Baldacci’s example

I read with interest the article about Gov. Baldacci’s approval ratings dropping of late and couldn’t help but reflect on our short memories. We seem to have forgotten that the governor inherited a $1.2 billion deficit that people said couldn’t be solved without a broad-based tax increase. We have forgotten the series of bankruptcies and mill closures he faced and overcame.

Have we been blind to the continuous cutbacks in federal programs (the most recent being an $80 million cut in our Medicaid reimbursement) that he has managed, or the funding of a multimillion-dollar settlement with Maine hospitals on a dispute that had been around for 10 years, or funding the largest increase in education funding in the state history all being done without an increase in a broad-based tax?

Our governor has managed crisis after crisis while we continue to move ahead economically with an unemployment rate lower than the national average and a per capita income growth rate better than the national average. Now the federal government has handed us another crisis to handle with the BRAC listings. Maine is slated to have 25 percent of the civilian job cuts nationally and again the governor will handle another crisis he did not create. I wonder how long it will take us to forget this one?

We citizens can do better. Let’s follow the governor’s example, face the facts, pull together and support his efforts to forge a sound future for the people of Maine.

Jean M. Deighan

Bangor