I’m glad to see that the Day is maintaining its policy of balancing each liberal column it runs with one (or more) by a conservative. After all, it’s been a few weeks since you hired right wing nutcase Lee Elci. Failed and embittered ex-legislator John Scott’s column in this morning’s paper (can’t seem to bring myself to provide a link) venting his spleen against tolls is yet another example of this stellar policy in action.
It’s a great example of right wing punditry, since not a word of it makes sense. But that’s not really the point, which is to try to take political advantage of what is a common sense solution to a real world problem.
As the Day noted in its printed (I believe the on-line version has been heavily edited) editorial endorsing tolls, it would be unrealistic to expect Republicans to endorse this common sense way of funding road maintenance, because doing the right thing is not their thing. Their thing is playing politics. With tolls, as with so much else, the game is played like this: Democrats are obligated to come up with solutions to problems. Republicans are in charge of creating more problems. (See, e.g., a certain very stable genius) Congratulations to the Day for enabling the very behavior it predicted in its editorial.
Scott swings for the fences and gets it over every time. The column is chock full of the “s” word, the go to insult from the right now that the “c” word is out of fashion. Like the “c” word, the “s” word has been drained of all content by the right, but it appears to be suffering a different fate than the “c” word. A substantial number of people appear to be concluding that if Republicans don’t like socialism, it must be a good thing.
He also hits the ball over the fence when he writes that everyone with a GPS will hit the back roads to avoid paying a couple of dollars in tolls. Only a right winger with a less than logical mind (all right winger minds are like that) could take that argument seriously. I guess it never occurred to John that such a dodge only works if you’re the only one dodging. As I pointed out in my own letter to the Day (gee, maybe I should get a column), I go to Maine every year (and other places with tolls). I never dodge them. Maybe it’s just me, but I’ll gladly pay a few bucks to cut the time it takes me to get to my ultimate destination. Just a suspicion, but I suspect it’s not just me. Oh, and that’s why you commission studies that Republicans vent about: to anticipate and minimize exactly those kinds of effects.
Anyway, back to my main point. Congratulations to the Day for enabling yet another Republican taking political advantage of Democratic willingness to do the right thing. Far be it from me to accuse you of knuckling under to the right wing nutcases that flood your letters page and troll your comment sections.
By the way, I’ve been having trouble finding the liberal columnists to whom I referred in my opening paragraph. I’ve looked and looked. You have a sports columnist who seems to have a sense of fair play and decency. Is that where I should be looking?
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