When Gov. Paul LePage on Thursday night threatened to close public schools on May 1 unless his proposed Maine Department of Health and Human Services budget is ratified by the Maine Legislature, it sent ripples of surprise and worry around the state.
Can the governor make good on such a promise, which he made while fielding audience questions at a Capitol for a Day event in Lewiston?
The answer, according to the Maine Constitution, politicians and others, is no — with one caveat. Though local school districts make decisions about closing schools, it is within the governor’s purview to curtail state spending on education to balance the budget. A curtailment order would remain in effect until the Legislature acts.
He can, of course, also ask lawmakers to cut funding for schools. The state pays about $900 million annually to local school districts.
“If you don’t balance the budget, you stop cutting checks,” David Connerty-Marin, spokesman for the Maine Department of Education, said Friday in an explanation of the governor’s remarks. “There would obviously be a huge impact on some districts. But what shape that would take, it would ultimately be up to the local school districts.”
According to Article 8 in the Maine Constitution, the Legislature requires that towns support public schools.
Other laws address the complicated formula by which those schools now are funded, which is partially through local taxes, partially through state monies and partially through federal dollars.
In the biennial budget process, the Legislature decides how much money to spend on schools. The state now pays an average of 45 percent of the costs of education through General Purpose Aid funds, but district to district, the percentage varies widely. Wealthier districts get less money from the state — as little as 4 percent of the cost of educating their students. Poorer districts with less property tax revenue get more money, receiving more than 75 percent of the school budget costs from the state.
So if the state slashed education payments — or stopped cutting checks to local districts entirely beginning on May 1 — it would have a much bigger impact on poorer districts than on the wealthier ones. Richer districts, by and large, are found in the southern coastal portion of the state.
“It would have a serious impact,” Connerty-Marin said, adding that such considerations were premature. “People are putting the cart way before the horse. The bottom line is, we’ve got a budget crisis and the money has to come from somewhere. If it can’t be found elsewhere, certainly a big chunk of it could come from education.”
The looming DHHS shortfall, estimated at $120 million through June 30, is still no reason to threaten closing schools, argued state Democrats.
“To use schoolchildren as some sort of weapon in negotiations is just shocking to me,” Sen. Justin Alfond, D-Portland, said Friday. “It’s just unconscionable.”
Even Sen. Kevin Raye, R-Perry, the Senate president, referred to the idea of cutting state funding to education and closing schools May 1 as a “doomsday scenario.”
“Frankly, that is an unthinkable option,” he said. “The Legislature and the governor must find common ground to resolve the budget. It is unthinkable to me that, as a state, we would allow that to happen.”
Raye said that the governor’s words served to put an exclamation point on the urgency of solving the budget problem.
“The result of not taking action could be calamitous,” he said. “What the governor was really trying to drive home is that we are on track for the DHHS to run out of money in April, if we don’t take quick and decisive action to find and identify savings in this fiscal year.”
But, he said, the joint committee on appropriations and financial affairs has been working diligently toward finding a solution. He and other legislative leaders met Friday morning to talk about the budget with the governor.
“I think there is a very strong commitment on both sides of the aisle to get this done and make government work for the people of Maine,” he said.
House Democratic leader Emily Cain, D-Orono, also was at the budget meeting. She agreed that the Appropriations Committee is hard at work, a point which she believes the governor’s town hall comments undermined.
“The governor’s statements are not accurate, and they are not helpful in solving the problems we face,” she said Friday afternoon. “Making dramatic statements and presenting false choices distracts from real work and creates unnecessary fear in our communities … . We urge the governor to focus on the facts instead of drumming up fear and blame.”
LePage called the Friday meeting a “positive conversation” in a statement released later that day.
“I believe Democratic leadership understands the severity of the financial situation we’re in and I’m cautiously optimistic that they are committed to working towards a resolution by February 1,” he said. “However, in order to solve this budget crisis we cannot use gimmicks to fill the hole. There will be difficult decisions made.”
But Alfond, the assistant minority leader of the senate, described the governor’s town hall statements as counterproductive to the process at best.
“I just don’t understand why he can’t find positive confidence and support in what the Legislature is doing,” he said. “Everyone understands we have a major shortfall. Instead, the governor wants to just be very negative about Augusta.”
If legislators end up drawing up a supplemental budget for the next fiscal year, he said that it’s possible schools would get less money.
“But those cuts wouldn’t be shutting down schools,” Alfond said. “When you think about trying to create long-term economic development, you need to have educated students. Anytime we make cuts to the system, it’s going to have an effect on how educated our students are.”
Call his buff.
put him out on his duff
Because his only plan is to talk tough
As the he lets the ship of state sails luff …
Enough.
but alas… many believe he’s a diamond in the rough..need I add with the right stuff?
Thankfully this man is a better buisnessman than politician.
He could give a rats rear what the bdn or its readers think of his plan. Remind you of someone?
Hurbert Hoover ?
Herbert?
Boss Hogg
Why so gruff ?
: )
gruff? isn’t that the thing that takes “a bite outta crime”….oh wait….he was Irisih, that’s McGruff…….crap!
This man needs to be sat on till he can be put on a plane to Florida.
Paul has so much “Baggage” he would likely have to be transported via train (Cattle car?), personal coach bus, or long haul Peterbuilt. Perhaps he could also squeeze his Lauren baggage on one of them as well.
Maine needs to come together an impeach LePage. We can initiate it by starting a petition to recall him.
Thank You….I thought I was the only Mainer that felt like that.. C’mon , lets see how many people like that….
How can you recall someone when their is no recall laws for state officials in Maine. The fact is the Liberals are stalling and refusing to see that DHHS has major issues and cuts to programs and services needs to be made. Education fat needs to be slashed as well and LePage needs to mandate those districts who still refuse to consolidate lose all funding. The taxpayer’s we have had enough of funding this bloated bureaucratic system here in Maine. It is time to put those who are able to work make them get a job.
Consolidation has not saved a penny. My taxes have gone up every year since then whereas they were stable previously. Granted Governor Baldacci started that process, but please don’t say that more consolidation ought to happen. A cap on superintendent salaries might be a good idea. It’s the top, as usual, that is the problem. Cut back on buses run for extra-curricular competitions. Limit all of it to intramural. That’s just a start.
End the HS basketball tournaments, etc. etc. etc.? Good luck with that.
you mean put them to work at the plentiful jobs available???
Education fat.
What a great phrase.
Greed fat gets nary a whisper.
Where are they going to get a job in Maine? The state that has 47% of it’s people on some sort of Federal and State assistance, and the other 53% paying taxes and footing the bill. Young people are leaving the state as their is no good paying jobs. The highest percentage of people receiving assistance in Maine is the elderly, disabled. A lot of people want to go to work, so I suggest that all the ones whining about these people that don’t have a job….you give them one. Maine isn’t the only one affected buy a bad economy….Maine goverment have made bad choices in the past, now and they knew they couldn’t afford it. This Governor has been in office well over a year now and is doing nothing but adding to the problem, hiring incompetent people to run the DHHS to start with. This is a dsigrace. Maine’s unemployment rate is 7.5, New England unemployment rate is 11.5 Maine is doing better than any other of the New England states, but the problem is that they are spending more than they are taken in…..That’s not the private sector doing this. Goverment is, and who is in charge….that’s right….Mr. Bully himself, LePage….
While I disagree with your attacks on Mr. LePage, as a Mainer at an Ivy League institution, there is a 0% chance that I come back to Maine in the near future. What kind of jobs other than the likes of blueberry picker or cashier (of which I’ve done both) are available to me? Maine has a heinous business climate.
I search the help wanted regularly: there are plenty of jobs in nursing, CNAs, personal care assistants etc…On second thought, an Ivy League education won’t prepare you for that. Well, there’s always blueberry raking in season. Please come back to Maine—you are needed.
Heinous business climate? We have the best fresh air this side of the Rocky Mountains. We can offer farming, boat building, logging, blueberry raking, canning, lobster fishing, ground fishing, clam digging, charter boats, tour guide, house painting and carpentry, road work, sewer plant work, hydro tidal development, wind power initiatives, solar power designer and installer, computer programmer, media consultant, tv and radio announcing, videographer, film making, numerous restaurant franchises, municipal backing for entrepreneurs, charter boat operator, sail maker, paddle maker, quarry worker, bus driver, train engineer, railroad worker, store clerk, store manager, janitors, pilot, Game Warden, Biologist, Biological Research, Cancer Research, doctor, medicine, psychologist, psychiatric, police officer, detective, crime lab technician, insurance, investment broker, magazine writer, editor, Web designer, operator…governor.
“Heinous business climate”. Have you ever checked the standings Maine 50th last infact territories like Guam, Puerto Rico, Virigin Islands are doing better than Maine. The Libs like trotting out they are good at education, infrastructure, shared prosperity , shared sacrifice blah blah blah. They refuse to see our schools are crumbling, 75% of them are failing, schools refuse to cooperate with their consolidation law, our school rankings are in the bottom half and falling. Our roads and bridges are pathetic you can’t go 50 feet without hitting a massive pothole and having a flat tire or doing damage to your car. So keep drinking the Liberal Kool-Aid coming from Emily Cain, Justin Alfond, Cynthia Dill, Peggy Rotundo, John Martin. They would do everything to clean out the rest of what is left in Maine if they come back to power. They can’t wait to turn Maine into their eco-friendly paradise with Quimby’s park statewide if they had their chance.
Ask McConnell and Boehner why they are blocking the Jobs Bill. Passing it would enable thousands to work on the nation’s infrastructure. That includes Maine.
The radical right wing tea party Brown Shirt manifesto has one goal: Get rid of Obama. That’s all the Kool Air drinking radical right wingers in DC and elsewhere want. Having the first African-American president is too much for them to swallow.
Assailing Liberals for lack of jobs in Maine is a typical radical right wing moan. More than 70 years ago the GOP – even without its bullying tea party clowns blocked Quoddy Tidal Power. Now – 73 years later – they’re just beginning to adjust their glasses, trying to re-focus their previous right wing wing myopic assessment, by noting its benefits. FDR was a Liberal. Liberals are all prejudged by the radical right as anti-business. Through the efforts of Obama, Detroit is making a fantastic recovery. Branded a radical left winger by your standard bearer Newt, Obama stuck his neck out and saved GM and Chrysler. He also saved us – all of us – from excessive credit card fees and a fleecing from the banks.
As for the Kool Aid – I drink Scotch.
Where is there any evidence that Ms. Mayhew is incompetent?
Only the tea party knows.
all that may be true, i won’t argue with you. but Maine needs a Governor that can bring us together on these issues, not tear us apart with false claims and favoritism.
how about letting Maine loggers work in the Maine woods for Maine companies so they can pay Maine taxes? Why is the governor allowing those jobs to go to Canadians who take their money back to Canada?
NAFTA? Free trade? They do it cheaper.
No recall? Right on. We can ask the House of Representatives to impeach this man.
Constitution of Maine, Article IV: Section 8. Power of Impeachment. The House of Representatives shall have the sole power of impeachment.
That’s better than recall.
Maine has no recall laws for state officials. Go out and collect 57,000+ for a referendum. Impeach him by the time they got done with that process the Re-Election campaigns will start up. Waste taxpayers money on more stupidity.
why dont you start with obama? you are just another in the long line of DOLTS that dont know any better. you juast like to spend., but dont like when the bills come due. its people like you, that got us into this mess. liberalism IS A MENTAL DEFECT!
please recall that GW Bush created the largest deficit in American history and was in charge for 8 yrs, right up to the financial crash of 2008.
Obama’s new policies: $1.44 trillion
Bush’s new policies: $5.07 trillion
http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-cohn/92569/bush-obama-deficit-tax-cut-stimulus-health
Why don’t you quit blaming everybody else for LePage’s mis-management, than the person who is at fault. The Governor has allienated everyone that is trying to help him solve some of these inportant issues, but he keeps bulling his way through their suggestions, the same guy who now has his own party upset with him for his ratical behavior and unsteadyness.
It is so easy to point a finger at everyone else around you when things get tough, it’s the measure of a man in how he adjusts to those situations and rises above the turmoil…..sadly, this Governor wants to divide Maine’s citizens, cause bitterness and tell them that you and I are the reason for their rotten lives, instead of putting the people of Maine and their best interest first.
These problems have been around for 20 + years. We are in one of the worst economic times of the century. Yes!!! Maine has spent more money than it’s taken in….this just didn’t happen over night. Let’s take one thing at a time and solve it and move on, instead of butting heads with every department of goverment and causing division and bitterness within their ranks….
It’s ironic that when the stimulus dollars stopped coming into Maine from the federal goverment, all these shortfalls started popping up…and at the same time the Governor was already ranting, dividing people in his ranks and telling people to kiss his butt….now stiffy, get over it and welcome to the real world of Maine…..
Tell your rep to start Impeachment proceedings.
Spoken (or rather, written) like one who is incapable of independent thinking and only knows how to repeat the words of others. There’s actually a phrase for them: sponge minds.
Thank God he stopped the Chicken Hawk Bush-Cheney adventure in Iraq chasing non-existent WMD. Two trillion dollars in the hole and 5,000 good young Americans wasted, and another 35,000 minus limbs and minds. In between killing Bin Laden, fending of tea party republican hate, he also saved the auto industry and finished of the Bush- initiated Save Wall Street bailout. He now has Iran facing the ‘red line” if that country blocks oil shipments.
We should get this petition going to impeach him before he does more damage!!!
Impeachment is only possible if he commits a crime. Arrogant bullies like Lepage can easily trip themselves up, so a group needs to be formed that sends out people to tape his every public move until he slips up badly enough to have violated the law.
Whoever volunteers to do the taping should be aware that the taping will very likely enrage him and the illegal act he performs could involve a physical attack on them.
Lepage suffers from Narcissistic personality disorder
and is prone to outbursts of uncontrollable rage whenever he is challenged, even if the challenge is done calmly and professionally and is completely warranted. See more about Lepage’s affliction here:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/narcissistic-personality-disorder/DS00652
yes, probably a result of his troubled childhood and a reminder to all of us the true cost of domestic violence and neglect.
So, according to the liberal train of thought, you can’t possibly begin to know or understand what he has suffered. Therefore you ought to not judge him because how would you like to be in his shoes? All you privileged folks who grew up in loving homes–you can’t wait to cast stones at a guy who is just dealing with all the hardship he has suffered.
But I guess compassion and understanding and the non-judgmental position are only for those who are on state benefits, not for those who actually have some success in life despite the setbacks.
i’m not sure how much of what you are saying is sarcasm and how much is sincere. hard to respond because i don’t understand where you’re coming from.
YOU MAINE VOTERS VOTED FOR HIM GOOD LUCK
61% of us did not
Just like the 81% of us didn’t want Liberal Mitchell. The same 63% of us didn’t want Eliot “Carter” Cutler “A Democrat fraud posing like an Independent from Maine being an Independent he is not an Independent as his tv ads claimed. It’s pretty sad when you refuse to run and lose to Liberal Mitchell in a primary. The 53% and 62% of us didn’t vote for Baldacci either time, and the 65% of us didn’t vote for Mr. MPBN AND Wind Power Angus King in 1994. What is your point. The fact is the 81% of the Maine people who voted wanted a philosophic change from the Libs in Augusta. You had 4 folks running opposing Liberal Mitchell to change the failed policies of the last 40 years of the Libs. Just the Libs can’t realize what it is like not having their voices not heard. Now you know the majority of us feel when the Libs refused to hear what we wanted and rammed their garbage down our throats and not being held accountable.
Definition
By Mayo Clinic staff
Narcissistic personality disorder is a mental disorder in which people
have an inflated sense of their own importance and a deep need for
admiration. Those with narcissistic personality disorder believe that
they’re superior to others and have little regard for other people’s
feelings. But behind this mask of ultra-confidence lies a fragile
self-esteem, vulnerable to the slightest criticism.
Sound familiar?
Narcissistic……………..Sounds like a lot of the people that post on here.
Listen, wandini, he has no right to take those hardships he suffered and visit them upon one other single human being.
I’ll repeat it:
He has no right to take those hardships he suffered and visit them upon one other single human being.
Liberal? Common sense train of thought? This man is acting in a reckless manner.
To re-visit and seek recompense for your own personal hardships by attacking innocent people, is no answer.
He’s tea-washed.
He has already violated the Oath of Office he took by failing to represent the best interest of this state;furthermore, as you say, Tyke, he has repeatedly shown that he is mentally incompetent to lead and that, too, is grounds for his removal.
The Constitution of the State of Maine: Article V Executive Power. Sect. 14: Mental or physical disability of the governor continuously for more than 6 months. “Whenever for 6 months a Governor in office shall have been continuously unable to discharge the powers and duties of that office because of mental or physical disability such office shall be deemed vacant.” A joint resolution of 2/3 of House and Senate attesting to these charges would be decided by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court.
He more than adequately qualifies under the terms of the Constitution of the State of Maine.
Problem is that it won’t happen because the legislature won’t go there.
I do think someone should start filming all of his public appearances though. It would be entirely legal and would give incredible material for the ads against him if he actually is arrogant enough to run again.
House of Representatives. Contact on the State of Maine page for a full listing – Dems and repubs. They have the sole power of Impeachment.
Maine’s Constitution states that the process has to begin w/legislators, so someone needs to start a petition calling for them to do their jobs.
Send them an e-mail on the State of Maine Web Page. Lists all reps. They have the sole authority to enact Impeachment proceedings.
Tap on the State of Maine web page. The House of Representatives need to be notified that we want him impeached. The House has the sole power to enact this legislation, according to the Maine Constitution.
Start the ball rolling. Sign in now.
When will you people get your heads out of the sand and understand that previous administrations have spent us into an unsustainable hole that will take PAINFULL REMEDIES to get us out of. All you want to do is IGNOR the economic crisis and kick the can down the road. We need grownups to fix this not can kickers. Now let the haters attack me!
I agree 100% ! I also know the state pays way too much for everything. They pay for adults to “transition’ INTO THE WORKFORCE! why should we pay for that or “retro” foodstamps. The people already ate the month b4. I have a family and I had rec. help from the state yrs ago. I am glad it was there then for me. I also told them WAY back then 20+ yrs ago they gave way too much in foodstamps. I had 5 young children and rec over 500 in stamps. I am sorry but the young children do NOT eat that much. The medical assistance is a good thing when not abused. There are Dr offices and people do not need to run to the ER for every little pain. And then there are all those thousands that lie and rec. all the assistance while living with a boy or girlfriend who works and brings money into and lives with , the assisted that lives in low income housing. There are NARCS for drugs why not hire some for fraud!!
People who work for the state make more money and have better benefits than people in comparable positions in the private sector. Fix that. Tax cuts that help the wealthy are harmful. The governor doesn’t need his salary. He could donate it back and encourage his cronies who are acting as public “servants” in his administration to do the same. It would be an amazing gesture. DHHS does need to be overhauled, but it needs to start at the top, not on the backs of the mentally ill, the mentally retarded, the children with cerebral palsy who cannot walk, talk, eat, bathe, and are stuck in wheelchairs. Young mothers whose children’s fathers have abandoned them and who are working and struggling to make ends meet are not the ones we want to reduce services for. Let harmless people out of prison and stop paying all that money to keep them in. There are so many ways to help this. The financial meltdown caused by the greedy corporatists is not the fault of our neighbor who has schizophrenia and cannot manage without the help he receive. No hate here. I firmly believe that one is either part of the problem or part of the solution. Threatening the future of children is not the work of a solution maker.
