Border blockade

I read the front-page article, “Labor Department rejects Maine loggers’ argument,” in the Oct. 27 edition of the Bangor Daily News.

I’ll quote a statement from the U.S. (Canadian?) Department of Labor: “Companies that follow all the rules when they use Canadian bonded workers and pay the prevailing wages are not an `adverse effect’ on logging.” I would guess the U.S. (Canadian?) Department of Transportation feels we in northern Maine are stupid and don’t donate enough to Alexis Herman’s favorite charity.

Just having 800 bonded Canadians has an adverse effect on prevailing wages. Has the U.S. Department of Labor never heard of the law of “supply and demand?” I think it was the same U.S. government that said a couple of months ago that farmers in northern Maine couldn’t harvest and sell hay to farms in drought-stricken southern Maine because it would have an adverse effect on the price of hay. Hello!

One has to remember that the bureaucrats in both the USDOL and state DOL have more of an interest in protecting their own jobs (adminstering the bonded labor program) than doing what is fair for the U.S. workers in northern Maine. I wonder if any of these bureaucrats would give up their prevailing wage and compensation packages and instead accept for compensation what Maine woods workers are paid?

It is distressing that no state or federal elected politician has spoken out on this matter. Oh, I forgot, it’s not an election year.

The next time these men blockade the border, I intend to be there for their support and would invite all you spineless elected officials, from the governor on down, to join us. But be careful, because the landowner may have you arrested by the RCMP. Steve Patterson Presque Isle