McHenry case mishandled
As I read the Dec. 11 BDN article reporting on the Bangor School Committee meeting at which the committee fired James McHenry, I was struck by the civics lessons that were ignored. First, the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights affords every person the presumption of innocence until proven guilty in a court of law, and secondly, the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution affords an individual in a criminal case the right to confront the accuser.
In my opinion, the members of the Bangor School Committee acted as judge and jury when they unilaterally fired McHenry. The outcome of future legal proceedings have been tainted by the action of this public body. The choice of wording as “unprofitable” may be legally acceptable; however, to the lay person it is an assumption of guilt. McHenry has not had his day in court, and yet parents, teachers and students have read, and may well believe, that he is guilty based on this information.
As a retired educator, I continue to assess situations from every angle. I do not know McHenry or his accuser but there are lessons here that should be have been considered before taking such serious action.
The most expeditious and cost-effective measures are not always the most prudent. In other situations, the Bangor School Committee has kept employees on the books until a case is resolved. In this case it seems to me to be case closed and class dismissed.
Margaret T. Clancey
Orono
Minimum wage is neither
Minimum wage, minimum wage, minimum wage – you hear these words very frequently of late. Looking close, it is clear that neither word is true. The word “wage” comes closer to validity if speaking about teenagers working after school for a few hours just for pocket change, whose essentials (food, shelter, clothing, etc.) are provided by parents fortunate enough to earn decent salaries. But $7.50 per hour should be called a stipend, or a gratuity, because it is totally and unambiguously inadequate to support even one person, let alone a family of two, three or four members. And that doesn’t even touch upon how this affects what people will have when they retire and rely on Social Security.
The other word “minimum” is at least more honest. It is definitely minimum in today’s economy. It is so minimum that is should be labeled inadequate, paltry, stingy, or even laughable (if it were not so tragic), or any other word that would adequately express its inappropriate connection to wages that are expected to sustain the lives of adults, children, and infants for weeks or even months.
When are we going to get real and call something by its name? Minimum wage is no wage all. It is a pittance and should be branded as such starting today.
Eileen E. Ward
Glenburn
President AWOL at game
My favorite athletic event for the year is the Army-Navy football game. I plan each year to watch on the second Saturday in December. I love the tradition and the fact these are America’s best in friendly competition just for the love of the game. There will be, with few very rare exceptions, no future pros in this game.
One of the major traditions is at half time when the commander-in-chief “transfers his flag” from one sideline to the other. Our current president has not been able to find time to be at this game and be part of that time-honored tradition. He didn’t even send the vice president; he sent the recently fired secretary of defense.
This is one chance the president had to honor and respect these fine young men and women that are making their career the defense of America, you and I. He is supposed to be leading them, the best of the best that America has to offer, and he could not bother to attend. By the way, this is not the first time he has been AWOL.
Actions speak volumes, do they not?
Bob Mercer
Bucksport
CIA torture embarrassment
No wonder the CIA did not want a summary of the torture report made public. Not because of torture — the broad outlines if not the sadistic details were already known — but because the summary revealed their incompetence. The agency relied on two goofball psychologists who thought experiments that worked on dogs would surely work on humans.
The CIA belief that information induced by torture was credible defies common sense. A CIA worker who blew the whistle on the agency now sits in prison.
Peg Cruikshank
Corea
Wall Street madness
I just heard that our congressmen snuck a bill into the budget that would deregulate Wall Street again. Did anyone learn anything at all in 2008?
I read that the tycoons from Citicorp were making calls to Capitol Hill to help put this bill through. I would like to know the names of the congressmen or senators who helped this bill along, but, alas, they don’t want their names out there I guess as I have tried for awhile now to find their names. It would seem to me that if they are working for the interest of the American people they would be proud to stand up and say they are the ones. Citicorp took a $326 billion bailout during the recession and then we passed some laws to prevent this from happening again. I guess they didn’t like it.
So now they can rape and pillage this country again. I will bet my left foot this was a Republican move, so congratulations America for giving them the majority.
Jeff Brawn
Brewer
Cold? Not really
Recently, I finished a recent narrative of the 1881 DeLong Arctic Polar Exploration Expedition, “In the Kingdom of Ice” by Hampton Sides. Some members survived while DeLong and many crew members failed to reach the support of anyone on the Lena River Delta in northern Siberia.
The struggle to reach this distant land from the pack ice was difficult beyond anyone’s imagination and demanded continued superhuman effort as another winter rapidly approached.
For anyone affected by recent cold weather, reading this account makes Bangor at this season look warm and tropical.
Robert Palmer
Bangor