Letters to the Editor
It is amazing the wonderful feedback that I have received from the parachute article that I wrote for your paper. Folks were calling me from northern Maine asking me to run for Governor. If they truly knew me they would not want me to do that, but nonetheless I was truly flattered. It is time that we put aside political correctness and tell the people the truth. It is hard to hear the truth, but truth does prevail in the end once it is told and accepted.
Sincerely,
Senator Lois Snowe Mello
To the Editor,
President Bush had to do something. He was losing his “conservative” base. His attempt to win back those who have left the camp will fail.
He has given the appearance of getting tough on the southern border, however, his “guest worker program” is nothing but an amnesty program.
Our own Olympia Snowe has latched on, helping to defeat an amendment that would have frozen the citizenship path for illegals. She, once again, has betrayed the United States of America by allowing those who have broken our laws to become citizens. This should not be tolerated.
The truth is, although very hard to swallow, Bill Clinton was much tougher on the border issue than President Bush ever has been. The statistics do not lie; President Bush has gotten too cozy with Mexican President Vicente Fox to enact any meaningful reform. If we follow the Bush/Fox agenda we will soon be flying the colors of MexAmeriCanada.
Need we look any further than NAFTA and the FTAA to prove this point? There is more evidence: the new political configuration called the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America. This past March, President Bush met in Cancun, Mexico with Fox and Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Here are Fox’s own words: “Our long-range objective is to establish with the United States, but also with Canada, our other regional partner, an ensemble of connections and institutions similar to those created by the European Union.”
This is scary. The illegal immigrant issue is only a sign that we are losing our sovereignty. Not only do we need to stand up and make our voices heard on the immigration issue, we need to let the administration know that we want to protect our American sovereignty.
Matthew Jones
Constitution Party of Maine
Chelsea, ME
mattykid91@yahoo.com
Enjoy reading your paper from cover to cover. Great writing and great wit. The satirical article on tagging “farm animals gone wild” was truly humorous!
Do you think you will ever use the HTML format as I would like to post some of your writings on Free Republic.Com where it must include linking to your site, have the date timely, and the author. And read by thousands of readers per day across the country as well as some of our military overseas.
I read the actual paper as takes to long with acrobat reader to load...or to easily cut and paste. I have dial up at around 50Kbps and a newer computer but am not a fan of pdf.
Lets get your paper out across the country for national reader enjoyment. In FR are many reporters and news people that use us as their “google” as it often the comments that give credibility to a story or dissect the untruths. It was on FR that Dan Rather was exposed moments after he appeared with his story on 60 minutes. The following week they continued to spin the truth with another story, not learning from what had happened the previous week.
Great writing! Great insight! And I wish you much success! Thanks!
A Freeper from Maine
fight_truth_decay
Ken and Michelle left copies of All Maine Matters in our office. I took one home to read, and left it on the ottoman in our livingroom. I finally got time to pick it up and read Jonathan Frary’s column the other day. That piqued my interest so I read Jon Reisman, always a favorite. Then I read more of the paper and finished with the excellent historical article about the little village in the woods called Onawa. It was a pleasure to be reminded of rural Maine and important private and cooperative construction projects like the building of the Alfred A. Burke Memorial Chapel. It was a reminder to me of the importance of Christianity to Maine culture, even in a town with only three year round residents. May God continue to bless the great places in Maine like Onawa.
Thanks Ken for taking the time to write the article, get the pictures and publish the article. What a great public service.
Michael S. Heath, Executive Director
Christian Civic League of Maine
Dear Editor, Exclusive to the All Maine Matters Newspaper:
Read with interest the letter in your April issue concerning immigration and after digesting it, respectfully request that I be given an opportunity to respond and offer my views on this very sensitive subject.
First, on a national level, if we allow all those illegal immigrants to get a free pass to citizenship, how will we ever be able to stop the stampede of all the people in other countries who see the floodgates open? We have woken up too late, and instead of guarding the borders of Iraq, we had better soon get on the ball and secure our own borders, albeit better late than never, right?
That being said, it’s strange how many people there are in Maine who for some unfathomable reason go out of their way to insult, ignore, and make life uncomfortable for people who move up here from away.
As a transplant of twenty years, I am just amazed at the goings-on of some (not all) Mainers who hate other new Englanders yet profess to love the Boston Red Sox and the New England Patriots who, of course, come from Massachusetts. This form of discrimination has always puzzled me and more so when over a thousand Somalis moved en masse to Lewiston, Maine, where they caused such a mess that the mayor had to beg for a halt which almost cost him his job.
