Fox News stunt
I am very disappointed that the Bangor Daily News chose not to run the Doonesbury comic strip this week and instead replaced it with what must be fill-in panels. Even the Houston Chronicle, a newspaper in the very conservative state of Texas, is running the panels on its editorial pages.
Reproductive choice for women is being eroded and the people of Maine could be informed on the subject in a somewhat humorous, somewhat ironic manner, should the newspaper do its job. You run Doonesbury on the editorial page for a reason, so quit pulling a Fox News stunt with selective offerings and omissions.
Martha Williams
Bar Harbor
Save healthy funds
There is a public health crisis looming on the state’s horizon: significant cuts to the Fund for a Healthy Maine that would dismantle the local public health system infrastructure.
Here in Androscoggin County, we have our local version, Healthy Androscoggin, doing community-level prevention, policy and environmental change work. The members of the Lewiston Auburn Public Health Committee know firsthand the value that Healthy Androscoggin brings to our community.
The Healthy Androscoggin collaboration with the LAPHC was vital to the success of our recent bath salts forum, as well as last year’s bed bug forum. Healthy Androscoggin and the LAPHC have been able to respond to the public health needs of our two communities.
Many Maine residents may not be aware that the Healthy Maine Partnerships are the cornerstones of the structure and funding for work on local public health priorities which include work site wellness and childhood obesity prevention. Additionally, Healthy Maine Partnerships are the state’s local tobacco control system, working on tobacco prevention and cessation in every Maine town.
The ongoing work of Healthy Androscoggin is a vital contribution to the public health efforts of Lewiston and Auburn. On behalf of the LAPHC, I urge our communities and legislators to see the long-term value of prevention on the rising rates of health care costs to business and the community as a whole. Preserve the Fund for a Healthy Maine, the Healthy Maine Partnerships and our local public health infrastructure.
Phil Nadeau
Vice chairman
Lewiston Auburn Public Health Committee
Brewer residence requirement
I just read a story in the BDN about the Brewer City Council proposing to require that future school superintendents be residents of Brewer.
There is no mention of Councilor Larry Doughty’s reasoning behind his proposal, but all I can say is that I think it is ridiculous to limit the Brewer’s choices for a potential leader of our children’s educators, just to force some show of loyalty, or make a few extra tax dollars, in exchange for our children’s quality of education.
I hope the people of Brewer will vote this down by a landslide.
Steve Campbell
Brewer
Martha Williams:
“Reproductive choice for women is being eroded” What choices have been eroded? You’re free to kill as many unborn babies as ever.
If not showing offensive material is Fox like, so be it.
I don’t know whether to take you for a fool or a knave. A fool doesn’t realize that contraception is not abortion. A knave knows the difference, but pretends they are the same.
Are you stuttering?
Messaging. A stutterer never finishes the sentence until the stuttering stops. A messenger delivers the message and, as necessary, repeats it.
A fool doesn’t know the difference. A knave does, but feigns ignorance. Which are you, Bishop?
you are a true example of why we want plenty of contraceptives available, we certainly dont need any more of your genetics clouding the common sense of the public
Undertaxed, I sense that countless women have rejected your mating call. Think of the instant and repeated rejections you draw as nature’s very own contraception.
I would compare my charm and appearance with you any day
Your charm and appearance are right up there with your spelling and punctuation.
You appear to be fluent in three languages, English, sarcasm, and profanity. Conservatives do not understand the first, the second is over their heads, and the BDN does not allow the third. You have probably found you are wasting your time trying to explain anything to them. Nice try though..
you forgot ignorance, he speaks it so fruently how could you have forgotten it???
she
LOL
It’s fruentry.
real women wont give a liberal the time of day
Obviously, my speaking the truth has hurt you.
So how many children have you raised?
your are a die hard liberal, you wouldnt recognize the truth if it snuck up and bit you on the arse. Beck speaks the truth which is why you all hate him so
There’s no such thing as a “die hard liberal.” A die hard radical right wing teapublican – maybe?- more often than not. I’ve heard Murdoch’s clan and the Fab Four squabble about who is best and flush millions down the toilet while doing it. Beck wouldn’t know what truth is.
