Obama for president
We recognize the difficulties of Barack Obama’s presidency, but we believe he offers more realistic ways to continue to improve America’s economy than Republican Mitt Romney. He came into the office facing a severe fiscal crisis and has worked steadily to help the nation grow.
We recognize that the president underestimated how long the economic recovery would take. But he acknowledges the need for revenues, healthy spending cuts and reform of entitlement programs, all of which require persistence and time. Romney is an able businessman, but it appears he is relying on a plan to cut taxes with no sustainable way to pay for it.
King for U.S. Senate
Former Gov. Angus King is most qualified to represent Maine in the U.S. Senate and carry on the state’s tradition of moderation. An independent, King offers the best hope for drawing leaders together to reach consensus.
He has reasonable ideas for mixing budget cuts with a plan for long-term growth, as well as a background of fostering collaboration during his eight years as governor. His challengers, Republican Charlie Summers, Democrat Cynthia Dill and independents Steve Woods, Andrew Ian Dodge and Danny Dalton, do not have the same level of experience or qualifications.
Pingree for 1st District
Democrat Chellie Pingree, of North Haven, has balanced speaking out for progressive social policies with able constituent service.
A former Senate majority leader in Maine, she helped lead the initiative that started the conservation program Land for Maine’s Future. She’s carried her environmental-related expertise to the House Committee on Agriculture, where she’s continued to fight for the economic value of preserving open spaces and land-based businesses. Her advocacy for small farmers during bipartisan negotiations on a new farm bill attempts to achieve fairness for Maine farmers and consumers against the interests of powerful agricultural conglomerates.
Her challenger, Republican Jon Courtney, has run a positive campaign and highlighted well his personable nature. But he has not shown the mostly liberal 1st District voters that he understands their values; he has rarely deviated from standard Republican Party talking points on education, health care, Social Security, taxes and the economy.
Raye for 2nd District
Republican Kevin Raye, of Perry, led the Maine Senate fairly as its president and could be a voice for moderation within the Republican Party in the U.S. House.
He has fought for the interests of his Maine Senate district and earned his constituents’ respect — being elected to his fourth term with 71.3 percent support. He acted as a liaison between communities and companies involved in the Cobscook Bay tidal energy power system; sponsored a bill to make the state’s school funding formula more equitable to rural school districts; sponsored a regulation-reform bill that passed unanimously in the Senate; and was not afraid to stand up to Republican Gov. Paul LePage on a research and development bond proposal.
Rep. Mike Michaud, D-2nd District, has been an advocate for manufacturing jobs and veterans’ health care and has represented well the values of his constituents. But progress has been slow, and we believe Raye’s affiliation with the party likely to hold the majority in the U.S. House could help Maine more.
Yes on Question 1
We support marriage equality. Permitting gay couples to marry will uphold equal treatment required by the U.S. Constitution, promote family values and protect religious beliefs. The ballot initiative is a matter of fairness and, in the end, care for one another. Clergy will not be forced to perform marriage ceremonies or bless gay couples.
Yes on Question 2
Voting yes will allow the University of Maine System to build a diagnostic facility that is biosecure, permit the Maine Community College System to grow programs that are in demand by both students and regional employers and help Maine Maritime Academy build a laboratory to accommodate expanding enrollment. These are valid initiatives to protect Maine people, animals and crops; better equip colleges to train Maine’s workforce; and, ultimately, support the larger economy.
Yes on Question 3
During its 25 years, the Land for Maine’s Future program has expanded its focus from public access-based land conservation to farm and working waterfront preservation that maintains important elements of Maine’s heritage. Through grants, conservation easements and partnerships with private landowners and trusts, the program has protected almost 200 properties that add to the state’s quality of place. Passage will further expand its benefit and help conserve deer habitat. Continuing the program benefits the state’s farmers, fishing families and outdoorsmen.
Yes on Question 4
There is a great need to improve Maine’s highways, bridges, local roads, airports and ports, and putting off repairs only makes the work more expensive. Improving infrastructure not only better links Maine businesses but also enhances Maine’s connection to the global marketplace.
Yes on Question 5
Passage of Question 5 would yield a 5-to-1 return in federal dollars on Maine’s expenditure to replenish the Drinking Water State Revolving Loan Fund, which was established in 1997 as a financing tool to minimize the impact on ratepayers of public water system capital projects, and a similar Clean Water Revolving Loan Fund created in 1987 for wastewater treatment. Maintaining infrastructure is good for the environment and business.
