To the editor:
Having read Troy Jackson’s commentary printed recently in this newspaper I find it necessary to respond.
According to Mr. Jackson he is for the people of Aroostook County, really? How long has he been in the legislature? We are loosing population every year. Local businesses are being gobbled up by people from away and they downsize leaving skeleton crews of what once was. Apparently if a job is not a union job it is not good enough for us. You would rather that we not work versus getting a job that pays you a salary so you can pay your bills, buy a house, car, save for your kids’ college education and pay taxes.
The reason you, Troy, and the rest of the Democrats want union jobs only is that the unions own all of you. They finance your campaigns, control Augusta and dictate what we should expect from them. The Governor wanted to pay the hospitals overdue bills but the Democrats attempted to put all their special little projects along with that bill. When the Governor refused they (Democrats) accused him of not wanting to pay the hospitals. Nice try Troy but most of us didn’t buy that little play.
The Governor sent you a budget and you rewrote it, spent more than we could afford. He, as I would have, vetoed it. You got it passed anyway, wonder how many favors that cost you?
Democrats were unhappy that he didn’t send you a revised budget once you found out there was a deficit. What makes you think that you would have accepted what he sent you? Democrats have been on a campaign to discredit him before he was sworn into office. Now you say that he is holding up bonds, really? The legislature took funds out of our rainy day fund so you could have all the things you wanted. A bond is borrowing money from us. If your financial condition is not appropriate you pay a higher interest rate, more money from the taxpayer = taxes. So you hold the bonds until we get the money back in the rainy day fund so it will cost us less. Not good enough I guess but your half truths don’t fly. You and your party are just as much at fault as the Executive Branch. We finally have someone in the governor’s office who is watching out for all of us not just the union bosses.
The rank and file in the unions are good working people just like we are. They get their message from the bosses, the folks you report to. The message the rank and file gets is convoluted in such a way that they are misled about the facts. Shame on you and those bosses.
Troy, think back over the last five years, how many of your neighbors, working peers left the Allagash/County region to move to North Carolina, Florida, Connecticut because they couldn’t make a living here. I know many of them and you were not the answer for their quandary. The Democrats have been running this state for over 50 years and look at where Aroostook County is. Your model for growing Maine isn’t working and we are all suffering for it. The next time you send a letter from the Senate we expect facts, not half truths then maybe we will listen to what you have to say.
And for the rest of us, here in The County it is important that we pay attention to what’s going on in Augusta for the simple reason that they are not representing us. Look around you, it is apparent, we need new representation in Augusta, new ideas not the same old stuff that we have heard for 40 or 50 years.
Tom Deschaine
Presque Isle