Right. Your toothless “real women” are too busy driving you right wingers to the truck pulls and getting you your next can of cheap beer while you switch the channels back and forth between FAKE NEWS and sports entertainment wrestling.
sorry to disappoint you. but full sets of teeth here, and too busy working trying to support all of the liberal programs to have much time for entertainment
What liberal programs? The one’s that support big oil and major corporations? The biggest liberal programs engineered by Bush and Co.
There are a lot of liberals in this world, despite your claim.
Sounds like you are a Phyllis Schlafly acolyte and darn proud of it !
But his genetics have enabled him to understand that you begin a sentence with a capital letter, don’t use run-on sentences, and end a sentence with a period.
sorry didnt realize you were the editor, and grading us on our quickly typed opinions
Are you advocating sterilization?
wow you are a true liberal,look at the twist you just tried to apply to my comment, so typical
Forced sterilization is historically a progressive position. Look up Margaret Sanger founder of Planned Parenthood.
To give you the benefit of a doubt, I re-read your testy little comment and the need to introduce condoms to prevent “your kind” from being born. Limbaugh said something similar about Rachael Maddow.
So you’re wrong. I didn’t twist your nasty little piece of scorn. I didn’t have to. And, so, I re-state my original question: What’s next? Sterilization? We’re not far from it. The radical right is to be watched and feared. Virginia is getting closer to it. Some years ago it was a practice down south to sterilize woman.
Aaaah, Saint chenard, I genuflect before your knowledge of the English language. Your arrogant personality is another matter.
Arrogant? Like asking someone if they stutter?
Simply a reaction to multiple postings of the same sentence. Sometimes as people get older they wander the hallways repeating the same words over and over as if they are trying to grasp their meaning or put them in the proper context.
Your simple reaction is just as arrogant as the behavior you complain about.
“Reproductive choice” for women is not a good” choice” for our unborn children. Simply a euphemism for killing them.
you should adopt all unwanted children then. oh that’s right, after they’re born they’re not children, they’re ‘welfare bums’ to be scorned, mocked and starved.
It is not the children we hold responsible for their being born into the world. No one holds any ill will towards the children. It is the irresponsible adults who bring the children into the world that I and many others have issues with. The vast majority of these children’s parents have zero clue about parenting, and the worst part is they don’t want a clue. To these adults it is nothing more then the results of sexual activity. I will continue to take issue with adults who procreate and yet take no responsibility, and expect the taxpayers to raise their families. Having children demands much more responsibility then driving a car, yet most of these parents we continue to discuss care more about their cars, and take better care of them then they do their kids.
Fair enough. But what do you want to be done with the children that *are* born?
I’ll take them.
I’m guessing you, and the individual who likes your comment, have pretty big homes and considerable resources.
There is much suffering among the little children of America. The best option would be some type of children’s home. a place were unwanted, abused, and neglected kids could find a safe and loving environment.There are many successful homes today were children are raised by other then their parents and grow up with love and proper care, and turn out to be great adults. Even if some of these holmes were government run it would be way cheaper then the wasted money we throw at broken families.
I don’t know whether to take you for a fool or a knave. A fool doesn’t realize that contraception is not abortion. A knave knows the difference, but pretends they are the same.
Another liberal who thinks he/she is the smartest person in the room Sounds to me like you trying to quote Jonathan Swift nice try meathead
It’s curious that conservatives so often feel so intellectually threatened. Your fellow posters vote 8 to 1 in my favor. Don’t give Swift credit for a turn of phrase coined by Ben Jonson.
I noticed another curiosity. Some liberal posters on here seem to hold conservative posters to a higher standard than liberal posters when it comes to grammar. I have noticed many poorly written posts from the liberal camp, but strangely enough you, and the other grammar gurus, don’t feel the need to tell them what complete idiots they are. Are you so insecure in your liberalism that you are afraid to admit when one of your fellow travelers makes a mistake?
You count “likes”???
Is that how you get your personal affirmation? Attacking people’s spelling, heartfelt beliefs and counting likes???
That is pretty pitiful.
Such is the liberal lifestyle.
says nopark, as he posts neocon bull 24/7.
Liberal, liberal, liberal, liberal, bla bla bla bla…
You should relax some, and enjoy a little liberalization of your restrictive government regimen.
Tough crowd, these liberals !
