Bravo to Edgar Allen Beem for getting it right that Shawn Moody is led by the nose and pulled by strings. Moody may have been a “compassionate conservative” (whatever that means) and, by all reports, a decent and civil fellow, but in the presence of brutes, one may become more brutal. Being soft spoken and polite are not the tests of “authentic” meanness. Letting people die and sicken without health care, decreasing food security, and caring more for chemical companies than clean water and air in our bodies – these and so many mean LePage policies are tests of decency. Not how well a collision company is run or how often one smiles.

Boo for Balentine’s blindness to the car problem. Our roads are indeed insufficient. Many local streets were built when every family had but one vehicle. Now even the hamster has its own car. The answer is not to make life comfortable for more cars, but to create mass transit wherever and whenever possible. Cars are killing us, and America invented the car love addiction we need a 12-step program for.

Trolley lines were once ripped up along city streets. A modern version of these running down every major artery of Portland and into surrounding towns is what can be done. Why is it easier to get space stations and Mars landings than high-speed light rail into American cities? These would be the only justification for spending huge sums to widen roads, and that goes for the Maine Turnpike, too.

Anna Wrobel
Westbrook