Author: Ron Schmidt
Dr. Ronald Schmidt is an Associate Professor of Political Science in the Department of History and Political Science at the University of Southern Maine.
“When you go to war, and you know the enemy, the enemy dresses in red, and you dress in blue, you shoot at red,” Maine Governor Paul LePage explained to a room full of reporters on Friday. “And the enemy right now,” he continued, in response to a question about racial profiling, “the overwhelming majority…
Even while rejecting Trump, Sen. Collins continues to endorse extreme figures like Rep. Jeff Pierce and Gov. Paul LePage.
Mainers in the Democratic Party who worked tirelessly for a candidate who did not win their nomination are offered a chance to keep working, because, as the president said, “democracy isn’t a spectator sport.” Mainers in the Republican Party, meanwhile, are given a chance to watch their candidate “fix” our republic, largely by reducing our world of multiplicity and compromise to a false organic unity, reinforced by xenophobia and state repression.
Americans love “balance,” or at least they know enough to say that they do. If a crowd of one hundred marches in favor of, let’s say, defending voting rights, and five people march in favor of restricting voting rights, the media will be sure to give equal time to both groups, in order to avoid…
The Fourth of July strikes me as a good time to think about a foundational concept in American politics, and June has provided some perfect object lessons in Washington and in Augusta. The topic is “checks and balances.” Charles Montesquieu is usually credited with explicitly formulating the idea of a government of “checks and balances,”…
Just over a year ago, on June 17, 2015, Dylann Roof murdered nine people at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Roof was motivated by his ideology of white supremacist violence, and so it wasn’t terribly surprising when photos emerged on social media of Roof wearing a jacket emblazoned with…
About a month ago, New York Magazine published a widely-read essay by Andrew Sullivan which foretold our doom, the end of democracy in America, at the hands of an elected tyrant. The tyrant in question is Donald Trump; the cause, Sullivan writes, is American democracy itself. Sullivan cites Book 8 of the Republic, in which…
Bruce Poliquin is “outraged”! Outraged “that political opponents or members of the press would claim or insinuate that I cast a vote due to pressure or party politics.” What vote is Representative Poliquin talking about? And why did he cast it? Why would it be outrageous to cast a vote for partisan reasons? And what…
A rule change at a state party convention doesn’t usually get much press attention, but one at the Maine Democratic State Convention has been getting national press coverage (in the Chicago Tribune, the New York Post, and the Washington Examiner, among other places). Why? What were the Democrats fighting about at the state convention this…
Governor Paul LePage can whine with the best of them, as he proved once more this week, at the state Republican convention and on-line at his Facebook account. Sure, he has also been threatening his “enemies,” promising to carry out a “little war” against such “intimidating,” “scary,” and “rich” non-profit organizations as the Natural Resources…