Yours is a ridculous extremist argument. While abortion should be as rare as we can make it through contraception and education, your party needs to stay right out of people’s private lives, hospital rooms, and bedrooms. You say you don’t like big government, but you love them in our private lives telling us who to marry, controlling reproductive choices, and on and on. If you are opposed to abortion, don’t have one. But you extremists want to jail women, nurses, and doctors over it.
You are in the minority on this, and your party will suffer heavily come November for its sickening attack on American women.
Thankfully, women already uniting and fighting back at state governments which are forcing women to undergo invasive non-medical examinations of their bodies. In Maine, it is only a matter of time before the republicans and their tea party pushers try to make it a law here.
Given your oft stated views, I would respectfully suggest you drop the “freedom” part of your name. You don’t seem to really believe in it.
Most women are appalled that the government of states like Virginia, feel compelled to order invasive non-medical examinations of their bodies.
Why are we talking birth control and the pill, used by many women to counteract other medical problems, besides preventing conception and disease?
After three years of non-stop attacks upon the president, teapublicans supported by their propaganda wiz – Rupert the Liar- have run short of dirty ammo. Anything goes as the economy grows, and the teapublicans continue to sow seeds of hate.
Ms. Williams, you are absolutely right. If the BDN can cover the Republican’s jihad against contraception, they should certainly, on the editorial page, be able to print a cartoon that exposes the hypocrisy and irrationality of the party.
First of all, there is no Republican jihad against contraception. This whole fiasco started with Obama and the Dems imposing on the rights of Catholic organizations to choose what they will and won’t offer in their insurance plans. When Obama discovered the egg on his face, he quickly changed course, and the left wing media idiots immediately went into OPM (Obama Protection Mode) and started blaming the right for wanting to keep women from getting contraceptives. It was a lie from the get-go, but they ran with it, and (no surprise here), Obama went along with it because it helps him politically.
Now the original sin, perpetrated by Obama, has been covered over up and the Republicans, Limbaugh and Fox News are being blamed.
No one on the Republican side is against women getting contraceptives, so quit spreading that lie. Limbaugh went off and said some very bad things, but he’s apologized. Trouble with that is, while Maher, Schultz, Maddow, Matthews, Biden, Waters, Letterman, Frank, Dodd, Schumer, Clinton, Reid, Pelosi, Obama, and many more lefties get to say whatever they want and are automatically forgiven, no one is forgiving Rush. That just goes to show that if the left didn’t have a double-standard, they wouldn’t have a standard at all.
As for Fox News, it is the only channel that can be trusted. And that’s why the left hates it so much.
Lefties don’t hate Fox News because it can be trusted. They hate Fox News because it doesn’t spread the lies they want told. This whole “left vs right” thing is a farce, a sham, an illusion.
Rupert Murdoch has the biggest propaganda machine in the world. The Brits are dismantling some of it. It seems when a little girl was kidnapped, Rupert’s “journalists” made false phone calls to the mother informing her that her daughter was alive and well. The girl was murdered.
The U.S. is looking into the American wing of this hate machine to see whether similar cases evolved around the 9/ll tragedies.
Why anyone listens or watches a station that breeds hate and spews lies 24-hours a day is beyond a rational person’s mind. Murdoch’s propagandists come the same cut of cloth that Joseph Goebbels spun in fascist Germany.
Which is why I don’t believe everything that’s published simply because it’s published, left or right. Each side works their own agenda, being different methods, but working towards the same goal.
Intuition cuts through the blather.
Human nature, really. They just want more power and that’s all there is to it. No huge secret. Greedy powerful people have always sought control of the world, trying to be that benevolent dictator, but always turning into a tyrannical atrocity.
Reading your piece it sounds like something that Murdoch station would broadcast on orders of its propaganda chief.
Lies and hate.
Please, indicate the lies and hate.
There isn’t enough room or time to get into it. However, tune into Murdoch’s One of four, or more, and if you don’t hear something hateful about Obama within a minute, I’ll bet they’ve gone senile.
Obama has been the target of hate since he was elected president. It is on account of him being an African-American – nothing more.
There’s lots of room and time to write, “Oh, you didn’t lie. I just didn’t like what you said so I called you a liar and hater.”
