Those Other Sidney Warriors

Evidently, I have inadvertently stirred up a bit of a hornet’s nest.

I suppose that’s what I get for assuming that not many people actually read this blog. This is not to say that I have an audience of millions but simply that these humble musings are read by an audience some members of which surprise me.

The gentleman of the previous post — the one with the Tea Party pro-hydrofracking propaganda — was Elliot Wood, I am given to understand. He was indignant with what I had to say about the newly appointed members of the Planning Board — as I predicted.

In fact, evidently, he was heard to say that he wanted to find out who had written such things and that he would ‘get’ them.

I have also heard that suspicion has fallen on Sue Sklenarik. I wouldn’t want Sue to get gotten by Mr. Wood. That would be unjust.

So, Mr. Wood, I want you to know that the writer of everything in this blog is me, Dawn R. Rivers (formerly Dawn Rivers Baker), chairwoman of the Sidney Democratic Committee.

I currently reside at 3 Weir Street, here in Sidney. If you’d care to visit the Contact page of this web site to send me an email, I’ll even provide directions, in case you need them.

I’m not entirely sure what, exactly, you mean when you say you want to ‘get’ me for what I have written here but I have only one thing to say to you in response.

Bring it.

I don’t know what you think you can do to me but I’m not afraid of you. If it would make you feel good to pick a fight with a middle-aged woman, go for it.

M-kay? See ya ’round, tough guy.

It’s looking to me as if King Bob has taken to being very careful.

Presumably, even he gets tired of looking like an idiot all the time. I won’t suggest that he has gotten to be a touch on the paranoid side, although I suppose I wouldn’t say he didn’t have reason.

At the moment, it’s also looking as if another storm is quietly brewing. It’s a storm that I’m betting Mr. McCarthy hopes we are not paying attention to, so that he can do what he’s doing and get it done before we notice.

Bob wants gas drilling in Sidney.

In the interests of having his way, he is packing the Planning Board with a bunch of his plants — who get righteously indignant if you suggest to them that you view them that way.

But it’s hard to take somebody seriously as an independent thinker when he comes into town board meetings and reads Tea Party style propaganda about the evils of government regulation and the benefits of poisoned public water supplies unfettered gas drilling.

He is also of the opinion that it is incumbent on gas drilling opponents to prove to him that it’s not safe rather than believing that it is incumbent upon the gas drilling companies to prove that it is safe. I forget the gentleman’s name (anybody who knows who I’m talking about, please come in here and help me out) but he is the new chairman of the Planning Board.

Mr. McCarthy is reputed to own enough land to make it unlikely that he has no financial interest in the matter. But of course, this guy who ran on openness and transparency is about as ethically challenged as they get. Evidently, he and his boys are going to (try to) handle this so quietly that those pesky citizens/voters of the town will get this one dumped on them before they get a chance to even say WTF?

I have been told that McCarthy believes that everyone in Sidney is in favor of gas drilling. I suppose it’s possible that he is stupid enough to genuinely believe that … although I’ll admit that I wouldn’t have thought anybody could be that stupid.

I’ll be very interested to see if he actually gets away with this or if some of our citizens get alarmed enough to get noisy about it.

Stay tuned.