That’s wrong. IT people make far less than their private sector counterparts but because there are not very many private sector jobs available, most stay with the state.
oooo. chrisrayhame for governor!
like!
Actually an impartial professional assessment was done recently of Maine state employees pay and benefits and the worker class are paid less even when the value of benefits are taken into account.
The only group of state employees who are overpaid are the higher level folks who serve at the pleasure of the governor, like political appointees and confidential employees. Because Lepage has 100% control over their continued employment he could demand letters of resignation and only rehire them if they agree to lower pay and benefits that the same as those of the lower paid state employees (currently the overpaid high level employees ALSO get better benefits).
He hasn’t even suggested that however because those are the jobs he has given to political supporters and family members. Baldacci was just as bad.
I misspoke, Tyke. The people who work for DHHS in comparable positions to the social work that I and others do make far more money and have greater benefits than those of us in the private sector.
That may be true, I am not familiar with specific positions.
I do know that an independent study says that overall the mid to low paid state workers make less than equitable jobs in the private sector.
Social work tends to pay badly everywhere, but the jobs I’ve seen in the private sector do not always require the same credentials as state workers must have (4 year degrees minimum to be hired as a caseworker). I know one HS dropout who got a GED and was hired in the private sector but was told she could not even interview for an equivalent state position because it required a degree and advanced degrees were preferred and common.
No, State employees make less than people in comparable jobs when years of experience and education are equal. It has been proved over and over. Taking advantage of someone who has invested 10, 15, 20, or more years of their lives and then taking away the benefits and pensions promised is the same thing Wall St. did……theft. Lies about the amount state employees make will not justify theft.
A million likes to you!
We believe that as grown ups -mature ones – we can tackle anything. However, there is a certain way of tackling any problem – a little bit of cool helps. This man is a Bully who threatens everyone each time he opens his mouth. You have to suffer, he says. Because of what is reported as a dismal Oliver Twist style childhood, Le Page believes he should blame everyone for not understanding what he allegedly suffered.
LePage should start by pulling back some of the $9,000,000 annual subsidy to the Maine Maritime Academy – a sports and spa facility of 900+ with nearly 1/2 of the student body from out of state that graduate and never look back taking their $40,000 four year stipend with them before he closes schools for Maine youth.
Hey Cool, did I tell ya my son just got accepted to MMA a couple weeks ago? Isn’t that great?!
Great news for your son. My grandson graduated 2 1/2 years ago and is doing great. Had a great job to go to prior to graduation and seems to be loving the job he has.
Congratulations. It is a great school that primarily serves Maine students and has an incredible employment rate for graduates!
It’s too bad that schools rely so much on government funding. This happens at all levels of government. The feds play the same game: They threaten to cut off funds when they don’t get their own way. I believe that some cuts have to be made to the budget, but LePage has less tact than most politicians I’ve seen. Actually, he doesn’t seem to have any at all. He would get a lot more done if he’d at least try to act a little nicer, at least publicly, even while making difficult decisions.
Bullies don’t know how to be nice or tactful. They just know how to be bullies!!!
Right, the president does the same thing. Cut elderly senior citizens, the sky is falling, quick catch it!!! We never hear, cut foreign aid……Or a war in where??? Thought so…
You’re right.
What would happen if each of us citizens, not corporations, chose how our tax dollars would be used? I wonder what our society would be like then?
What % of our federal budget do you think goes to foreign aid?
Someone once told me, its not that what you say to people sometimes. It is how you say it. Yes there is a very difficult problem ahead, people should be told that. But I dont think predicting or suggesting wild things that will never happen to get people serious is the best way to go either.
“To change people’s minds, they first have to listen to you.”
Damien Hirst
This is why I work so hard to listen and speak from a moderate perspective. I know you do too. Why can’t our elected officials?
me thinks its a character flaw (extremism)
I was just listening to a recap of the economic disaster in Greece. What struck me is that the conservative government said that the national debt was 6%. Then the liberal government came to power and confessed that the real debt was 13% (of GDP). And people accused the new government of creating a crisis so they could cut workers’ benefits.
Most people in Maine are feeling the effects of our economic downturn. I would be more angry if LePage adopted a conciliatory tone over the impending budget shortfalls. This is serious, and he is taking it seriously. This is not some political game to him as some contend.
Extremism–it’s so easy to hurl that charge at someone. What is extreme in LePage’s proposal? Wait and see – what comes out of the legislature will be something with concessions in it–and LePage will sign it, as long as it gets the job of fixing the system rolling. He is practicing simple political diplomacy–ask for a lot, settle for the most you can get. But get the job done.
we are headed down Greece’s path if we don’t learn how to compromise and sacrifice. times like these call for a leader who can bring people together, not tear them apart.
extreme action may require a more moderate tone, so that people can come together.
getting the job done in a democracy requires compromise.
if we were a dictatorship (or a business) LePage might be the man for the job.
Cutting spending on education is about the stupidest cuts imaginable. But then the Koch brothers have been advocating such cuts since the 1970’s and when they tell LePage to jump, he asks “how high”.
He isn’t going, and doesn’t want to cut taxes on education, I am guessing you didn’t read the article?
He is saying that the legislature either needs to make his proposed cuts to DHHS (which is what he wants), or he will have to make cuts to education, because the state doesn’t have enough money to pay the bills. He doesn’t want to cut education.
This is in contrast to the past in which everytime there needed to be cuts they were always made to education. They have continuously cut education over the past 20+ years, yet I never heard a peep from anyone about it. Meanwhile, state spending has grown year after year.
Cutting spending on education is about the stupidest cut imaginable, agreed. And the Koch brothers have nothing to do with any of this.
Please provide the data to support your statement:
“This is in contrast to the past in which everytime there needed to be cuts they were always made to education. They have continuously cut education over the past 20+ years, yet I never heard a peep from anyone about it.”
Do a search on the BDN site for supplemental budgets/biennial budgets for the last Baldacci term. You will see that the Democrats and Baldacci not only cut services, but cut education funding, cut state workers’ pay and used federal stimulus dollars to close the remaining gaps in their budgets. I found several articles detailing these things this afternoon–I think around Jan/Feb 2009, 2010.
People have short memories, but I was sure that this budget game had been played before and it has. The difference this time is that there is no federal stimulus.
The difference this time is that there is a bloated, self-important, immature, crude person in the Blaine House.
In the Blaine House? Reallly?? Are you sure about that?
You said it yourself … he is saying do what he wants or he will do something draconian …. that’s a threat and blackmail. And more importantly, it is NOT leadership.
Here is how I take it, he evaluated the budget and realized that either education or DHHS had to be cut, and since cutting DHHS funding seemed like the better idea, so he presented this by stating that if cuts from DHHS are not made then we will have to cut education. He is essentially saying “Here is my choice, what is yours?”
I guess I must be missing something, but I don’t see how this is blackmail.
here’s how I see it.
he just needs to think before he speaks. he doesn’t seem to grasp that he is the Governor and that his words carry weight.
sure, i respect ‘calling it like you see it’ and get accused of that myself. but the point is, he is in a leadership position and needs to think beyond his initial reaction.
Your foolish boy is refusing to deal with this in terms of the comprehensive budget with everything on the table, he is pitting human services against education, he is being divisive and using scare tactics, he is a bully, and your party worships the ground the Koch Brothers walk on because they are funding your party and their radical agenda with their unlimited corporate money all over the country. The GOP is nothing more than a subsidiary of corporate America, and they take their orders from ALEC, the Heritage Foundation, and the Koch Brothers. Mainers know it, and major change is coming in November. As to budgets just going up and up, Baldacci and the Dems CUT the budget by $800million WITHOUT all the bullying and divisiveness and sheer nuttiness of this buffoon that we have in there now.
Enough about the Koch brothers. It’s getting as old as Tebow.
Tebow is pout for the season, while the Kochs are still jerking the strings of their puppet Lepage.
The issue of the Koch brothers needs to stay public.
This man should not be in office. He is unfit to govern.
All Paul’s latest gaffe of intelligence will do is force each local community to pay more on their own to educate their children. Those who can afford the extra property taxes will likely do so while those who can’t will either not eat and keep their schools open, or choose to eat and close em down. It’s almost a perfect GOP/Tea Party scenario. They don’t directly increase taxes, the well-to-do are largely unaffected, the poor go without and a near perfect slave labor force is created because the poor’s children will never escape their plight.
Think Mr. LePage is wrong again? Please vote accordingly next November.
Good take the funding away and that should give the local communities the right to tell the state to (quoting our fearless leader) “Go to hell” when it comes to state mandates. Tell the state that we the community will operate to the benefit of our childrens education and operate on our rules.
Well said patom1
Perfectly said.
nice….
that equals increased property taxes and possibly local sales taxes. its a shell game, pushing responsibility from one level of government to the other.
This is exactly what is going to transpire under the current trends we are experiencing in this country. Fecal matter flows down hill. The Fed is cutting the states, the states are cutting the towns and cities. With the end result that local towns will have to fund services, including education, on their own. In one way that will be a blessing, in that we can tell them where to shove their unfunded mandates with no threat of financial doom. It will also force real school consolidation in some rural areas of the state.
In Washington County, at least half if not more of the schools could and probably should be closed. There is a continuing reduction in the number of children in all our schools. This trend will only get worse, as there is nothing to keep the greater majority of those graduating from HS here.
can’t argue with your assessment.
it’s unfortunate. education is the one area that requires our investment if we want to remain competitive on an international level.
good luck to us attracting companies like Kestrel to Maine with a short changed school system.
education should be the key, not the scapegoat.
Keep in mind that that the state’s two largest expenditures are in education and welfare. The governor feels that there is much room left in our welfare programs to make serious cuts. On account of the legislative branches’ reluctance to cut welfare and its past tendency to expand welfare from year to year, the governor issued a warning that a failure by these branches to come up with sufficient cuts in welfare would have to result in cuts to the extra 15 millions dollars allocated to education during his term as governor. Unlike the federal government the state may not print money to fill in shortfalls. And neither can it continue to borrow endlessly without causing a much greater hardship for the future of those who depend on it. Right now the threat posed by a slow growing national economy – that could turn south anytime – could put Maine in dire straights unless spending is kept in check today in order to avoid a very serious financial disaster down the road due to decreasing tax revenues.
then why can’t he just say it as thoughtfully as you just did? tough times require a tough approach, but not always ‘talking tough’. what we need is someone who can bring us together on these issues, not divide us with his ranting.
Well, it looks like it’s official. He’s lost all support, even republican senate president Kevin Raye. There must be some way to get rid of this guy. I’m wondering if he should undergo a psychiatric evaluation…he’s delusional.
Yes. We should demand a psych eval.
Impeachment is only possible if he commits a crime. Arrogant bullies like Lepage can easily trip themselves up, so a group needs to be formed that sends out people to tape his every public move until he slips up badly enough to have violated the law.
Whoever volunteers to do the taping should be aware that the taping will very likely enrage him and the illegal act he performs could involve a physical attack on them.
Lepage suffers from Narcissistic personality disorder and is prone to outbursts of uncontrollable rage whenever he is challenged, even if the challenge is done calmly and professionally and is completely warranted. See more about Lepage’s affliction here:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/narcissistic-personality-disorder/DS00652
Hasn’t it pretty much been that over the past 20+ years everytime we make budget cuts they are almost always on education, as to not cut the beloved entitlement programs? Why is it that no one seemed to care then?
Here is the governors dilemma, either cut DHHS or education. What would you rather have? Granted he did make a small tax cut for the wealthier (as he did for lower-class as well), but despite this there would still need to be cuts. We are spending too much money, and simply do not have the revenues.
Voice of reason.
Let’s say that you are running a business and need to make X amount of money to operate your business. Would it make any sense to cut your income to below what it takes to keep operating?
Well first, government is not a business, sure there are many aspects that should be run like a business the fact that politics is such an integral part of government it will never be run like a business.
Second, I would like to see the lowest possible taxes for everyone while still maintaining necessary government services. That being said, I am assuming that your comment is in regards to the half a percent tax cut to the wealthy he gave. I don’t recall the exact amount that it cost the state to cut that tax rate, but I know it wasn’t enough to cover the shortfall. Now I am not defending the tax cut, as it honestly doesn’t really make a lot of sense, I am just saying that it still wouldn’t have been enough and this would have still happened had the cut not been made.
Go ahead and defend the tax cut. Look, the tax cut has not even taken effect yet so it has no bearing on this DHHS budget shortfall. The tax cut will put a few more dollars into most Mainer’s pockets each week. Isn’t that the whole premise of the Obama payroll tax holiday?
The cutting of the top tier back to %7.95 is a good step to addressing the poor business climate in Maine. Businesses don’t like to locate in high income tax states unless you can offer incentives like the state of NY can. But Maine can’t do that. We can offer a reasonable tax structure, and LePage is doing what he can for that.
The general estimates of the cost of the tax cuts to the rich was $150,000,000. Sounds like a large piece of the defecit.
The tax cuts haven’t been implemented yet, so they could not possibly close the current DHHS deficit.
No, don’t cut DHHS…get rid of the Commissioner who put this department in the red….first it was 60 million….week later they found 50 million more in the red…..When you write your checks, I bet you know how much money you have in the bank….and if you spend more than you have, you know that also…..DHHS check book is a little bigger, but they know what they are doing….spend, spend, spend and than ask the Maine tax payers to bail them out…..with the Governor pushing the agenda…..Gov…..you are the CEO…the buck stops with you….quit hiring Commissioners who can’t do the job….and start taking the responsibility for your own mistakes, instead of balancing your mistakes on the backs of the disabled, elderly, middle class and poor….and giving your rich friends in Portalnd tax breaks. Just leave early like Palin did in Alaska and leave us alone…..Good Day!!
this was in a mess ong before lepage came along. you are just another that hatws to see a problem trying to be solved. again, plenty to cut, and too much given to these depts. mis management at its best, in previous years. get over it.
baldacchi is a saint
If you go to this link, you will understand how men and woman worked there way through one of the most difficult six years since the great depression…..the last two years of the Bush administration, and the four years into the Obama administration….than you will understand that though diplomacy, sound management, brilliant minds setting down with rational behavior of men and woman in charge can accomplish briliant ideas and solutions.
This has not happened with LePage. He sits down, argues, threaten’s and than storms out and the bullying begins. This link gives you a better understanding of how we got to where we are now federal and state level and where can we go from here…not as a bitter people….but as minds in motion with solutions.
http://www2.goldmansachs.com/our-thinking/global-economic-outlook/some-lessons.html
Those are not the only two choices, DHHS or education. There could be many creative solutions to our problem if we did not have a bullying, bull headed, ignorant, monomaniacal mentally ill person at the helm.
Cuts have already been made to many other things, there is/was a huge budget gap.
No more free insurance for state employees. Make them pay just like everyone else has to. No more retirement plans for state employees. Make them pay into Social Security just like everyone else has to. When the politicians have to deal with the same conditions that their constituents have to THEN they might actually do a better job in doing what is right for the people.
Tax alcohol the same way cigarettes have been taxed.
Eliminate the governor’s daughter’s job…he created it for her…not needed.
Raise the sales tax by a penny.
Pass same sex marriage to boost revenue.
Eliminate tax cuts for the wealthy.
ZERO tax breaks for businesses that don’t create new jobs each year.
Triple taxes for any business that outsources jobs.
Let ALL Mainers buy into Mainecare based on a sliding fee scale and run it like an HMO.
some good ideas there, hon.
let me add one more: luxury tax on snowmobiles, large screen tvs, etc.
What a mix! Attack state employees with falsehoods and bad information, then go ahead and support a penny sales tax increase along with same sex marriage.
From a liberal point of view, mine, you should be in the legislature. It sounds like you actually listen even when there is much I don’t agree with you might just………………listen.
It’s the money of tax payers that is paying for all of those benefits…and if Maine can’t help keep our elderly people warm, provide for the needy, fund schools and pay for the bare necessities then we can’t afford all those perks. I do realize that these folks don’t get social security…but they need to change that. If there is extra money in the future, then do bonuses based on years of service. Just put the NEEDS ahead of the perks, please.
Did you see what the state employee’s union did when LePage proposed a small reduction in the state’s contribution to their pension and a small increase in their contribution? Do you really think the State Employees Union and their Democratc allies will allow for a greater contribution to their health benefits and a buy-in to Social Security, which offers a much smaller return for retirement than their current state plan? LePage would have to be some kind of BIG bully to get that to happen.
Lauren LePage worked hard on her dad’s campaign. I have seen no evidence that she is not doing an important job in his administration, nor any evidence that she is not qualified for the position.
Hmmm…all the raise taxes on people. Sorry, can’t support you there.
How about we pass same sex marriage just because it is the right thing to do?
I agree that a good change to Maine Care would be a sliding fee scale with a more open enrollment. I am not sure why we don’t do something like that already. But nobody has suggested this idea that I’ve seen.
It’s more about the POLITICIANS who I think need to not get all these perks…because they don’t understand what it’s like for regular Mainers…they are completely out of touch.
And one of those solutions would be what?
They would be up to our legislature to come up with if they would develop some backbone, stop being bullied, and remind the governor that he is the executive branch, not the lawmaking branch.
the education, ever notice that the more money that is spent, the stupider the kids are?plenty of room to cut ,in many areas of gvt.
Our kids are stupid.
Our elders are on the golden tit.
The rest of us? Well, we were all raised properly, and teach our young the same.
If your kids are stupid you didn’t teach your young very well, then, did you?
Actually, Lepage, himself, is a prime example of someone whose parents never instilled basic morals in him. Oh sure, he went from rags to riches all by himself, but without those values, he became a rotten, undisciplined,tantrum throwing liar.
Lower-class?
No revenues because he gave tax cuts almost immediaitely without really looking down the road to see what affect they would have.We need balance approach, not just a draconian one.
the tax cuts have not even taken effect yet. You can’t recover money that hasn’t even been returned to the taxpayer yet. I’d be interested in knowing what you find draconian about LePage’s proposal and what you might find to be a more balanced approach.
Doesn’t this man even realize that every time he opens himself up to reveal his “real self” he costs the house and senate candidates votes?
I hope that he keeps opening his yap, then perhaps the legislature will stand up to this little thug.
How is it that school choice can even be thought about, when this guy is threatening to cut school funding? This is absolute crap, this guy needs to be challanged, and if the Legislative majority doesn’t put their foot down soon, they are going to be getting the smaller offices.
