to close the schools. Why would that be his first priority? Why not close down the roads? Last month he said he could fix the whole thing if he was given control of MSHA. He alluded to that again last night. Why can't he just work with them? He says the DHHS budget is way out of control due to new applicants and increases in spending when his own budget analyses shows a small amount of new applicants and very little spending increase in the last 8 years and that the problem is the reduction in federal stimulus funds which was entirely forseeable before his tax cuts. Once, just once, I wish this guy would get his story straight.

In this country students get credit for seat time. You show up, you get passed on. In Europe, Japan, China and other countries that constantly score higher than us students are required to show proficiency in order to graduate. In this country all accountability rests with the teacher. There is little or no accountability for the system as to whether they have funded the schools sufficiently, for the parents as to whether they support the students' educational requirements adequately or for the students as to whether they actually work towards their educational goals. In these other countries accountablility is shared all around. All the required testing that we do here in the name of accountability is primarily to enrich testing companies. And it enriches them a lot. You could buy a ton of educational technology for the cost of all the testing. You will see a whole lot of resistance though if you try to hold school systems, parents and students accountable for their proficiency. That, however, is what results in real education not just test scores.

I think this is an idea that is worth revisiting. We should be doing everything possible to encourage development and the businesses that have opened there. The only problem I see is that a 2 hours limit would result in people staying longer and less availability for the space. But since things are definitely changing there it should be looked at.

Gov. Walker needs some positive press right now with the recall petitions coming in today but for him to steal this from his most ardent admirer Gov Lepage is just plain sad. Sometimes Republicans are the kind that eat their young. I mean he could have given a sweetheart deal to any number of companies but he had to pick this one??

Sounds like hostage taking to me. We can keep granny out of the snowbank and we can have roads but he has to get control of the Maine Housing authority, his gas pipeline and all his budget cuts first. Do hostage takers usually keep their promises or are we being taken for a ride?

So there has been growth in the budget in the last 30 years. What's the problem? Who would like to get a salary from 30 years ago? Who would like to drive a car from 30 years ago? How many people have the same waistline as 30 years ago? People need to get their eyes unstuck from the rear view mirror and choose what is best for the road ahead not the one we passed 30 years ago. There have been many medical, psychological and sociological advances in that time and we should be responding to them. Sometimes preventive care costs less than neglect and sometimes city dwellers have different needs than rural dwellers. And maybe an aging population has different problems than a young population.

So it turns out to be true. By the governor's own budget analysis the budget shortfall for DHHS was totally forseen. It did not occur primarily because of new applicants, nor did it occur because of an increase in spending for this department. It turns out to be merely a political stunt to reinforce the Republican mantra that all of our economic ills are the fault of the poor. I can only assume they are so desperate to sell this in order to help people forget the mess they left us with in 2008. In fact it turns out most of the problem was created when the federal government withdrew their funds. And that occurred because of the financial crisis and because Republicans in the house refuse to tax the wealthy 1% an extra 4 percentage points to balance the federal budget. Just once I would like to see this administration tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

When I think about the cost of a year long investigation, court costs and incarcerating somebody for 10 years over a theft of less than $10,000, I personally cannot justify that kind of expense no matter how reprehensible the crime. And, suppose you have to multiply that by 50 or more cases! It just doesn't make economic sense. I think, however, that it is obvious that no matter what system you use for these benefits, regardless of the politics involved, cheats will find a way to beat the system. If fraud is that prevalent, it is clearly time for a new system, one that takes into consideration modern communications (for reporting fraud, tracking how it is used and who uses it) and that tightens up the process to determine eligibily and to maintain eligibility. In the meantime I'm hoping these guys get lots of community service, mandatory drug rehab and school and, of course, automatic loss of all benefits . Otherwise, we could find ourselves in a situation where violent offenders are released from prisons because these guys are overcrowding them.

That was very informative.

You may rail against raising taxes all you want but no one has even suggested raising taxes. What is being discussed is CUTTING taxes while at the same time saying there is no money for even basic life saving protections to the most vulnerable citizens of our state. True there will never be enough money for everything that everybody wants but there is such a thing as setting priorities. Why should building gas pipe lines take priority over say medicine for sick people or fuel for people who are freezing? Why would experimental planes take priority over keeping promises to the elderly who paid for a retirement program? And just because Fox news keeps repeating a million times a day that the government is broke does not make it so. Sometimes people who profit from spreading fear and discontent lie about things.