Ummm I can’t recall a President ever being elected that didn’t meet resistance coming out of the gate. Hate by the opposition always follows a President.
EJ Parsons has been caught lying on this forum many times. He says that he is not a homophobe, yet this forum is full of his recorded statements stating his homphobia. He claims he is not a bigot but again, his statements on this forum is evidence of his bigotry. Now he claims that a war on women does not exist. EJ is not only out of touch with reality but he also is so ideology driven that facts are not part of thinking. Each time he makes an erronous statement he is asked to present facts. Oddly enough EJ disappears or changes the subject.
EJ Parsons – the poster child for the worst of humanity.
“To those who claim President Obama made contraceptive coverage an issue to cover up the bad economy, the Greek implosion, the war in Syria and volcanic eruptions in Iceland be aware that recommendation for coverage came from the United States Preventive Services Task Force. They researched cost effective medications and services to be covered by the Affordable Care Act. Immunization of children and women’s contraceptives decrease health care costs by preventing diseases in children and unwanted pregnancies in women. Insurance companies want these included in the Affordable Care Act. This was not some dastardly plot to distract the public.
The Catholic bishops brought the coverage of contraceptives to the attention of the media and kept it there even after a compromise had been found. Senator Issa attracted media attention in blocking women from testifying at his hearing on the constitutionality of birth control coverage in hospitals, universities, soup kitchens etc run by a church. Mr. Limbaugh’s criticism of Ms Fluke whose testimony would probably have gone unnoticed by the press had Mr. Limbaugh not spent three days smearing her kept the media pot boiling
The bishops, Mr. Issa and Mr. Limbaugh created this issue and Republicans have intensified media attention with bills aimed at restricting women’s reproductive health decisions. This is not a Democratic plot to make Republicans look unintelligent or mentally unbalanced. Republicans appear to be doing this to themselves.”
how much does the RNC pay you to post your bull EJ?
Probably not as much as the DNC is paying you.
Whatever they are paying him it is not money well-spent.
Please consider the Arizona law working its way through the Arizona Legislature that would allow an employer to fire an employee who uses contraceptives. Please consider the Blunt Amendment which would have allowed any employer to refuse to provide contraception coverage if they were morally opposed to it. The latter got the vote of every Republican Senator other than Senator Snowe. Jihad and crusade are similar in meaning. I sense you might be more comfortable with the latter label.
Please explain what business any employer has in deciding what medications his employees purchase? Were I to hire you should I be able to fire you if you used Viagra?
It is sad to see that the Catholic Church has absolutely no credibility. They should stay out of the peoples’ lives. Here is the latest from the Church.
‘Religious institutions have constitutional protections, but they are not above the law. Unfortunately, that has not stopped the Roman Catholic Church and other religious groups from arguing that the First Amendment shields them from civil lawsuits for negligent supervision and retention of employees who sexually abuse children.’
“WARNING ” This message is rated “C” for conservative minds only.
MARTHA,
Real women watch and enjoy Fox News.
PHIL,
One spending bandwagon after another. Do you really want a healthy Maine? Then I suggest you share what being a responsible Mainer is all about. It’s about giving up the concept that government owes me something, that I’m entitled to something for nothing. Get the message out and Maine will get healthy.
SUSAN,
If the phone records verified she was texting then she was, and if not your theory may be correct. Either way the driver was not being responsible.
Fox News is FAKE NEWS and nothing but lies and right wing corporatist propaganda, and you darn well know it. I think one national study has found that the collective IQ’s of those who watch FAKE NEWS is considerabley lower than the rest of the population. I would not doubt that for a second. The same low information low intelligence crowd that would actually waste time listening to that disgusting waste of space lying druggie college dropout numbskull blowhard Rush Limpmind. As to being against government programs, then I expect you will refuse to accept any social security or medicare benefits and that you will never use the post office, public roads or sidewalks or bridges, that you will never go near a public park, school, or arena, and that if your house is burning down or being robbed you won’t call the public cops or the public fire department. I also expect that you will lobby hard to reduce the bloated military industrial complex budget, the very height of socialism, and that you will lobby hard to end the endless tax giveaways to the oil companies and other large corporations owned by your right wing corporate masters. Then you won’t have to risk being called a right wing hyprocrite. PS: Thank you so much for your party’s national war on women. I can’t wait until November when your party is utterly crushed at the voting booth. The Republican Party sells crazy, and Mainers and Americans aren’t buying any more of it.