My God when will the madness end? Bullying, threats, temper tantrums, blaming everyone under the sun except himself. First it was the poor, then the unions, the teachers, the mural, the NAACP, jokes about pregnant nuns, state workers, our voting system, Maine State Housing, the legislature, newspapers, reporters, blaming joblessness on the unemployed, the list goes on and on. First he screams we are broke, then proposes more tax cuts and slush funds. He told us he would create jobs, 600 just flew away. Jobs are leaving the State of Maine, over 1000 by some estimates and over 4500 by others. He is constantly putting the people of Maine down. He says we aren’t qualified for all of the “jobs” that are available. Of course no one can find these imaginary jobs. He lies to us and gets caught over and over again. Forbes comes to mind. If anyone questions him he gets surly and nasty. I have yet to hear or read where he has said something positive about Maine or her people. He wants to run legislature. He wants to run Maine State Housing. And now he is again threatening that if he does not get his way then he will violate the Maine Constitution and shut down the schools. This man isn’t acting like a Governor he is acting like a dictator. It is time for the republican party to get this man under control. Because if they do not we might see a legislature comprised of 100% non republicans. The people of the State of Maine are fed up to their chins with this man and his childish tantrums. Kevin Reye, Bob Nutting and the rest of the republican leadership needs to form a posse and head to the Governor’s office and get this out of out of control headcase under control. That is if getting him under control is possible. And they had better do it damned soon.
Well said. You are my hero.
Oh my goodness! Look at the explosion of awakening people are having just from reading this brief synopsis (There were more horrors of course, 41K Lauren comes to mind and we can expect more to follow) of Mr. LePage and crew’s first year in office. I would disagree with 4mermainer’s suggestion of the make-up of his posse. Some of those mentioned have almost as much baggage as Paul and are unlikely to make a move against the head gangster. I’m recommending something a bit more realistic here, like a posse of Democratic voters to take Paul down at the knees next November. Anyone else with me, come on cowpokes we’re gonna bring this culprit in then cast him out with our votes! Lets giddy-up and get er done.
Good points and until he gets his kid off the state payroll he has no right to lecture anyone about budget problems. The $41k + benefits would not save much, but it’s the right thing to do and everyone knows it.
And everyone knows it? Maybe the ones who don’t deserve the welfare they receive and suffer from “Poor me” syndrome. Btw, I hope you’re not one of those.
Thank You MaineOpenGov.org
We need to know where our Tax monies are being Wasted.
Easier to Cut Effectively. Lots of Pork in here.
Stop Spending what we DO NOT Have!
Send this to our representatives and hold them accountable!
Unlike the Feds, Maine can’t just print money and I don’t think China will float us a loan.
MaineOpenGov.org
http://maineopengov.org/
No need to be rude or insulting. BTW, I make over six figures and I don’t mind paying taxes. We don’t have to hurt the most needy for more tax breaks to those who really don’t need them.
I’ll believe it when you release your tax records.
Then again, you could be counting the two numbers after the decimal point as a couple of your “six figures”.
We pay for 357 State salaries over $100,000.
This doesn’t count Education, and other government funded “quasi’s”
Something is wrong in this “welfare state”.
Check out MaineOpenGov.org
I don’t believe funds to those who need them should be cut. And neither does the governor. What we want is to see those who should not be receiving welfare cut off. This can be done by re-writing our laws that encourage people to go and remain on welfare. Some states have done exactly that and have managed to reduce welfare dependency substantially. Wisconsin under the leadership of Governor Thompson managed to cut welfare expenses by roughly half.
Those dirty, dirty poor people!
Not just those people who take advantage of government programs intended for those in need, but corporations as well. In both cases our elected officials need to stop pandering to both these groups.
Bravo! Well said!
Why Thank You!
Still some common sense out there.
You bring up an excellent point NE, And to realize Real savings ALL state employees, positions, and programs, including the “quasi’s” need to be reviewed for purpose, and effectiveness. Then CUT about 20% of them. Balance the budget to a level of what is Needed, Not wanted.
Start looking here, then offer a proposal or the Guvnah will do it as he was voted in to do.
MaineOpenGov.org
Let’s not waite untill next November Let’s recall him. Let’s impeach him! Let’s just through him out of the blane house, out of Maine, out of Augusta.
I’m In!!!
waste of time and money. His time is almost done anyway. Focus on finding a better person next time. Adding to the budget problems by the impreachment process slows down everything.
Ya, great idea! Let’s get someone who doesn’t care about getting our spending under control, someone who wants to raise our taxes so the government can spend more on big government programs, someone who oesnt care about having a balanced budget so Maine people and business can prosper. Ya, that’s great idea!!!!!
I’m talking about what can be done today. Come November , as I said , you won’t be able to find a republican in Augusta if this foolishness continues.
I hear you but look who you want to send in to bring LePage under control, the dastardly duo of “Mean Mister Mustard” and the master thief “MaineCare Ain’t Gettin Nuttin Nutting.” That would be like pouring gas on a fire or providing reinforcements for “Dictator LePage.” Better to take down the whole gang when we have a real chance to round up our troops and make one mighty charge at the voting booths. Take em all out at once!
I would have suggested a few democrats as well, but even if he let them into his office he would just say that they were, like he said about another democratic rep that met with him “a bunch of bullshit”. The man has such a way with words doesn’t he?
Agreed! Why is there all this foolishness about having a balanced budget. I mean, it’s so foolish for the governor to want to cut down on government spending. He makes it sound like the money is his to cut or spend. If having enough money to operate all those programs is the problem, why doesn’t he just print more, or force those nasty evil rich people who never worked a day in their lives to give more. Let’s get someone in their who enjoys spending lots of money and isnt afraid to raise taxes on income, goods and services!! This crazy talk about cutting back needs to stop! When we get a Dem back in control, we won’t have all this foolishness.
UNfortunately we have yet to see one person GOP or DEM, IND, whatever come forward to see this through. It is good if that unknown person wood step forward so we can learn what they are all about.
Hard line DEMs and GOP are not the way to go. We need good balanced thinking to get us out of the mess our budget is in. Threats to educaton and taking care of people that have nothing is not the way either.
We need good paying jobs….not Right to Work (this leads to more min wage stuff no benefits) in order to get people off any State assistance we need the people to get to work. But there are no real jobs in ME. I do not believe that regulations are the reason why businesses are not heading this way.
Cutting everything that the State offers discurages people from moving up here also. Poor education, services etc will only make it worse.
Go ahead, you and all your buddies. Try to oust the governor, I dare you. I want to see you spin your wheels until they burn out! Keep it up while most folks like myself will ignore your antics. Radicals always like to make a lot of noise. It makes them feel more important, which is okay by me. :)
According to Article 8 in the Maine Constitution, the Legislature requires that towns support public schools.
How about Article
Article 9 Section 9 ?
{ The legislature shall never in any manner suspend or surrender the power of taxation!}
Grover Norguist Tax Pledge
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist
List of Conspirators?
http://s3.amazonaws.com/atrfiles/files/files/State%20Taxpayer%20Protection%
20Pledge%20List_CURRENT_2012.pdf
I say remove them all for Violation of the Oaths of Office to uphold the Maine Constitution!
I’m with ya, compadre. A vote for a real leader is a vote for Maine.
How about we Mainer’s take matters into our own hands and take back the crooked government. There are two sides to each story but we need to come together as humans to make any real difference. These are people we vote in so we can change that! Only if we work together!
Actually I don’t see the legislature being 100% non republicans, I think it will be a close election due to the fact Obama is not popular to most people. We need to fix all of these problems in Maine. How about making those who are sick and disabled join a wellness program in their Mainecare to help improve their health to keep costs down. How about making those folks who keep getting pregnant get out and get jobs. We need to start to seeing the deadbeat dads like my sister’s ex-boyfriend and current boyfriend get jobs and stop trying to collect SSDI and Welfare. We need to keep continuing to cut taxes so working folks like myself can afford to live here and not be forced to move. Have private sector build our crumbling roads and bridges including new east-west highways. But to continue the failed status quo is not the answer to our problems.
Maybe you could be writing about gratitude for being able to work and for having a job. There are people who with illnesses such as agoraphobia, anxiety disorder, Fibromyalgia, depression appear able to work, but may not be able. It is not for any one of us to judge another not having lived that person’ s experience. The economy of this country and of Maine were not ruined by people in need. They were ruined by people in greed.
And the Penguin is attacking those very people, as well as children and the elderly
So true. Romney’s bid to wipe out Obamacare is an extension of the tea party national mandate to put the underprivileged “in their place.” Like Le Page, their nonsensical answer is much akin to Bush’s – Go to the ER. What could be more Socialistic and crippling than that?
Le Page, Romney, Gingrich, Santorum, repeatedly wage war on the poor. None of them have ever gone without their morning cereal and toast. They all act like the shattered British and French aristocracy of centuries ago, where you were either rich or poor with no mercy for the poor.
The preamble to our Constitution seeks to have America address the concerns of those less fortunate than others. However, this tea party menace makes a mockery of anyone who attempts to assist.
well said
I think that as unpopular as Obama is the republicans are still going to lose the Presidency. Newts not liked in his own party and neither is Mitt. I agree that we need to fix the problems in Maine and I am sure most people do. It is just the way that the current crowd in Augusta is trying to go about fixing them. I don’t like paying taxes anymore then you do, but we need to fix the system first. The first thing that should be done and this is all just my opinion is that we have to dig into DHHS and get rid of the fraud first and that means, vendors, providers and recipients. That will mean spending money to hire investigators. Secondly we need to screen applicants much better then we are doing it now. Then we have to go after the real problem which is the cost of healthcare in this State. I am a fan of wellcare programs, but there is a price attached to those as well. The entire system does need an overhaul and some programs need to be eliminated, but you can’t just take an ax to do the job. The problem didn’t come about over night and it won’t be cured overnight either. It has to be done in a well thought out way. I agree deadbeat dads need to become paying dads, the investigators would work on that as well. The other thing is that when fraud is found it needs to be prosecuted and the guilty need to do jail time, it sends a message to others that gaming the system needs to stop. That also means providers, vendors as well as recipients. After that is done and it will probably take 2-3 years then cut taxes.
Thank You MaineOpenGov.org
We need to know where our Tax monies are being Wasted.
Easier to Cut Effectively. Lots of Pork in here.
Send this to our representatives and hold them accountable!
Unlike the Feds, Maine can’t just print money and I don’t think China will float us
a loan.
MaineOpenGov.org
http://maineopengov.org/
Thanks for the link. I always make it a point to read whatever the Grand Wizard and his clan of highly paid political operatives at Maine Heritage Policy Center put out.
Obama has done a damn good job under the toughest of circumstances. This was nearly a Great Depression, and people wanted it solved overnight. Well of course it wan’t going to be solved overnight, especially with the endless pro-corporate obstruction of the GOP. However, the economy is slowing improving nationally, and as that continues watch for Obama’s numbers to continue to climb. And yes, the GOP will lose.
The Republicans will lose the Presidential election, because they have acted so poorly during their time in power. They have managed to accomplish nothing in the past two years, except run interference every time Obama tried to do something. And the y didn’t even do that well, we still got Obama’s Health Care plan (thank God).
And what a joke it is.
Obamacare is a concoction brewed by your own W., Clinton, and primarily Romney. It needs re-vamping. But with Mitch McConnell it’s a no go. The latter professes his only wish in serving his constituents is to see Obama serve one term.
Are you serious or do you just like to stir the pot? That health care plan wont ever make it beyond his lying lips and you have swallowed it all hook line and sinker!!!
Thank You MaineOpenGov.org
We need to know where our Tax monies are being Wasted.
Easier to Cut Effectively. Lots of Pork in here.
Stop Spending what we DON’T Have!
Send this to our representatives and hold them accountable!
Unlike the Feds, Maine can’t just print money and I don’t think China will float us
a loan.
MaineOpenGov.org
http://maineopengov.org/
maineopengov.com is just another Maine Heritage policy propaganda site. You should not believe a word they say and I can personally attest to that.
Probably too much Romney. That could easily be culled, as well the potion added byt Bush. The latter’s “lying lips” gave us Iraq.
Last time I checked, it did make it past his lying lips and onto paper as a law :)
Have you ever heard the expression: “it will take an Act of Congress” to imply that something is going to be very difficult to accomplish? Well guess what – Congress acted and the legislation became law. Now it will take an act of Congress to undo it, and that’s not going to happen. You’d know that if you listened to something other than conservative talk shows.
All ObamaCare is Dirigo on a National level. How is Dirigo working here??. It’s basically the same exact things that Baldo tried here. This program will make the deficit skyrocket it will cost us more in taxes. While providing terrible care and force us to buy something most of us don’t want to. More Liberal Nanny State mentality telling us what to do and how to live our lives. It is time for the Emperor to pack his bags and enjoy his new hobby singing Al Green songs like he did on tv yesterday. Because he will have more time on his hands after January 20th, 2013.
Just imagine what condition this country would be in if someone like LePage were president. Scary thought, isn’t it? The Republican Party CANNOT be trusted as long as there are tea nutters amongst them. America has NO choice but to re-elect Obama.
And that will be a very sad day for the USA !!!!!!!
Can you imagine Romney? Gingrich? Santorum? or Paul? The other losers were smart enough to get off the hay wagon. These four have nothing to offer – except slurs.
I hear ya……we’re screwed either way.
No, it will not. With re-election, I believe President Obama will continue to do his good work with quiet dignity. Don’t believe the Fox News palaver about him. Look for yourselves. Any of the GOP candidate would bring disaster to us.
It is funny to hear a comment like that, you people are applauding obama and slamming on Lepage. I guess if Lepage had the option to just keep printing useless money and borrowing into an unimaginable figure, he could make things look better on the surface also. Lepage is trying to make needed cuts, while Obama is just spending us into eternity. How easily fooled some of you are
It isn;t his printing press we hate, it’s his dictatorship.
President Obama would be hard pressed to outspend Bush. Look at the facts rather than listening to the propaganda. It is not what LePage is trying to do. It’s how he is trying to do it with bullying and temper tantrums. He has no respect for the legislative process.
Obama had out spent any president in history only 2 years into his first and only term look at the facts yourself
You are accepting propaganda. There is no factual truth to the statement you have made. Did you get that information from Fox News? Do you realize that people who watch Fox News know less than if they had no contact at all with the doings of the U.S.
spoken like a true cnn listener. Try listening to news that isnt controlled by the liberal media and politicians and you too could familiarize yourself with facts and truth
Can you imagine what would have happened if Romney took what was left of this country from Bush? How about Gingrich? Santorum? Paul?
You’re right. Obama inherited a job loss of 750,000 people from the Bush-Cheney years. The banks were failing and Obama subsidized them against his own followers wishes. He also saved the auto industry. Banks are paying back the stimulus loans, as are the auto companies he saved.
Last year, according to reports, 1.9 million jobs were created. He has implemented tax cuts to most Americans and cut the payroll tax. Interestingly enough, he had to fight Mitch McConnell’s tea party stressed out party. Unless Obama agreed not to cut tax cuts for the rich, he would have his henchmen vote the measure down.
Obama has been under attack since taking office. Teapublicans want him out of office. That is the reason everything has been stonewalled by the teapublicans. Attempting to make people believe – with the help of Fox propaganda – that Obama was a do nothing president – they failed.
He has accomplished a lot even though Murdoch’s propagandists continually attack him. But he remains cool, calm and collected. That’s how he brought down Osama Bin Laden, whom Bush said he couldn’t care less about. He’s stopped the ill-begotten Iraq war created through Cheney and Rumsfeld lies. And, a whole lot more.
LePage will continue attacking the poor, the unemployed, and anyone below his “status” or “class.” Like all dictators he is a snob.
I wish I could like this one million times. You are precisely on point. I only wish I’d said it so eloquently, Briney
The numbers that will climb for obama will be unemployment and inflation, also known as the misery index, through his last year in office – MARK MY WORDS! You can’t cease drilling by US corporations in the Gulf, stop a huge project like the Keystone Pipeline, wildly print new dollars, borrow $6T from China, and impose a flawed healthcare system without serious consequences.
You need to do some fact checking on money. The healthcare system proposed by President Obama is far more fair and manageable than all of us being robbed by insurance companies and doctors behaving in excess.
I can’t even begin to explain how wrong you are.
dont even bother trying you would be exhausted and breathless and they still wont understand until the country hits rock bottom, and even then they will be blaming bush
fair does not mean affordable by the taxpayers footing the bill no one ever said life was fair your reap what you sow
Im not a deadbeat dad never was but I have witnessed many friends and family dealing with the state and would argue that theydo not get away with much. Wage garnishments, loss license, loss of dignity and possibly children. I do not think welfare fraud is nearly as rampant as the SUBJECTIVE rightwing cult believes and would like us to believe. Been cutting for years actually if there were any good jobs for our youth/disabled/etc. u know who I mean look around, they would not be what you don’t want to see.
The r’s are attacking the poor, anyone who is on a state –
run program to get attention away from their inability to do what this dictator
of a governor to do what he said he would do.Put people first, provide jobs, and make Maine a
much better place to live and work.
He cuts taxes to the level of 170 plus millions
and then is “surpridsed when we have all these deficits.For all their talk, the
r’s have really spent most of their time on social issues that aren’t providing
jobs. Mural, union busting, supposed voter fraud to name just a few. Imagine
what they may have accomplished if they really tried to improve the
economy first through job creation
Like his fellow dictator Scott Walker in Michigan, the poor, and the average working American and retirees are all in their sights – just like they were that baked Alaskan – Palin.
Voter fraud is another tea party flip. Anyone reading or watching would believe that it is widespread, when actually its has been proven – it as false as Iraq having WMD.
I agree with you. I don’t think welfare fraud is as widespread as we are being told it is. I do however think that it exist within the system at a variety of levels and it needs to be found and stopped. As far as deadbeat dads are concerned I really do feel that the State’s effort in this area is in need of improvement.
Actually I think it’s anybody but Obama to most folks it doesn’t matter who runs. Nobama should lose to anyone of the current Republicans because it will be easy to run on his failed record.
DC you may be right, but remember Obama is sitting on a billion dollars and you certainly can’t say that the current crop of Republicans do not have their own problems.
to join a wellness program in their maincare requires one to have mainecare and for that mainecare to have the funds!
Well, the GOP will complain until the cows come home about poor people getting pregnant and going on welfare yet they oppose programs that would help prevent unplanned pregnancies and abortion. You can’t sit back and complain about something that you refuse to contribute to preventing in all possible ways. You can’t claim to care so much about the lives of unborn children and then ignore their needs for the next 18 years if they need help. I’m so sick of GOP hypocrisy. If they want to try to force people into being parents when those people CAN’T afford to even take care of themselves then they need to quit whining about welfare, medicaid and the like.
Well said OldWench
hear hear!
People like you make me sick. I am not aware of any GOP candidate that is against prophylactics or other birth control measures – except abortion. I know many people who have aborted a viable baby because they did not want to be inconvenienced. Many later suffered from severe depression for what they did. You liberal fools, who preach do what every makes you happy regardless of the consequences, are the reason this country is in such terrible shape.
a fetus isn’t considered viable until about 24 weeks. That would be six months. 41 states have laws against post-viability abortions.
I actually despise abortion and my PERSONAL view is that it is essentially murder. That being said…I support legalized abortion because that is the only way it can be regulated and because there ARE times when I think it should be available.
I’m also really conservative in EVERY area except Social Justice, which is the most important thing to me. Most people who take the time to actually educate themselves about the issues will find that they are not only conservative or only liberal on everything…they are a little of both. That’s what we call MODERATES…they THINK before deciding their opinion. You should try it sometime.