A favorite right wing tactic is when you don't have the answers, change the subject or find a scapegoat to attack. For example, before Christmas a budget analysis for the State of Maine showed that we spent more this year than last. That was before the supplemental budget discussion even came up. So in order to look like our Republican friends are making the tough calls and cutting spending we are having this whole discussion over throwing grandma out of her home. In reality spending is up and any reasonable person would have expected this to be the case given the deal the feds have been giving us. But we really don't want to talk about that. We would rather stir up hatred and division. A red herring. Look here and don't look there.

Like you I'm looking out for myself. I live in a city and just like the federal cuts have rained down on the states the state cuts are going to have a huge impact on city property taxes. The sick and the poor and the elderly aren't going to disappear just because the governor would rather put his money elswhere while pleading poverty. They are instead going to turn the cities into third world countries with homelessness and crime and broken families rapidly increasing. The cost of health care will go up due to increased emergency room usage and as an old person that will cost me. Cuts in education will have long term negative economic repercussions. Teachers, police, ambulance drivers, government workers and health care workers losing their jobs doesn't sound like job creation to me. It sounds like property values going down because of people walking away from their mortgages and that will cost me. They say a rising tide lifts all boats. The governor's program looks like the receding tide before a tsunami to me. If we have a right to anything it is to live in a safe, healthy, thriving society. You know "The way life should be".

I'm sorry to hear all that but in the unfortunate event that your paycheck should suddently disappear through illness, accident, or economic turbulence say, me and my ilk would hope that there would be someone who would give you a chance to get back on your feet. What would be the altenative, throwing you away?

The lead lobbyist for this pipeline is Grover Norquist author of the "no new taxes pledge". I suspect once he gets his pipeline much of the gridlock we see in the House will magically disappear. It's also no coincidence that the report came out this week that the chief export for the USA is now gas and oil. No wonder there's no money for LIHEAP. What they are fighting over is not getting the pipeline built but skipping the environmental studies. I wonder who will pick up the tab if it turns out that taking shortcuts results in environmental disaster? My guess, the taxpayer again!

There are some countries where a human life has no value at all. Some African countries come to mind. Here, we believe that a life has value because it is human. Because of that, certain things are illegal. You cannot kill your wife, your husband or your children, for example, and we go to extraordinary means to save our soldiers wounded in battle. The safety net reflects the attitude that we do not allow people to starve in the midst of food, or freeze when there is shelter available or die from curable illnesses because they are human beings. It is intended to be a floor below which human beings should not fall regardless of their talent, morality, intelligence etc. There are no throw away people and it is not a gift. Charity is a gift, given because you are a person of empathy, or you want to please God or because you want people to think you are generous. It is also given to people you consider worthy of your gift often children or the elderly. The two are not the same. Both are necessary in a world as hazardous as ours.

This actually has a historical precedent. During the Great Depression when we had 25% unemployment the government had programs to hire people to build roads and do whatever and after WWII when the soldiers returned home to an economy that had no jobs for them the government came up with the GI Bill that sent a bunch of them to school and gave others low income loans to buy homes which created a slew of construction and manufacturing jobs and boosted the American economy to the point where we were able to revive the economies of Japan and Europe. Putting money in the pockets of people who will readily spend it does create jobs and businesses.

The whole conversation about volunteering is an example of what Republicans do best. When you have no answer change the subject. As much as I admire people who volunteer, that will not solve the problems represented here. I can say, having observed the folks in assisted living,that they are not placed there for frivolous reasons. Most of them have worked hard and saved their whole lives and had their savings wiped out by illness. That is the real culprit here, the cost of health care. They need help with their meds, hygiene, doctor appointments, getting dressed and getting meals. To put them in boarding homes means they will get this care by ambulance rides to the hospital emergency rooms, or the state will have to hire an army of part time workers to go to boarding homes to provide these services.3 workers can take care of 20-30 patients in an assisted living situation and it keeps most of these patients out of nursing homes and emergency rooms sometimes for years. We need a state program to do this for the same reason we pool our money to build and maintain the roads. It is a service all of us need. When was the last time some politician suggested that from now on everybody should build their own roads or that we should take care of plowing and tarring with volunteerism. Old age is a concern to everybody in the state and that is who should address it.

