The Maine Democratic Party may have finally gotten the message: Simply being the party of “no” to Gov. Paul LePage, and opposing nearly everything he says and does in knee-jerk fashion, isn’t enough to win elections. After a year of anti-LePage shenanigans — including an attempt at impeachment that was essentially a circus pandering to their base — Democrats appear to be realizing that, even in this era of partisan polarization, they need a few actual ideas of their own to get elected. Of course, some Democrats have realized this already. In the Second Congressional District, Democrat Emily Cain has…
Author: Jim Fossel
Jim Fossel
A Maine native, Jim grew up in Alna. After returning to Maine from attending Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, where he studied Political Science, Jim volunteered on Peter Mills’ 2006 gubernatorial campaign. He has helped with a wide variety of campaigns since then, from state legislative campaigns to U.S. Senate campaigns. In the past, he served as a Policy Aide for House Republican Leader Josh Tardy and as staff to Senator Susan Collins in her Augusta office. He lives in Gardiner, where he is active on the Kennebec County Republican Committee.
To hear the supporters of Question 3 — Michael Bloomberg’s attempt to impose nanny-state universal background checks — tell it, you’d be forgiven to think that Maine is an anarchic backwater with gunfights on every corner and bullets whizzing past innocent bystanders. This is hardly the truth, of course. Indeed, far from being a state awash in crime, Maine is one of the least violent states in the nation. Even with the recent opioid epidemic that has swept Maine, violent crime has not been skyrocketing. This isn’t just true in Maine, but nationwide — violent crime has been dropping like a…
“The Legislature reached bipartisan agreement on welfare reform recently. It’s long past time for lawmakers to come together to reform corporate welfare as well.” Last week’s announcement that the Portland Pirates will leave Portland after more than two decades in the city was sudden and unexpected. The owner of the Pirates gave neither the city nor the state any chance to negotiate before announcing the team’s move to Springfield, Massachusetts. All of this comes after the Portland Pirates spent the past several years wrangling with the Cumberland County Civic Center — now the Cross Insurance Arena — over lease details…