Archive for ‘Opinion’

  • Never too late for a first date

    The man hadn’t had a date since 1979. Actually, he’d never had a date. As a gangly, height-challenged, pimple-ridden, poorly dressed teenager with goofy hair and bad teeth, he’d rarely even talked to an actual girl. Never called one on the phone to stutter about Saturday night, never been to a prom, never leaned against […]

  • Session Highlights

    By State Senator Bill Diamond Well, the First Session of the 125th Maine Legislature is finally over. While there were some glitches and some heated moments, I would say that overall things worked fairly well. There were even some major successes, including a budget that went on to be overwhelmingly approved by the entire legislature […]

  • The June Tree

    By Alice Darlington Last summer, a client of my husband’s offered him a tulip poplar sapling from her yard in Portland, a volunteer from the magnificent tulip tree her father had planted years before. I have admired those trees ever since I first saw one in Virginia, but was surprised by the offer because I […]

  • Democracy in Action

    By State Senator Bill Diamond Since 1909, when the 31st Amendment to the Maine Constitution went into effect, Maine has had what is known as a “People’s Veto.” This allows the people of Maine to overturn a law enacted by the legislature through a direct vote on the issue. I feel that this is a […]

  • A Day On The Bay

    Last week, I spent five days on the coast of Maine at the Audubon Camp on Hog Island. One day, our group headed out on the camp’s modified fishing boat for a daylong cruise on Muscongus Bay with a north wind to clear the skies and flatten the water, a perfect day to look for […]

  • The signs are inviting

    The signs are inviting in Bridgton this year. They speak of better times to come, of a time when we can look back and say 2011 was the year that Bridgton took charge of its own destiny. Let’s start, literally in the heart of downtown, with the new sign that just went up in front […]

  • The automatic indexing of fuel taxes is gone

    By Rep. Rich Cebra Last fall, I submitted a bill for this legislative session to eliminate the automatic, annual “indexing” of fuel taxes. Indexing, of course, is the polite word for a tax increase. The bill, LD 383, was written in response to one of the most common complaints I have heard in my seven […]

  • The new state budget

    By State Senator Bill Diamond After countless hours spent over the last five months, the Maine Legislature has passed a budget for the next two years. In a strong show of bipartisanship, the Appropriations Committee unanimously endorsed the budget, which went on to pass both the House and the Senate by large margins. Given the […]

  • Curtailing our right to vote

    By Bill Diamond State Senator, D – Windham Traditionally, Maine has among the highest voter turnout in the nation. Before I was a state senator, I had the honor of being Maine’s Secretary of State, which oversees elections, and I was very proud of Maine’s high voter participation numbers. One of the reasons we have […]

  • Together, alone among the crowds

    Each spring, Maine Maritime Academy’s training ship, the State of Maine, chugs out of the picturesque mid-coast harbor of Castine on an eight-week cruise to ports of call in the North Atlantic, the Mediterranean, or the Caribbean. It’s 500 feet long, displaces over 12,500 tons, and is pushed through the swells by 10,000 charging horses. […]