Precisely!! That is the GOP problem. Why don’t people see it? That is my question. I believe they have been conditioned to hate the poor so that the more well to do will be able to go about their robber baron ways. I say this from the position of a well educated middle class person with a good job. I have no bitterness and no axe to grind. I simply believe that it is my responsibility to love and care for those less fortunate.
I don’t know a single Republican in Maine who hates the poor. The Republicans I know are working class folks who pay their bills and their taxes and they simply ask that the state use their money responsibly. The Republicans I know are educated at all levels, some high school grads, some college, and even a PhD or three. They are farmers, lawyers, selectmen, waitresses, editors,mechanics –just ordinary people.
I guess it would be hard for such ordinary folk to aspire to your nobleness…
I do!!! His name is Paul LePage!!!
I misspoke. The tea partiers and the right wing who claim to be christians hate the poor. LePage hates the poor. They remind him of where he came from. I am not noble. My point was that although I started out poor and worked hard to become educated, I work as a social worker and I know something about the lot of the poor. If they could do better they would. Franklin Roosevelt saved this country from the great Depression. The wealth of the 50’s through the 70’s came from that time. President Eisenhower warned about the marriage of corporations and war and industry. He warned that it would bring about the end of the Republican party. He was the last sensible Republican president. The downhill slide started after Nixon, continued with Reagan and Bush I. There was a lovely period of prosperity in the 90’s and then Bush II took us into Iraq for no good reason and gave big tax cuts to the wealthy. Look where we are now. That is my point.
Have you read Darkcat33’s comments???????????????//
So knock yourself out with your feeling of responsibility. Not everyone shares the feeling. Some people are working their butt off to try and barely take care their own families, and are not interested in taking care of others first, and caring for their own with what is left.
Maybe people who decided to have children should have to pay to educate them instead of expecting people who chose not to have any pay to educate them. Look at all the money that would free up if people had to be responsible for what they bring into the world.
Old Republican spouting. You’ve not addressed one single issue I raised.
Oh please these folks are just deadbeats who refuse to work. The Gop and Independents (myself) are tired of paying for the deadbeats in Maine (the 61ers%) who continue to want to mooch off of the working Maine citizen. The Libs in Augusta continue to refuse to see their agenda has caused the huge shortfalls this state continues to have because they refuse to cut spending and these useless programs. Well it is time to make cuts or shut the state down till further notice. The Republicans should come out and expose the frauds in Augusta who continue to want to pay for the failed programs that Maine has. They should also publish the names of the people who continue to live off of my tax dollars.
Get a job and pay your Taxes!
Perhaps they could also persuade their Old Pal Nutting to repay the money he owes that state, for starters?
You can continue your wishful thinking all you want. The Maine GOP is going to take a pounding in November, and THEY know it and are bracing for it, just like the pounding they just took over the voting rights bill. They better wake up and smell the coffee. LePage is a walking disaster. As to tax cuts, upper income people sure as all heck don’t need one more dime in tax cuts. They have had tax cuts upon cuts, and where are all the “jobs jobs jobs” they were already supposed to have created? Where? If I were you I’d stop listening to the corporate liars on FAKE News and the OxyHeadRushLimbaugh program and stop voting against your own interest.
The fact is we don’t have anymore money for these programs they need to be restructed or eliminated. It is time to put Maine on a better fiscal path. Yeah let’s go back to failed liberal agenda that has caused this mess in the first place. The Democrats have no intentions of cutting spending, creating jobs, fixing our roads etc.. Why because they all come from the Welfare program sector.
More nonsense you are swallowing via the corporate lying right wing propaganda you folks drink like KoolAid. Where is the money going to come from to pay their health bills once they start flocking to emergency rooms instead? It is going to come from everyone else’s larger premiums. Listen to yourself. You want to fix roads but cut spending. Make up your mind. As to cutting spending, I guess you had better stop listening to the likes of the Maine Heritage Center, FakeNews, and RushIdiot and do a little real research. Baldacci and the Democrats cut over $800million when they inherited Bush and Co’s Great Recession. And they did it without acting like a temper- tantrumming schoolyard bully like the buffoon we now have disgracing the Blaine House. Your corporate Bush trickled-on economic plan of cutting taxes for the mansion owners was supposed to create “jobs jobs jobs”. What did we get? Flat wages, net zero job growth, and the Great Recession. Answer the question: Where are all the “jobs jobs jobs” your tax cuts for the mansion owners for ten years were supposed to create? The “mess” has been your right wing policies which have shipped jobs overseas for decades while transferring the tax burden from the richest of the rich to the middle class. The GOP despises the middle class, wants to destroy it, and only cares about their corporate masters. Democrats improve the economy by investing in education, science, and infrastructure, with middle class tax cuts, and with targeted tax incentives for businesses to expand domestically. You grow an economy with policies that broaden and support the middle class to provide the demand businesses need. You don’t do it with FAILED right wing trickled-on policies that only benefit the very few 1% at the expense of everyone else. The Maine GOP will take a BASHING in November. You know it, and so do they.
“Welfare” like endless tax loopholes, tax shelters, and tax subsidies for the corporate rich like your corporate pal Mitt Romney? He pays far lower tax rates than you do with his $250million net worth, and yet you worship at his feet. Also, since you hate public programs so much, you are no longer allowed to use public roads, bridges, and sidewalks. Do not be seen using any kind of public park, public school, or public arena, and make sure your children and grandchildren do not use them either. You are no longer allowed to use the post office, and do not call the police or the fire department, EVER. Need a cop? Hire private security. Need a fireman? Buy another fire extingisher. Go pay private school tuition. Need your roads and sidewalks plowed and sanded? Go buy a truck and plow and do it yourself. Want to go to a public beach in the summer? Tough luck. Dump some sand in your backyard and imagine it. Need Social Security or Medicare when you grow old? Tough luck. Buy private insurance and good luck with that when you’re in your 80’s.
Oh yeah, the US Military and the US military industrial complex are pure SOCIALISM. And you GOPers just love that. All those sweet TAXPAYER-financed military contracts, and military jobs with free clothes, housing, food, medical,…yeah you just love those trillions of dollars in SOCIALISM. Such hypocrisy. It never ends.
You going to make companies hire these people ?
It is time for these folks who keep getting pregant and or are able bodied to get a job. They shouldn’t be collecting welfare. Just like 18 and 19 yr olds that would also get kicked off as well. The Libs need to accept reality these programs don’t work. That is why the Libs in Augusta (Rep. Valentino, Carey, Russell etc.) are proposing more Casinos and Gambling to have all the money to fund expanding DHHS and Welfare etc.. Why because they don’t know any better , I like Casinos and Gambling do it myself but the Dems are doing everything to protect their voting block. Casino & Gambling money shouldn’t go to Welfare it is wrong to say having new Casinos and new Gambling halls to have money be used improperly. That once they open that all Casino and Gambling money in Maine including other forms (Bingo, Harness Racing, Lottery etc) should go to expand Government including blowing it on DHHS and Welfare as Rep. Valentino wants to do. Time to cut the fat in Augusta and this is the place to start DHHS/Welfare. The Dems are in denial they created the problems that Maine has. They are afraid if theY vote to cut programs they will be booted. They are cowards want everyone on Government checks because then they can tell them what to do.
You did not answer my question
Well, maybe we could start with cutting the sweet little job LeBuffoon gave to his just-out-of-college daughter. Enjoy your OxyHeadRushLimpmind type rants while they can last. Come November the Maine GOP is going to get pounded, and you know it.
???
Obama is runing for State Legislator?????
I am disabled and Mainecare will pay for only 2 physical therapy sessions to help my lower body strenght. Help with my COPD? only 12 of 24 sessions needed to help improve lung function will be paid for. There are many wellness programs available that Mainecare just won’t pay for.
And it doesn’t look like LePage has missed too many meals, maybe HE should be in a wellness program. You know the old lead by example thing? Just a thought
He’s many things to many people, especially those relying on help due to unfortunate circumstances.
His association with today’s problems reincarnate folk who populated the Dickensian era. Le Page physically and mentally fits Dickens’s “Mr Bumble.” He was the rotund and well-fed individual who dragged Oliver Twist through the decrepit streets of London offering the orphaned lad for sale.
Compassionateless. A bully , who begins each angry attack On the people of Maine with a threat.
Eligibility claims should be handled by a state government office established to make sure that those receiving free aid are qualified to receive it. We have this set-up. The office should be doing it – not the man who claims to be governor.
So where you going to move? “Tax havens” are an illusion.
Where are you going to move Lepage has the Greyhound and Vermont Transit busses ready for all the Welfare crowd. He can send them to Quebec , New Brunswick, or to a Liberal Welfare Haven so they can have those bums having new sugar daddies paying for them.
Perhaps y0u could elaborate on how people who are disabled can join a wellness program to improve their health? That makes absolutely no sense at all. I am considered handicapped and no program exists that is going to change that.
He’s acting like someone who is mentally ill…and there is a provision in Maine’s laws that allow the legislature to remove him from office…IF they are brave enough to put their collective feet down and save our state from hurricane Paul.
I don’t know if he is legally insane or not, but I do know that if the republican leadership in the legislature doesn’t get this guy under control it will be decades before we ever see republicans even come close to having a majority. About the only people who are supporting him now are the die hard tea party folks. The tea party is losing it’s luster. In Tennessee they are disbanding. The tea party favorites in the republican Presidential field are slowly being left by the wayside. They have proven to be all show and no substance. Complicated problems can not be cured by simplistic solutions. Even Fox News is disassociating itself from the tea party. There are reasonable and responsible members of the legislature who are republicans and to be honest we need both parties in order to have the legislative process work, but unless they get LePage under control I think November will be a blood bath for republicans
YOU VOTED FOR IT GREAT
YOU VOTED FOR HIM GOOD LUCK
i sure as heck didn’t, i thought he’d lost his marbles before he came in office…
I didn’t vote for him! I knew he was a walking disaster as soon as he first opened his mouth.
I have had that same thought, very irrational …he really needs an evaluation, for our sake…
He has the same personality type as Hitler, Mussolini, and many other narcissistic dictators from history. He will screw up royally in time just as Richard Nixon did. We need only wait.
I think it’s time we think about impeachment, get some one in there who can get the job done.
And it would creat one more job in the state!
So true! Wake up legislators, time to do your jobs and start the process of getting rid of this lying, incompetent fool.
Looks like he is getting the job done .Yes I have taken a Hit as well but we need to cut out the waste and the pork . where do you think we should get our monies from? yes we should make sure our people in the Gov. take a hit as well. I voted for him and yes it is painfull but at least he has enough brass to speak his mind without worrying if it is politically correct.I say go get’em Mr. LePage cut the pork
He is a dictator. A man without any compassion.
A lot of this has to do with how he didn’t plan his budget well in the first place and has mismanaged it since. Now this shortfall needs to be handled through the broader lens of the comprehensive budget with everything on the table including a delay of some of his tax cuts for the rich. John Baldacci and the Democrats dealt with $800million in cutbacks without all the bullying and nonsense we are seeing out of this guy. And why is he doing it? Because he has no clue how to be governor instead of an arrogant dictatorial pigheaded Mardens CEO, and because of his TeaRadical political philosophy.
Well, don’t look for much help from the R’s in the legislature who carry his water. Just look toward November and the pounding that the Maine GOP is going to take at the polls because of this nasty radical and that they just defend him and tote his water for him. See you in November.
I agree with just about everything you have said with the exception of your first sentence, ”
A lot of this has to do with how he didn’t plan his budget well in the first place and has mismanaged it since.”
Paul Richard LePage knew exactly what he was doing when he put the current budget together and he knew exactly what would happen. He planned for a shortfall in the DHHS budget just so he could , once again, start up his war on Maine’s poor. If you remember this is not the first time he has gone after Mainecare. He is very good at saying we are broke, but yet he proposed and the legislature passed a tax cut in the last session of slightly less then $110 million. The primary beneficiaries of which were approximately 260 of Maine’s wealthiest families. This session again while screaming , “we are broke” he is proposing an almost $100 million tax cut and to put $39 million into a “slush fund” which is basically a saving account. If we are as he says, “broke” how can we afford to have a savings account? Do not for a moment underestimate this man. Remember he told Don Carrigan in an interview recently that “I’m a good actor”.
I put you on 100 for the likes, because I’m jealous.
I wished I could recall all of what you just recalled. And the funny thing is; this is only the first year. You are correct, he won’t be seeing a majority Legislature. Which is why he is trying to slam through as many as his pet proposals as he can. He’s even, and I really can’t believe this, threatening a separate branch of government. Some say that an action like this is treason.
I’ve written all of the members of the Appropriation Committee and reminded them that it is their duty to: get the information that they want, weigh all opinions, and gather information, and when you are done gathering information,….gather some more.
Their duties as legislators is the same as the Governor’s, put the people of Maine and their best interest first. I’ve also asked them to restrain from voting until their questions are answered. There is no cataclysmic blowing up of DHHS if they don’t vote by the end of January, DHHS just don’t get what they want, when they want it. They should have paid those bills earlier.
Very well said. If I may add: the GOP will not be able to control him, so they the need to work with the Dems and govern around him. That is the only solution.
No, there actually is another solution. The legislators can begin impeachment proceedings…and
if none of them has the guts to step up and start it, they can ALL plan to be defeated at the polls. The public has had it with this governor.
You’re correct.
Under Article IV, Constitution of Maine, Section 8: Power of Impeachment. “The House of Representatives shall have the sole power of impeachment.”
All of our elected representatives have addresses and E-Mail connections listed on the State of Maine web page.
Now is the time…for all good Mainers to come to the aid of their state and tell the Legislature to Impeach Le Page.
This is ridiculous. What is his impeachable offense? You can’t impeach a person just because you disagree with his policy initiatives and his budget allocations.
Even “bullying” is not an impeachable offense.
Threatening is.
Conspiracy to Violate the Maine Constitution is an empeachable offense for the
Legislature!
Article 9 Section 9 ?
{ The legislature shall never in any manner suspend or surrender the power of taxation!}
List of Possible conspirators
http://s3.amazonaws.com/atrfiles/files/files/State%20Taxpayer%20Protection%20Pledge%20List_CURRENT_2012.pdf
What better reason than Conspiracy to Violate the Maine Constitution
Article (9) Section (9)
{ The legislature shall never in any manner suspend or surrender the power of taxation!}
http://s3.amazonaws.com/atrfiles/files/files/State%20Taxpayer%20Protection%20Pledge%20List_CURRENT_2012.pdfll
Very well said. However, with that one statement he cemented the future of the Republican Party in Maine… every middle school kid in the state just became Republican.
Vote LePage for longer summer vacation! What a slogan.
You are probably right. But their parents just became democratic voters.
Impeachment. Whilst waiting – Censure.
I disagree with practically everything you said. You do however sound very persuasive with your use of hyperbole and tendency to stray far from the issue. For that matter, let me say you’ll never make a good mathematician nor a good philosopher! A good rabble rouser you are for sure even though you repeat the same old things over and over.
I know you won’t be convince by what I have to say because you are simply out to hang the governor for political reasons. For the sake of our readers, here’s the essence of what is really going on here:
Part of the legislature is not taking the dire financial state of the state government very seriously. It wants to continue doing what it has been doing for the past 3 decades and that is, kicking the can down the road. This leaves the governor with the only option of sounding off the alarm. His approach appears to be working as most people seem to agree with him in general. If you don’t think so, then start attending his town hall meetings where his comments are usually well-received by the majority, which often erupt in loud applause.
All in all, I commend the governor for his fortitude and attempt to make our state financially responsible by living within its means.
Perhaps as you say I will never make a good mathematician even thought I hold both a BS in Mechanical Engineering and an MS as well . I seem to remember just a few math courses. Of course you would be in a much better position to judge my mathematical abilities then let’s say the professors who had to have found my participation in their courses satisfactory or my company’s clients who do not share your feelings thankfully. You are right I will never be a good philosopher, nor has that ever been my intention. As far as your statement that I am out to hang the Governor remember I voted for him. However when I make a mistake , and believe me I make plenty of them, usually not in calculations, I admit it rather then trying to blame someone else. As far as your using the town hall attendees as your indicator of his support isn’t that a lot like trying to use the crowd at a home Patriots game as an indicator as to how the entire NFL fan base views the Patriots? I know that I , in your opinion, would not be considered a historian and neither do I , but I seem to remember that Hitler got some pretty good rounds of applause , Castro and Saddam as well. Keep on supporting Paul Richard LePage. At the rate he is going you might just end up being the only one.
I would agree with you about the governor getting his support only from like-minded folks, except for the fact that that’s not the case. For instance, he went to the St. John Valley recently, a democrat stronghold, and was widely applauded even after being attacked incessantly by a contingent of career democrat politicians. This has been happening all around the state. You don’t seem to understand how turned off common folks are to the glib and slick politicians of the past and present in both legislative and executive branches. In contrast they see LePage as straight forward if not always articulate, and someone determined to get this state’s finances in order and the economy going again. For too long Maine has ranked near or at the bottom among all the states in the union as a a friendly place to do business. Many people agree with him that the only way the state’s poor reputation can be restored is by cutting taxes and regulations that don’t work or are simply counter-productive, while cutting down on needles spending and excessive government. People everywhere want smaller and less intrusive government, lower taxes, and less welfare. They don’t care about murals, about his daughter’s government job, etc. They just want a return to prosperity and opportunity, something they see the governor addressing and trying to achieve.
Yesterday on this very board you insulted me for no other reason then I do not share your view of the current resident of the Blaine House. If you think LePage is doing such a great job then that is your opinion and I most certainly wouldn’t want to do anything to change it. If you think the tactics that LePage is using in an attempt to get his agenda passed are acceptable to you then that is again your opinion and I most certainly realize that there is nothing that I, or perhaps anyone else , could do to change it. You have your view on the way things should be and it is most certainly your right to support whomever you wish. I just do not care for people, in everyday life or in politics who do not tell the truth. If I found out that one of my employees were a liar I would not want them on my payroll. I believe very strongly in being able to trust people and frankly I do not trust liars. I look at lying as a form of dishonesty. Apparently it is okay with you if someone is a liar and again that is your choice. Just a quick question though. When was the last time you heard, if ever LePage say something positive about the State of Maine or her people?
It’s very easy to call others liars. Without meaning to insult you, I can easily make a persuasive a case against you – or mostly anybody – for lying. But that’s not my style. If I disagree with someone I’ll tell him why and sometimes bluntly so when I detect unfair treatment. No, it’s not okay when someone lies. But calling other people liars is rarely okay because in most cases deception is not intended, and is very difficult to prove when it actually exists.
In short, it’s all about charity, treating others as you yourself would want to be treated when being critically examined. As you well know, none of us are perfect, including yourself.
I’d feel remiss if I didn’t offer the following simple suggestions when you post: Attack the message, if you feel impelled to do so, but not the messenger. When criticizing, direct your criticism towards a particular idea or action, not the person per se.
They need to convince this guy to pull a Sarah Palin & then run another republican up the flag pole and see if he/she flies.
I disagree but I like your sense of humor. In Maine it would be very difficult if not impossible to “pull a Sarah Palin” because Maine, unlike Alaska, has certain protections for its head of state to prevent political enemies from bankrupting him or her with frivolous lawsuits.
LePage isn’t going to close Maine schools which are mostly funded locally. He is trying to make a point that we can’t close our eyes any longer. The situation is grave and I, for one, am tied of kicking the problem down the road.
