Make your voice heard
Now that the elections are over, it is my hope that our newly elected and re-elected state and federal representatives will waste no time in focusing on the issues of concern to older Mainers and their families.
Issues such as financial and health security are of paramount importance to many of our older residents. The next Congress will be making decisions about the future of Social Security and Medicare.
There are many options likely to be considered in 2013 that will affect the long-term solvency of both of these programs. Now the work truly begins, and I am looking forward to hearing how campaign promises will turn into meaningful action.
Here in Maine, the 126th Legislature will need to find ways to balance the state budget without cutting programs that are so important to some of our most at-risk residents. As we head into the coldest months of the year, the challenges for older Mainers will undoubtedly grow. We need to protect our long-term care services and supports and strengthen consumer protections, so Mainers can stay in their own homes and communities as they age.
I hope our representatives will reach across the aisle and work together to find solutions that make sense now and for the future. I encourage all Mainers to play an active role in watching how things unfold in the months and years ahead and making sure their voices are heard throughout.
Meredith Tipton
AARP Executive Council
South Portland
Limit robocalls
I lost count of the number of calls I either didn’t answer (thank you, caller ID) or hung up on if there wasn’t a voice in my ear in one second. Maine has some laws in effect for robocalls, but they obviously don’t go far enough.
I urge (and you should urge) our Maine Legislature to take a bold, nonpartisan step, by joining the growing number of states that require automated calls to be initiated by a live operator who must obtain your permission before starting the recorded message. This will make robocall campaigns much more expensive but not get in the way of “free speech” concerns. And if your argument against such a move is that “well then, only super-PACs will be able to afford robocalls,” let me introduce you to movetoamend.org. The Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision can be reversed. It’s time to move on this, don’t you think?
John Greenman
Old Town
New state law
I was surprised at the start of the school year when our superintendent instructed the entire staff on the new state law LD 1838, which was designed to insure safe restraint and seclusion procedures for children with severe behavioral disabilities. The rule change to Chapter 33 expands the law beyond the special education population to include all students. The law specifically states that school personnel are not allowed to lay a hand on a student if their actions are verbal in nature or if they are destroying school property.
I am offended as a school employee, a parent and a taxpayer. This law is undermining civility in our schools and is causing the erosion of authority of school personnel to keep our schools safe. Students can now engage in inappropriate outbursts. Students do not have to listen to authority figures and use basic forms of courtesy. Students can destroy any school property for any amount of money, and school personnel are not to interfere. The only recourse to any of the above is to call the police.
This appalling situation arises as an unintended consequence of bad legislation. When the majority of the student body is placed in fear for personal safety, school property is subject to destruction, the education process is disrupted and personnel are subjected to abuse, constitutional rights are grossly infringed upon.
LD 1838 may be the law, but that does not make it right.
Charlotte E. Violette
PCES Librarian
Wellington
Omitted obits
In light of several recent tragic deaths in Hancock County, it saddens me to see the obituaries omitted from local newspapers, due to the expense involved with putting an obituary in print. For several years I have wondered why this is not offered through the newspapers or funeral homes as a community service. An obituary is a person’s last tribute, a memorial to the person’s life. I feel it would be appropriate for our local papers to give back to the community that supports them. The last thing a loved one left behind needs to worry about is whether they can afford to post an obituary.
For some of the population, we are fortunate that news travels quickly through cyberspace. However a large population still relies for information exclusively through newspapers. I would like to see this issue in a reader survey or opinion poll.
Lisa Patten
Franklin
Doonesbury boycott
Perhaps the BDN’s decision to place Doonesbury on the editorial page is a good one; it is certainly no longer a comic strip. I have read Doonesbury since Gary Trudeau drew it for the Yale Daily News. While I am generally 180 degrees out of phase with Trudeau politically, I have always found him funny, even when we disagree. No more.