The governor has this horrible problem balancing the budget. Well that problem didn't materialize overnight. It was there when he submitted his first budget. He could have solved it then by not giving out tax cuts, rescinding subsidies to out of state corporations, taking out a bond for bridge and road repair, cutting some off other departments. Instead he chose to put the money where he wanted and left a huge deficit in funding Medicare coincidentally a program targeted by the national Republican party. Now, having created this hole, he says he has no money. I hope the Democrates are saving the photos of all those moms and dads and grannies he will be throwing out of their homes. It will be interesting to see the new Republicans in the legislature running on that platform.

Other than number 5 the rest of the stories go from bad news to horrific news. I'm not sure it's much of an honor to be in this list.

When did we stop praying for "Peace on Earth" and start praying to be #1 in everything regardless of who we run over. Money and power seems to have become our newfound god. I no longer listen to people who say we are a "Christian country". There is too much evidence that we now worship a very different jesus.

That is probably an impossible task and I agree that money is the problem but I think it's lobbyist money rather than tax money. If you take the money out of the government you will have to eventually defund the military and the veteran's groups and hell will freeze over long before that happens. I think transparency in campaign financing would at least let us know what we are voting for when we elect these guys. The same guys who were elected to balance the budget and lower taxes were willing to raise your taxes and mine just for the sake of getting an oil pipe line. The lead lobbyist for that pipeline is Grover Norquist. How many of his supporters knew who he was actually working for. The same people who were elected to lower the deficit have passed laws again and again and gutted the funding for them. That creates deficits. Now they want to gut the financing for the health care law. More deficits. They start wars and do not fund them again and again. More deficits. Another thing that would help would be to control gerrymandering. There are way too many safe districts. That creates a sense of entitlement in our congress and makes them way less accountable to their constituents. Finally the voter needs to become more sophisticated and start reading what a candidate has actually said he believes in and look at his past behavior and stop listening to campaign ads and sound bites.

I don't ever remember a time when Congress was popular but this one sets a new record for putrid. I think the American people should insist that these prima donnas have to settle for the same life the rest of us lead. No special exemptions from the law (for insider trading, for example),no special retirement systems ( social security should be good enough, no special health insurance plans( medicare is good enough for them too), no pay check when they don't show up for work, and especially no paycheck at all when they don't get anything done. They work for us and look down on us as though we were some kind of pesky nuisance. What's good enough for us should be good enough for them. And most of all we should have the right to know who funds their campaigns and their supporters campaigns. For all we know Saudi millionaires or Russian billionaires could be running this congress.

The governor created this shortfall when he submitted his original budget with errors in the DHHS budget to justify his tax cut. Now he says he has no money for social programs. It's like paying your bills and having leftover money to spend on buying golf clubs without paying your rent. Then you can't afford rent. Right? It's also very suspicious that he seems to be setting up a request for waivers in the Federal Health Care Law and filing a suit against it at the same time. Could this possibly be a Tea Party move to block the law? Using the most vulnerable citizens in our state as hostages in a political strategy would be pretty low. Doing this as a result of policital allegiance to right wing groups would really be hateful.

I did not comment on your life. I was responding to another post about someone who came her with nothing but the clothes on his back and made it without assistance. As far as I know your facts are correct. I was only commenting on customs about hospitality.

To someone growing up in a grass hut in Africa, I'm guessing that ending up in a mill town in Maine, in the middle of January, would be as alien as it would be for a Mainer to move to a remote village in India. If I got that right you moved to Maine with no possessions, no job, no knowledge of the English language, no family, no place to live, no friends, no government assistance and kids to feed and you are all still alive. That is heroic. You should write a book about that story. It would inspire many.

It galls me that we find this out after the election. I don't care how many bribes a candidate takes but I think I have a right to know who is bribing him before the election. Otherwise we open ourselves to groups that represent terrorists and enemies of our country getting involved in our election process. I'm not comfortable knowing Al Queda could be bribing our Congress. Not that they would do much more damage to our country than they are doing now.

