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On Friday, Lisa Ronan and her family got a little closer to justice when Gov. Paul LePage signed a bill making it a crime to drive a large commercial vehicle while on methadone.

Ronan, who lives in Gray, was widowed in 2009 when her 44-year-old husband, Shannon Ronan, was killed just before Christmas.

A UPS driver, Ronan had stopped his vehicle on Route 302 in Naples, waiting to make a left turn, when he was hit from behind by a driver operating a bucket-type utility truck. The impact forced Ronan’s delivery truck into oncoming traffic. He was killed when he was struck head-on by a tractor-trailer carrying bulk propane.

The driver who hit Ronan from behind was using methadone; he was never charged in connection with the accident.

After her husband died, Lisa Ronan learned Maine law does not prohibit methadone users from driving commercial trucks intrastate, which is contrary to federal law.

She set out to fix that.

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Cheers to her.

And, now, thanks to her, Mainers have some assurance in knowing that drivers behind the wheel of heavy-duty commercial vehicles are not using pain-relieving synthetic narcotics.

The penalty under the new law is mild, with a conviction punishable by up to $1,000 in fines and/or six months in a county jail. But, it’s something.

If it means no other family has to endure what the Ronan family has, then it’s everything.

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What’s up with networks skewing live, televised events?

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On Monday, as viewers tuned to CBS to watch Boston’s Fourth of July fireworks display, they were treated to expansive views of rockets exploding behind the State House, Quincy Market and Fenway Park. It was, according to the Boston Globe, spectacular. And, it was fake.

CBS videographers went about the city weeks before and shot nighttime footage of those landmarks and, on Independence Day, the fireworks launched from a barge in the Charles River were edited into these images.

But, you can’t gimmick Bostonians. They complained, as they should have. Cheers to them.

The show’s executive producer, Boston-area businessman David Mugar, told the Globe the footage had been altered, but he didn’t see a problem with that because the fireworks were “entertainment” and not “news.”

CBS didn’t offer that information during the broadcast, misleading viewers who thought they were watching live programming.

Last month, NBC also displayed a curious editing decision when it deleted the words “under God” from the Pledge of Allegiance as it was being recited by schoolchildren Sunday at golf’s U.S. Open.

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The children were reciting the pledge as images of the nation’s capital flashed on the screen behind them. NBC broadcaster Dan Hicks told The Associated Press it was the network’s intention to capture the patriotism of “our national championship being held in our nation’s capital for the third time.”

NBC called the decision to edit out “under God” regrettable. Seems like a lean word for revising our national pledge.

In Boston, CBS was wrong to edit the fireworks display to make it more grand.

And, in Bethesda, NBC was wrong to delete words from this nation’s Pledge of Allegiance.

When it’s live, let’s keep it real.

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The opinions expressed in this column reflect the views of the ownership and editorial board.

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