Challenged By Mary Fallin, Paul LePage Fights Back to Be America’s Worst Governor

Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, Maine’s Paul Le Page will be damned if he’s not considered the worst governor in this great nation of ours.
Yes, as a political payback Le Page withheld money from a school for kids with special needs. But Mary Fallin, folks. Her governin’ of Oklahoma is noteworthy in its awfulness. Fallin seems to have difficulty understanding the separation of cult and state, as my colleague John Paul Brammer pointed out earlier this week. Additionally, her grasp of the relations between the three branches of government is, to be charitable, tenuous.
For the purposes of this race to the bottom we’ll exclude those governors who wish to plumb America to the same depths with which they’ve taken the states they “lead.” So Bobby Jindal, Chris Christie (endorsed by Le Page!), Scott Walker, and John Kasich, you’re all disqualified. Admittedly, that clears the field of some serious contenders.
But Le Page and Fallin still must reckon with Rick Scott of Florida, Kansas’ Sam Brownback, Pat McCrory in North Carolina, and Texas’ Greg Abbott, all of whom are formidable in their ineptitude.
Which brings us back to Le Page. Le Page, bless his heart, doesn’t understand the rules of his own legislature after five years as governor.

In Maine, if the governor does not veto a bill 10 days after it passed in the legislature, the bill automatically becomes law. But if the legislature has adjourned for the session and the governor does not veto or sign a bill within 10 days, the bill dies. Sure, these are unusual rules but hey, that’s why we call states the laboratories of democracy.
The key word in this set of rules is the word “adjourn.” The rules are meant to give the legislature an opportunity to override the governor’s vetoes, which is impossible after it’s adjourned. This session, Le Page let 19 bills pass without either or vetoing or signing them within 10 days, utilizing the so-called “pocket veto.” He claims the legislature had adjourned. Except it most definitely hadn’t adjourned, which means the bills Le Page wanted to prevent from becoming law will now do just that thanks to his own incompetence.
The dispute will ultimately be settled in court, to the chagrin of Le Page and his staffers — imagine being on Paul Le Page’s staff for a moment. Yikes!
The mess achieved Full Le Page Farce when the governor managed to insult an entire group of people, the French, who are not a small population in Maine. Speaking about his interpretation of the state’s constitution regarding vetoes, Le Page said, “even I can understand it and I’m French.”
Nice.
One lawmaker responded of the latest Faux Pas Le Page by saying, “I can’t even process this right now.” Join the club, sir.
In the meantime, it’s your move Fallin.