By LOU ANTONELLI
Editor-in-Chief
One of the reasons people are usually so
unhappy over small-town politics is that you don’t always get what you expect.
People want efficient government, low
taxes and public projects that benefit the community. But that’s not always
what you get.
We hear so much in the major media that
the nation is torn because of competing political ideologies – Big Government
vs. Small Taxes, Cutting Waste vs. Tax and Spend, Protecting Liberties vs. Big
Brother Surveillance.
The arguments are about the cause of
that division. No matter what you’ve heard, the most consistent culprit seems
to be gerrymandering. Thanks to modern software, electoral districts are drawn
to lean heavily towards one party or the other. No matter what party controls
the state government, the trend is the same – to make as many districts as
possible favoring the majority party, and cramming as many voters of the
minority party into as few districts as possible.
The lack of competitiveness is so many
districts means candidates don’t have to actually put forth a platform or
program. They get elected on the basis of their party affiliation.
On the local level, in small-town Texas,
there’s a similar system, but the parties are the Old Timers vs. Everybody
Else.
The system favors the Old Timers because
of their longevity in the community and extensive family connections.
Just as the lack of competitiveness on
the state and federal level leads to poor representation and bad government,
the frequency of how often the Old Timers win local elections contributes to government
mismanagement and inefficiency.
Local candidates don’t have to run on a
platform of ideas. They just remind everyone of who they are, and expect their
votes. In Titus County and Mount Pleasant, candidates who run a campaign based
on real issues have been few and far between.
Just as gerrymandering results in great
voter dissatisfaction at the state and federal level, the Old Boy/Brother-in-Law
system at the local level results in equal unhappiness.
In this election, as usual, there are
candidates who expect to cruise to victory on the basis of their names and
their families, because they have the most friends and relatives. It’s the old
high school-style Popularity Contest carried to an adult level.
To the extent the establishment candidates
have advocated any platform, it is the backward and reactionary promise to roll
back progress and efficiency in public works by repealing the Unit Road System
easily adopted by voters in 2016.
They must be pretty certain the election
is in the bag for them to advocate an action which any honest or intelligent
voter can see is a naked patronage racket.
Voters in Titus County are not that
cynical. We suspect there are a lot of people who have nodded and said they
agreed with this grafting bullshit because of family and/or social ties.
THAT’S the biggest reason why taxpayers
are so often unhappy with their local officials. They didn’t feel they could
vote for someone who would actually represent them. They had to vote for someone
because of social pressure and family ties.
Well, we still have a secret ballot in
this country. You can tell someone you’ll vote a certain way, but still vote
your conscience at the polls. You keep screwing yourself over by electing
people who not only care don’t care about efficient government and lower taxes,
people who probably don’t even know HOW to work for efficient government and
lower taxes.
We can tell you one thing for certain –
if the Unit Road System is repealed, you will get worse roads, ever-increasing
taxes and no accountability.
Vote against repeal, and at the same
time vote Raymond Johnson for Commissioner Precinct 2 and write-in Wesley
McCollum for Commissioner Precinct 4.
Stop being taken for granted by the same
tired old bunch who thinks the county owes them a living. You’re a Texan,
dammit – stand up for yourself!
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