The Feb. 4, 2013, Bangor Daily had an article quoting our esteemed Governor, Paul LePage, as having twice now told schoolchildren at different Maine schools not to read Maine newspapers because they allegedly spin the news–and, in his view, spin the news against him and others conservative leaders. Better to rely on TV and radio news because they supposedly don’t spin the news. No doubt the Governor believes that Fox News, for example, provides a view of the world that is absolutely non-partisan and completely objective.

Apart from LePage’s denial of the balanced perspectives actually provided by most Maine newspapers–such as the careful balance of letters to the editor and of Op Ed columns in the Bangor Daily News–there is the equally dismaying denial of the value of newspapers to citizens young and old. Rather than resist the well-known trend away from at least traditional printed newspapers, LePage embraces what, in a deeper level, is hostility toward reading itself. Very few TV and radio programs (like National Public Radio to some degree) carry anything akin to the details found in larger newspapers. And LePage would surely like to see the allegedly liberal NPR be defunded by the federal and state governments and, ideally, go off the air altogether.

Once again Gov. :LePage embarrasses himself and the State of Maine by his contempt for all forms of education that are not strictly utilitarianism and not completely oriented toward vocational training.