Loosen your corset
The three young people who scrambled buck naked into Moosehead Lake for a free roast beef sandwich should have been given mugs of cold beer and blueberry pie with ice cream for dessert – all free. They remind me of my crazy friends from that wonderful carefree time of my life.
Their cockamamie prank sounds exactly like what my cockamamie friends would have done. I would have been right with them. Of course I would not have dropped my panties and dived in. I am way too prudish. But I would have egged them on and I would have been at the ready with towels when they climbed back on the barge. And we all would have laughed. Ah, the free spirit of youth.
So loosen your too tight corsets and unstuff your shirts and laugh. The world needs more harmless cockamamiousness. And, I am old enough to be the grandmother of all of those young people.
Penny Lehman
Hampden
···
Disturbing photo
Did we really have to have that disturbing photo in Tuesday’s [Sept. 23] of the dead cow moose being elevated by a rope to be weighed in Houlton? And that upsetting photo appeared next to a column with the headline “Pit bulls maul dog in Carmel.” Both the photo and the story about the pit bulls and the unfortunate German shepherd that was attacked were, to put it mildly, distressing.
In the future, could we perhaps have a little less jubilation about the opening of moose-hunting season and fewer distasteful photographs to accompany it?
Ralph Pettie
Blue Hill
···
Vote for Schneider
Our state senator Elizabeth M. Schneider not only shows up to help out at events like the fundraiser at the Knights of Columbus Hall for the food cupboard, she also jumps into action when asked to solve problems.
There were some rules which hurt nonprofit organizations when holding card games which help us raise money for things such as clothes and food for the elderly and others who need our help. I called Elizabeth to ask if there was anything she could do to change the law so our ability to raise money for our community was not hurt. She listened to the problem and worked hard on legislation to fix the situation. She got at the problem and has helped make it much easier for us and organizations statewide to help people in the community.
These are difficult times and we need Sen. Schneider with her strength to advocate for us. She works hard and spends time not only in Augusta on our behalf, but she spends time with us, too.
Ballots will be available in about a week to vote absentee and Nov. 4 is the day of the election. I hope everyone in Senate District 30 from Veazie to Orono, Old Town, Howland, Enfield, Lincoln, Lee to Kingman and the rest of the towns in our district get out and vote for Sen. Schneider.
Melvin Voisine
Lincoln
···
McCain and gimmicks
John McCain has more gimmicks than a bad sales pitch. After picking Sarah Palin in a move that was as purely political as possible, McCain decided to “suspend” his campaign to work with Congress on the bailout plan. Is this the same McCain who just months ago told us that he really didn’t know all that much about the economy? What, then, does he have to contribute to such a convoluted situation?
McCain worked on economic issues in the past. The problem is that he spent his time on these issues arguing for deregulation of just about everything. Deregulation is probably the single largest contributor to the current financial debacle we find ourselves in, not to mention a number of scandals, such as Enron and WorldCom, that were largely the result of deregulated markets. In the case of Enron and WorldCom, the markets were energy and telecommunications. In the current situation, the deregulation of financial markets is largely to blame. Fannie and Freddie are now being probed by the FBI in potential mortgage fraud cases. What have been the benefits of the deregulation McCain argued for?
Now McCain has backed away from his deregulation stance, but if he’s just figuring it out now, at 72 I have to say that he’s an extremely slow learner. Despite this change of heart, he still advocates a tax policy that would probably sound the death knell of our economy. We don’t need another president who figures out the right way to do something after he’s already done it wrong.
Joshua Cyr
Bangor
···
Palin as VP scary
Rosalie Johnson’s comments [Sept. 25 BDN] would be all well and good if Sarah Palin were going to be responsible for White House day care, or if she were coming to the White House to bake cookies. However, her position requires her to travel the world talking about U.S. policies, and would put her a heartbeat away from the presidency. How scary is that?
John W. Graf
Abbot
···
Bashing Bush-Cheney
Jonathan Worthley seems to be out of touch with reality when he claims George Bush has made this country safe since 9-11. (BDN Sept. 17) We are no more safe today than we were before 9-11. For Bush and Cheney, Homeland Security existed only as an occasion for plunder, payoffs and posturing.
A study made recently by two nonprofit journalism organizations found that Bush, Cheney and other top administration officials issued hundreds of false statements about the national threat after 9-11, and led the nation to war with Iraq on the basis of false information that culminated with military actions on March 19, 2003. As a result, each week more U.S. soldiers are killed in action while suicide bombs and airstrikes destroy the lives of hundreds of Iraqi citizens with no end in sight.
The U.S. is now on the road to fiscal ruin with a $9.7 trillion deficit caused mainly by the Bush-Cheney war and passage of the $700 billion rescue package to stabilize shaky financial markets pushes the deficit even higher.
A recent poll has 76 percent of Americans saying the country is going in the wrong direction.
I consider the Bush-Cheney administration to be the worst in this country’s history, a failure at home and abroad and financially corrupt.
Dee C. Brown Jr.
Bangor
···
Bailout takes the cake
Of all the projects to come out of an imprudent administration, the $700 billion bailout takes the cake. It would exhaust the nation’s credit for a pile of questionable loans.
The nation has far more pressing needs to address, neglected for years in energy and transportation.
The great danger in a federal bankruptcy — the product of huge deficits and bailouts. As long as we need foreign oil, we need to protect the nation’s credit.
Rejecting the buyout would have sent a vote of confidence to Wall Street in its ability to recover on its own — and it would emerge from the present turmoil the stronger.
Once voice of reason in Congress would bring this exorbitant buy-up down.
Rick Beckjord
Sullivan