What bugs me is these same Mainers who go out of their way to hate people from away welcomed the Somalis with open arms. Of course, something none of them knew -- I guess ignorance is really bliss -- is that these people had lived in Atlanta, Georgia, for over fifteen years. According to the media, they moved to Maine for our “benevolent welfare system”. They were informed of this cash cow by ads put in the Atlanta newspapers by Catholic Charities of Maine, who I guess wanted more people who breed big families to settle in Maine.
So to the letter-writers, I would caution them and al your readers that I have been called xenophobic (“Fear of the unknown”). I see a real immigration problem coming to Maine, and it’s not because of the hard-working and retired people who come from New England and elsewhere. It’s when they come from other countries for, as one man said at the welfare office, “I come for the free money.”
Maine better wake up and my first advice would be to change the sign welcoming all visitors to Maine from “Maine, the way life should be” to a new and bolder one saying “Maine, the way life used to be.” And that people is a fact. I have seen in just my short twenty years here.
One last word of wisdom: As a former educator, I always told my students, “:if you want to correct the injustices of this world, start with the native American and work your way up; Blacks, Chinese, etc. The Native American welcomed us to their land, and we slaughtered them and jailed them on reservations located in a country they once owned. Even now, we fight their right to open casinos to get back some of their riches we stole from them over the years. Let’s hope all the new people immigrating here either way show us more compassion than we shoed the Native Americans, as son here in Maine and America, we will be the minority.
Frank D. Slason
Somerville, Maine
Definition of tolerance: a permissible difference; allowing some freedom to move within limits
I live in Maine, however I am “from away” as I am often told. I graduated from High School in 1967. I was a member of the “free-love” generation that Laura Adelmann speaks of in her article LIBERALS SILENCE PARENTS, SACRIFICE CHILDREN AT ALTAR OF TOLERANCE. (May, 2006)
I protested our involvement in the Viet Nam War, however I supported our troops as I had several classmates drafted or enlisted in this war. I remember full well the recruiters in our school in the weeks prior to graduation. As I often say, I grew up with the Viet Nam War.
I protested the Viet Nam War, lived in a commune, travelled the country and eventually returned to New England. I married a Veteran of the War, we had two children, a son and a daughter. All the while I held on to my liberal views.
I raised my children during the “free love” generation that Laura Adelmann speaks. They are now in their 30’s and parents themselves. My daughter is a nurse and my son a machinist. Both hard working American’s. Their Father passed away in a Veterans Hospital after an 8 year battle with cancer. (the children were 14 and 16 at the time)
Many of my friends, from the free love generation, have families and grown children. My friends are productive workers in jobs from Doctors and Lawyers to writers and farmers. Their children are also hard working adults.
Where does Ms. Adelmann get the idea that all liberals from my generation are forever reckless and never grew up?
I taught my children that Peace is always something we need to work for. I taught them that tolerance of all people is a priority. We had friends of all races and religions and non religion. We taught our children that differences are to be embraced, we can always learn from people who are different from us. I taught my children that money does not make a person better, that the poor among us deserve our love also. I taught them not to be blinded by ignorance and to learn something every day of their lives.
I do not understand the thinking that a person with a tattoo or piercing is a reprobate.
I do not for one minute believe that children are having sex any more or less than in previous times. Human nature being what it is I expect that sexual activity will continue between unmarried folks. If you have young children at home than it is up to you, the adult, to censor pornography and violence in your home. Shut the TV off, don’t use the computer and all the other electronic gadgets for a babysitter. Eventually your children will grow up and make decisions for themselves. It is your job as a parent to prepare them for that day. Yes, children experiment with alcohol and drugs, they wear outrageous clothing, listen to music that hurts our ears, it is all part of growing up. Being naive to that fact will surely hurt your children. As I read on a bumper sticker recently “Denial is not a river in Egypt”.
I hear as much filthy language from adults at the local grocery as I do from ANY child or young adult. Recently, while shopping, I heard an adult call their child a “little f * @ ker”. That language was never used in my home. Even with my liberal views, if my children used foul language they were soundly reprimanded.
The serious issues of our time will never be resolved until we can stop putting labels on people. He’s a Jew, she is a democrat, they are gay, she is liberal, she was a hippy and on and on.
Teach your children to think with an open mind, teach them that learning is a lifelong pursuit.
So, with my few words I am standing up and speaking out for accountability and morals. Love one another, do not judge, leave that to the Creator.
Thank you for your time.
Respectfully,
Ann Harper
Abbot, ME
Letters to the Editor are most welcome and even encouraged! Email editor@allmainematters.com or send it via USPS to PO Box 788, Kingman, ME 04451.
We do publish anonymous letters to the editor, or those signed with a pseudonym.