Why not Emulate Wisconsin and Recall this inept Governor! It can be done!!
Recall him what. Maine has no recall laws. You can’t recall any state official without a recall law. The Libs love to talk about recalls they are full of hot air just like Rep. Cynthia Dill and her stupid online recall petition. No wonder most people north of Augusta find her to be a nutcase.
When the socialist system begins to fail, it is the poorest among us, those who have been herded into the immoral grasp of dependency, that will feel the most pain….while striving for compassion, these programs ultimately bring misery upon those they seek to console.
What? ……….. ok What?
“while striving for compassion, these programs ultimately being misery upon those they seek to console”…??
What in the world does that mean? I’m taking it as those who are in need, the things that help them live, are bringing misery to those that offer help.
Ok Mr. Whipple…..keep squeezing the Charmin and think of a great mantra.
…when you and i think of social services, we think of those in true need. when Tea Party people think of social services, they think of the ‘trailer trash’ with ten kids and big screen tv scamming the state.
both sides have a point. not sure how to reconcile them, tho.
:-/
….
And if he had said he would shut down funding to nursing homes, then he would be accused of threatening grannie.
WHat’s shameful is that certain segments of the political society will not come to the table in good faith. The tactics of the Democrats are clear. Stall, work up as much negative hype as possible, and hope to reap the political benefits in the next election. It may be good for the Democratic party in Maine, but it is bad for Maine people.
Ah! don’t put this man’s incompetance on the backs of the Democrats. Even his own party members in the house and senate can’t stand him…..And by the way….you must not of heard…..Granny is next in line for LePage’s boot…..you better hope that this Governor is in Flordia when you become a Senior or you may be the one getting the shaft…..Thank You Gov…..
With LePage dropping “Silly” bombs everyday there is growing and distinctive smell in the air. No not napalm…this is the smell of conservative fear. Fear of being cast out once again by Maine voters. Sniff, sniff, sniff. Ahhhh…I love the smell of conservative fear in the morning!
Democrats would be hard pressed to create more negative hype than Governor LePage creates. Democrats and Republicans have tried to compromise and get some work done. LePage is threatening both parties if he does not get his way. I have not seen stalling. I have seen bullying, finger pointing, temper tantrums, and threats….all done by the governor. He has no one to blame but himself.
Someone needs to explain to him that he is the governor, not the emperor, dictator or king.
LePage needs to just GTFO of Maine.
both parties are doing that wandini. both parties.
You’re right, and I despise it just as much when the Republicans do it. But right now, that is the Maine Democrats’ strategy–to delay and whip up public sentiment by making false and inflammatory statements. And I find it repugnant. Democrats in this state need to tell their reps to get to the table, swallow a smidgen of their overblown egos, and get to work.
….
So, we should let the children starve because their parents were irresponsible? That’s heartless, that is. It shouldn’t surprise people in this day that young folks have sex, and that babies often result from having sex. Would you leave a house with an infant without heat in the dead of winter? Neither would I, and neither, it seems, will LePage.
….
Where did I say let the old folks be cold and suffer?
…..
Just another daily attack on our Governor.
And he brought it on himself. The man is an egomaniacal, bullying, child. He has temper tantrums rather than think of solutions. Please.
vote for me im stupid, no wait ill have someone else do it so Summers can keep his job, evil voters.
redundant isn’t it? Why’s that?
It s not what he is saying, its how he is saying it. Truth hurts. Lepage is blunt. Cut, or it’ll be cut, we are balancing this budget……Obviously, those that place their children in state run schools don’t want to see cuts there. We all want to see a balanced budget, but no one wants to see anyone cut, hmmmm.
and it is those parents placing kids in state run schools that will be casting votes next election!
Yep…
As we reported in December, in Fort Kent LePage said, “Come April first, I’m going to have to close schools or close nursing homes.”
http://www.dirigoblue.com/2011/12/lepage-to-former-legislator-i-dont-know-what-planet-youre-from/
close em
Get rid of government unions. we will save all sorts of money.
get rid of the Governor, wipe the slate clean and THEN start over. Government unions? I suppose we should get rid of all the unions, because they are so, so powerful nowadays aren’t they?
Perhaps we should get rid of Maine National Guard pay scales as well.
If It doesn’t go his way he threatens us….isn’t there a word for that???????
I’m amazed at the ignorant comments here. What is it that people can’t understand? Governor LePage is doing all he can to avoid closing nursing homes. Cutting the benefits to younger, lesss vulnerable people is the only alternative. THERE IS NO MORE MONEY. Gee, wonder where it went? Watch the shenanigans of the Maine Housing Authority. We’ve already seen the MTA finally held accountable.
Doing all he can? Like giving tax breaks to those whose wealth is valued at over $2 million? Like putting through a tax break that nets the average Joe $5.00 per week but provides a nice $2,500 bonus for those with nice 6 figure incomes?
I have no problem with reducing taxes, but I’m not sure an economic downturn with so many unemployed or minimally employed is a good time to cut the social safety net.
Please open your eyes. Every proposal LePage has made has benefited the wealthy and corporations. ((Incidentally, every proposal has also fallen in line with the platform of ALEC and the Koch Bros. You like having the Koch Brothers dictate the politics of your state?) Not one of them has been targeted toward helping out the working people of Maine.
“I have no problem with reducing taxes, but I’m not sure an economic
downturn with so many unemployed or minimally employed is a good time to
cut the social safety net.”
Really? You expect us to but this statement when you follow it up with nonsense like……..
Please open your eyes. Every proposal LePage has made has benefited
the wealthy and corporations. ((Incidentally, every proposal has also
fallen in line with the platform of ALEC and the Koch Bros. You like
having the Koch Brothers dictate the politics of your state?) Not one
of them has been targeted toward helping out the working people of
Maine.”
Why not try thinking for yourself ,for once, and join in with those who are trying to fix the problems that those ,like you, refuse to admit are real.
Why not openly admit that the goal here is deny the problem long enough in hopes that you can install the next round of libs to be in control and bury it all, again.
He can claim title of being the first dictator this state ever had. It is up to the Maine House of Representatives to impeach him. Our Maine Constitution provides us with that privilege.
We should all turn to the State of Maine Web Page, find our representatives and tell them to start the ball rolling.
Impeach this scoundrel.
Tax breaks for the wealthy? In case you haven’t noticed, this is Maine…where are those wealthy people you refer to?
Well, LePage did recently kick of his re-election (hah!) campaign with a $500 per plate dinner.
I’m pretty sure the folks who attended patted him on back and told him to keep up the good work in terms of fattening their wallets.
So despite the LePage assertion (which you seem to have swallowed) that there are no rich people in Maine, there are rich people here. And LePage is working hard to appease them — but he doesn’t want you to know that, of course.
Ignorant, really? Such word usage coming from someone who wonders where the money went? Pssst…there’s a worldwide economic recession going on. Here in the U.S. that recession was brought about by expensive un-necessary wars and nation building along with monetary theft by those with lots of money but who have never actually done a day’s labor in their lives. It would be “unknowing” of anyone to believe that this recession was brought about by the poorest among us. I guess you have to find scapegoats somewhere when those who are responsible are your political leaders and their corporate bosses who tell them how to legislate. Still, picking on the poor, elderly, physically or mentally handicapped, or children seems pretty darn slimy even for Republicans.
Wealth has been extracted by the ruling class, not produced.
And they will not stop.
I imagine that bankers working 100+ hours a week under incredibly stressful conditions paying 40%+ of their income in taxes are just extracting wealth.
Ahhh… pity the poor bankers. Amazing to hear someone actually advance that as an argument.
40%! Wow! Those boys have got to get in contact with Mitt Romney’s accountants. Mitt just informed us that he’s paying only 15% on the Billions that he can readily find. On the many other billions that he’s not even sure where it’s being kept/hidden he’s likely paying far-far less. Like ZERO! Oh yes, tax laws and opportunities to avoid them are very kind to rich.
Mitt paid 15% on his capital investments where he has made most of his profits. Those firms too in which he invested paid taxes on their profits. These taxes were then passed on to investors like Mitt just like a landlord passes on his rental expenses to his renters in the form of higher rental fees. I don’t besmirch Mitt for the millions (not billions as you stated) he has made as a result of good investments.
name one.
Wow. I guess you all got a bit riled up. I have many friends that just graduated college last year and work at investment banks. They are not all wealthy, and work their butts off (100+ hours a week in NYC).
Suppose they make roughly $100,000 of INCOME a year. The NY state INCOME tax is 6.85% on every dollar earned. The NYC INCOME tax is roughly 3%. Using a neat take-home pay calculator (http://www.calculator.net/take-home-pay-calculator.html?cannualincome=100000&cpayfrequency=Annual&cfilestatus=Single&callowance=2&cdeduction=500&cstatetax=6.85&ccitytax=3&cadditionat1=no&x=43&y=6) that also breaks taxes down into line-items, the take home pay of this single banker in NYC is $64,201, close to my 40%.
The difference between investment bankers and Mitt Romney/Warren Buffet is that by IRS standards, they have no INCOME and thus do not pay an INCOME tax. They have WEALTH. WEALTH is different than INCOME. They are taxed on capital gains, dividends, etc., which is (you guessed it!) taxed at a rate 15%! Of course Buffet wants higher INCOME taxes, but I bet he’d fight an increase on capital gains taxes to the death. Guys like Buffet do not pay any INCOME taxes, nor payroll taxes, on vast portions of their WEALTH.
You subtract take-home pay from gross to determine his tax percentage- not even close. Medicare and SocSec are part of the withholding as well, not to mention the tax deferred IRA. Then, with any cleverness, his tax return is very likely enough to feed a family of four for a year. When he takes all that into the equation, saying that he is paying 40% in taxes is totally off the wall. Or maybe that’s Tea Party Arithmetic 101.
15% not 40. If they paid the percentage rate that an auto mechanic pays I would root for them, and say more power to you.
This sounds like socialist/Marxist talk. Few countries in the world treat their citizens any better than the U.S., and those that do, have free enterprise capitalist systems in place that value hard work and an entrepreneurial spirit that made this country prosperous.
bullkrap
Lepage cut taxes for the rich then complains that there isn’t enough money for schools…. Maybe he should read the Robin Hood story from front to back instead of backwards….
No, as has been shown MANY of those 65000 people are very vulnerable, will now be even less healthy and will go to emergency rooms which WE will pay for in higher premiums, and many healthcare professionals will be laid off. He refuses to deal with this through a comprehensive budgeting process with everything on the table. He is an arrogant pigheaded TeaRadical, and he and his party are going to pay bigtime in November.
ya…and I have a bridge to sell,…..it’s cheap. Not interested? well then I have this marvelous elixir that will cure just about every thing, it will even take stains out.
Please, don’t glorify an idiot.
Wait-is that the same bridge I have for sale in Brooklyn? Lost count on how many times I’ve sold it to a teapartier.
Now tell me about your elixir, rusjan. Will it rub out morons such as the one at the Blaine House who’s left stains all over this state?
The liberals cant understand that Siberia… you see he going to cut some peoples mailbox money and that makes him an evil man.. See you cant take away mailbox money… because.. well… its mailbox money… and aint no one gonna take it away… the idea of there not being enough money dosnt compute.. charts do not help them…. no more money dosnt compute. because im not sure they even know where the money comes from.. and they dont care as long as the mailbox money is there come the first of the month..the funniest thing is they all seem to think there is no fraud in the welfare system… well of course not.. Im sure that every single person on the system deserves what they are getting..but I say even if that were true.. that is too many.. we have to have a criteria and its going to hurt because obviously there are more people receiving than there are giving … and that kind of dance cant never last.. and the answer is to that.. it simple .. get a dem back in there so the mailbox money continues on .. Ride it right into the ground..
MaineCare paying for nursing homes, medical care and medication. Doubt that goes to someones mail box. Sounds more like health care to me.
Obviously Mr Born no one wants to endanger anyone in a nursing home. The disabled .. In other words the ones that HAS to have help. Notice he hasnt said anything like that?.. What he HAS said is that there are 65000 non deserving people in the health care system. The problem with the Democrats is there is no line in the sand.. There HAS to be a line in the sand because 220 million dollar deficit proves that. You cant take form what ISNT there … Its simple math. My wife works with the mentally ill. 6 years ago when Baldy was in there he didnt threaten .. He just simply TOOK the money away from her line of work. It was easy for him to do because he wouldnt hear from these people come election time.. They can not speak for themselves so it was easy to cut 120 million from that budget. Then over the course of the next couple years he just started giving more out on the other side.. and the people in the mental health field just had to deal with it. So he just really took money away from the mentally handicapped and gave it to others who should NOT qualify for any benefits at all.. Now Lepage.. He now has inherited a 220 million dollar deficit .. again that means there isnt enough money in the system to pay all the people that are on it.. So .. what do you do?.. You try to cut out the people that shouldnt be on the system in the first place so that the people who actually NEED it can continue to receive benefits .. how come thats sooooo hard to understand?.. He is trying to say.. tho rather calloused Ill admit.. that if his plan dosnt get passed something else has to be cut.. He didnt say nursing homes or the disabled.. he said schools.. Because something somewhere HAS to be cut because the MONEY ISNT THERE.. Im dont know if mailbox money has made everyone all confused .. or if liberals has never had a check book… but when the checkbook reads ZERO.. you cant write any more CHECKS.. He is trying to make that clear.. The liberals say .. he is an evil man.. he is this he is that.. hates the poor … there is no fraud in the system.. My god people pull your head out of you azz and look around.. The money comes from the working people.. in case you havent realized there are less jobs.. there are less people working.. Where is that money going to come from?.. there is no magic money tree.. We are giving money away thru TANIF there are kids having babies everywhere.. We are raising a generation of children.. We have young males on a the mainecare system.. Im paying for this crap and all the while I have a 10000 dollar deductible and I still have to pay 6oo dollars a month for that.. Is it fair that I have to work constantly … live in fear of something happening to me or my family while an able bodied 20 year old goes thru emergency because it eliminates the wait .. and he dosnt have to pay for it.. I DO..no dam it.. its time we made a criteria for all this .. and its not just a good idea. IT HAS TO BE DONE …. The money isnt there .. the dems have given away TOOO MUCH .. To TOOOO MANY PEOPLE now the evil rep has to take it back .. and HE is the bad man.. I think its pretty clear
Slash, cut, threaten. A real tea party marionette. A dictator.
has to be done.. because of the lack of money in the budget and the amount of people in the system.. I think we need charts here.. because It seems liberals cant understand basic math.. maybe we could use beans… or apples to demonstrate how a check books work… the person in office before LaPage gave out MORE money than there was.. Now the current gov is facing a deficit.. Its not threats.. This is what it is coming to .. Because there isnt enough money.. sound it out.. think about it.. and see if you can understand……
Replies to all negative responses to Le Page’s tyrannical ravings, suggest that all Liberals lack the ability to understand this arrogant person. The clause: See if you can understand it? – suggests that anyone who objects to this man’s demeanor is ignorant.
I would offer in rebuttal that the inability of his supporters to see beyond this man’s tea party radical and self serving ideological Mein Kampf, exhibits a total lack of understanding.
Sue, people love burying their heads in the sand. That’s why they hate Lepage for being honest about the State’s money problems and liked the Baldacci approach of playing shell games and kicking the problems down the road. Many people don’t understand what WE HAVE NO MORE MONEY means. What Maine needs is a magician that can turn one dollar into two dollars, since we can’t do like Obama and just print more when we run out.
You know how Lepage got elected? He appealed to the very uneducated. There it is, cut and dried.
that’s slander, that is. And it’s not true–but keep on believing it if it makes you happy.
well well miss smarty pants dont get to close to the edge of your throne or you might fall
Your spelling and grammar usage just proved my point. Thank you.
Oh, BTW it’s LePage (capital P)—you got it wrong—Its Karma the way someone will make some small typo or grammatical errer when they set out to critizcize other peoples writing skillz–oops, just did it meself.
LePage appealed to me– and I have a college degree–summa cum laude,but I don’t like to brag. Oh darn, did it again.
Please do your alma mater a favor and don’t mention where you got your degree. You are a lousy reflection and a poor advertisement for your college.
I know it’s LePage, but I often deliberately use a lower-case p just to stick it to him. If you graduated summa cum laude, I can only guess you had to have attended a “christian” or “bible” college. In intelligent circles, those are known as kindergartens.
I may not be overly educated miss Mainegal … Im not certain how educated you are… But I can understand that when the money is gone as in … NOT THERE to give out.. that you cant give out any more money… I understand what a deficit is.. Im not sure you and all your liberal smarty pants so much better then I can understand that…So crack those books and try to grasp on what we are talking about.
If he can cut taxes for the rich without a snarl, what’s left for the rest of us? More bullying and daily threats against our kids’ future?
Impeach him.
Gov. 39% again shows what the Tea Party can do, at its very best. Damned little.
He is a yowling buffoon.
He says he will close pubic schools. Is this his pitch for charter schools?
Undoubtedly. I’m sure he wants private prisons a well. For profit incarceration. No rehabilitation. No Christianity at all.
Keep pushing um Gov. you tell it like it is more and more and its time they pull the cotton or I could say S！！！ out of their ears and listen. We behind you all the way. Give m Hell.
This reminds me of the scene from the Dead Zone when the wanna-be politician uses an innocent person as a shield from the hero’s bullet. Is this the final straw of bullying that the people will tolerate? Or, will the people allow this to be done to prove a point? Dangerous times.
This story is madness. I took the time to watch the town hall meeting in Lewiston. There is nothing that was said that undermines the committee’s work in any way. And what the governor said about schools, when taken in context, was simply that he didn’t want to close nursing homes due to lack of money, that he would close schools before nursing homes. The context of the discussion was about lack of funding–LePage has no authority to shut down nursing homes either, but he can be forced to move funding from one source to another.
I can’t believe the lack of integrity in journalism sometimes. Sensational headlines and stories, very little fact checking and reporting, and absolutely no research.
I’ve seen BDN do this numerous times.
So, LePage will close schools first, and nursing homes second?
I am so reaassured.
Right on.
maybe you can wave your magic wand for Lepage and fix our shortfalls!
Or better yet, use it to make this incompetent governor vanish.
No, we’ll get the House of Representatives to initiate impeachment proceedings.
Yeah, pitting human services advocates against education advocates, now there is a helpful strategy. This guy is a TeaRadical whacko, and he and crazyland party need to GO.
What some people are really not absorbing is that the state only has a certain amount of money collected in revenues. When that money is spent, there is no more and they cannot write a check for something they don’t have. The state cannot borrow money to cover budget expenses. In that way, they are in a more difficult position than the average person, who could attempt to leverage credit to cover emergency costs. The state can’t. So, with money getting low, the choice comes down to which bill do I pay? Do I pay the nursing home Maine Care bill, or the bill to towns to fund the schools? There are certain things they can’t NOT pay. Can you imagine state workers not getting their paycheck for a few weeks? No.
Impeach.
He’s always being “taken out context.” Especially when he invited a reporter outside for a knuckle dusting. Especially when he growled he would tall the president to go to hell. How about when he fearlessly had his spokesperson Bennett tell the NAACP to kiss my butt. After a closed door discussion in which he allowed of his ears to absorb suggestions, he told a close associate the talk was nothing but BS.
