When the stakes for a community were as high as they were in ex-cop Amber Guyger’s murder trial for killing an innocent man, we’re rightly focused on making sure that judges fairly and professionally follow the points of law. But if we’re fortunate, we also have judges who understand that there are human beings involved […]
Ben Bragdon
Staff Writer
Ben Bragdon is managing editor of the Sun Journal. Prior to that, he was deputy managing editor for news at the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel. Ben was previously editorial page editor for those newspapers and Central Maine Sunday for more than 10 years. Before that, he was managing editor for weekly newspapers at Current Publishing in Westbrook. He began his career as a reporter at the Piscataquis Observer in Dover-Foxcroft and editor at the Moosehead Messenger in Greenville. He has a bachelor’s degree in history from Boston University.
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Posted inEditorials, Opinion
View from Away: Other states will benefit from California’s move to upend NCAA rules on paying student-athletes
The NCAA likes to say that all its student-athletes are “students first, athletes second.” And there’s a great deal of truth to that. Largely due to academic reforms enacted in 2003, graduation rates for NCAA athletes have risen from 74% in 2002 to an all-time high of 88% in 2018. But it’s also true that […]
Posted inEditorials, Opinion
View from Away: Small airplane seats to finally get crucial FAA safety checks
Airplane passengers loathe being crammed together in coach and seethe when seatbacks are reclined onto their laps. But are these crowded conditions actually unsafe? Americans soon should find out. A 2018 funding bill gave the Federal Aviation Administration the authority to set minimum seat sizes as cabins shrink and body sizes grow. Federal regulations require […]
Posted inEditorials, Opinion
Our View: No, small family farms should not ‘get out’
Comments by the secretary of agriculture show who has the power in agriculture.
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Doyle McManus: Hunter Biden — and Trump’s children — follow a long line of White House relatives cashing in
The tangled tale of Hunter Biden is worthy of a Russian, or maybe Ukrainian, novel: A ne’er-do-well son goes abroad to seek his fortune, but succeeds only in endangering his father’s presidential campaign. In 2014, Hunter, a not-very-successful lawyer who had been in and out of alcohol rehabilitation and debt, landed a lucrative job working […]
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Jay Ambrose: Could a President Pence save the Republicans?
In 2008, Esquire magazine named him one of the 10 best members of Congress, a forever principled conservative, never a party hack. And a question is whether he might be among the country’s top presidents, this smooth-talking, gently paced Mike Pence. It’s possible, at the least, that he could in fact become president, given the […]
Posted inEditorials, Opinion
Our View: Safer streets part of building community
Roads should be improved to acknowledge their use by pedestrians and bicyclists, not just motorists.
Posted inEditorials, Opinion
OUR OPINION: Augusta voters should approve Lithgow project
Renovation and expansion project will set up building for the next 100 years.
Posted inOp-Eds, Opinion
Douglas Rooks: A missing link in Maine’s corrections system
Given renewed awareness of the costs of locking people up for decades, is it time to bring back parole?