Obama didn’t have the first clue how to make the economy grow when he came to office and he still doesn’t. If he is re-elected we face four more years of ineptitude and economic decline and political gridlok.
How revisionist. It was the republican party that screwed up the economy in the first place. They inherited a national budget from Clinton and the democrats that was actually running in the green. The GOP took that working economy and ruined it so badly the country was on the brink of a depression. Clearly it will take awhile to fix 8 years of unprecedented “ineptitude and economic decline”. If the GOP wasn’t obstructionist we would probably be back in good shape by now.
clinton signed NAFTA, which shipped a lot of maine jobs to canada and other jobs in the nation to mexico. he was as bad as bush.
and as far as the economic crisis we’re in now,
thank the fed, their printing of money devalues the dollar, they issued massive amounts of debt that the banks played volatile hot potato with. and then the glass ceiling broke.
most of all, thank yourself for continuing to elect the same old, 2 party, 1 headed system that has destroyed this once-great nation.
enjoy the results of the corruption you elect.
Agreed! We will go down in history as the only nation that “sold itself” instead of being defeated.
What is revisionist is that it takes 8 years to climbed out of a recession. Every recession since WW2 was followed by a climb up as quick and sharp as the fall down. During the Clinton Administration he had 2 months of 800k job growth back to back. All you libs get excited when 179k jobs get created in a single month and that does not even cover normal population increase.
That is an incredibly simplistic view of economics. When you get hit by a bus, it takes longer to recover than it does if you are struck by a bicycle. All recessions are not the same.
Except history says I am correct. Most recessions post ww2 have followed a “V” shape. The reason is pent up demand… business demand followed by consumer demand. Look at the GDP numbers…its all there.
Cheesey, past recoveries after all post war recessionswere fueled by a healthy manufacturing base, and our products had no appricable competition. Now the “pent up demand” is met at Walmart with Chinese products. The Chinese economy may see a bump, but even Maytags, and Mopar parts are made over there now.
The demand in the b2b sector is being restricted by “capital” being used other ways (buying government debt) and new restrictions on how capital can be used. That is why the fed is throwing all that money out there.
Money that is growing the b2b sector?
Cnn says GDP was up 2% in 3rd quarter.
Just a bit of info. The minimum GDP growth rate you need to keep up with population growth and income growth is 3%. 2 % doesn’t cut it.
In GDP growth and employment growth is about 67% of what it needs to be just to maintain much less put people back to work.
You forgot to mention GE………….. recall after Obama was in office, he appointed Jeffrey Immelt to a top position. Next we see, GE is mfr. in China. That was simply securing huge donations and votes for this election. The puppeteers showed their hand. Wake up America………….
No fan of Bronco ‘bama either, but voting for him becasue he is slightly better than the man who smashes U.S. companies for personal profit.
Vote for whoever you want. Romney will be the next President. The LIES have to stop. THe liberals have spent too much of our money on Playtime for the fat cats in DC. Maybe that finally made Michelle Proud of the country. Still waiting for the TRUTH about Fast and Furious and now the US Embassy attack . THink of those men who died and of their families. I would be PO to say the least if anyone in my family was killed in either Fast and Furious or the US Embassy. When a president is too busy playing golf, that just stinks beyond septic. A vote for the liberals is a vote to collapse our economy. And as for Biden. he is always good for a laugh…………………….
I’ll go out on a limb here and state that the previous recessions didn’t have a Congress that was dead set on defeating the President above trying to get the economy back on track. We have a disfuncitonal Congress to blame, if blame is to be given, for the slowness of a recovery.
Perhaps previous Congress’s had President’s that worked for the good of the nation and didn’t pay off campaign supporters with tax dollars and called it stimulus.
About the history of recessions and different kinds of recessions and their outcomes: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/22/opinion/krugman-the-secret-of-our-non-success.html
Thank you for the link. I appreciate your sentiment, but that’s Krugman. An opinionist who operates on his own “gross misinterpretation of the facts”.
Bear in mind that this “opinionist” also happens to teach and have a Nobel Prize in economics.
I’m no fan of the curent President, and I’d love to vote for someone who actually knew how to create jobs in the U.S.A., but as a Perot voter in ’92, I have to ask. What has Mitt the $h!t done to create jobs HERE. He’s created a bunch in China, but that’s not helping anyone I know.
I would LOVE to vote for someone other than our current nincompoop, but I can’t (as a worker) vote for a man who makes his great wealth buying companies, firing the workers, and selling the parts.
Don’t forget for a minute the jobs Obama has created in China with your stimulus tax dollars.