Over the last few months, his blatant bias against Republican Mitt Romney and conservatives in general has been disgusting. His inaccurate posturing and attribution of racial bias to efforts by states to control voter fraud, his mean-spirited and insulting caricatures of Romney’s religion and his generally snarky treatment of anyone who does not worship President Barack Obama disqualifies him as a comic strip artist.
It is a shame that a talent such as his has gone off the deep end in this way. I will no longer read him, and I hope others who recognize his deviation from good taste will also boycott the strip and will so inform the newspapers that carry it.
Donald Lodge
Southwest Harbor
King’s independence
Sen.-elect Angus King now says he’s affiliated with the Democrats in the Senate. Talk about changing canoes in mid stream. Independent, is there more than one meaning for the same word? Tell me you couldn’t see this coming.
Paul Worsaa
Bangor
Ms. Tipton: a gentle reminder of who put the Ds back in power? Message received. Also, I like your national “let’s not be hasty” campaign when it comes to changes to Medicare. You’ve held a gun to both parties heads, lest they do anything you don’t like to Medicare. Now that something must be done, and the pressure is on, NOW you say “don’t be too hasty?” You’ve had your chance to be part of a constructive conversation, and it’s too late for that…your campaign money won’t save you from the fiscal cliff.
The fiscal bump has little to do with Medicare and nothing to do with Social Security. Applying the Medicare tax to capital gains income will solve any short or long term Medicare funding problems. That is far preferable to cutting benefits.
Donald Lodge, is calling Obama, the Anti-Christ, or Messiah nice?
We still have freedom of speech in this country, just because you don’t like what, Gary has to say, doesn’t make freedom of speech any less. I don’t like Fox News, so I just don’t watch it.
Mr. Lodge, Doonesbury still tickles the funny bones of most BDN readers. If we cannot make fun of the powerful, we have lost our sense of humor. Would you have censored Will Rogers or Mark Twain?
That you think such a thing as “voter fraud” exists tells me that you are untethered from reality.
Don’t read the strip if you don’t like it. Don’t try to prevent others from reading it.
Were you more attentive, you would remember strips critical of President Obama. Look for them in the future.
Mr. Lodge, it is incongruous to expect political cartoonists of all people to sanitize their message when all media is saturated to overflowing with bloviators. I find Gary Trudeau to be one of the least harmful.
Gary Trudeau has met the enemy, and it is himself.
Ms. Patten, I agree. I was surprised and dismayed at the cost of publishing an obituary. Instead we set up a free remembrance blog on the internet which has worked out very well. There are many sites that offer free blogs. We use Google blogspot.
Mr Lodge: Those who voted for President Obama do not “worship” him. What an ignorant remark . They voted for him as they felt he was the much better person to be president . You might have voted for Romney. Does that mean you worship that person? I doubt it. This hyperbole is getting old. Is that all you’ve got?! It sounds pathetic on your part.
Trudeau has never been conservative. No one is forced to read any particular cartoon strip or forced to read anything. We have choice; isn’t it great? I like Dilbert myself.
Charlotte E. Violette, good letter. There is a trend in our schools to only control our children with mood altering drugs. If a child shows any hyperactivity they are quickly diagnosed with ADD or ADHD or one or more of the other alphabet conditions. They are then prescribed one or more mood altering drugs. They are not stupid, it takes them a very short period of time to learn that they can tell teachers and other adults in the schools to go ‘F’ themselves with no worry about any repercussions.
We are not doing these children any favors. When they go out to the real world that awaits them after they go through the school system, their employers, if they can find employment, will not put up with that kind of behavior. They will have a very difficult time addapting to the reallity that awaits them.
Totally agree. There is such a thing as over the top political correctness and instituting gutless policies for sake of not offending.
Unfortunately they will fit right in. Government will have the hands of business tied behind their backs because they have to “accommodate” every little thing. The real hard workers will have an even tougher time.
How is it these children have in their minds that it is OK to act that way to authority figures or anyone else for that matter, to begin with? It all starts in the home, alphabet or no alphabet diagnoses. A diagnosis shouldn’t/doesn’t excuse rude behavior–at least it doesn’t in my home. It’s the parents responsibility to teach kids about respect. That lesson begins as a toddler, not a teenager. By then it is too late!
