What Maine Needs Now
By Matt McDonald
Why do people choose to live in the State of Maine? This is the question that I have been proposing to myself over the last couple of weeks. You have probably asked yourself the same question. With the beauty of Maine’s vast forests, pristine Coastline and untouched wilderness the State is certainly in a class all by itself.
The citizens of Maine are known for being good hearted as well as hardworking. There is hardly any pollution or crime and a number of National studies places Maine as one of the top places to raise children and yet with all these positive characteristics the State of Maine is one of the hardest, if not the hardest places to live and to make a living and if things to do not change soon the only people who will be enjoying all the beauty of this fine State will be the people who vacation here in the Summer because all the good hearted and
hardworking Maine citizens will have to move because of the lack of well paying jobs and the terrible tax burden that citizens of Maine are being forced to carry.
What needs to change here in the State? First of all there is the obvious, there has to be tax reform brought to the State of Maine. As the great tax reform patriot Mary Adams says, “It’s time to rein in government spending.”
The State of Maine has a great spending problem. At the time of the writing of this article the State of Maine has appropriated $6,911,419,180.00 (that’s almost seven billion dollars) to spend in this fiscal year. This money represents the funds that will be used in the General fund, the Highway fund, Internal Service funds, Bond funds and other State Service funds.
What the nearly seven billion dollar budget funding does not represent is education spending that is derived from local tax sources, nor does it include federal funds that do not go through state agencies, such as Social Security, Medicare and agriculture subsidies.
If one were to calculate what the State of Maine spends a day it comes out to nearly $19,000,000.00. The under paid and over taxed people of Maine are being asked to daily anti up nearly $19,000,000.00 a day so that the current Governor and his administration can recklessly and carelessly spend it. This should not be so.
Another challenge that the citizens of Maine are being forced to carry is the terrible cost of healthcare. In 2003 the Governor introduced socialized medicine into Maine with the introduction of Dirigo Choice. The Governor promised that Dirigo Choice would be the answer to the nearly one hundred and thirty thousand uninsured citizens of Maine.
Nearly three years later and fifty three million dollars spent; there are only two thousand newly enrolled people in Dirigo Choice. That is certainly a far cried difference between what the Governor promised.
Instead of reforming or getting rid of this failure of a healthcare plan, the Governor is asking for more time and more tax dollars to fund it. What is the answer to the terrible cost of healthcare in Maine? It is found in a free market where the individual is able to choose what type of coverage he or she needs based upon their needs and wants not based on what the State of Maine says that they need. It is based in a free market where an interstate insurance sale is available. It is found in a free market where a Maine family can purchase an insurance rate at the same rate as a family in New Hampshire.
The citizens of Maine should not have to suffer with such high healthcare cost when the answer is simply found in a free market approach to healthcare.
A final challenge that the citizens of the State of Maine have to deal with is that we have a person in the Blaine House that should not be there. He has done nothing but fail the people that he is supposed to be governing.
The people of Maine cried out for tax reform and tax relief. The
Governor provided LD1. LD1 has done nothing to bring tax reform
or tax relief to the people of Maine. The people of Maine have cried out for healthcare reform and relief from high healthcare cost.
The Governor introduce socialized healthcare via Dirigo Choice which has been nothing but a tax burden to the Maine citizens. The Governor has vetoed and discouraged the will of the majority of the citizens of Maine on multiple occasions. This can be seen with the introduction of sexual orientation into the Maine Civil Rights Act and with the hasting of the Racino in Bangor even though the majority of the voters voted it in.
This November the citizens of Maine have a great opportunity to remove a man from the Blaine House that has shown himself to nothing more then a failure of a governor. Maine is a great place to live and with change it will be a great place for our children to live..
Facts and figures from the article can be found on taxpayersbillofrights.com, www.mainegop.com, www.mainepolicy.org and www.maine.gov
Matt McDonald can be reached at matthewthomasmcdonald@yahoo.com