Profiles of Political Suicide

Not to long ago, it seemed that a person could become involved in this community with out being subjugated to personal political attacks. It would seem to the misfortune of the entire community that this is no longer the case.

After having my fill of a "community activism" following the defeat of the toxic waste dump that was attempted to be placed in the Hoosier Panel lot, and the retirement of King Larry the Grand Poo bah of the council, I had dined at that buffet table for long enough and had my fill.

Spending the extra time that created with my pursuit of amateur nature photography, I found a niche I found rather comfortable, and even managed to get some things published.

Recently, with the cities intent to do business with CCE again, I found myself being drawn back in, and before I knew it, I was waist deep in waste. Police issues, political health care issues, budgetary issues, and so on.

Incredibly, those who would attack people from behind a mask of anonymity caught my scent and soon began the sucker punches.

More incredibly, is the fact that we ALL want the same things, we ALL want changes to our stagnant city. We want progress, we want balance between expenditures and services, and we all want transparency in Government operations.

Yet consistently this becomes a battle between citizens, and while we fight, the political landscape never changes, the bombs we drop only seem to hit the community advocates with the shrapnel.

Aristotle said "Man by nature is a political animal", and I guess that holds true over 2300 years later. Some of us are drawn into the web of politics light bugs to a street lamp. And unfortunately some of us are bats that swoop down from out of the night to scatter and destroy.

It is an unfortunate landscape when we as Country, and society have become to associate political activism with bulls eyes painted on the backs of the advocates where their personal lives, and every aspect of their character as free game for attacks, and as long as we continue to travel down that road, change will become more and more elusive. It is no big secret that I am not a very religious person, but in this instance the saying of casting the first stone comes to mind.

What damage is being done locally when the example that is being set is that anyone who is even remotely interested in community activism is subjugated to non-stop criticism on every level. Who their family is, where they come from, if they misspell a word, what hours they run their business, what business they operate, or what they have done in the spirit of giving to their community in the past. Who will fill the shoes of those whose intentions are truly that of positive change and progress? Will the void be filled with a new generation of those who feel that insults, immaturity and cowardly hiding behind fake names and organizations take over the chores of tending to the garden that we pick our elected officials from?

I kind of see it like this, Abraham Lincoln said "The ballot is stronger than the bullet.", and we all know how that turned out for him! Have we lost the ability to effectively and fairly conduct ourselves and chosen the bullet?

Regardless, through other political endeavours, I have found myself the steward of millions of dollars of funds, all of which are earmarked to the betterment of care for the medically indigent of our local communities. The capital investments that are to come with these funds will bring our local clinics not only up to par in state of the art treatment and management of our patients, but in most cases we will surpass many of the for profit, insurance driven private practices.
Electronic Medical records, digital dental xray technology, the ability to instantly communicate lab results, and diagnostics with hospitals, specialists, and the government to help speed along disability determinations, and acquiring temporary medicaid to those who need it.

Some of the capital funds will also being going to improvements of the facilities themselves. Creating a comfortable and inviting atmosphere for our clients who for so long have been a victim of the Hollywood stigma of what a clinic should look like.

After all, some of our patients we are seeing now, 4 months ago were riding high on the horse, with 6 figure incomes, and now lucky to be bringing in $20k per year.

So I leave the community advocacy in the competent hands of the guys who have been doing this for much longer than I have. Keep your chins up guys, and don't let the anon hordes get you down.