Viable companies are saved that way. Dozens of them. You sell the parts to ongoing concerns so the non-viable parts don’t drag everything down.
No, Cheesey. You are missing the bigger picture. I was told the same thing about the textile industry. “Just move to South Carolina, there are PLENTY of jobs for an experienced loom worker like you.” I was young and believed them. five years later Essex Mills ((founded in 1884 in Lowell Massachusetts) had moved to India.
Old Noah Taylor got rich, and we all got the shaft.
Romney is a disaster for working folk in the USA, and I wouldn’t vote for him if he wre the only person running.
The Republicans run a job destroyer like Romney at their peirl.
Apples to oranges. The current situation is much more nuanced and serious than any other recession since WWII, so to expect the same swift recovery is rather simplistic. Where monetary policy was fairly useful in all of these cases, the Fed’s ability to affect the current economy is severely hampered by deleveraging. Firms in virtually all sectors of the economy are decreasing debt, and moreover flight to quality is probably an insurmountable problem when discount rates are near the zero bound. At healthy levels, debt is the fuel of economic growth, and particularly of the transmission mechanism of monetary policy. We are in a period of deleveraging that is likely to be sharp and quite lengthy given a whole host of factors not particularly linked to government policy, except for the fact that private debt-reduction would have likely driven the economy far deeper into recession following the financial crisis had it not been for increased government debt (much of which, recall, results from automatic spending) during the same period. Obama has made plenty of mistakes, and there is definitely room for improvement even in terms of economic policy (particularly in terms of where money is spent), but it’s pretty clear that our situation would be worse had government spending not increased so sharply.
Cheesecake is correct in this debate. Liberals just love to spend. ouch.
Re: Obama not having a clue. I just saw a photo, close up of him at the last debate. It really appears he had a hearing device in his ear. That explains why he would listen to Romney with his left ear as the aid was in his right. Makes sense. Wonder who told him what to say. We will not have 4 more years if he is re elected. The economy will fail. Gridlock with the elected will be the cause.
No new bonds!
Even in – maybe especially in – a down economy, we have to continue on with major infrastructure projects & improvements. There are JOBS behind these bonds, and many of them leverage federal dollars as well. Vote yes on the bonds.
Yes, let’s borrow more money we don’t have. Sounds like a good plan. Ask Greece, or California, how that is working out for them.
4+5 really aren’t luxuries, they’re necessities. Sure, we could vote no and not get matching funds, yet the work would still need to be done. It would end up costing more in the long run. I think 2+3 are debatable items, though 4+5 are completely no-brainers really.
…just checking, but are those matching funds also from taxpayers? Or did the tooth fairy leave them.
Of course. Though if we don’t use these funds, the feds will simply give them to another state. If giving this money to another state sits well with you, by all means, vote no. You’re not getting this money back either way, so why not put it to work for Maine?
Because, the more we use, the more they tax. Voting NO on all bonds until State can again afford them.
That’s fine. Your right. Though like the governors who rejected stimulus money out of “principle”, all in reality it will achieve (if it doesn’t pass) is to punish the people in the state, not help them. Sometimes pragmatism must trump idealism.
“Fiscal conservatives” should be targeting waste and luxury, not necessity (in my opinion of course.)
Your opinion is valid if you believe in grabbing all the “government money” available. I do not agree. In a fiscally conservative’s dream world, government would plan ahead and save for necessary projects. Also the people and businesses who benefited from government improvements would pay full cost. For-an-instance, the city dwellers who benefit from “water projects” would be the folks who paid for these works. People (like me) who must pay full frieght for our water would not be billed additional for someone else’s water.
Just seems fairer to me.
Yes in a dream world we’d have balanced budgets, fair taxation and honest politicians. Though I’m talking how it is – not how it should be, that’s another matter entirely.
Then this is money that should have already been set aside. Paying twice for something is just a waste of taxpayer money.
In the form of a straight tax or bond – either way it needs to be paid. Which is preferable, higher taxes or bonds? I suppose option C – let infrastructure crumble away is a choice as well.
Wrong. We would pay far less if we pay for it upfront. Our tax dollars would be earning interest instead of paying out interest.
Wrong what? I asked a question.
I’m fine with raising taxes vs bonds, though I suspect most voting against the bonds would disagree. They don’t seem to want to pay for taxes or bonds.
The interest on the loans we take out buys us nothing. Each year we push more and more money into the interest column. When 20, 30 or 40 precent of gas tax money goes to pay bond holders, we get no value for that money, and higher taxes to support it. Currently the rates are low, BUT what if we have a inflation situation like we had in the Seventies? Suppose the rates go to 15, 18, or 20 percent? What then?