If Ed Schultz takes a quick right turn, you’re gonna’ break your neck.
judging from the content of most of your posts your neck was broken a long time ago and the brain has died.
I thought the lefties weren’t allowed to judge. Or is that they tell others not to do to them? Interesting. There’s that old double standard again.
I’ll judge anything I please sonny. you included.
Sonny? You must be ancient. If so, you should be wiser than you seem to be.
We need more of Ed’. Gives the hypocriptic teapublicans a toe lift each night and day.
Murdoch’ stations are filled with hate and lies.
Since Obama was elected president, it has been the sole goal of Hannity, O’Reilly, Dobbs, Perino, Kruphammer, Palin, Morris, Palin and the rest of the Murdoch’s propaganda staff to twist everything into a hate message against the president of the United States.
Visitors from other countries are appalled that Americans have descended to such a despicable low because the president is an African American.
I haven’t noticed visitors from other countries petitioning obama to lead their nation. Could there be a valid reason we don’t want him at the helm, besides the typical liberal comeback ” racist “?
Conservatives in Other countries – true conservatives – are shocked at what they see and hear the Koch supported media spew 24 hours a day.
The only valid reason you don’t want him at the helm is because he is black. I’ve read numerous posts here and other places where he is constantly castigated. Nothing I’ve read holds water. The attacks invariably end or begin with accusations that he is a communist, a socialist, a Marxist, a Muslim. Many seem lost about what to call him with their next scornful breath.
Pretty sad.
After reading a daily smear of Obama bashing, I thoroughly enjoyed your frontal attack on these hypocrites. It was as refreshing as today. Top o’ the mornin’ t’ ya, as I lift me glass of Guinness to y’.
Women of Maine need to be ready when the state pushes for similar legislation as pushed in Virginia. No self-respecting woman would ever allow such miserable practices to be performed on her.
amco’s posts are rated C, for closed minds only.
Re: Martha—I don’t know any real women who enjoy being lied to, what kind of women do you know? Are they air heads or what?
I agree with Ms. Williams. What was the reasoning behind the BDN’s decision not to carry the Doonesbury strip other than editorial cowardice? Anybody that actually makes it to the editorial pages of any newspaper today ought to be able to handle controversy. An explanation underlying the decision by the BDN would have been the least the paper owed its readers.
Other papers simply put the strip in the editorial section, I don’t know why that couldn’t have been done here. And isn’t it funny how some commenters screech about BDN being a liberal rag, yet they have their letters applauding women being called sl*ts and gays being compared to pedophiles frequently?
The Bangor Daily DOES run the strip on the editorial pages.
But not this time.
Seeing as Doonesbury is printed on the editorial page of the BDN, I really don’t understand their reluctance to print or ban this strip. It only got my curiosity up and I went in search of the censored strips on line. Some other papers have also censored the strip and others, some in Texas, have opted to run them on their editorial page and have a discussion about the contorversial strips. The second group are apparently adult enough to be willing to discuss this in an open and honest way.
Yea Martha!
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/assets/pdf/A2186481313.PDF – Doonesbury, March 12-17, 2012 (PDF)
Joshua 11:11 (KJV)
Thanks for the link
I’ve always thought the BDN was fairly courageous about their editorial positions. I’m sorry to see you didn’t have the courage to post the Doonesbury strips that could have lead to a discussion of women’s reproductive choices and Republican’s strange interest in curtailing them. This is a current and important subject to 50% of your readers. Why censor it?
That lie will not go over in November. The truth is the Catholic church or any other church who does not want to pay for your birth control or your abortion shouldn’t have to. Buy your own pills, buy your own condems, and if your going to kill babies you shouldn’t be asking someone else to pay for it.
You really think independents are so stupid that they will actually beleave that republicans want to control womens bodies? Total lie and totally absurd.
If Republican sreally have no interest in women’s reproductive decisions and what consenting adults decide to do they have a very funny way of showing it.
Martial Law??
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/03/16/executive-order-national-defense-resources-preparedness
In peacetime AND national emergency