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Wiping the Record Clean: Will Marijuana Amnesty Make It to Maine?

Wiping the Record Clean: Will Marijuana Amnesty Make It to Maine?

Think of it as a scarlet letter: The blemish that stays on your permanent record long after your arrest for marijuana possession, cultivation, or distribution. The long-term implications of getting busted for a pot-related offense — regardless of whether the crime is classified as a civil infraction, misdemeanor, or felony — can range from annoying to life-altering. One youthful indiscretion can keep you from getting into Canada or hinder your chances of getting a job; it can limit access to...

18-09-2017 Hits:253 Features Deirdre Fulton

Columns

Might makes wrong — Retired Portland cop accused of abuse of…

Above The Law is a column featuring news and analysis on incarceration, policing, and the criminal justice system in Maine. The name evokes the extrajudicial actions and impunity of law enforcement that will be covered here, while also imploring citizens to think "above" and beyond the status quo to envision better ways of dealing with harm. Here, we will question and critique not only the conduct of law enforcement but the roles played by various... Read more

19-09-2017 Hits:310 Columns Brian Sonenstein

  • Culture of Excess: The Strange…

    Call me old-fashioned, but when it comes to consuming cannabis, I’m perfectly satisfied with a simple, tightly rolled joint. Clean bowls/pipes are nice too. Much of everything else — gravity bongs, CBD oil vaporizers, crazy edibles, and water-soluble THC capsules…

  • Time to Get Moving

    An object at rest will tend to remain at rest, and an object in motion will tend to remain in motion. The law of inertia. It’s physics, but also an apt metaphor for physical fitness. As in, “Hey, we’ve been…

  • The Labors of Listening

    In February of 2016, I answered a robocall from white supremacists supporting Donald Trump at my mother’s house in Vermont. It was a shocking, gut-wrenching thing to hear the tinny voice of a white nationalist gripe about the dearth of “beautiful white children”…

News

Cramped Docks: Fishermen Petition the City Council To Halt N…

Cramped Docks: Fishermen Petition the City Council To Halt Non-Marine Development

Last week, 90 fishermen in Portland signed and submitted a petition to the city asking leaders to do something about the dwindling amount of space on the working waterfront due to tourism, traffic, and rapid nonmarine development that they say makes their job much harder. Whether it’s because of a literal lack of space both on the water and on the streets where their bait trucks drive, or the rising cost of parking, these fishermen feel... Read more

18-09-2017 Hits:32 News Francis Flisiuk

  • Latest Republican Effort To Repeal and Replace Oba…

    An analysis from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that the Republicans last-ditch effort to repeal and replace Obamacare would — if passed — likely be “even more damaging than a straight repeal-without-replace bill” (which the Congressional Budget…

  • Housing First: One Apartment Building Geared Towar…

    Barriers that slowed the construction of two new housing projects on the peninsula have now been lifted after the Portland City Council voted unanimously on a series of affordable housing amendments earlier this month. First proposed by the groups Portland Housing…

  • Two Sides, Zero Compromise: Can Centrism Bridge th…

    Leaders of the Maine Centrist Project are aware that centrism is something of a dirty word in America’s highly-polarized political environment. “When did compromise become a bad thing?” asked Dave McConnell, an attorney from Falmouth and one of the founding members…

Arts

Manhood Strikes Again — The Many Charms of Ray Harrington's …

Manhood Strikes Again — The Many Charms of Ray Harrington's 'Overwhelmed'

In 2015, Providence comic Ray Harrington turned a snapshot of his life — a thirtysomething brand-new dad who had just released his first comedy album — into a documentary film. Titled Be a Man, the stand-up artist’s movie explored the expectations of modern American masculinity as seen through the comic’s characteristically goofy, self-deprecating style. Harrington grew up in Bangor and his parents divorced when he was very young, and he was legitimately interested in cultivating... Read more

19-09-17 Hits:169 Arts Nick Schroeder

  • 8 Days a Week: Dark Crystals, Half Moons, All Blac…

    THURSDAY 21 FOISTED EAST | One of the summer's successful music series, Are You Kidding Me? Tapes' Thursday night showcases of weird, experimental, and next-wave rock, has moved from Geno's Rock Club to Bayside's Urban Farm Fermentory. Besides bands of unpredictable…

  • Modeling a Crisis: Hal Cohen's 'Intervention' Cuts…

    We encounter the statistics almost daily now: opioid addiction is killing far too many of us. But statistics, as I once heard someone say, never made anyone change their understanding or their life. Stories do that, and in the face of the crisis, we’ve been hearing more…

  • 8 Days a Week: Posi-Jams, Lawn Hangs, and Street T…

    THURSDAY 14 HERE'S YOUR CHANCE | Tell you what. You could skip this whole weekend and drive to New York right now to see the Fall, the legendary post-punk band from Manchester, UK, fronted by the brilliant and asinine Mark E…