As I see it the mayor's most important job is marketing the city of Lewiston. He needs to convince people throughout Maine, especially in Augusta, that Lewiston and its citizens are the best thing going and worthy of investing their time and money in our community. He also should be actively marketing us to any potential investors and businesses and especially helping the Chamber of Commerce to promote our local businesses. In that vein, I had a thought. It started last summer when I got some vegetables from the Lots to Garden program in the park. I was amazed at how tasty, beautiful and clean those vegetables were and I was left with the impression that some Somalis are excellent farmers. What if the city looked to organize support for an experimental winter farm in the city. The Canadians are doing it with some success and there may be one in northern Maine already. It would provide jobs that someone who has challenges with the English language and American culture could do. If Lewiston has a grant writer we could start there looking for financing. The University of Maine might be interested in developing new crops and techniques for winter farming. Perhaps we could approach Hannaford's, Shaw's, and WalMart. Maybe food producers like General Mills would invest. There is a growing market for local organic produce and I think it would be wonderful to have fresh local produce in February.

As I see it the mayor's most important job is marketing the city of Lewiston. He needs to convince people throughout Maine, especially in Augusta, that Lewiston and its citizens are the best thing going and worthy of investing their time and money in our community. He also should be actively marketing us to any potential investors and businesses and especially helping the Chamber of Commerce to promote our local businesses. In that vein, I had a thought. It started last summer when I got some vegetables from the Lots to Garden program in the park. I was amazed at how tasty, beautiful and clean those vegetables were and I was left with the impression that some Somalis are excellent farmers. What if the city looked to organize support for an experimental winter farm in the city. The Canadians are doing it with some success and there may be one in northern Maine already. It would provide jobs that someone who has challenges with the English language and American culture could do. If Lewiston has a grant writer we could start there looking for financing. The University of Maine might be interested in developing new crops and techniques for winter farming. Perhaps we could approach Hannaford's, Shaw's, and WalMart. Maybe food producers like General Mills would invest. There is a growing market for local organic produce and I think it would be wonderful to have fresh local produce in February.

Multiculturism is pretty new to this area. Ten years is not a long time. So it isn't surprising to find some people who cannot deal with it. Prejudice and bigotry is not an intellectual exercise. The biggest bigot in the world knows it is wrong intellectually. I know that because I am an educator and I can say uncategorically that if I start punishing Billy for something Tommy did I would never hear the end of it no matter what excuse I gave. EVERYONE knows that's not fair, especially Billy. Find me one person who thinks its OK that he was punished for someone else's behavior. Our entire system of justice is based on the premise that it is better to let 10 guilty people go free than to convict an innocent man. Yet the bigot thinks it is OK to blame an entire group of people they have never even met for something they think someone did. No bigotry is emotional. Like the girl who runs screaming at the sight of a spider she knows is tiny and non-venomous. No one can prevent emotions that powerful. They can only learn to control them. It is said the hero is not the man who is fearless but the person who fights in spite of being afraid. There is something to be said for gaining control of emotions that don't make sense and make you less human.

Whatever happened to the SunJournal's poll on things we could do with that mill? It has so many possibilities I am dying to know what people think.

When you take income off the table you can't be too surprised that you will have money woes. We're poor because we refuse to do anything to generate income. Things cost what they cost. There is no cheap medical care for anybody. Jobs are scarce and many of them don't pay enough to live on. Health insurance benefits for working people are going the way of our snow banks. The more uninsured people you have the more expensive Maine Care will be. With the budget cuts coming down hospitals are expecting a shortfall. They will be shedding jobs and raising prices. The $4 asperin will become the $8 asperin. More uninsured and higher health insurance costs are sure to follow. The more hospitals, doctors, nursing homes and pharmaceutical companies raise their rates, the higher the cost of Maine Care will be even with fewer claimants. This will amount to cost shifting not cost saving and some of the cost will be the lives of some of the poor.