Dozens of people E-Mailed this – he said – claiming the mural was a duplicate of what they’d seen in North Korean POW camps. His office verified one complaint. The rest must have been part of the tea party radicals, or, Walker’s East Coast attack force.
He should be impeached. Take that out of context.
That’s funny. I watched the tape also and I came away with a totally different perception. I thought he was threatening the legislature and Maine citizens in his usual bullying lying way!! I also thought it was very interesting that Benneett was the only one allowed to hold the microphone. Was that so she could pull it away if someone said something the Gov might respond to in usual idiotic way or because they were afraid someone would hit him with it!!
The Appropriations Committee is a BIG JOKE and a complete disappointment. If the Governor cuts education it is entirely their fault for not fixing the DHHS structural gap. Shame on the Appropriations Committee for not doing their job! I support the Governor 100%!
Then you are as big a fool as he is.
Then what state budget cuts do you propose to continue a bloated Medicaid program that has grown to 35% above the national average, in just the past 10 years?
If you “support the Governor 100%,” as you say, then you support stupidity. Can you not see what he’s up to? He’d like nothing more than to eliminate any/all committees and agencies that he can,so he can gain 100% control. This, my friend, is called a dictatorship. In his case, (excuse my spelling) a “dicktatorship.”
Dictatorship is what we presently have in these failed quasi state agencies because the director is not accountable to anyone, not even the voter. Giving our elected officials control of taxpayer money is what I call common sense.
I believe that it’s high time to call Governor LePages bluff. He wants to act like the school yard bully. The only way to handle a bully is to stand up to him. It is high time that the legislature, stand on their own hind legs and tell the bully to back down.
Are you saying you prefer welfare over education? Those are our choices.
Please. Nothing is that black and white in any aspect of life. Do some thinking. Encourage LePlague to do some thinking.
Hey, easy there. Expecting him to think is a bit much, isn’t it?
What I’m saying is that we need a surgeon in the Blain House instead of an axe weilding butcher.
And, what, precisely, would that look like in your Fantasy Land of a government that can make policies with no uncomfortable consequences? Give me an example.
It would look like the Democracy that our founding fathers envisioned.
That’s not really very specific….
My rep came to a meeting the other night. He laughed, shook his head, and told us that the situation in Augusta is nothing like what the press is reporting. He says they are making progress, getting the information they need, and that the governor is doing a great job.
When you repeat the LePage is a bully, you know you are just propagating the “talking point” created by the Democrats. THe press has a vested interest in promoting the idea of conflict in Augusta–it sells papers.
And what was your rep smoking?
Cut spending.
I for one will drive him to Florida after the vote comes in….for free. Free at last….Paul just wants to make enough money so that when he moves to Florida he will beable to live high on the hog…..No…I didn’t call him a hog…..he just keeps walloring in deep mud……
Cut this, Cut that, Does he know how to do anything besides cut. I bet he doesnt think about cutting his salary.
The man has screwed the poor,the retired,the state workers,and now he is working on the children of Maine,what hasn’t he touched???? oh yes, the rich and new jobs..
THAT IS WHY I LEFT MAINE, DUMB MAINE PEOPLE
Here is a governor who talks big about education and jobs but that is all it is, talk. Sure let’s cut out state funding and let it all fall on the backs of property tax payers. to threaten something like this is not proper and show a great lack of respect for not only the education of the children of Maine but show just how poor the state if being run and just how un-friendly it is. I, for one, Think that the Governor should resign immeadiately and let someone with some common sense run the state.
Do you mean a common sense governor, like Baldacci who doesn’t know what 2 + 2 is? Do you mean a common sense governor like Baldacci who stacked the MTA, MSHA and DHHS with crooks as their departmental heads? Ah yes, the failed days of Baldacci. LePage is simply cleaning up the BALDACCI TRAIN WRECK and LePage is doing one mighty fine job.
Yes by bullying and threatening, but where are the results, where are all the jobs he talked about. I haven’t seen them. All I have seen is the tax burden shifted from the state to local and in the same breath take away more local control. DHHS is a mess but to threaten to basicaly bankrupt towns and cities but cutting off state funds for education is not the way to balance a budget. He has shown his true colors and I, for one, rank him no better as Baldy who was one of the worst governors I have seen. I voted for him last time, next time will be a different story.
You claim to have voted for him, but at the same time you also claim you want Maine to continue down the failed policies of Baldacci. This does not make sense. LePage isn’t going back on his word. He is doing exactly what he promised us during the campaign. He is cleaning up the Democratic MESS!
NO I do not want to keep going the way we were and it is not just a democratic mess. It is a mess created by the politicians in Augusta, period! I blame both parties, there is way too much one party more interested in seeing how they can make the other one look bad and not enough caring for the people of this state. BUT, is it right for the governor to threaten to cut education funding if HE does not get his way? Not in my book, shows a complete disrespect for the local communities that will either have to shut their schools down or foot 100% of the cost.
by the way before you ask, I am un-enrolled and extremely proud to be.
First of all, let me assure you that Governor LePage’s statement was taken completely out of context by a very liberal media who is doing everything they can to neutralize him and his policies. I hope by now that you can see through the liberal media bias. Last year, LePage increased education funding by 63 million dollars from the prior budget. Does this sound like a man who wants to cut education? Of course not. However, if the DEMS do not co-operate, the money to fund welfare needs to come from somewhere. In the past, the DEMS used education, along with many other departments to fund the ever increasing welfare budget. LePage does not want to do that and his point is that Maine is in a dire fiscal mess and we need to get to the root cause of the problem, which is a Medicaid program the good people of Maine cannot afford.
Still the financial mess is the fault of Augusta not one political party. Right now I fault the house, senate and the governor for not working together to get it worked out. It took years to get into this mess and will take years to get out of it, not bullying the way overnight. Oh yes, if everything fails blame it on Medicaid. Cut it out completely and all will be right again even though there are some who need it badly. If DHHS had policed themselves properly and had someone in charge who knew what they were doing it might not be as bad. That is where a lot of the fault lies. An agency too big to control it self.
Lets see – we Don’t want government run health care (but don’t touch medicare) yet we want government to fund education – with public education being one of the biggest failed government programs in the history of the country.
Paul LePage needs to be recalled. His threat could cause tremendous anxiety for parents and their children. It is unthinkable.
Governor LePage, everything you cut and want to cut only affects me one way, as a TAXPAYER, keep on cutting!!
There is no recall provision in Maine. Can’t people get that fact straight? You are stuck with him until the end of this term and I think that is great. I love watching all you compassionate, sensitive types spit insults and froth at the gums with hatred of him.
You are exactly right, what it comes down to is a grown man picking on helpless children. Our children should NOT be made to pay for our legislators lack of responsible budgeting. Our children are this country’s hope. He is playing a dangerous game of chicken and it is obvious he will not stop at nothing to get what he wants. The man is a menace and an embarrassment to this state.
Good, I say do it.Put the checkbook away and stop funding the Schools. I bet the Lib’s will stop their nonsense and address the funding/spending nightmare that is DHHS
School isn’t important, anyway. You can do tons of things with no education. Rake blue berries, cut wood, pick potatoes, felon, steal, children you can’t take care of, and on and on. Phhhtt, school……
and lets not forget…not having proper education can get you a governor’s job!!!
ha ha ha ha ha
This guy is an idiot. If we’re out of money, maybe we should stop building a new methadone clinic every other month, then paying the drug addicts to get there!
This guy is reminding me of Sarah Palin, no clue what his job entails, just lets the mouth open and let it spew out whatever spews out. No power to close the schools which his direct words were he would close schools on May 1, he didn’t word it any other fancier to terms such as he would not cut checks to the schools, which would have been better context.
where are my posts BDN
The title of this article is suspiciously misleading.
that is sick blackmail
this guy is FACIST
Yeah, I’ve noticed that about him.
As Orwell lives and breathes.
If there is no more money to fund HHS why would Landslide Le Page threaten to close schools when it would be HHS that would have to close?
LePage said that he was going to help Maine residents find jobs. If he cuts funding for education, there are going to be hundreds (if not thousands) of educators without a job. How is that helping??
As I see it, the Governor is using scare tactics to pressure the [foot-dragging]legislators. He wants scared parents to pressure their legislators to pass his budget as submitted to the legislature. He knows that he can’t directly close public schools. He’s required by law to submit a balanced budget. The State currently funds public education at about the 45% level. If that level were to drop to some lower percentage, local school districts would then have the choice of cutting some programs or going back to the district’s taxpayers for enough additional money to support programs that the taxpayers in that district wish to keep. So it’s not a black-and-white thing, and as the article stated, smaller school districts would bear a larger proportionate share of the additional costs(assuming that their taxpayers wanted to keep most programs intact).
If you remember, several years ago, the legislature agreed to fund public education at the 55% level, and IIRC they wrote that agreement into law. The State has never reached the 55% funding level. Noone has ever tested that law in court to my knowledge, but if a court ruled in favor of plaintiffs(parents), both the Governor and the legislature would be prohibited from making cuts to public education funding – indeed, the court might rule that the State must comply with its own law requiring funding at the 55% level.
Cut cut and save the rest of the state…
This is how a UC Berkeley Graduate sells newspapers or a ideology………. Utopia here we come.
It has become very obvious that LePage has mental issues. I really don’t think that Maine can survive 3 more years of his mental crises.
I got an idea, stop building multi million dollar gyms, play ball outside. Teachers should be less specialized, its grade school math and English, not rocket science. Not saying we need to go back to one room school houses, but come on, every district is spending millions, MILLIONS of dollars. I witnessed a school in northern Maine throw away thousands of dollars worth of equipment because they were getting “,.new stuff”. Wasteful ignorance.
Then, when these kids do actually get an education, they leave the state to earn real money,.. Sorry, side tracked.
I didn’t care for LePage when he first stepped into office, but I gotta say I love his approach. HEY MAINE, YOU’RE BROKE, Time to skimp a little. People are going without, get real, prioritize. Watching this guy at work is an inspiration. He doesn’t beat around the bush, figure it out, politics is so much about making a name for oneself, but this guy, he stands by his word, whether you like him or not. That’s the politician I want, one concerned with action, and solutions, not the next vote,..
Where are they going to get a job in Maine? The state that has 47% of it’s people on some sort of Federal and State assistance, and the other 53% paying taxes and footing the bill. Young people are leaving the state as their is no good paying jobs. The highest percentage of people receiving assistance in Maine is the elderly, disabled. A lot of people want to go to work, so I suggest that all the ones whining about these people that don’t have a job….you give them one. Maine isn’t the only one affected buy a bad economy….Maine goverment have made bad choices in the past, now and they knew they couldn’t afford it. This Governor has been in office well over a year now and is doing nothing but adding to the problem, hiring incompetent people to run the DHHS to start with. This is a dsigrace. Maine’s unemployment rate is 7.5, New England unemployment rate is 11.5 Maine is doing better than any other of the New England states, but the problem is that they are spending more than they are taken in…..That’s not the private sector doing this. Goverment is, and who is in charge….that’s right….Mr. Bully himself, LePage….
Ooops…I’m being “watched”……………..again?
I don’t swear, I stay on topic, I respond to those that disagree……..doesn’t everyone?
I kinda like it…..at least someone is seeing what I post……
Pfffffft
When is a real leader with real solutions going to step to the forefront? Gov Lepage, acting like a child and threatening to take his ball and go home if he doesn’t get his way is no different than Obama ramrodding his health care down our throats. I know there are common sense solutions to these issues that are going to A.) take more rights away from us citizens and B.) Uphold the Constitution at both the federal and state level. What’s going on with our government now, from the feds right to our town councils is sickening. Perhaps we don’t need school anymore because from where I’m sitting non of these people understood their history or civics lessons anyways. And forget about an ethics and accounting classes. Those subjects have fallen so far off our radar they’re not even a blip on the screen anymore. This country is in a sad, sad state right now. Will a Real Leader Please Stand Up? (BTW, I don’t trust anyone on any side of the isle if you haven’t guessed)
Ha, ha ha…..this is so cool.
Big Brother is watching. You know, in 1984 I was a student at the University of Maine in Orono. And we had this hellacious party called the “George Orwell was wrong! Bash” It was great, you should have been there. It was held in Pat’s Pizza’s cellar, free tacos!…….wicked fun
Why is it always Education that is getting hacked by the legislature. For once look at the welfare system and those abusing it and take that away, make them get a job and then you would have a balanced budget. Making kids lose out on Education is BS, when there is a lot of people on welfare who can work, but choose not to and drive a better vehicle, have atvs, and bigger tvs then most of us that work a full time job and one or two part time jobs on the side. Slashing and threatening to slash education is not the answer and never will be. Start with the legislature, slash their pay, then go after welfare abusers.
Well, at least he’s outta the closet now. ‘My way or the highway’ has been ‘politely’ commented on as LePage’s style but no one to this point has been willing to come out and say it publicly. Now we don’t have to wait. LePage has done it for us. He’s telling us all that he’s going to shutdown the schools unless he get’s his way with the DHHS budget. The 2 have nothing to do with each other except that LePage is holding one hostage to the other. And with Augusta’s session just coming back into session, it’s only going to get worse. It’s also going to make the political process that much harder to work.
“What the governor was really trying to drive home is that we are on
track for the DHHS to run out of money in April, if we don’t take quick
and decisive action to find and identify savings in this fiscal year.”
Why is it that every idiotic empty bluster from this man has to be paraphrased by a staff apologist?? There was no hidden meaning. LePage said what he said because fear and intimidation are the tools that he’s used throughout his ugly and pointless existence to get his way, so why stop now?
Can we still get a recall on the November ballot? It would be the biggest landslide in history.
You must be on welfare or live on handouts in mommys basement.
Go get a job and this will be a non issue as far as you are concerned.
We elected him Governor to do the job and he is acting responsibly unlike Baldacci who took every cent he could to get money from President Foodstamp Obama.
Now Obama has cut the money so something in DHHS has to be cut. Of course all the numbers for current year DHHS budget was created by the Baldacci Administration and the former DHHS Director who was canned for incompetance, so go occupy Baldacci’s house and complain!
If he can’t balance the budget on the backs of the poor and sick, the kids are next in line to lose.
This clown and his munchkin treasurer are making us all look like fools.
“The school is the last expenditure upon which America should be willing to economize”
FDR
” So Roosevelt is dead: a man who would never tell the truth when a lie would serve him just as well. ” Douglas MacArthur
I love the in your face attitude..for to long we have been hearing the kinder garden sing songy voices pacifying the “intellectuals.” For to long I have looked at my pay check shrinking while those on welfare prosper. He wants to cut things provided by welfare like dental….I don’t get dental and have suffered many times until I could save up to get a tooth pulled. Why in the world should someone who sits around all day be rewarded for doing nothing. I am tired of being punished and then told that I have to share half of what I earn. You want half of what I earn, then get a job. Welfare recipients get free day care, education, food, housing, medical, phones, heating assistance, I knew one girl that got not only a free car and gas but a free cell phone including free calling and internet. You have to be kidding me!!!! I have stood behind morons on welfare at the groc. store while they purchased beer and soda. I have seen them purchase designer clothes (not for the children) and have even stood by one that was on a cell phone making a drug deal, I even walked by two ladies in Walmart discussing more ways they could manipulate more money out of my pocket…..all in the name of fairness of course. Those that are using the system for it’s intended purpose are few and far between and should be rewarded for their efforts at trying to better themselves, but it is time to clean house. LePage has my vote for years and years to come, I can only hope that he runs for president one day and do just what the protesters are destroying businesses for…clean up wall street.
I love the in your face attitude..for to long we have been hearing the kinder garden sing songy voices pacifying the “intellectuals.” For to long I have looked at my pay check shrinking while those on welfare prosper. He wants to cut things provided by welfare like dental….I don’t get dental and have suffered many times until I could save up to get a tooth pulled. Why in the world should someone who sits around all day be rewarded for doing nothing. I am tired of being punished and then told that I have to share half of what I earn. You want half of what I earn, then get a job. Welfare recipients get free day care, education, food, housing, medical, phones, heating assistance, I knew one girl that got not only a free car and gas but a free cell phone including free calling and internet. You have to be kidding me!!!! I have stood behind morons on welfare at the groc. store while they purchased beer and soda. I have seen them purchase designer clothes (not for the children) and have even stood by one that was on a cell phone making a drug deal, I even walked by two ladies in Walmart discussing more ways they could manipulate more money out of my pocket…..all in the name of fairness of course. Those that are using the system for it’s intended purpose are few and far between and should be rewarded for their efforts at trying to better themselves, but it is time to clean house. LePage has my vote for years and years to come, I can only hope that he runs for president one day and do just what the protesters are destroying businesses for…clean up wall street.
The amount of ignorance of how our two party system of government works is demonstrated in this forum. It would seem most contributors really would prefer a one party system; just their own of course.
Personally I would prefer a move to lessen the current two parties ability to prevent more viable political parties from forming.
Wow, if you can’t win, use force and intimidation. glad I did not vote for him, he is destroying the state before he moves to Florida, after all, he sold his Maine home seeing he has rent free quarters. He is going after Maine Housing, but I wonder how much his mansion cost to maintain and build? I am not sure why we give Governors and University Presidents mansions, it is really shameful.
It’s about time we zeroed out Augusta’s education subsidy. If the locals had to raise ALL the money themselves, tons of blubber would be sliced from the education bureaucracy and the quality of education would much improve.
We should tar and feather him and send him over the big green bridge.
He is NOT for the Maine people!
NH already has a decent economy, lower unemployment, better standard of living, and a more reasonable welfare system–including a Medicaid system that is much more restrictive than Maine’s. They don’t need LePage in NH–he is needed here in Maine.
Lapage has it exactly right.. Gov’t and it’s budget are not sustainable.. it must be cut and cut and cut… towns can figure out the shortfall.. we have allowed the nanny state to take over.. it’s time to stop the craziness.. pay as you go or don’t go
I can understand that some cuts need to be made. It’s maddening to me that we continue to support those folks who are able bodied citizens that could find something to do. With that being said, I often wonder shouldn’t we be helping those who are trying to help themselves? For instance, a couple who are working for minimum wage with children who need daycare. Daycare can be very expensive, gas to get back and forth to work is expensive, we’ve taken away their mainecare & foodstamps, they need to purchase some sort of health insurance. One serious illness or injury can bankrupt you. And are there are other areas that we can recoup some revenue? I know people who are serious taxcheats and are taking write offs for things they shouldn’t be. If we cracked down on all the dishonesty…….
Why are we in this “budget crisis”? Evidently DHHS will run short 2 1/2 or 3 months before the end of the fiscal year. Was the budget prepared for this fiscal year so far off? It looks like from what I can find on the internet, that the budget for this fiscal year was prepared in 2010 while John Baldacci was governor and submitted in early 2011 by Paul LePage. Has something changed unexpectedly, like money coming back from the federal government? I would be a lot more satisfied with Governor LePage and even the Democratic leadership if they could explain what happened.
Pat, this seems to happen every year with DHHS, thus the annual need to submit supplemental budgets in addition to the biennial budget. And what does happen is that they underestimate how much will be needed to reimburse for Maine Care expenses, they never know exactly what the feds will end up paying because that money is always fluctuating based on what is happening in Congress.
