Improved cell service can save lives
I have two purposes for writing this letter. One, to work on healing from a horrific loss, and two, to ask for better cellphone service between Van Buren and Caribou.
I became a widow on Jan. 13. My husband’s truck was stuck in a snow bank because of off-and-on white-out conditions that day. He made 13 frantic calls for help, but he was unable to get service. After being unable to contact or reach anyone by on his cell, he walked a half-mile and then was picked up by a young gentleman who helped him pull his truck out of the snow bank.
Suddenly, my husband collapsed to the ground, and the young man stayed with my husband and paced back and forth trying to call 911. He was not able to reach 911. In all, at least 20 to 25 critical minutes passed while my husband lay dying on the road that day.
With the technology of today, there is no excuse for not having emergency 911 service in such a rural area. Time is of the essence, and every second counts because of the distance for emergency and critical care.
In memory of my husband, Arthur Brissette, I would like to advocate for improved cellphone services in my community so when the next crisis happens maybe we can save a life to avoid the same ending as my dear husband met that day.
Lisa Brissette
Van Buren
Senate’s ‘wealthcare’ bill
Interestingly, people who say the Affordable Care Act is failing are often those who don’t rely on it for their health insurance while trying to convince us that the government has no way to fund it. As small-business owners who purchase health insurance through the exchanges, we can attest it’s a huge improvement over previous options.
In 2009, we paid $7,068 per year for catastrophic health insurance, carrying a $35,000 deductible for our family of four. Today’s 2017 mid-level insurance family premiums through Community Health Options costs $19,648.40 annually, or $1,637.36 monthly before the Affordable Care Act tax credits. Maine families must earn $98,242 to afford a $19,648 premium. Yet, Maine’s 2015 median income was only $49,331. Repealing the advance premium tax credits puts 22 million Americans at risk medically and financially.
Concerned by the Affordable Care Act funding challenges? Consider this: In 1981, top U.S. individual income earners were taxed at 69 percent on annual income over $215,400 while 2015 top incomes were taxed at 39.6 percent on annual earnings above $464,850.
Since 1987, top tax rates have been at or below 39.6 percent, creating a tax giveaway to wealthiest Americans of 29.5 percent or more, per person, per year, for 30 years.
How can Congress repeal the Affordable Care Act and even talk of more tax cuts — i.e. “wealthcare” — when we need health care for 22 million Americans?
Celeste Bard
Portland
Extremism thrives in GOP
How ironic that the Republican health care bill, that’s not less than an assault on the health and very lives of tens of millions of Americans, was postponed because one member of the Senate — John McCain — needed surgery. He couldn’t join the vote to deny health care to millions because he was otherwise occupied — getting largely taxpayer paid, incredibly generous health care for himself.
What kind of country is the greed and lack of humanity in our political leaders offering us? And will we say, as my daughter does in teaching her 2-year-old certain behavior is unwanted, “no thank you”? Or blindly allow the leaders of our country to continue to corrupt it with their lack of a moral center?
A country with political leaders without morals is ultimately no better off than a parent without same leading the growth and progress of their offspring. And both create the same result. Will we blindly continue to “vote” for politicians that have no true leadership, but rather serve themselves largely and make the wealthy and corporations wealthier still at the expense of every American whose future is in jeopardy through such corrupted leadership?
With all due respect to Sen. Susan Collins, who has shown integrity, courage and compassion in her stand against her party on this macabre piece of legislation, her party has been co-opted by the very worse the country has to offer — the self-serving, blindness of extremism in the right wing.
Nancy J. Fitzgerald
Gouldsboro
Chipping away at our freedom
Maybe I’m just an old curmudgeon, but when did we all become sheep?
The other night, I stood in line at Darling’s Waterfront Pavilion for a good half-hour holding my reserved seat ticket. I was admitted after the first act had started. Two months ago, as I prepared for TSA screening, I was advised I no longer had “expedited” status but can get it again by paying $80.
Yet, we all know we have more chance of hitting the lottery than we have of being killed by a foreign-born terrorist, of whom “everyone” is afraid. The fact is that we are much more likely to be killed by the police or someone else armed with a gun. So the real threat motivating this level of “security” is the people carrying guns. Of all the murders in the U.S. in 2012, more were committed with firearms than in Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom.
Everyone’s freedom is being chipped away at by the few who demand to carry weapons in public places and own weapons that are not suitable for hunting and are designed to kill people.
When did we become sheep who tolerate this tyranny that defies logic, impinges on our freedom and endangers our lives?
Peter Vance
Bangor
EPA under attack
The Environmental Protection Agency and its ability to protect us and our environment is under blatant attack by the Trump administration. President Donald Trump is attempting to slash a third of the EPA’s budget, and a fifth of its staff.
For more than four decades, the EPA has been America’s chief defender of clean air and water, wildlife and wild places. It has cleared the air of our cities. It has dramatically reduced acid rain that damages our forests and waters. And it has saved the bald eagle — one of the most iconic animals in America — from extinction.
We need to defend the EPA against these outrageous and devastating cuts.
Penelope Andrews
Bangor