Eight Republican state senators are in an uproar over Gov. LePage’s behavior because it lacks “respect.” The senators would do well to consult a dictionary.

Mine defines respect as “high or special regard.” If these senators think they have earned any respect from anyone in Maine, they are gravely mistaken.

These senators should consider the low level of respect that many voters have for them when they waste days discussing whoopie pie treats and blueberry pie desserts. I suggest these very same senators spend all their time doing much more important work.

The moronic sponsor of this waste of our collective time and money was proudly running around the Capitol bragging about being on CNN and Fox nationally. Apparently it wasn’t enough to be an idiot in Maine, he needed to demonstrate that he was an idiot to the nation.

I join ranks with Gov. LePage with his lack of patience with these senators’ ridiculous behavior in the light of enormous deficits, enormous pension deposit shortfalls and enormous lack of leadership in our GOP-controlled Legislature.

Memo to GOP leadership: You’re in the majority for the first time in nearly 40 years. Grow up and act like it.

Michael Doyle
Falmouth 

Maine’s governor, Paul LePage, has left town. He has gone on vacation. We are in the middle of a legislative session during the first year of his four-year term. He has been in office a mere three months.

Nearly five years ago my mother was on her deathbed. I told her I was going on a vacation. I told her my brother would replace me at her bedside for five days.

She turned away. When I was about 90 miles from her, a nurse called to tell me she had “fallen” out of bed. Her disapproval was clear.

In Maine we don’t go on a vacation when there’s work to be done.

True, Gov. LePage is not a legislator. He leads the executive branch of Maine government. He has promised changes. He has made changes.

I soothe my anger at this abdication with the thought that perhaps it will be easier for us to focus on legislation and proposed legislation without the sorts of distractions he has recently provided.

Mimi Dunn
Portland 

Our new governor has certainly rewritten the script for doing politics in Maine. His directness on issues has had the touch of combativeness and certainly can be offensive to those unaccustomed to this new “directness.”

On environmental issues he surely will be the adversary that we most feared. Our vision of a dynamic and job-producing national park in the North Woods of Maine is not a vision shared at this time by the governor. Hopefully we can illuminate that possibility with him as we go forward.

Although he and I are on opposite sides on several major issues, the offer to come to one of his “constituents’ meetings” in Augusta appealed to me. For my wife and I, it was a positive revelation.

He came across as a regular guy with a warm and friendly disposition. I feel that the gaffes that have marked his administrative beginnings might speak more to just a clumsy void of established etiquette and should not be the mark that measures the whole man.

His ordeal of a desperate early childhood has made his career climb remarkable. I feel that we all reflect the values and conditions that shape our growing up, either for the better or for the worse. Overall, I feel that he has done well with what his early years have given him.

I certainly do not condone any of the mistakes in judgment on those recent political distractions, but the constant vilification of him by the media and social groups is wrong. The wolf-pack mentality of verbal and media assault is counterproductive.

Let’s just back off a bit and give him the opportunity to show the people of Maine more of the good person that he really is.

John Oser
Parsonsfield 

Just a quickie reply to Gov. LePage’s apologists: Let him take responsibility. His critics are simply reacting to the governor’s actions. This is Maine — if the governor is saying or doing what we think is wrong, there’ll be plenty of us out here letting him, and anyone else who wants to listen, know about it.

No matter which side you are on in this issue, the whole thing started with Gov. LePage.

Although much is said of the right to vote, it is also our right and duty to criticize, as well as support, our government.

Paul DiBiase
Portland 

Once again I am let down by your paper’s constant depicting Gov. LePage in a negative light. When is The Portland Press Herald going to endorse, respect and encourage the governor of Maine?

First we had front page with him telling the NAACP to kiss his butt, and when you read on, it was not what he meant at all. Your general use of his vocabulary is what seemed to be the issue with your paper.

Funny how in the back of your newspaper, there was one paragraph explaining the meaning of that statement. It only took the governor a week to get the press to explain what he said.

Then there was the reason we voted him in — you know, he wants to trim and balance the budget. Well, I guess he is allowed to trim the budget as long as there are no cuts, no new taxes and no loss of jobs.

Did we vote for change or were we just pretending? To make it worse, your paper seems to think he is the bad guy in all of this.

Finally, the governor wants to take down a mural of unionized workers in Maine picketing and walking out on their jobs. The mural makes us look like whiners. Are you seriously telling me that is what Maine workers are all about?

I’ve been a Maine worker for 22 years. I have never joined a union. I will never join a union. Unions drive up the cost of their workers, driving up the cost of items, driving up the cost of unemployment.

I want the Department of Labor to say that’s the kind of worker I am? Are you all nuts? I work for a living.

When I lost my job, guess what? I went out and got another one. That’s what a Maine worker does.

Scott Wilburn
South Portland 

I was told there would be a steep learning curve in my first few months as an elected representative in Augusta. I thought it would be determining budgets and learning all of the abbreviations related to Health and Human Services Department.

That is the easy part. The hard part is listening to individuals who think that raising taxes and increasing fees is the solution to all of our problems.

They fail to recognize that this is precisely what has transpired for more than three decades and the only thing it has delivered is an enormous state of dependency and an equal distribution of misery. How easy it is for them to spend other people’s money.

The governor has called for an honest-to-goodness tax decrease of $203 million that will put more money in the pockets of over 400,000 people in Maine.

Empirical evidence throughout history has proven that tax decreases increase revenue and improve the business climate.

LePage also has proposed exempting estates worth up to $2 million from Maine’s estate tax, or “death tax.” The current exemption is $1 million or less.

Hallelujah, this may just save some of the families of the land-rich but dollar-poor farmers who are struggling to survive and pass on their heritage to their children and grandchildren.

It’s about time we had a leader with a keen business sense as well as genuine concern for the hard-working families in Maine.

I will be supporting every tax cut the governor proposes, and if we can reduce the regulations, unfunded mandates and energy costs, I dare say Maine can and will truly be “open for business.”

Rep. Beth A. O’Connor
Berwick 

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