Opinion Piece By Samuel Strait – April 12, 2017 –
Something at the local level that one would think citizens, Democrats in particular, would at least try to avoid, or rather make a greater effort to appear somewhat more tolerant, but that is clearly not the case.  As we have seen Nationally, Progressive Democrats have taken to the streets, the news media, to the courts, and every where in between in an effort to forecast the future and right imaginary wrongs.   What is unfortunate for them, is that most of what they appear to be complaining about, has yet to take place.  Here in California, at the State level, Democratic legislators who appear to have the talents of a crystal ball fortune teller are busily passing legislation that clearly does more harm to its citizens than protecting the illegal aliens as SB 54 intends.  Another bill SB 1 whose harm rests squarely on the shoulders of middle and lower class Californians will no doubt supply billions of dollars of new tax money to the State’s coffers, which likely will be spent on other ill conceived progressive nonsense, rather than the transportation projects as it has been advertised.  That is not speculation, but a given born out by how our State’s government has operated over the last several years.

We here locally will pay dearly for the aberrant behavior of our State government, particularly those that can least afford it. But even more disturbing is a particularly insidious malady, no doubt contracted by listening to lurid tales at the National and State levels, where local Democrats in large numbers have contracted that alarming condition known as “the Chicken Little Syndrome” with reported symptoms such as “the sky is falling” often to be on display in public meetings and at the one and only “town hall meeting” most recently held at Crescent Elk Auditorium.

Some of the most obvious signs of the dreaded Syndrome are the Chairman of the local Democratic Party pleading with County Supervisors to address the failing Affordable Care Act, (ACA) which according to Chairman Kevin Hendrick would create a crisis of health care in the County.  But wait a minute, the ACA is still in place and the new administration can do little to change that as it is largely a cheering section for what desperately needs to happen to avoid a large scale health care disaster.  For Kevin’s information, your angst is misplaced, and you can relax, as the Affordable Care Act will likely fail of its own economic weight, before Congress has the good sense to simply repeal it.

Other symptoms can be found in the various presentations made by local non profits and federally grant funded projects and operations where forecasts of doom and gloom by various providers are rife with finger pointing at the new administration before a budget is even discussed let alone passed.  These poor souls often point gleefully to the Trump administration’s activities as if it were some how different from previous administrations.  It would seem that identical processes found in the Obama administration by the droves are suddenly out of bounds for President Trump.  Cries of horror over policy reversals and and budget trimming in bloated Federal Bureaucracies in an effort to aid the Taxpayer and generate a real world economy are further signs of this dreaded illness.

It is beyond comprehension that educated adults can succumb to such lunacy without pausing to reflect on more than sixteen years of bitter political gamesmanship.  In the same vein, when will the grown ups return to the table and stop the fascination with a political ideology that historically has no up side.  Chairman Hendricks has no workable scheme for solving any of the problems that beset us here locally, let alone at the National level.  Part of the “Chicken Little Syndrome” is the inability to understand just why Progressive ideas do not work.  They do not work in the National sense and are even less effective at the local level.  We simply do not have the financial resources to even make this philosophy marginally successful.  The people that tend to pay the greatest price are those that are in the greatest need.

One should be able to count on rational thinking by educated adults, but it is clear from the abysmal coverage in the local newspaper, the Triplicate, that the Syndrome has affected most Democrats and some Republicans as well.  Only a few “letters to the editor,” Robin Fornoff was embarrassed into publishing seem to have some idea that the United States, and us here locally are in for some rather tough sledding due to the arrogance of some local leaders and most leaders at the State level.  It is difficult to imagine some sanity returning any time soon, yet to not do anything is just as bad.  If local government officials and representatives cannot be “cured,” and soon, our situation can only become grimmer.  I have no expectations of any immediate changes in direction, but at some point the voters locally and at State in general will experience such hardship that the ballot box will have be a vehicle of change.  Last November’s election was a clear sign that the past many years have not produced much in the way of solutions.  Time for a change in direction, something that progressive Democrats cannot seem to grasp.  Must be a byproduct of the dreaded “Chicken Little Syndrome”.  I fervently hope for a cure sooner rather than later.