There are so many people claiming to have seen welfare fraud on a massive scale that I have to believe some of it must be true. Unless of course they all saw the one same person doing it. Or they just resent helping people of a different race? The problem is we don't know the scale of it or who is doing it and amazingly enough the governor is not interested in finding out. He figures if he throws everybody out he will get the cheats. That ignores the fact that he will also be eliminating life saving help for those who have real need (sorry, but there is such a thing), and he will create false savings by cost shifting. Eliminating a sick person's resources does not automatically cure them. It only moves the problem someplace else and sometimes makes the problem worse. I keep hearing "We just can't afford it". Well who's to say what we can and can't afford? And how is it we can't afford to help seniors with Alzheimer's but we can afford to cut taxes for wealthy people?? Some people have a strange notion of the meaning of the word afford.

I finally found an independent asssessment of the financial woes existing in the DHHS budget. As expected some of them are real and some are exaggerated. For example new claimants account for $6 million of the $200 million shortfall. So much for Maine as the welcome wagon for the world's poor especially when you consider the recent state of the economy. $19 million is from billing that occurred last year and was not done last year but was added to this year's budget and should have been anticipated not a shortfall. There is also no explanation of why this happened. It is possible the State does not actually owe this money and that they are billing errors. $19 million is for the non-medical care and treatment of alzheimer's patients in residential facilities. This is not funded by federal medicaid now but will be after the implementation of the new health care law. So we are looking at throwing them out of their homes and putting them back in later. Also the assumption is being made the the entire amount will come out of the general fund ignoring other sources of funding that will most likely be used. It seems the legislature has plenty of room to whittle down this huge amount.

This did not ring true to me but I didn't know for sure so I called and checked. The government brings immigrants to this country and pays Catholic Charities to help them resettle for 8 months. After that they are on their own and they can move wherever they want. Catholic Charities does not help them to move or encourage them to move or pay anything towards their travel or resettlement in another community. Once they have moved Catholic Charities treats them like anyone else and will help them if they qualify for help and there are resources available. All the ones I have asked have told me they moved here because they had friends or family and because they hated living in the big city because they are basically a rural people. That is the reason they looked for a fairly rural place to live. Some have told me they came here from Atlanta, some from Colorado, and some from Minneapolis.

There is limited information available on exactly what the cuts to medicare will be but according to what I have read, and I pray to God I am incorrect, elderly people living in residential care with advanced Alzheimer's will no longer be covered by medicare. These are the saddest, most helpless, most vulnerable people in the state. They have worked all their lives, raised families, had their savings taken by the nursing homes and now that they have no money, and are totally helpless, the state will take away the only chance they have. It would be the cruelest government policy since Mao marched his citizens into the country to freeze and starve to death. If it does come to pass it will be interesting to see the Republicans in the legislature run for reelection on this policy.

There are several reasons why people should question the "facts" coming out of the governor's office. First of all there were all the cases of voter fraud that turned out not to exist. A credibility gap? Secondly, the shortfall went from 50 million to 200 million in a matter of months with no explanation of where exactly this increase came from. Thirdly, the firing of all the people who ran the agency and who knew what the shortfall is and how it occurred just before the governor announced his cuts. Way too convenient. The claim that the large increase in the cost of Medicaid is related to a large increase in claimants. Since the cost of private health insurance went up 200% in the same time period and the population of the state got older it would seem normal that medicare costs would have gone up even with fewer claimants. Most significantly the State has gotten involved in a lawsuit against the new national health care bill. It is an odd coincidence that the benefits the governor want to cut pretty much match up with the benefits those states with less coverage will have to add when it is implemented. Why would we want to kick people off who will have to be put back on unless it is a political move to influence the 2012 election or a plan B in case the law suit fails.

It was the governor's bill and the Republican legislature that passed it over democratic objections. It allowed insurance companies to do this. They wrote the bill. It really would be hard to spin this around so that its Obama's fault. By the way I don't blame Republicans for all that is wrong. I have supported and voted for many Republicans from Eisenhower to Reagan to Collins to Snowe. I think the new brand of Republicans has been corrupted and no longer adhere to traditional Republican values. For example the last president raised the deficit higher than any president before him. The current leader among the primary candidates has taken bribes from Freddy Mac and lobbied for every earmark you can think of. Margaret Chase Smith would turn over in her grave. I take the blame for not being clear in that I am criticizing certain Republicans and not all of them.