I totally agree. The problem being is that the schools have had their hands tied by the fear of being sued over the slightest offense. Common sense has gone out the window. Parents aren’t even asked to be parents anymore.
Donald Lodge, would you be hapier if we ran a strip that parroted Rush Limbaugh talking points?
Mr. Lodge, Do you seriously believe that the efforts by so many Republican governors and legislators–including Maine–to reduce opportunities for pre-election registration and voting and for the imposition of voter ID requirements are NOT motivated by bias toward people of color and, as in the case of Maine, white potential voters who would also likely vote Democratic? The Doonesbury cartoons on “Jim Crow” were factually accurate, if that term can be applied to cartoons, and you must not read or listen to serious news accounts to think otherwise. Hence the appropriateness of the strip on editorial pages in many newspapers.
I agree on the obituaries…i did one for my dad when he died a couple years ago but didn’t write one for my mom. i regret it but i figured it was an expense i didn’t need
John Greenman- There is a cure for robo calls and telemarketers. It is called a cell phone. I have not had a land line phone for ten years now and have not received any robo calls. The first time I do, the cell phone will get shut off too.
It’s the principle. I still have a land line and though caller Id identified the spam coming in (which prompted an answer and hang up), ones privacy should not be able to be invaded like that. There should be laws against phone spam, just like there are laws against email spam.
I’d say the laws against spam are not very effective. My girlfriend emptied over 800 spam emails last week and she is back up to 500 already. It is all an invasion of privacy as far as I am concerned.
Everyone saw King’s decision to caucus with the Democrats coming Paul, though what I think many fail to understand is that caucusing with one or the other in this lovely two party system of ours is essentially unavoidable. It does not compromise his independence.
Independent does not mean voting 50/50 – it means one votes with their conscience, not a party. There are two scales to consider – political persuasion and partisanship.
I do picture King voting with the Democrats more often than with the Republicans though.
I’ve no doubt about that either.
I sure hope so. I do not want the America those in control of the Rs seem to want.
Donald Lodge: You claim you’ve read Doonesbury for years and years, yet only now have you realized he isn’t too thrilled with the right wing. Did you only recently uncover you’ve been holding the paper upside-down as well?
As far as Trudeau abusing the right wing goes, maybe if they didn’t do so many mindless Charlie Webster-esque screwups, then Trudeau would have to look elsewhere for humor fodder.
Are you also making the same complaint of the various Washington Post editorials who constantly bash the left? Of course not…The right consistently ignores, bashes, or refuses to believe and person or position which doesn’t fall lock-step in their party line. Global warming, anyone?
Sorry Donny-boy, but thanks for again proving the right-wing stereotype of, “if I disagree with it, it doesn’t exist” is more than just a stereotype. Keep moving to the right by refusing to read anything that’s left…because that worked so well for you in the last election.
Paul Worsaa – Considering all his affiliations at several levels with the Republican Party, I can honestly say I didn’t see it coming. I was so shocked he didn’t go with the Republicans, I had to read the story three times before it really sank in.
After the big $$$$ the Republicans spent trying to smear King and promote both his Republican and Democratic opponents, I’d have been surprised if he caucused with them.
But Worsaa says King “affiliated” with the Democrats. No, he’s only caucusing with them.
Paul, are you really that surprised? I saw this one coming from a mile away, unfortunately.
What you fail to realize Mr. Lodge is that Trudeau was exposing what too many Rs refused to see. That the Grand Ole Party is controlled by extremists. No, Romney was probably not one of them, but he would have been controlled by them. His selection of Ryan was a perfect example. I doubt that was his choice. It was made to satisfy Rove, the Kochs, Adelson, Norquist, etc. I am relieved that they will not be in control of America. When the Rs can restore some measure of moderation to their Grand Ole Party you might see America more supportive.