Doggie compromise
On Jan. 14, I went shopping at the Belfast Renys with my dog. Because he’s welcome, it has been one of our favorite places to shop. On that day, though, a veil of sadness was present.
Staff was informed their long tradition of allowing well-behaved pets into the store must end. Their eyes welled with tears as they told me. A customer visited a Renys location and saw a dog in the store and hair on the floor. The complaint made to the Maine Department of Agriculture brought about a store inspection. Renys passed because nothing was found. However, sealed edibles are in certain areas and dogs are now banned.
Renys is a safe haven network for pets where pets are welcomed by the staff and a water bowl is waiting. Renys relies heavily on tourist dollars, especially coastal stores. This summer’s guests will be caught unawares when told their dogs aren’t welcome. U.S. pet owners spend $45 billion-plus annually. How much of this will Renys lose due to this decision?
Many stores allow dogs and offer food products without issue. Home food license holders don’t have to remove pets from their home for food preparations, so why disallow dogs in a building due to sealed food items that the dog may or may not be near?
Why not a compromise? Allow dogs — but not in foodstuff areas — and post these sections as such. Maine’s safe place for traveling pets would be retained as well as Renys income.
Linda Gonzalez
Albion
Vigilant editors
I send you this belated commentary on an OpEd piece I tore out of the Jan. 10 newspaper to peruse at my leisure. I fear my views are still relevant.
The article was written by “scholar” and “intelligence analyst” Marvin Weinbaum. Co-authored by a “research assistant,” it promised information on the confusing political and social situation in Pakistan.
I read this article only after digesting Chellie Pingree’s comments on abusive language in Congressional debates, and of course with awareness of the recent events in Arizona.
Aside from any objective content the article may have had, I was cautioned and concerned by the authors’ use of the language. Here are just some of the words I highlighted in red: “must” and “should” (at least four times); “menacing,” “ever present threat of extremism,” “attack” (as metaphor), “crisis,” “hateful agenda, “distortion of values” — you get the point. I could cite at least a third of the article’s vocabulary, space permitting.
Through a long life of literary and political observation, I have learned how the content of a story can be completely submerged in its style. It’s called propaganda, and we must learn as an intelligent people how to avoid its use and influence. Unbalanced speech creates unbalanced thought, which leads to unbalanced actions. Please, BDN editor, help us to be vigilant. We are all implicated in the Arizona tragedy.
David Putnam
Brooklin
Importance of culverts
To roll back the regulations involving culverts, as proposed by Gov. Paul LePage, is a very short-range and counter-productive proposal.
The long-range health of sport fishing in Maine’s renowned rivers, an important tourist attraction, depends on feeder brooks, which provide breeding areas and cool water for fish survival in the summer heat.
Improperly installed culverts can cut off miles of needed access.
Currently, the Georges River Trout Unlimited chapter is working on correcting a culvert involving a major feeder of the St. George River. The chapter is having to raise $128,000 to redo what would have cost a tiny fraction of that to do right in the first place.
It might cost a little more now to install culverts according to current state regulations, but in the long run, the river fishing in Maine will get better and better — all to our economic interest and enjoyment.
Rolfe Gerhardt
South Thomaston
Making whoopie sense
I can think of no better symbol for Maine’s current administration than the proposed official state “dessert,” the whoopie pie.
As an official government symbol, what really could be better? Puffed up on the outside, full of soft mushy lard on the inside. And misleadingly calling it a dessert, when (as some alert grade school kids just pointed out) it’s really just a snack? Perfect political double speak.
Yep, it’s perfect: promising all kinds of delectable benefits, but looking less and less likely to deliver anything sustaining — remind anyone of the LePage administration?
Tammy Scully
Belfast
The truth about Cutler
The BDN’s Jan. 28 story regarding the Cutler Files site and the Maine Ethics Commission investigation omits the root-cause reason for the creation of that site. Mr. Cutler never did disclose his China-based law activities. They remain undisclosed. The printed media endorsed Mr. Cutler while mirroring that same silence.
The Maine Ethics Commission now wants names and appears to be leaning toward charging the site owner and contributors with ethics violations along with the increasing fines.
The very foundation of the word ethics is truth. The truth is apparently a missing element that now includes, at least suspiciously at this point, the Maine Ethics Commission.
The truth — Mr. Cutler’s silence, thus the silence of the printed media, was a disservice to the voters of Maine. The Internet media’s Cutler site response? Checkmate!
Roy Rivers
Benedicta
Rand Paul is right
The parade of media commentators, expert analysts and government officials who routinely spin our Middle East policies — with Israel in the role of (entitled) victim — is a sad commentary on the current (pay to play) state of American politics and journalism. Such preferential treatment for the tribes if Israel, in contrast to how we’ve dealt with other Middle East tribes, also compromises America’s security and its (diminishing) reputation in a nation that practices what it preaches.
I agree with freshman Sen. Rand Paul: It’s time to end foreign aid to the wealthy state of Israel. Not only can we no longer afford it — more than $3 billion a year, but Israel, unlike the (formerly stabilizing) nation of Egypt, has done little to earn our increasingly hard-earned crash. (Far from fostering peace and stability, Israel’s growing occupation of Palestinian land enrages the Muslim world.)
Here’s another budget-cutting idea: With so many untaxed nonprofits and think tanks doing business these days, we should deny nonprofit status to the ones whose main mission has more to do with promoting their biased, special-interest propaganda “products” than producing anything that would benefit the majority of Americans.
Melodie Greene
Calais