We don't know whether or not Carolyn Cosby lives in a glass house, but if she does, she would do well to heed the age-old admonition not to throw stones. Mrs. Cosby is the leader of a campaign to deny civil rights protection to Maine citizens gay and lesbian citizens. Her political action committee, Concerned Maine Families, has raised thousands of dollars in that effort.
Whatever type of house Mrs. Cosby and her husband occupy, thousands of dollars of Portland property taxes on it remain unpaid, even as Cosby seeks to roll back civil rights protections that city voters approved in a referendum.
Displaying a true hallmark of the zealot, Mrs. Cosby does not consider herself bound by the same laws and obligations that most other citizens live by. Nobody likes to pay taxes, but most of us do our part, knowing that the local property tax is the chief source of revenue that enables cities to run school systems, hire police officers and fire fighters, and otherwise discharge the duties of a government on which we all depend.
In Portland, the tax revenues to which Mrs. Cosby doesn't contribute also help to assure fair treatment for all of the city's residents, regardless of their sexual orientation.
Several years ago, Mrs. Cosby was identified as a material witness in a stealthy leaflet campaign aimed at Robin Lambert, a Portland Republican candidate for the state senate in a primary election. The leaflet campaign, targeting Lambert's acknowledged homosexuality, effectively derailed his candidacy.
When called before the state commission that monitors election practices, Mrs. Cosby refused to answer any of its questions on what she claimed were constitutional grounds, and the matter was eventually dropped when another person claimed responsibility for the improperly anonymous leaflets.
Now, this constitutionally sensitive citizen seeks to amend the laws of our state to deny basic civil rights to people she is well known to abhor. We hope Maine people will answer Mrs. Cosby's campaign of malice with a resounding "no" reply to Question 1 on the November ballot.
Marian McCue is Publisher and Editor of
The Forecaster
PO Box 66797
Falmouth, Maine 04105