Two Pieces of Good News

Number One: Despite claims to the contrary, Mainers are not the most taxed humans on earth. A newly released study by The Tax Foundation says we are a long way from holding that place and we never have. In fact we've been as low as 35th and has high as 6th, and currently hold 15th place some 3/10s of a percent from dead average.
How the drama queens in the Republican Party and the Chamber of Commerce have managed to make this lie into their mantra is a sad mystery to me. Did no one actually check their numbers? The pity party is over though. Spread the word friends. Turn Maine Blue is. Maine's plain ol' in the middle as far as taxes go. Maybe instead of whining about taxes we ought to demand that we get something in return for them other than the privilege of living in the least evolved industrialized nation.
This brings me to the second bit of good news. Nearly all the 357 inhabitants of two islands in Penobscot Bay, Vinalhaven and North Haven, voted almost unanimously late last month to go completely to wind power. They own their power company in a quasi-public deal and they get to make decisions like that. Amazing, huh?
Of course it helps that they live in one of the windiest spots in America. This kind of good sense is astonishing these days, however.
Apparently the biggest snag is obtaining the turbines. There's some ungodly wait time for the equipment needed to make the change. Paging University of Maine and Southern Maine Vocational--think you could train some wind engineer and installer types in a big hurry, please?