Customer Reviews

An Insider's Guide to Maine Politics

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

If you are looking for something close to an insider's guide to Maine politics please don't look here.

Chrsitian Potholm, the DeAlva Stanwood Alexander Professor of Government at Maine's prestigious Bowdoin College (the alma mater of Northern Ireland Peace Envoy, George Mitchell [1954]) and Republican political operative, falls short of providing any balance view of Maine politics and politicians. The book is fraught with omissions. Some of Maine's most influential and colorful policy-makers have gone unnoticed or receive only cursory mention by Potholm. For example, State Representative Louis Jalbert (D-Lewiston) wielded an enormous amount of power while serving in Maine government: whether dominated by Republicans in the 40's and 50's, the shift toward Democrats in the 60's or an independent Governor (Longley) in the early 70's, and the administration of one of Maine's most popular Democratic governors, Joseph E. Brennan. Jalbert stood on the platform with Presidential Candidate Ed Muskie as Muskie responded to the dirty tricks of the Nixon campaign and the poison pen of the Manchester Union Leader newspaper. Even as a rank and file member of the Democratic caucus, Jalbert's insider status saw him leveraging votes and tutoring newcomers to the Maine political scene. Many who escape mention in Potholm's work. Potholm saw fit to give ONE sentence to the first African-American to serve in the Maine Legislature, Gerald Talbot (D-Portland). Lobbyists, media personalities, and insignificant ineffectual gubernatorial staff members get more ink.

On the back cover of the book there is even a boast, "he has personally known many of the politicians mentioned in this book." Potholm's bias comes to the fore with his selective memory or revisionist history.

Potholm fails in this endeavor. He gets one star from me because he was able to get this work published.

While I agree this is a valuable book to own because it is essentially the only book to focus on the interesting Maine political scene, I disagree about the quality and the balance. Potholm abuses his authority as a well known Maine political commentator to sell a book that is filled with plugs for his consulting work, and his love for indipendent candidates. As a Maine political junkie, I found a majority of the terms defined in this book to be common knowledge and in many cases not solely related to Maine politics, but national political issues. Am I disappointed that I bought this book? not really. Would I have been happier if a little more time and thought would have gone into it? absolutely.

I thoroughly disagree with the reader below. I found this book to be extremely balanced. The commentary, while ocassionally straying, is generally helpful and accurate. As a lexicon, it serves its purpose very well, covering every aspect of Maine politics of the past fifty years. It contains historical data on Maine politics in the period covered that would be hard to find anywhere else. It is, as far as I know, the only of its kind, and is extremely useful to any serious student of Maine politics. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone who's not a political junkie, though-it's quite definitely a scholarly reference. Anybody remotely interested in Maine politics will should buy this book.