If we need higher taxes, and the majority wants that, then fine, I will be forced to go along. BUT passing our bills on to our children and grandchildren is not how I want to be remembered
Debt is not what I’d want for a legacy either. But then, an infrastructure that has been allowed to deteriorate to the point that it negatively effects our economy, is not a legacy I’d want to leave either.
Vote YES on all bonds. Don’t listen to the “don’t borrow” crowd. These aren’t loans, they are investments in vital infrastructure which not only increase employment but raise valuation and return $$ on investment in the future. If we continue to reject necessary improvements today (roads, bridges, clean water, etc.), it will cost us far more to fix things in the future.
wow on the Raye enforcement
OBAMA 2012!! Nuff Said! =D
What a Liberal rag!
Just raised the tolls on 95 to pay for bonds they have spent. Bonds = Higher Texes
If you want more people on welfare, food stamps or dependendent on Government – Vote for Obama
If you want continued poor job growth – Vote for Obama
If you want billions of your dollars to be wasted on green energy programs – Vote for Obama
If you want illegal immigrants to run back to Mexico – Vote for Obama
If you want to see a continued decline in American education – Vote for Obama
If you want to see the US diminished and embarassed throughout the world – Vote for Obama
If you want 4 more years lies – Vote for Obama
If you hate the rich, success, independence and free enterprise – Vote for Obama
Of course BDN never saw a bond they did not like. Go figure. Other than their token endorsement of Raye, BDN offers nothing new but a rehash of failed leftist political figures that will bring on more of the economic misery that we suffer under as they pursue their so-called enlightened path of liberal progress and righteousness. And they wonder why most failed (and failing states) are in the BLUE column. Coincidence? Don’t think so.
Because Pingree’s husband is the multi millionaire Hedge fund manager Donald $us$$man. THe guy who received millions in stimulus money which Pingree voted for. Also, he owns the majority of the papers in Southern Maine, and is one of the largest contributors to Equality Maine. And a buddy of Barney Frank who uses $u$$man’s private jet often.
Where is the logic? If you support Raye for Congress because he is a member of the Republican majority in Congress why not Pingree’s opponent for the same reason?
I like how the Obama endorsement is so negative. You cannot think of anything the man has done right but you endorse him anyway.
The same can be said for lying Romeny
No, you are mistaken. It is the Republican/Tea/ALEC party that can find nothing that Obama has done right. If the sun came up in the east and Obama said it did, you and your cohorts would deny it ever happened.
The sun does come up in the east and Obama has nothing to do with it. Only his sycophants believe he does.
LOL, If Obama mentioned that the sun still comes up in the east you would deny it.
I can’t see why I would want to pay for a bond for Question 5, like many Mainers I have my own well and septic that I paid for and maintain. The rate payers for municipal water/sewer should be footing the bill for any upgrades need to their perspective districts.
I am so sick of footing the entire bill for my costs and then having to subsidize others.
Yeah, when do we get a tax break for pumping our septic. Or a break for a water softener when my water is too hard and it is destroying my heating system?
Yes on all the bonds. We need our infrastructure.
Then why don’t you send a check to the State for a little extra. My, I’m quite satisfied with things as they are.
Never understood why I must pay for the deams of others. No one pays for mine.
Never would I have thought a left wing paper, would endorse Obama. Will miracles never cease.
Let me correct you BDN!
ROMNEY for President!
Summers for Senate!
Jon Courtney for First District!
Raye for 2nd District!
NO on Question 1 (homosexual acts are sin)
NO on Question 2 (Bonds are loans that must be repaid with higher taxes, they are not free money)
NO on Question 3 (Bonds are loans that must be repaid with higher taxes, they are not free money)
NO on Question 4 (Bonds are loans that must be repaid with higher taxes, they are not free money)
NO on Question 5 (Bonds are loans that must be repaid with higher taxes, they are not free money)
THAT’S HOW YA GET MAINE AND THE REST OF THE UNITED STATES BACK ON TRACK!
Ladies and gentlemen, Bill Peters for the Regressive party.
Already voted that very same way and encourage others to do the same.
Thank you! It’s nice to have friendly company for a change!
WHAT A SURPRISE! The BND endorsing obama! Never met a Democrat they didn’t worship or a Socialist agenda they didn’t support! You prove yourself more and more irrelevant ever day.
Thanks for being part of the problem, instead of the solution! You sure have no problem spending other people’s money!
Now you know why readership is dwindling!
And BDN is wrong again