Food & Drink

Strawberry Beers Forever

Strawberry Beers Forever

In these waning days of summer, I'm tasting beers with added fruits, berries, and other unusual ingredients. Earlier, we tried three beers brewed with added strawberries. Two weeks ago, I reviewed a notice that two breweries I follow were releasing strawberry beers and I took it as a sign. Summer ain't over yet, and there's more strawberry to drink!   Hidden Cove Fragola ABV: 6.0% Format Sampled: 16 oz corked bottle Availability: Purchased at Bow Street... Read more

19-09-2017 Hits:44 Drink Seth Levy

  • First Bites: Roma Cafe

    Nostalgia is one hell of a spicy meatball. Powerful longings for and affection toward the past have been used to boost sales of cameras, movie tickets and everything in between over the course of the last century, with food being…

  • An easy commute does not mean …

    There are several kinds of restaurant owners. There are those who thrive on chaos and wouldn’t have it any other way; those who give management over to someone else and detach completely; owners who can turn it off like a…

  • Keg Count: What's new at Barre…

    I first got to know Chris Schofield and Matt Mills during my time as a driver and guide for the Maine Brew Bus. Back in those days, they had just opened their hole-in-the-wall brewery in a basement on route one…

Music

Contemporary Band — An Interview with Colin Newman of Wire

Contemporary Band — An Interview with Colin Newman of Wire

If you don't have a ticket to see Wire, the legendary English art-rock band formed in 1976 by Colin Newman, Graham Lewis, Bruce Gilbert, and Robert Gotobed, we don't know what to tell you. The show's been out since late spring. Still, we jumped at the chance to discuss the band's adventurous career in a surprisingly long and thoughtful conversation with singer and guitarist Colin Newman, who spoke to the Phoenix via Skype from his home... Read more

19-09-2017 Hits:22 Featured show Nick Schroeder

  • Five of the Eyes drop sprawling first album 'The V…

    If I had a criticism prepared for The Venus Transit, the first full-length by Five of the Eyes, it would have been that the band registered too studiously as disciples of The Mars Volta, that cultish, amazing, inscrutable El Paso…

  • Never gone — The unremitting spirit of Forget, For…

    One of my favorite lines on You’re Not Gone, the second album from Portland-based duo Forget, Forget, arrives midway through “Seashells,” track five. It’s when Patia Maule sings "let’s get takeout and go see a show.” Kind of a throwaway line…

  • Double Negative — Rap Artist Brzowski Drops Fiery …

    "When I was young, the art world was where you went to be a failure," says a mysterious audio sample opening the first track from ENMITYVILLE, a new album by Portland “post-rap” artist BRZOWSKI. “It was a chosen profession. You…

Outdoors & Sports

Time to Get Moving

Time to Get Moving

An object at rest will tend to remain at rest, and an object in motion will tend to remain in motion. The law of inertia. It’s physics, but also an apt metaphor for physical fitness. As in, “Hey, we’ve been talking about getting exercise. Wanna go for a walk?” “Nah. Too much inertia.” And it’s easy to tell ourselves that acknowledging our lack of motivation absolves us of the obligation... Read more

19-09-2017 Hits:20 Sports Gabe Gregoire

  • Acknowledge Your Inner Cowboy

    How prone to injury are you in your chosen athletic pursuit? A runner might sprain an ankle. A football player might get a concussion. Those old enough to remember Greg Louganis know that even platform divers are not exempt. What…

  • Who will be the top Pumpkinhea…

    The scent of woodsmoke on your clothes. The hush of an evening breeze in the treetops above. The glow of your friends’ faces in the warm light that only a campfire can throw. Even a maddening mosquito in your tent…

  • Do You Have a SAFE Plan?

    If we’re not going to fool ourselves and each other, it is clear that there are some dangers in our society that we may have to face, through no fault of our own. Have you ever thought about some specific…

Kids & Pets

Bouncers Welcome

Everybody remembers the excitement we felt as children when entry into the most fun place on earth was imminent. It could have been located within a state or county fair, or even in a well-off friend’s back yard. What is that place? The gravity-defying, backflip-trying bouncy house, of course. Parents watching their kids literally jump for joy in those inflatable fun zones have been known to shake their heads and... Read more

18-09-2017 Hits:18 Kids Gabe Gregoire

  • Better Safe than Sorry

    You can see it in the fascination on their faces as an emergency vehicle wails by, and in their choices of toy cars, one of which almost always is an ambulance, police car, or fire engine, if not all three…

  • Pups at the Point

    Don’t you feel a little older when an annual event you remember like it happened yesterday rolls around again? The odd part about it, as the seasons roll past, is not the number of yearly events you recall, but the…

  • Look alive: STRIVE for 5

    It’s something every expecting mother and father ask themselves: What if our child is born with developmental disabilities? How will I feel? What will we do? And, should it eventually come to pass and be confirmed (usually before the age…