Archive for ‘Opinion’

  • Darkside of the Sun: A real festival of okay ideas

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist I see where Governor LePage is using his overwhelming mandate of 48% of those Mainers who bothered to vote last November, to advance yet another trickle-up plan. He wants to grow the sales tax, an idea which will surely jack up the cost of living for people who already can’t […]

  • Uppermost House: Toilet gig, totally rocked it

    By S. Peter Lewis BN Columnist A couple of columns back, I left you all awkwardly standing by while I paused in my efforts to fix a leaky toilet. I fear some of you have been shifting from one foot to the other for a month now, and I’m sorry if I caused you any […]

  • Darkside of the Sun: Retirement expands to fill the time there is

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist The trouble with being retired is that everyone you know suddenly thinks you have all the time in the world. Of course, this is not true, because, since everyone you know thinks you have all the time in the world, just their consequent demands on you take up the entire […]

  • Small World: Walking the streets of Brooklyn

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist This year, our extended family gathered in Brooklyn, N.Y., for the festivities of Christmas week. We stayed in a neighborhood that is mainly a fusion of Jamaican and Haitian immigrants, with a salting of Asians. Far from their balmy beaches, these folk have embarked on the search for job opportunities […]

  • Nostradamus on: next year

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Nostradamus lived in either the 13th or 14th century, in Spain or Italy or France, and he made a lot of predictions in the form of vague assertions, under the influence of powerful mind-altering drugs. In fact, his most definite prediction seems to have been, “In the future, in a […]

  • Small World: The Realities of racism

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist There has been much talk in recent weeks of racism in America. Outraged by police shootings of unarmed black youth and subsequent grand jury refusals to indict the officers responsible, some citizens have condemned our society as racist to its core. While it’s hard for an outsider to comment on […]

  • Irreverence, irrelevance, whatever…More international news, supposedly

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist Homeland grants to Maine schools Homeland Security has announced its 2015 grants to the nation’s middle and high schools. Homeland Chief D’Arcy Snogg noted that the expanded academic programs are beneficiaries of cutbacks in ongoing police department militarization across the land, a funding program which has grown more controversial now […]

  • Darkside of the Sun: A moving experience

    By Mike Corrigan BN Columnist When you move house you find out who your real friends are — or if you have any. When they hear you are changing addresses, people develop exotic ailments: typhoid, hoof and mouth disease, a sudden onset of contagious mange. Really, they would love to help, but they are old […]

  • Small World: Unruly youth and our discontent

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist Ferguson and Hong Kong, Egypt and Syria, Tehran and Palestine, Ukraine and Iraq and Turkey. The list is long. These are the sites of youth-led demonstrations or violent confrontations with regimes. What do these places have in common, if anything? Should there be a common U.S. policy for dealing with […]

  • Small World: Talking to Iran, despite hard liners

    By Henry Precht BN Columnist For over three decades, it seemed impossible for Iran and America to swap even the mildest of pleasantries with each other. Then some months ago, they started exchanges on Iran’s nuclear program. Now, it seems they can’t stop talking as the negotiations about preventing a supposed atom bomb have been […]