This week’s edition!
Letters
LETTER: School policies should be judged by jury
To the Editor:
It is generally agreed that a good education is the key to future success and wealth. What is forgotten is that the opposite is also true: an inadequate education leads to unemployment and poverty.
Accordingly, the signs are obvious—and so is the future. Our public schools are failing. But because the community is generally unaware, because the failure is denied by school officials, it will be difficult to confront and solve.
NECAP testing in October and the identified failure of Park Avenue, Sherwood Heights and Washburn Elementary Schools in Auburn and Farwell in Lewiston provided the warning signs. School officials admit to low test scores, but remain reluctant to admit schools are failing. Accordingly, they are unable or unwilling to identify the causative problems and therefore unable to solve them.
LETTER: 250 days to register to vote
To the Editor:
The Legislature passed a law that stated registration for voting on Election Day and the day before will not be allowed. The opponents of this law are proclaiming that thousands of voters will have their right to vote removed because of the legislature’s action. What happened to the other 250 days of the year that are available for voter registration?
If there was ever an opportunity for voter fraud to occur, it would be when the town election clerks are distracted by the management of the voting process and cannot thoroughly check the eligibility data of a potential voter.
LETTER: Washington “lets the robber barons rob”
To the Editor:
Apparently, State Treasurer Bruce Poliquin has spent so much of his life counting beans that he now is full of them. (“Treasurer: Maine is—thankfully—unlike Washington,” page 1, TCT, August 11, 2011.)
Granted, his assessment of the situation in Augusta, which constitutionally must balance its budget, seems to be essentially accurate, if bloated with praise for his own administration. I want to address two of Poliquin’s more gaseous talking points, made in last week’s piece about the imminent beatification of the LePage administration.
1. “This is the third year in a row that Washington spent at least $1 trillion more than it collected in tax revenues.” True, sadly. But the GOP’s answer is to rob from the poor, who are, we have been told and told, “given” too much already. Hence, the debt deal idea: cut military spending, cut programs like heating fuel assistance and Medicaid and raise all the boundaries on Social Security.
Op/Ed: What we can all learn from the TEA Party
By Tim Lajoie, Chairman
Lewiston Republican City Committee
The recent battle over raising the federal debt ceiling thrust the TEA Party into the limelight—and not in a good way.
Vice-President Joe Biden called the TEA Party terrorists. Democratic Leader Senator Harry Reid called the TEA Party “unfair and disconcerting.” The major news outlets blamed the TEA Party for holding up the debt ceiling deal because of their “extreme” positions.
Massachusetts Senator John Kerry suggested—apparently forgetting that we have a 1st Amendment right not only to speak out against our government, but also to peaceably confront it—that the news outlets stop talking about TEA Party members because he said their arguments were not credible.
Lost in all of this hyperbolic rhetoric is some valuable truth, truth that only the TEA Party is not willing to abdicate for the sake of political compromise. I submit that every American, for the good of the country, take a real hard look at what the TEA Party stands for and learn some lessons from them.
People’s Veto: Be careful what you wish for
To the Editor:
The legislative session just closed passed LD 1376 with Republican votes alone. This bill ended “same-day registration.” That is, it required voters to register no later than the previous Thursday and not on the same day that elections are held. Maine’s Secretary of State Charles Summers supported the legislation because he felt a flood of new registration on Election Day overburdens the town clerks.
The Republican State Committee Chairman, Charles Webster, backed LD 1376 on different grounds. He believes that “flooding” the polling place on Election Day makes it impossible for the town clerks to properly check the brand-new voters. It opens the door to fraudulent practices.
Democrats support same-day registration in the legislature and the Maine Usual Suspects Alliance, along with other progressive groups, have started a petition drive to put a People’s Veto of LD 1376 on the ballot. The progressives (people formerly known as “liberals”) accuse Republicans of trying to “disenfranchise” voters—the old, the young, the handicapped and students (especially students). Some tie this in with a national GOP disenfranchisement scheme.
LETTER: Voter fraud is “nothing new”
To the Editor:
Not only do our local college students have the ability to—and do—vote multiple times, many of them have been foolish enough to boast of their actions.
Due to its easy access, my classroom at Lewiston Middle School was used as a voting site for many years in the 1980s and ’90s. Students from the nearby college would arrive on Election Day and were allowed to register on site so they could cast a ballot in local and national elections.
LETTER: Mayor Gilbert is a Catholic in name only
To the Editor:
Thank you, Larry Gilbert, for showing us your true personality: “Why would a local mayor support Gay Marriage?” (“Mayor’s Corner,” TCT, July 14, 2011).
Week after week Gilbert preaches tolerance and understanding for others’ beliefs in front of any media outlet that will give him face time in an attempt to raise his public stature. But, like every sanctimonious liberal, they occasionally let their guard down and expose their true nasty personality.
Gilbert’s trashing of our Catholic Church, its clergy and the Catholic faithful went well over the line of civility. When one calls themselves a Christian, a Jew or a Muslim, it means they adhere to fundamental beliefs set forth in their religion.
LETTER: What would happen if our schools decided to be honest?
To the Editor:
Our public schools are failing, but our teachers, our school principals, our school superintendents and even our school boards assure us that things are not as bad as some believe and promise things will improve and all that is necessary is more time, more highly certified teachers, more parental involvement and more school funding.
Because they are experts, it is difficult for ordinary citizens to challenge them; for undereducated poor and welfare parents, the parents of the children most at risk, challenging or parental involvement is impossible.
But there is convincing evidence of school failure. Because public school officials lie, exaggerate or deny the failure of their schools, our national government mandates the employment of commonly agreed upon annual standardized testing to provide a means to compare schools and students.
LETTER: Reverend opposed to gay marriage
To The Editor:
The same way that lawyers, activists and politicians have public platforms, I believe that clergy has a voice and a place in public debate and should share the stage.
I am disgusted with the self-righteous and pompous attitude of Lewiston Mayor Larry Gilbert as of late. His recent pro-gay/pro-same-sex-marriage rally he held on the steps of City Hall was totally uncalled for. This flies in the face of voters of this state and this community.
In 2009 Mainers repealed the same-sex marriage law by a vote of 53 percent to 47 percent. If the mayor wants to be a gay rights advocate, let him do it on the front steps of his own home and not the steps of City Hall. He should not be using his position as mayor to trump his own ideas, agendas and self-interests.
LETTER: Glass houses and charter schools
To the Editor:
The Republican legislators are feeling pretty pleased with themselves. They have reduced the tax burden, restructured Maine’s health insurance system, taken vital steps to fund the state’s unfunded obligations, reformed welfare, rationalized our daft regulatory regime and paid the state’s debts to the hospitals.
Governor LePage is also pleased, but not nearly as pleased as most of the legislators. He had more ambitious goals on all these issues and will be persisting in his efforts to achieve them in the time remaining in his first term. I have a feeling that he really hopes to get the job done in a single term and then get clear of politics and politicians. (Nothing to support this, just a feeling I have.)
