Courting civility was a promising political proposal during the honeymoon period welcoming in Maine’s first woman chief executive. Janet Mills put that game changer in play from the get-go by offering up an inclusive and healing inaugural ceremony without so much as a mention of her predecessor’s archly abusive to outright punitive partisanship. For those that weren’t paying close attention to her moderate-centrist positioning among competing candidates that may have been somewhat less of a high five relished victory lap than many desired, but it certainly provided an immediately refreshing walk along a far higher road of governance than Paul LePage ever frequented. 

Straightway, reports from Augusta seemed altogether positive in mentioning a widely shared bipartisan sigh of relief that far more cordial across the aisle exchanges would become commonplace. Eight years of governmental impasse suddenly gave way to the possibility of constructive compromise and moving the state forward from the center rather than opposing extremes.  

I was therefore disheartened by the recent low road partisan attack upon Chloe Maxmin, a first-term Maine House Democrat. An idealistically unapologetic 26-year-old Green New Deal champion whose commonality based approach to politics gained her unexpected election in a traditionally conservative district. I was also disappointed that her encouragingly progressive yet hardly radical environmental bill had its more pointed teeth filed down by a go-slow establishment agenda despite a planetary existential threat’s increasing need for full-throttle engagement. Fortunately, the procedural harassment of her visionary floor speech didn’t deter her own political civility nor eventual House passage of the bill by an 84-55 margin.  

She afterward commented: “It was really devastating to see the kind of partisan, angry politics that has turned so many folks away from this process be on full display in the chamber.” “One of the biggest messages of my campaign was that we need a better politics, one that treats everybody — regardless of age, gender, sexual orientation, race or political party — with kindness and respect, and really taking the time to listen to people.”  

That message is indeed a crucial one if we ever expect to end our political, economic, environmental and cultural race to the bottom that an Us-vs. Them politics will never surmount. Never say never, but so far doubling down on retribution politics isn’t getting us very far.  

Here in Maine, and nationwide, the electorate reportedly desires a common ground approach to government. Yet, almost everyone I personally know, on either side of a self-perpetuating acceptance of an -ever-widening “aisle,” nevertheless maintain an unforgiving judgmental defiance of any actual attempts at political unity.  

Again, never say never but there’s likely never been a more timely need to heed the adage that “Nothing brings people together like a common enemy.” That sage certainty most certainly should be happening now. The sky might not be falling but Chicken Little will soon be treading water or finding none to drink. The irony is that our worst common enemy isn’t climate change but our own unchanging self-defeating behavior.  

Like Nancy Pelosi, Janet Mills carries the Democratic flag proudly but in a bureaucratically cautionary manner. Leadership all about achievement, not risk taking. Vote-counting before any commitment.  

Enjoying a trifecta of one-party domination, Maine Democrats have the ball of leadership totally in their court. That ball’s as large and complex as anyone’s ever had to deal with. “The Way Life Should Be” needs a radically transformative overhaul to surmount the challenges a changing climate’s imposing in ways many already have major difficulty accepting. The cost of doing nothing, or doing it on the cheap, will eventually be unaffordable even for those believed economically above the fray. As bumper sticker wisdom prophesies: “We can’t eat money. We can’t drink oil.”  

Maine’s new governor ran as a moderate and proves to steadfastly walk that talk. I myself hoped a more progressive candidate would replace LePage. Incrementalism, bipartisanship consensus and “prudent transition” aren’t at all revolutionary enough for me.  

I don’t expect Governor Mills to start sporting a beret anytime soon, and her reelection will likely remain a far more enlightened option than any offered by even a moderate Republican. The only hope for a more left-leaning Blaine House lies in a viable third-party gubernatorial bid in 2022. In the very long meantime, at least we have a governorship that isn’t orchestrating a shutdown and inclines towards passing rather than vetoing legislation.  

If nothing else, Janet Mills is defining herself by an administrative sense of largely responsive stewardship. As to getting her budget passed: “I believe through this process we have returned an air of civility and bipartisan agreement to state government that may have been lacking in the recent past.” “This is the type of government that Maine people deserve.”  

There’s a certain newsworthy bartender in Boothbay Harbor that might think otherwise. His idea of governance was to disrespect any and all that differed with his self-mandated my-way-or-the-highway take-no-prisoners vision of leadership. Hopefully, the hospitality gig he’s taken goes well. One certainly should applaud anyone willing to attempt such a daunting personally antithetical learning curve where the customer’s always right.  

Gary Anderson lives in Bath.