Last Wednesday afternoon, Gov. Angus King announced a press conference would be held the next day to announce the date for the start of the long-awaited Amtrak service between Portland and Boston. Four hours later, he announced the previous announcement was canceled, citing difficulties in coordinating the schedules of all the dignitaries who deserved to be there. Compared to holding a press conference, making the trains run on time should be a snap.

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Last week was not one of the governor’s better weeks for announcements. First, he told the audience of a Caribou radio station that checkpoints along the U.S.-Canadian border should be eliminated. Then, after being criticized for suggesting such a thing at such an inopportune time, he hustled to clarify that he meant it in the context of a long-range coordination of immigration policy and security procedures between the two countries. With that little uproar settled, the governor moved on to other, less controversial matters, such as his worry that the federal government isn’t doing enough to protect the closed Maine Yankee from terrorist attack. Asked if the governor would use his authority to put Maine National Guard troops on duty at the facility, a spokesman said it’s being looked at.

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Others are struggling in this new environment of terrorist threat and security concerns, including the police officials in Portland and South Portland who publicly scolded the FBI last week for not sharing information as fully as they’d like. The greatest criminal investigation in history is under way and a couple of local cops shoot their mouths off – it’s hard to imagine why the feds aren’t more forthcoming.

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The U.S. Department of Agriculture has awarded University of Maine researchers a grant of $530,873 grant to study why consumers increasingly prefer large supermarkets over small mom-and-pop groceries. Study leader Gregory White of UMaine’s Resource Economics and Policy Department says surveys in 10 communities will seek to determine whether consumers really value such supermarket conveniences as ATM machines and checkout scanners and whether wider selection and lower prices are an attraction. The study is supposed to take four years, but it seems like it’s already done. Can taxpayers get a refund?

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That new Amtrak service, incidentally, will be called the Downeast Express. Residents of the real transportation-starved Downeast region might carp about having their identity appropriated for a service they’ll not use, but at $35 a head to get from Portland to Boston and back, they couldn’t afford it anyway.