We see this article every year and Republicans love to point to it as proof that we need to apply government shrinking, tax breaks for the rich, deregulate everything policies in Maine. Well first of all it comes from Forbes, not God. Secondly the problems mentioned are high energy costs, high health insurance costs and lack of a trained and educated workforce. The health insurance policies instituted by the current administration have actually caused an increase in the cost of health insurance for businesses in the northern part of the state. None of the other factors will be improved by the big tax break to the rich or the dismantling of the safety net. To make it even weirder they say Portland is one of the best cities for business and Maine is one of the best places to live. Not too much to hang your hat on there.

Reading the comments here I guess the sky is falling and the guy you want running things is the guy who made you afraid. I am getting tired of minority candidates who feel they are smarter than the rest of us and need to shove their so called pain down the throats of the " ignorant masses who don't know any better". I would like to see a mayor who has popular support whoever he is. I would have more confidence that we aren't being sold a line of bull. I think with a do-over we have a chance to express the will of the voters.

Well I guess we have to disagree. You see I was here 40 years ago when most of my neighbors were moving to California because there were no jobs here and I watched most of the small businesses along Lisbon st. shut down and the school dept. had a job action and a slew of their experienced teachers quit(good for me though because I got my first job but really bad for the quality of education here for years to come). I spent the afternoon on Lisbon St. today at the Festival and saw for myself the new businesses and the people walking downtown. We should not go back and we should not turn our backs on money saving cooperation with Auburn. I am open to change but to go backwards? No thanks, been there done that.

There is a difference between cutting waste and cutting programs without actually finding out if there is waste. Just because a program is expensive does not mean it is wasteful. Does anybody know where the inexpensive medical care is? I am all for cutting out fraud and waste but I don't see that happening. I just see someone with a desire to eliminate a program using the fraud and waste excuse without any real effort to find out where the fraud and waste is. I also see someone who has no clue what is going on using a hatchet where a scalpel is called for. In the end the cost in money and lives will show this to be a stupid approach. I'm hoping our legislature has more sense.

I, for one, would welcome any solution to an increasing welfare population that would eliminate the causes rather than eliminate the people. Right now much of our welfare money actually goes to subsidize people who are working for wages that are so low or provide so few hours that they are living below poverty and cannot afford rent food and medical care. I think this is OK. It is sort of a small business subsidy. Some people on welfare will never be employable due to medical issues, mental illness, addiction or long criminal histories. There are many, however, who just do not have the skills or work ethic to get or keep a job. I could see such a grant as you propose hiring these people to do public service for a limited length of time and teaching them the skills they lack. For example they could be involved in working to insulate homes for the elderly, or work in state parks, animal shelters or paint schools etc. Also the problem exists that there simply are not enough jobs for everyone who wants one in this economy. I expect much of that will change after the 2012 election when Congress no longer has an incentive to slow the recovery.

So that's what we get with this candidate? A 10 year moratorium on Section 8 housing? No plans for economic development? No plans for how to keep our schools when the State decreases funding and the Feds cut funding for Head Start? No plans for roads,clean water,cheaper cable service? No plans for riverfront development? No vision for the unused mill, the abandoned tenements? No plans to market our festivals? No ideas on how to make our downtown safer for the children who have to live there? As I see it the best way to decrease dependence on welfare is to encourage economic development. Throwing people out in the street and assuming they will just go elswhere is not realistic when most of them have nowhere else to go. All this will do is increase homelessness and crime and delinquency. Lewiston deserves better than a guy with one idea who is going to blart ideaology instead of working with others to improve our community.

Who does she think she is kidding? Her idea of a small business would be Goldman Sachs, Wellpoint, Halliburton, Exxon, Microsoft, Google etc. The one thing that helps the small businesses I know about is lots of customers with cash in their pockets. That seems to be the one thing Republicans don't want to see around the next election time. God forbid Goldman Sachs. Wellpoint, and Halliburton should kick back a little of the government largesse that has come their way the last 10 years to help pay for our wars, unemployed, infrastructure upgrades and health care problems. It seems to me it would be fitting when you consider how much they have profited from wars, inflated health care costs and oil price gouging.

Let's get everybody all excited about a tax cut that isn't a tax cut and let's not mention the 7.3 trillion dollars the Fed has given the banks in the last two years at 0% interest with no strings attached. That's beyond the TARP bailout they got at $800 billion. Fortunately our politicians have no end of scapegoats to blame our fiscal problems on, goverment workers, teachers, unions , welfare mothers, seniors who live too long, sick people who want medicine, kids who want to eat and on and on.

