I feel so sorry for our veterans who gave their lives for people like Michael Jackson. He received so much glory when he died. I guess being a drug addict and some of the other things he was accused of doing made him more important than the brave men and women who have given their lives in the defense of our country.

As a member of the Edgecomb Fire Department and current Asst. Chief I am the one used to responding to people in need of help but in the early hours of Fri., July 3, I found myself in need of help.

If we were in a boxing match, it would have been stopped by now.

If the State of Maine were in the ring with all-time champ Mother Nature, by now the ref would have pulled her off of us as we hang helpless on the ropes; wrapping his arms around us to keep us from falling and muttering into our ear, “It’s not your night, kid. It’s not your night.”

This is written in response to last week’s letter by Gearry Ranger which called Carl Scheiman to task for his earlier letter on these pages.

Things are pretty quiet down on Rutherford Island on a holiday. So it was as my other half was at work on July 4. I was home alone, in the garden and wishing I had gone to the parade.

On Thursday, June 18 at 1:30 p.m. while driving on Main St. toward Newcastle I stopped at a crosswalk by Renys to allow pedestrians to cross.

What would our Founding Fathers think if they could see us now?

Our Founders deserve a lot of credit and rightly so for creating a form of government that, for the first time in history, recognized the rights of all (free, white) men, and gave all (free, white) men a say in their form of government.

The Maine State Senate has defeated a bill, LD 1438, which would have approved allowing charter schools to operate in Maine, as 40 other states already do.

Charter Schools are public and do not add to the tax burden of either the state or local governments. Not all parents approve of their local public school for their child and charter schools offer another educational choice.

Saturday’s education budget meeting in Windsor set a budget that many will not be able to afford. The end result for each of the eight member towns in the RSU will be a 17.75 percent increase ($2,225,130) in the funds they need to raise in property taxes to pay for the increase in the budget.

In response to Paul’s [Marseglia of Dresden] letter last week about gas and cigarette taxes. I know what you’re saying Paul, but what’s the alternative?

I hear a lot of complaints about taxes but seldom do folks offer solutions. We have to raise money somewhere to keep roads, state parks, schools, etc. operating.

I would like to commend the Transfer station in Nobleboro for now having a place to dispose of ‘flashlight’ batteries; small batteries that used to go in the general garbage and get burned, thereby putting a lot of cadmium and other chemicals into the atmosphere (see http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1525/is_n6_v78/ai_14263165/).

You can tell by the way people talk about him today that R.H. “Bob” Reny was a special kind of man.

He connected with people in a special way. He was a salesman sure, but he was a man who would look you in the eye, firmly shake your hand, inquire after the health of your mother and recall the names of your children.

A truly great man has passed and there are many grieving hearts of those who loved him. There will never be another Robert H. Reny. For those of us who worked for him and with him, he became part of our lives and we would like to think that we became a part of his.

Along the road of life, we meet people who leave lasting impressions. Bob Reny is one of them.