I know one expense is the $30 million that DHHS had to pay back to the Feds because the department billed for services that were not allowed back in 2002-03. The previous head of DHHS said she was not going to include that payback amount in her budget for 2010 because she was “sure” that their appeal would overturn the verdict against the state. Well, Ms. Harvey was wrong.
I find that the governor has explained these shortfalls—it just seems that explanations do not make good headlines or news stories. Perhaps the reporter just doesn’t understand how the budget works, or maybe they think the public prefers sensationalism over news reporting.
At least he is not letting crack heads, rapist, thieves and murderers loose on a pardons like Governor Haley Barbour.
I can just see it now…
**** BANGOR DAILY NEWS ****
LePage at it again
Augusta — Maine Governor LePage said today if you don’t fix this I am going to let a murder out on of prison and put them on the streets.
Would this surprise any of you?
This is a Robin Hood movie with no Robin Hood. We have the Sheriff of Nottingham played by Poor Paul LePage and we have Prince John played by David Koch. Pass the popcorn.
To many drones employed by the state, in cushioned chairs, draging thier heals to save nonproductive jobs of thier friends, and themselfs. We voted to have a man solve this mess. Quit hitting him below the belt and let him do his job.
Cut education? Lepage these kids are our future generation , if you knew anything about running the state of Maine , you don’t cut programs for the kids future. How about we start at the top. Eliminate your pay and everyone else in Augusta for 3 months.
This is what you get when you elect a businessman to run the State! Helping out his cronies and turning his back on the most vulnerable (old, sick, and school aged children). If you were a true leader you would explore other options such as possible temporary sales tax increase, eliminating wasted positions in state government (such as your daughter’s job), or taking back the tax breaks you gave the weathy. Shame on you Mr. LePage!
First of all, a sales tax increase hurts the poor disproportionately. They can not afford to pay the extra money every time at the register. Eliminating positions in the government will put more people out of work and will not even come close to closing the funding gap. And the tax breaks, which go to all Mainers, have not even taken effect yet so it would be hard to take them back.
The few things the poor purchase (if they can afford it) are food, heating fuel, and prescriptions. The last time I purchased these items they were tax exempt has that changed? Raising the sales tax means everyone pays a proportionately equal tax, those that have extra money and can afford to purchase luxury cars, boats, and so forth end up paying more. Those that have no money can’t spend it so they pay less. The same goes for tax breaks sure everyone gets a tax break, however who ends up with more money in their pockets? I for one am tired of these politicians trying to tell me it is the middle class or the low income or the elderly people in homes fault that our economy is in crapper. We need a change and that means getting rid of all of the career politicians and elect people from the working class who understand what its like to earn a dollar rather than living off their trust funds or being bought off by outside interests. It is the working man that built this country and it will be the working man that will save it no thanks to republicans or the democrats. What is sad but true is until we get all the dirty money out of politics nothing will ever get done.
I hear what you are saying about the sales tax, but the conventional wisdom analysis of sales tax is that it is a regressive tax that hurts the poor and middle class more than the wealthy.
On the other hand, you talk of electing a working class guy instead of career politicians and I can’t help but say we did! We elected Paul LePage–a guy who was poor as a kid, worked his way up to becoming the general manager at Marden’s and who is not wealthy. His claim to a political career is a few terms as mayor of Waterville. He is certainly not living off a trust fund. And you still don’t like him. Will people never be satisfied?
You are correct I don’t like him, but not for the above reasons!
Time is important. Dems led by Cain on the comittee will waste months studying the numbers even though Lepage is correct and the numbers presented are correct. So Cain and her minion will delay, delay, delay. So when the state runs out of money, they will blame Lepage.
His solution is to stop the checks for the education since that is one of the only options he has.
If there is no money he has to cut something?
So the Dems on the Appropriations comittee need to start to propose what to cut which equals 120 million.
Very simple!
Kudos to Governer Lepage for lighting a fire under it.
Send LePage back to Canada where he dodged the Vietnam Draft…
I think it was Bill Clinton who avoided the Vietnam draft.
Paul LePage’s birthday, 10/9/48, was #342 in the 1970 draft lottery. Bill Clinton’s birthday, 8/19/46, was #311. The highest number reached in the draft was 195. Back in the day and before the lottery, there were ways to avoid being drafted including family responsibility and student deferments. The lottery was supposed to end that. If you look at the biographies of many of our leaders today, you will find many, maybe most, avoided military service during that time. One very convenient way to avoid the unpleasantness of serving in Vietnam was to join a national guard or air national guard unit. Flying the skies above Texas, even if not done well, was far more appealing than flying above Vietnam.
Oh, and by the way, Mitt Romney’s birthday is 3/12/47, #300 in the 1970 lottery. Newt Gingrich was not subject to the draft lottery, but had deferments for being a student and then a father. President Obama and Rick Santorum were born after the lottery ended. And, of course, Ron Paul was an Air Force doctor from 1963 to 1968.
Since 2002, Maine’s Medicaid entitlement program has grown over 35% and the Medicaid expenditures have increased over 1 billion dollars (78%), all since 2002. Doing nothing to fix the DHHS structural gap, as the DEMS propose will only increase Medicaid expenditures by another 78% in the next 10 years. Can Maine afford to see another 78% increase in
Medicaid in the next 10 years? I don’t think so, unless we want to close every school in the state and stop all road maintenance and GUT public safety. Is this what you liberals support? These are the options and I applaud the Governor for tackling this issue head on. Making across the board cuts to essential departments that Maine’s economy depends on is not the solution, even though the DEMS did this 11 times. This approach did not and will not address the root cause of the bloated Medicaid program.
If you do not support the Governor, then what budget cuts do you propose to continue feeding Medicaid for 1 out of every 4 Mainers? Are you liberals saying that 1 out of every 4 Mainers is either physically or mentally impaired or elderly? That does not begin to make sense. Under the Governor’s proposal, 290,000 Mainers will still get the Medicaid entitlement. Protecting Medicaid for 290,000 of Maine’s truly needy is hardly an ax wielding approach, as some liberals claim. However, making across the board cuts in every budget cycle, as Baldacci did 11 times is the ax wielding approach because it never addresses the welfare abuses and the Cadillac Medicaid expansion that Maine cannot afford.
If you do not support the Governor, then what budget cuts do you propose to continue feeding Medicaid for 1 out of every 4 Mainers? Are you saying that 1 out of every 4 Mainers are either elderly or disabled and qualify as our truly needy? That does not begin to make sense and would be a tough sell from even the best marketers.
The Governor’s proposal to protect the Medicaid safety net for 290,000 Mainers is very reasonable and I encourage our legislature to support the Governor.
According to the last Census, 12.6% of the Maine population live in poverty, the highest in New England (US Census). Current Medicaid eligibility is 200% above the poverty line for some, 150% for others (AARP). Mainers are also some of the oldest people in the nation. All this leads to one in five Mainer’s receiving some Social Security (AARP). This is not about being lazy or drug-addled. It’s about a poor and elderly population in a state with at least 7% unemployment for the past three years. So no, I don’t believe it’s a stretch to say that 1 in 4 Mainer’s are either elderly, disabled, or live near poverty.
But the elderly are really not part of the issue here, Lepage isnt cutting Social Security or Medicare, he wants to “normalize the Medicaid and DHHD programs to match the National Average. As has been pointed out here and in amillion other threads, Maine is too damn generous at giving Matching Federal Money away and now the matching money from the Feds has been cut. So all these people who have signed up on these give away programs will no longer receive them. This isnt about cutting ederly, it is about booting able bodied people off the doles. Sucks for them, but being dependant on Baldacci types is not the percentage move. Time for these folks to get a job.
George W. Bush and the GOP crashed the economy and put 8.7 million people out of work.
That is why Medicaid enrollment increased in the Bush years.
The GOP fools no one
yessah
Moon bat,
What the heck does Bush have to do with this? You Parrots need a better explanation to FIX the problem versus cry about it.
Yes welfare in Maine is out of control, but LePage… take a break. At Marden’s you could threaten to fire anyone who said something you did not like. You could have threaten to close a Marden’s store if they got out of line with your simplistic thinking. You can not try to lead a government with such troglidyte tactics.
So long as LePage talks and acts like this, there is no business that will come to Maine. After all, he has already told everyone around the world that there are no qualified workers in Maine. Why would businesses be the least bit interested in locating here? This is going to be a dismal three more years of this person being our Govenror.
Yes I agree it is gonna be a dismal few years for all the welfare cheats and couch potato whinners
This reporter is blowing smoke in everyone’s face–it’s no wonder so many are gagging and eye watering. The Lewiston Sun Journal posted a full video of this meeting. The part about the schools is around 1:15 into the tape. Judge for yourselves what the governor said…I suggest watching the whole hour and a half for those who are completely unfamiliar with the governor except through the pages of the BDN or through sound bites on the local news.
So. Toddler throws a tantrum. What’s his next threat — pull the plow trucks and state troopers off the highways? Shut down the prisons and unleash convicted felons on us?
Dude, the state government exists to perform certain functions. You wanted the job. Now do it. That includes raising taxes if that is necessary to keep basic services going.
That is what Martin wants, Feed the Welfare system and cut everything else.
Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists — care of the poor and sick is a basic human duty.
‘For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you
gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
This guy is not messing around…got to draw a line in the sand somewhere.
Come on. This most recent move by “leader in residence” is just too ignorant for words. I suppose by the time impeachment process takes place, his term will be finished anyway. I think 4mermainer said it all.
LePage is full of baloney! If this budget didn’t pass and the state had to “stop cutting checks”, it would make the most sense if DHHS stopped getting checks…I am sure most people here agree with that point.
But rather than stop cutting checks to DHHS, LePage says he will close schools on May 1. Why would he rather threaten to close schools over threatening to close DHHS? Because he thinks that everyone will support him with that threat hanging over all of our heads…no one wants to see schools close early.
(For those here that take everything literally: I am not advocating removing funding from DHHS, but pointing out the fact that if DHHS is the problem then we would stop giving them money, not stop giving schools money. Which proves that LePage is only using this threat to get his way, there is NO logic behind it)
Please O’ Tyrant – please close the schools
Demonstrate your Terrible Power Sire
We will pay homage to you
in November
yessah
LePage wants to keep the schools open and that is why LePage supports re-structuring Medicaid. John Martin wants to transfer funds from education and give it to welfare, so it is Martin who is closing the schools, not LePage. Another good dose of the truth.
Yeah right – LePage can’t even come up with independently verifiable numbers to back up his stupid claims regarding the DHHS budget.
He has no credibility – none – and is incompetence and arrogance is clearly on display.
The GOP fools no one – LePage is the villain here – not John Martin.
try again
yessah
Oh yes, his numbers were indeed verified. Stop with your web of lies. LePage is the best thing that happened to Maine. He is doing his best to clean up the Baldacci/Martin/Cain TRAIN WRECK. If John Martin is so smart, then why didn’t he fix this problem before this? Hasn’t Martin been in office for over 40 years. Martin and the rest of the DEMS are completely incompetent and as a taxpayer, I am outraged over their failed service. These problems existed long before LePage was inaugurated, but the Democratic FAILED leadership ignored them. Now, the day of reckoning is upon us. Go Gov. LePage.
We have a True Believer – ignore the Bush Recession and its effect on Maine’s state budget and Medicaid enrollment.
LePage is a bad bad joke
try again
yesah
Excuse me, Bush hasn’t been the Pres for 3 years. It’s the OBAMA recession.
Financial meltdown, giant tax cuts for wealthy, housing bubble all occurred before election of 2008. Remember?
Housing bubble = Frank and Dodd, two liberal Icons who created the whole mess with the Community Reinvestment Act, you know the law forcing banks to give loans to people who couldnt pay them back? Ring a bell.
Obama= President Foodstamp, get your terms right ;)
Obama is indeed President Foodstamp and Baldacci was Governor Welfare.
….
Do you mean Obama’s Wars? I clearly remember, that the DEMS were on board and gave Bush the authorization to go to war with Iraq. Let’s see, Hillary, Biden, Edwards and Kerry all agreed to go to war with Iraq, so again, how is it Bush’s wars?
….
When Bush left office GDP was crashing at -8.9% per quarter and we were losing 750,000 jobs per month.
After Obama and the Democratic Party passed the Stimulus – which saved the world from a Great GOP Depression – we started creating 200,000 jobs a month and GDP is growing by 2-3% per quarter.
Reality
yessah
Why isn’t LePage’s budget, then
….
Don’t argue with, the shills, they get paid, to post, their swill.
Right on I couldnt have said it better
part of the reason it is hard to put the numbers together is because of the mess this department is in from the previous administration
Moon Bat, your still debating the damn numbers, they have already been verified.
Besides, if they make the cuts and the numbers are wrong , they can ask the voters to “reinstate the Cadillac Welfare Plan” down the road ;)
It is too bad we didnt get ” independently verifiable numbers” when Baldacci was Gov, because Mainers would have realized the state was broke 3 years ago.
Threats and intimidation, the Republican way.
Why does the governor have the totalitarian power to cut payment to schools but not DHHS? We have some tough choices to make. Would we rather send childless people with cancer out on the street or pay an extra 1 cent per dollar on sales tax for 6 months? In that 6 months they can rewrite the formulas for Mainecare and other assistance. I would cut dental for mainecare first considering many people not on assistance can’t get dental and then add minimal copays for mainecare to reduce the number of people going in to the emergency room for a cough. We need to reduce spending but it needs more thought than a quick reaction to a budget shortfall.
How many times do the Democraps have to be told
THE STATE IS BROKE!!!!
We must cut spending
Instead of whining to the press give a plan of there own
Oh I forgot they already have a plan spend spend tax tax tax
The state is “broke” because LePage cut revenue during a severe recession.
He is the problem.
not the Dems
yessah
the high tax rates in this state are a problem.
Retired and high income earners simply move to a state with no or lower taxes.
If you had a choice after retirement would you live here with the high cost of living and pay 8.5% in state taxes or go to Florida lower cost of living and 0 state tax.
This is not my opinion it proven in this state and others.
Let them go to Florida…the gov there is worse than the one here.
Sound thinking,
Then the State collects 0 taxes
….
Where did he cut revenue? Revenue was up by over $9 million last month. His budget for this biennium was higher than Baldacci’s previous budget. The problem with DHHS is that you cannot always predict the Maine Care expenditures. Which is why that program is the one mainly facing reform so that these continual unexpected increases in costs can be brought under control.
You know one little tactic Baldacci used to balance the DHHS budget in 2009? He changed making payments to nursing homes from making biweekly payments to monthly payments. This allowed him to put the last month’s payment of the current year onto the next year’s budget. Just one more little gift Baldacci and the Democrat-controlled legislature gave to LePage and the Republicans.
Let’s not forget that Baldacci DID NOT PAY THE HOSPITALS. When LePage was inaugurated, Maine owed 500 million dollars to our hospitals. This is part of the failed Baldacci MESS. Baldacci and the Democratic House and Senate were the worst in Maine’s history. They left a complete mess with scandal after scandal erupting from all their corrupt cronies. LePage is an honorable man and the hospitals are now being paid. Go LePage!
You know, I was doing some research yesterday, and I came across an article about the lawsuit filed against Maine’s DHHS by the Feds for billing for services not covered by Medicaid. Maine lost and was ordered to repay $29 million. Head of DHHS, Ms. Harvey appealed. So when they were setting the budget for DHHS that year, they deliberately did not figure in the $29 million because, according to Harvey, she didn’t thing they would lose and have to pay it. Guess what? She was wrong, and the repayment to the federal government fell on LePage’s watch. Just one more gift from Baldacci and the Democrats to the people of Maine.
Harvey was another mental midget running one of these agencys, like Violet and MTA.
If LePage can get rid of Dale McCormick maine would be much better off!
As has been stated many times, the Democrats “fix” everything with Gimmicks versus dealing with Reality like LePage is attempting to do, put permanent fixes in place!
You mean the Dems drove the businesses out and Taxes(er Revenue as Libs call it) fell.
You mean George W. Bush and the GOP crashed the economy and put 8.7 million Americans out of work.
yessah
….
Nossah revenues are up
yessah
He saw this coming…why did he give the tax break to the rich????
What tax breaks, please be specific as to what he changed in Maine Tax Code?
Gov Lepage is trying to be a dictator, plain and simple. Its his way or no way. Thats not how our government works, nor should it. He should be truthful and not change his story to suit where he is and from day to day. I do not like this man, but I realize he has a very diffecult job to try to do to get us back on track and a applaud trying to do that. BUT he should stop his bullying and threatening and sit down with everyone up in Augusta and try to come up with compromises to get things done.
I double-dog-dare that man to close the schools on May 1st! It would be political suicide! Go for it, Mad Man!
Article VIII. — Part First.
Education.
Section 1. Legislature shall require towns to support public schools; duty of Legislature.
A general diffusion of the advantages of education being essential to the
preservation of the rights and liberties of the people; to promote this
important object,
THE LEGISLATURE ARE AUTHORIZED, AND IT SHALL BE THEIR DUTY TO REQUIRE,
THE SEVERAL TOWNS TO MAKE SUITABLE PROVISION, AT THEIR OWN EXPENSE, FOR
THE SUPPORT AND MAINTENANCE OF PUBLIC SCHOOLS;
and it shall further be their duty to encourage and suitably endow, from time
to time, AS THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE PEOPLE MAY AUTHORIZE,
I once worked with a young fellow who had just graduated from high school. He was a tad nieve but a real good kid. He started work and thought he ought to get a checking account and credit card and start “living the dream.” One day he told me he wanted to purchase some new clothes and new boots and alot of other things, and i said “how are you going to pay for all that?” He stated he had all kinds of checks left in his check book and that he was going to keep buying what he felt he deserved until he ran out of checks. This state has run its finances alot like this young buck, we just keep writing checks because we can keep printing them, and we feel we deserve it. The state can do this without fear of being charged with “negotiating a worthless instrument”. We as citizens would be hauled off to court and sued if we conducted our affairs this way. It is time to stop living as if we can afford everything we want. Alot of you want to bash Mr. Lepage and that is your right, but he can see that there is no money left in the checking account and its time to be responsible. He is using alot of hot topics to raise awareness of just how grave our situation is. He sure got alot of you people up in arms. May God grant Him wisdom in dealing with these no win situations we all find ourselves in. Go get Em’ Paul!
I normally do not post to these thinks since most of the comments come from the clueless, mindless educated idiots this state in now full of but, enough of the nonsense! I hear all you left wing democrat loving people complain about the current Governor but yet all I hear from the Democrats is complain, complain, complain. Where are their ideas? What have they done over the past 40 years to help this state? All I ever see them do is tax and spend. Well it’s hard to tax anyone now that they have driven out most of the companies and put Maine on the map as a welfare state and an extremely hostile business locale.
Stop complaining about the governor and tell your loser Democrat reps to come up with ideas not complaints!
If the Governor of Wisconsin can face a recall, what’s stopping Mainers from doing the same?
Mostly be cause most people think he is doing a great job dealing with the mess left over by Pingree, Mitchell, Baldacci and Caine
Go ahead let LePage cut school funding…..that will be the fastest way to end any thought of a second term for this fool. Cut away LePage…….