Cities are places where people who are physically, emotionally, mentally and financially challenged congregate because that is where the services that help them to survive are located. Add to that the clientele from Probation and parole, addiction treatment centers, group homes and shelters. The mayor of Lewiston is not going to change DHHS policy and Lewiston is no different from other Maine cities. It just makes economical sense to provide services in central locations instead of scattered in every town and village of the state. The office of mayor of Lewiston pays very little and comes with very little power. The one thing we don't need is someone who will create national embarrassment. As I recall we already had a mayor who decided to use the bully pulpit to get rid of people he didn't want here and made us a national laughing stock. I also find it ironic that the people who never want to pay taxes think it's a good idea to turn away five million dollars in rental money. I wonder what that converts to in property taxes? Finally, Lewiston has a lot of small businesses that can't afford to pay very well. Many of their workers actually qualify for state aid because they don't earn enough to meet the poverty level. Do we really want to drive those workers away?

There are many examples of communistic societies which worked just fine. The most glaring example are the monastic orders which thrived for centuries. There are also agricultural communities in Israel and elsewhere and religious communities all over the world. Totalitarianism never works for very long and it can come in communistic, theocratic, socialistic or fascist forms.

Pretty much my point exactly. Conservatives want to belong to communities. They want families, jobs, the amenities of towns and cities, the protections of a national defense but ask them to contribute to that community and they start with Marxism, Communism, socialism and every other ism. There is a difference between community and totalitarianism that they don't get. If they don't want to be in a community they are free to leave. If they want to be in one they should expect to contribute to the welfare of the group unless they are there to mooch.

For some reason conservatives are just uncomfortable with the whole notion of community. They want the benefits:jobs,roads,football games etc. but they don't want the responsibility of creating community which involves sharing resources. They picture themselves as lone survivors on a prairie fighting against nature and enemies when the reality for most of us is that there are 7 billion people on the planet and most of us live in cities piled on top of each other in communities. Take a family as an example of a community. People contribute what they can and share resources. No one expects the 3 year old to fix the roof or go out and get a job. The sick ones are taken care of by others and those who can mow the lawn and go out and earn money and take care of those who can't. That's community. The whole notion that cutting taxes and eliminating regulation will make the rest of the community better is some sort of a conservative mantra that has never been shown to work anywhere in the world. It just makes the rich richer and they keep their resources in gated communities and tell the rest of us to go ahead and die if you don't have money.

Of course this will be back in 2012. Republicans have oodles of ways to keep voters away from the voting booth. They are already talking about a photo ID law. Never mind what it will cost. When you are in the minority you can win by logical persuasion,fear and bigotry, cheating or secret money.Guess which one they never use. The Republicans in Augusta should be reading the tea leaves on this one and take pause before they pass any more voter intimidation laws.

Given the attitude of the Supreme Court these days any attempt at fairness in financing election campaigns is a lost cost. There is no way the tax payer can even attempt to balance the money the Koch billionaires can spend. What I would like to see before the Supreme Court declares that unconstitutional is for the State or some private independent organization to buy 5 hours of TV and radio time the last week before the election, one hour a day, and give each candidate a chance to rebut all the smut that is coming at us in TV ads, the mail the radio and the internet in some sort of a debate or conversation forum. I have been very impressed with the polical arena conversations that take place on WCSH. I have learned a lot and found them very interesting. We could probably afford that and it would add an element of truth and fairness to the circus that our elections have become.

The most important reason for keeping same day registration is that it works and there is no valid reason for not keeping what works. The most compelling reason given for changing it is that other states don't have same day registration; other states that have lower turnouts that is. Comparing voting to shopping is bogus. You shop 364 days a year but you vote 1 day a year. If you don't buy bread next Tues. you can buy it on Wed. If you miss your chance to vote next Tues it is gone forever. Basically we are being told we need to do this because Republicans want us to; plain and simple. Since it doesn't inconvenience them that much the rest of us shouldn't mind. That is the worst reason of all for changing anything. And to add insult to injury they tell us that if we object to this pointless bullying we must be lazy or unpatriotic. The real patriots will protect their right to vote and register on election day.