What started as a workingman’s holiday, Labor Day’s turned into an annual checkpoint for assessing the health of the American workforce. Wonkish assessments abound, as every policy analyst and economic assessor produces figures decrying, or applauding, the employment landscape.Here’s what we’re told, in 2007:Americans work fewer hours per week than 50 years ago (barely). We […]

Rumford Selectman Frank DiConzo, who asked a firefighter to “step outside” during a recent meeting about department overtime, says his statement was not intended to be a threat. “What I saw was blatant disrespect of the board’s authority and its responsibility to be fiscally responsible with the taxpayers’ money,” DiConzo wrote to the Sun Journal, […]

Death by a thousand small cuts is still a death, but it doesn’t send the message that an old-fashioned guillotining in the town square does. Nor is it as crowd-pleasing, as nothing enthralls more than an overfed bourgeoisie getting the chop in a populist uprising.Thankfully, we live in more civilized times. But the thirst for […]

For an agency dedicated to compassionate care, Richardson Hollow showed a cold, calculating side by its after-hours slashing of benefits for dozens of employees on Aug. 24.By withholding this announcement until late that Friday, the state’s largest in-home provider of mental health services left workers baffled and distraught. This tactic was clipped straight from the […]

Memo to Gov. John Baldacci: Don’t stop consolidation with county jails.On Thursday, the governor released his proposal to consolidate county jails under the Maine Department of Corrections. Four jails – including those in Franklin and Oxford counties – would close, amid promised savings of $10 million in the first year alone.Areas touted for efficiency are […]

It’s forgivable to be unaware of William Walcott.The three-term representative from downtown Lewiston, who resigned Tuesday, was the antithesis of the flashy politician. No bombast, no grandstanding, no scandals. A lunch-pail representative, to coin a phrase.Which makes it unsurprising that Walcott, whose career involves caring for developmentally disabled adults, has put his work first. He […]

In 1949, Barbara Yeaton picked up a pen and wrote her first news report. “I just started doing it,” she said 50 years later. And she continued for 55 years, retiring at the age of 89.Yeaton, a correspondent for the Lewiston Daily Sun, the Lewiston Evening Journal – and later, the Sun Journal – died […]

Only a delay could make a convicted dogfighter seem more sincere than the U.S. Attorney General.Michael Vick, the disgraced Atlanta Falcons quarterback, stood behind a dais Monday and took responsibility for his abhorrent behavior: financing organized dogfighting, and participating in and condoning animal slaughter. Alberto Gonzales, the disgraced attorney general, also stood behind a lecturn, […]

Using the “dance partner” analogy for school consolidation really doesn’t work, if enough partners decide to dance alone. With the state’s deadline for notices of intent looming this week, many local districts are deciding a solo performance is better than a shotgun duet.Auburn is going alone. So are SAD 17 and Lewiston. These larger districts […]

On the whole, the legislated obsolescence of analog television is a fine idea. Most Americans (about 92 million, or 85 percent of the viewing populace) subscribe to satellite or cable services anyway, while the remaining 15 percent – about 16 million people – are still watching over-the-air.Abandoned frequencies will be earmarked for public safety or […]