The problem always has been, and always will be, that cuts are always made from the bottom with every state funding cut made! How about we try cutting from the top down, it doesn’t make any sense to cut all lower level paying jobs first, it doesn’t save ANY MONEY!! Now start eliminating some of the upper management jobs in every state funded occupation and then you can start saving some serious money. Schools and DHS are the notorious for creating new positions that really don’t need to exist at all, the ones in education that crack me up are “Training Coordinator and Curriculum Coordinator”, high paying positions set up to micro manage the teachers, pretty much anything that has the word coordinator in it, is a job that could be easily taken on by someone else in the workplace, like…..oh, how about someone in a management position. Public schools need to change they way they teach and they could save tax payers tons of money…. DIFFERENTIATED EDUCATION folks! You could cut your special education and your “gifted and talented” programs done to the bare bones. Your severely handicapped population would still need to be served of course, but there are tons of children in special education that could be served by regular ed classroom teachers if DIFFERENTIATED EDUCATION was mandatory, fully embraced, enforced and not just a fancy word that teachers pretend to do but really DONT. They have the skills to do it, but right now the only thing school administrators care about are numbers on assessments, and teachers dont want to change the way they have always done things because it would mean extra work for the first year or so of implementation (this statement excludes the very few that do genuinely try to do this)…..uh, I digress, sorry, just a sore spot after working in a school for the last nine years and seeing a lot of wasted money at the top of the food chain. But the same concept goes for DHS and other state agencies that I am not familiar with, a lot of high paid upper level positions, looking to cut at the lower level, the level that is actually providing a service to individuals.
Libby Mitchell was right about the Governor !
She probably voted for him too!
Mitchel = Incompetent, ran the state into the ground with gimmicks!
Cutler = Demo disguised as Indy, whose claim to fame was closing businesses and moving them to China
LePage= Competent business man, only one truly qualified for the job and it shows!
He brought nothing on himself. This mess was left in his lap. He has been in office one year and this problem has been left by a pack of cheshire cats.
YOU VOTED FOR HIM GREAT GOOD LUCK
….
No problem, he has excellent Health Insurance coverage.
…
Can he be recalled like Gov Walker in Wisconsin….If so I’ll sign it and stand out on the streets getting signatures…This guy is out of control……
See this is a huge part of the problem with politics today. You have people who know just about nothing about things signing on to support a cause. No, he cannot be recalled. Maine does not have a recall provision.
You now have the freedom to learn about how state government works. Consider joining your town’s Republican/Democrat Committee, be part of the upcoming caucus, and/or attend an event featuring the governor or legislators. Ask them about how things are going. Read newspaper stories to the end, in hopes that the reporter may slip up and actually print something important and factual.
What a loser. Balance the budget by targeting children. Time to Turn LePage!
Since when are 18 and 19 year olds considered children? Be real. What do you propose cutting this time? What departments will you propose cutting in the next budget cycle when we have a new DHHS budget shortfall, but only much larger. The DHHS needs structural reform, not gimmicks!
How does one cut checks from accounts that have run out of money. Mr. LePage is doing what every moral resident in this state is doing when it comes to paying the bills, spending only what is in the bank and looking at ways to save/manage what monies are available. Wake up fellow Mainers, it has to be done. The democrats and liberals usurious ways are cominin home to haunt us all.
HOW CAN YOU WIN WITH 61 % OF A NO VOTE, HOW DUMB CAN A MAINE PERSON BE
Excuse me, 81% of us rejected the failed Democratic policies and voted for CHANGE! LePage is doing an excellent job!
Oh, yeah threatening to close schools and cut educational budgets is really a smart move.
We don’t knead no stinkin skools. We jist kneed t’cut hour taxes. Thin we kin spend monie and git stuff. ifn ya got stuff you gonna be OK
If the DEMS refuse to restructure Medicaid, there will be no money for schools. It’s a relatively simple concept and I don’t understand why people just don’t understand that. LePage does not want to close schools, but the DEMS are forcing his hand because they want to cut education and send it to welfare.
Your right, we were “DUMB’ for 40 years of allowing Democrat( Both decalred and Fake like King) Governors and Legislatures run Maine into the ground.
Thank god some of us woke up and voted to kick the arrogance and incompetence out of Augusta.
BTW If cutler hadnt jumped in last minute to buy the election and it was Mitchell vs Lepage, it would have been LePage by a Landslide.
You Libs lost, deal with it!
Clinton won with 39% of the popular vote. That’s what happens when 3 or more people run for office.
First the governor threatens higher education with cuts unless it browbeats the legislature into coming up with money to pay off a DHHS short fall the governor didn’t see coming.
Now the governor has decided to threaten elementary and secondary education with closures unless they find the shortfall money.
Would someone please explain why the short fall at DHHS which the LePage administration failed to see coming now becomes the responsibility of Maine’s educational systems to solve???
Does anyone think solutions are best found by threatening people and organizations that have no relation to the problem.
It’s an interesting threat. Close the public schools. Remove that money from property taxes. Pool that money. Open schools that use teachers, not laptops and the internet, to teach. Let educators, not school boards, direct education. Return to writing and publishing text books and saving original source materials to be utilized in education.
“… re-institute stone tablets and chalk too. While we are at it, replace the internet with the telegraphs and walk to school, up hill both ways.”
Just building on the satire. :) Progress is not going away. How do we accomplish your sentiment within this context? I get your point… really.
Again I ask where his staff is on this, because he’s either getting terrible support or ignoring it entirely. LePage has successfully kept the Left from characterizing cuts to PA as “hurting children,” so why would you do this? Even our base should be against this kind of rhetoric.
He is amping up pressure to push his agenda. He’s like a bull in a china shop. Give him what he wants or he will break more stuff. I say to the legislature, be smart and prudent and not hot headed.
Schools survived throughout the Great Depression and World War Two. They will survive this as well. The political hacks who whine and moan about the possibility of their petty prize being cut is sickening. Quit whining about your personal peeve and work towards finding ths solution to the budget crunch which threatens to hurt EVERY aspect of our lives. The ability to save money is not hard but the delivery of the program is. The priority therefore is to determine priorities and everyone has their own. However, that can change depending on to whom that particular person is talking. The local small school was the answer then and it is possibly the answer now. Big schools are and always have been cash cows into which great sums are poured and mediocre results are obtained but political fodder is greatly increased. This is not in the public’s best interest. I do not at all like the political hacks wasting time yapping about all the mistakes that the governor is making when they themselves refuse to consider anything which may downsize their personal little empire. Everything is on the table for reconsideration and enough of this crap. Get to work and do the job you were elected to do.
Yes, but there MUST be such conglomerates as “Many Flags,” musnt’ there? More fodder, as you say, for the cash and power mongers. It does not help, of course, that so few people pay any attention to what happens with school boards — one of the most powerful, ignored bodies we have. I appreciate your comment.
Thank you. Of course the comments section here will hardly be sited in any forward thinking literature, still I am an optimistic person. I find if I am going to interact with the world I get more out of optimism. Ironic given my lot in life.
As for school boards… My experience tells me you can’t paint them with too broad a brush. The patina might all look same, but some function better then others on the inside. I wonder if its better to identify what we don’t appreciate (and shouldn’t) and what we do appreciate. Argue from there. I personally know a number of current political figures and I find them to be smart caring people. Also flawed and… well people like me, and I suspect like you to.
I don’t say any of this supposing I have a complete paradigm nor could I every summarize one. I bristle at the negative rhetoric because I believe its part of the problem. Those with power build foment in those without power, then harvest that power for their own gain. The previous sentence is my contribution to the rhetoric. :)
You sound just like what you criticize. Nothing but rhetorical posturing. I could think more carefully about your arguments if you could provide observable fact to back them up. The quality of any argument, including the so called ” political hacks” you refer to is based on the authenticity and credibility of their reasoning. Unfortunately, incite is the favored means to political ends, rather then insight. Chew on that.
My point exactly!!!
Threatening the school system is just stupid to say the least. Let’s cut the funding for schools so we have more of a drop out rate and more young people trying to get help from DHHS because they never finished their schooling and now have families. What needs to happen is drop everyone on mainecare if they can not pass a drug test at any given time. Do not give them a second chance – go to their house that all of our state taxes are going towards paying some sort of; tell them to do a drug test at that point, If they refuse you take away any support from DHHS – if they fail the drug test you do the same. They do not get a second chance and they do not get to receive help again! Be blunt about it from the beginning and don’t slack off. The true people who need help will support it because they are truly using it for the correct purposes and the ones who are on drugs will be pissed off because they will need to find something to do finally! Don’t threaten the schooling which is supporting all of the next generations of our state! They will not be able to get these jobs that would be needed to pay for the people sitting on their asses collecting from the state smoking their weed! ABSOLUTELY STUPID!! Don’t think you will get reelected!
It is unfortunate that you think the number of people receiving MaineCare, who are using illegal drugs, is so high. And, given the lack of jobs that do not involve technology, I wonder if closing the schools would matter, except to the parents who are fortunate enough to have a job, yet need the day care THAT STILL ISN’T offered by employers.
You make it sound like business should provide daycare, it’s not their responsibility to babysit your kids. Parents know ahead of time that, if they work and have kids that daycare will be an issue, don’t want that issue, don’t have kids.
….
FL. did it they only found 7 out of 7,000 so they dropped the drug test besides who will pay for the drug test ? the state or the people taking it ? FL. made the people pay for the drug test an if they pass it the state would pay them back
I have read what this so call governor is doing to our children and
Maine and can’t believe that he is threatening to close the schools if
he doesn’t get what he wants is crazy and I thought that when Bush said
no child left behind and look what this man is going to do to our
children let alone the elders and people of Maine with no jobs etc. I
have to say that I am gland I didn’t vote for him for I read and hear in
between the lines and I can’t understand why the people of Maine didn’t
see this coming. My grandparents live the depression and guest what
the Republicans were in office. If my grandparents and others who live
in the 20’s and so on and alive today they can tell you everything and
even say never trust anyone who would promise you a rose garden for
they be lying to us and continue to unless we stand up for ourselves and
say enough is enough, they will continue to do their lies, and
threatening. If we can impeach a president then we can impeach a
governor. Mr Le Page is out of control and wants the rich to be rich and we the people of Maine continue to lose our jobs and business to overseas country’s
where it is cheap to employ people to work for low wages. Until we the
people of Maine stand up fight for our children, ourselves and all who
have lost their jobs because of business moving to other countries, the
so call government of Maine will continue to cut programs that help
everyone. So it is up to Maine people stand-up and fight back for what
is right for us all. Remember November is coming and the Republicans is
going to look for our vote and as for me I will never vote for them or
anyone parties who try to convince me they can do better for right now
they can’t for what I see is they only are telling you what you want to
hear so they can get in and then boom you got fool again. So be very
careful of who you listen to and vote for better yet listen, read in
between the line and dot your eye’s before you vote that person in. I
have remember what our late President Kenny said and it is time we take
that and put these so call people we voted in and let them know they are
on the chopping block. Type your comment here.
….
THIS IS NOT HOW LEPAGE WORDED IT. BDN twisted the crap out of this story
What did he say than ??
This is what Lepage said at the meeting on Friday: “Right now in order to continue the way we are, I will close schools May 1, and use that money because that’s where we are.”
http://www.wgme.com/news/top-stories/stories/wgme_vid_10607.shtml
Would-be demigod.
Seriously, I can’t believe the ignorance! He was trying to make a point that our state is in serious trouble! I think was quite successful in getting everyone’s attention that we need to cut spending. As Obama would say, he inherited a mess and everyone is going to have to sacrifice.
This is the BDN, where ignorant liberals hangout, If your on welfare, you get a free copy every day on your doorstep!
Just how old is Lepage anyway? This sounds like a child who doesnt like the way a game is being played because he is not winning so he takes his ball and goes home so that nobody else can play. Mr. Lepage is a crackpot who lacks class, decent judgement for all Mainers, and a feeling of humanity for anyone other than his cronies and his church. Isnt there a way to IMPEACH a governor? Honestly that is what needs to be done. Cutler has said he might run again…some of you that voted for Lepage should be very happy to hear about that.
The Maine Constitution dictates that the locals are to provide their own support and maintenance for their schools at their own expense.
4mermainer Very well said! I’m paralyzed on my right side due to a sever stroke. I am one of the ones he want’s to cut on the disability end. I’m able to have someone come in for 28 hours a week, and he wants to cut that. Why? So I along with so many others have to be put in a nursing home? How can he even consider shutting down Maine Schools!…Oh I suppose maybe for his Job Security?! It would be great to see “4mermainer” on the front page of Monday’s Bangor Daily Newspaper.
But as others have said, Please don’t wait until next November, what will be left?
God Bless!
The States have become the final safety net as we provide corporate welfare so the corporation can make a profit. Many billion dollar profiteers depend on the corporate welfare. They pay less than living wages, no benefits, and we the taxpayer pick up the tab for the cost of this corporate welfare profit assistance program. Food stamps, LIHEAP, healthcare, etc., are our costs of making sure they make a profit and these profiteers will not pay thier fair share.
Only part-time legiststures in Maine get full-tine health benefits and a full time pension for being elected as a partime job. They rail against the high costs of providing the safety nets for for us but they expect these free benefits from us for them selves!
It appears to me that The Governor and Many Legislators have entered into a Conspiracy to violate the Maine Constitution via the Grover Norquist Tax Pledge!
http://www.atr.org/userfiles/StatePledge.pdf
Article (9) Section ( 9) ( The legislature shall never in any manner suspend or surrender the power of taxation.
http://s3.amazonaws.com/atrfiles/files/files/State%20Taxpayer%20Protection%20Pledge%20List_CURRENT_2012.pdf
LePage is trying to pit middle class Mainers against the poor. The poor can keep MaineCare if the middle class forks over more taxes to keep schools running. You’d think a republican would be afraid of threatening the middle class with higher taxes.
We should cut the prohibition budget before the education budget. We can no longer afford to put non violent people in jail for how they treat their own bodies.
WE NEED TO GET HIM OUT OF OFFICE ASAP
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qydrr1Z91mM&feature=related
All states that have based their economy on manufacturing will have to change. Maine is one of those states. Now is not the time to be cutting education, demeaning teachers and threatening universities and colleges. The only way to change is through education.
We just lost several hundred jobs to Connecticut because we didn’t have a pool of educated workers and a university that could coordinate with Jackson Labs.
A smart governor would be searching for ways to build educational resources and re-educate workers. A smart governor would be out there talking up education and creating new job opportunities with the industries we already have. A smart governor would be encouraging kids to get an education past high school. A smart gov …………. oh …… wait ………… we don’t have a smart governor.
You obviously are not really listening to LePage. He has been talking since the campaign about his plan for a 5 year high school. In this Lewiston meeting he spoke at length about training workers to meet the demand for companies in this state, and about training workers to attract new businesses to this state. He increased state aid to education. He helped remove some many regulations that were hampering businesses, including the much-covered lobster traps shading the water reg. He wants kids to have the opportunity to complete a year of college while still in high school. He wants to focus education programs on vocational and technical ed that will make kids who are not interested in a full college education, or a liberal arts education, ready to compete in the modern workforce. His education commissioner just introduced a new plan for moving the educational system in Maine in that direction.
When LePage came out saying that business leaders told him Maine did not have a workforce with the skills they needed, people said he was criticizing Maine workers. You just said the same thing. Are you down on Maine workers too?
I get it. You don’t like LePage. But if you attack him on his policies, or lack thereof, you should at least know what they are.
You haven’t looked at his 5th year of high school plan very carefully. If you had you would find that he is talking about training not education. And the training he most often focuses on is woods working. His proposal is nothing more than a scheme to make schools do the training cutting operators should be doing. Maine needs education not training. Companies train, states educate.
And without Manufacturing what creates wealth? Nothing!
You have to make things, we dont need more lawyers, teachers, beurocrats, state workers etc They are the parasites who bleed the patient dry.
Yes we need manufacturing but not the type of manufacturing we used to do. Most of that has moved overseas. The state will have to invest in education for the highly technical and research oriented modern manufacturing that requires post secondary education.
Even the dubious Kestrel enterprise would have needed educated personnel not just a bright kid with a HS diploma. Those days are gone forever.
What kind of jobs do you think will come to Maine if we cut education funding and call teaching a parasitic disease? I’d really be interested to know what you think we should be doing.
With all the money spent on edcuation, we should have
a nation of Einsteins. Go ahead Gov…let the state take
back control of educating the kids and if more states did
that, then the mooching for fed money of which we are paying
would stop. Then they can spend it on the poor…like all the billions
they have supposedly used to clean up that war on poverty. Seems
like the more they rake in, the worse the agenda gets. You think
they purposely make it worse in order to have a cause?
Sure would be nice to have that $235 million dollars stolen from DHHS under Baldacci.
Mainers respect democracy and election results.
And that isn’t even getting to the $235 million.
Funny how no one is talking about that.
I sincerely recommend that LePage consider taking a serious cut to his salary and those of his staff..including lobbyists in DC ..maybe cut down on personal expense accounts as well..foot his fair share of the bill for running Blaine House..pay for his own Air Fares…Buy or Lease his own vehicle for Government Business-like most State workers must do-and pay for his own groceries and healthcare before even beginning to entertain the slightest thought of taking away from Maine’s already destitute Educational System. Teachers should be outraged and Parents should be marching as I type this! What kind of Demigod does LePage consider himself to be? No Governor should try to balance a budget on the backs of our childrens future!
Did Baldacci do that??
Slanderous lies. I hope you meet Karma some day soon.
You are right. The only bullies are the greedy grabbing 61% (mostly public workers and old hippies who are professional recipients) who try to disrupt the only effort a Governor in Maine’s history has made to be in touch with the residents.
Are you ok?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mp-ibXxRQjo&feature=related
Sounds like bull semen to me,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AaL1W59d6U&feature=related
The way most people see this problem with the State budget is, that we have an incompetent Governor and there is not a way to recall him. So what we need is a special referendum in June or next November to recall this Governor and any legislators who to try to stop us.
You only have one problem, your three years too late, if we had rid ourselves of the Mitchells, Pingrees, Cain, and Baldacci and the rest of the clueless Democrats who ran the state into the ground, regulated everything in sight and drove out all the decent jobs, maybe we and LeApge would not be in this mess.
Kudos to Gov Lepage who is facing the problems left by his predecessor head on!
your name suggests that you work for pauls countryman Decosta?
I am so sorry that we do not have a recall process in Maine. This big mouthed bully needs to go! He does not know the first thing about GOVERNING! Thank God we have some smart, cool, hardworking legislators on both sides of the aisle. They could teach this fool a thing or two!
Yes
we needed it to get rid of Baldacci who has bankrupted the state.
Hey yeah – close the schools, open casinos, cut off welfare to the poor — a state we can be proud of. NOT.
Maybe we can expand on Newt’s plan to put the poor kids to work cleaning the schools and fire regular custodians, and then hire the honor students to replace some of the over paid teachers.
No need to worry about contract breaking, as LePage will find a legal way to terminate them. Oh the money that could be saved!!!!! (I really am kidding)
LiePage cant find a way legal or illegal to cover his lies or misconceptions, eventually he will lie under oath and then he will be impeached and all done.