Fear

Preying on primal emotions
By Will Collette

Ebola. Islamic State. Benghazi. Illegal Immigrants. The Crash of Social Security. Gun control. Vladimir Putin. The IRS. Vaccines.

Day after day after day, we get deluged with overblown and often totally wrong tales of impending doom. 

Things that go bump in the night and threaten, if not our lives, our way of life. It seems that every election season, we get the most noise about scary stuff from politicians who need to distract the public from their own appalling records.

Since 2006, and in the past three elections here in Charlestown, the Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA Party) has risen to power – and stayed there – by appealing to the basest of human emotions – fear – over boogey monsters that often don’t exist, but that only the CCA Party can vanquish.

It’s a lie. It has set Charlestown back and on November 4, it’s time to tell them to stop.

This season, we’ve already seen the CCA Party tee up Chariho as a threat by concocting the phony “issue” that Hopkinton and Richmond are about to gang up on Charlestown and force a colossal tax hike on us through a “single taxing district.” They even spent town resources to send a "Poopline" to every household. Except it’s completely untrue. Click here.

They’ve conjured up the fear that state Water Resource Board is about to turn Charlestown into a water pumping station which will drain all of our well water so it can be piped to parts north. Maybe Providence. Maybe Central Falls. Except, again, it’s totally untrue. Click here for details. New documents just released to me show exactly how ridiculous this scare tactic is. Click here to read one of the best fact-based smack-downs ever.

They sicced the town’s official Indian fighter Joe Larisa onto a land transfer from the state DOT to the Narragansett Indian Tribe of the old abandoned Camp Davis. The state is required under law to give the Tribe some land in compensation for highway work that is disturbing Indian archaeological sites. But the town can’t stand the idea of such a transaction that might expand the Tribe’s domain since – you know – they might build a casino here. Except, again, it’s totally untrue. Click here.

They’ve hampered the Parks & Recreation Department from building a storm-proof shelter in Ninigret Park for summer camp children because the Arnolda neighbors are afraid of noise and Planning Commissar Ruth Platner is afraid of light. Click here.

And of course, there’s the on-going and deadly threat of Progressive Charlestown, the one place where the CCA’s various boogey monsters go to die. And to get laughed at. 

To not only dig out the truth about the CCA Party’s panic attacks and to openly make fun of it probably draws makes the CCA Party more upset than anything. More than unregulated quarries. More than rising taxes. More than rising sea levels. More than festering wounds in our relationship with our neighbors, the Narragansetts.

My Progressive Charlestown colleagues and I put our heads together to compile the long list of things the CCA Party has conjured up to scare the voters. They include:

• The Narragansett Indian Tribe – that’s #1
• Jim Mageau – the CCA Party organized in 2006 to try to run a recall against Mageau. They're still running against him even though he's not on the ballot.
• Developers
• Families with school-age children – Click here for Ruth Platner’s mathematical formula that purports to show that school age children are parasites.
• Children at play
• General tax relief for Charlestown homeowners
• New technologies, especially green energy
• Richmond
• Hopkinton
• Westerly
• South Kingstown
• People from Providence
• People from Providence telling Charlestown what to do
• People from Providence moving into Charlestown
• The federal government coming to take Ninigret Park back
• State government agencies coming into Charlestown to do nefarious deeds
• Gambling
• Humor and laughter – I call this humorous dyscognition.
• Loss of control
• People asking for tax breaks who aren’t part of Charlestown’s 1%
• Charlestown Democrats

Then there are lots of very specific things the CCA Party has attacked and wants you to fear:

• Aquaculture – even though it helps to clean up our salt ponds
• Public water systems – even though the Fire Districts at Quonnie and Shady Harbor already have them.
• Human activity at Ninigret Park
• Charlestown Parks & Recreation Commission
• Charlestown Parks & Recreation Department
• Outdoor lighting, except for CCA Party Steering Committee member Joe Quadrato’s homing beacon
• Frank Glista
• Breachway Grill
• Asphalt
• Brick
• Wrong-colored shingles
• Rhythm and Roots
• Cats
• People who go to the beach but don't pay to park in town lots
• Group Homes for Handicapped Citizens
• Heavy construction equipment 
• Effective recycling programs
• Public health centers
• Day care centers
• Full-time professional fire departments
• Columbia Heights
• Watchaug Pond bass tournaments
• Cell towers
• Burlingame Picnic Area
• Dunkin’ Donuts
• Charlestown MiniSuper
• Bio-fuels
• Chamber of Commerce
• Any Chamber of Commerce member
• Dentures
• People qualifying for free dentures
• People qualifying for free anything

As I said earlier, they’re really scared of Progressive Charlestown because of our devotion to digging out the facts about what’s really going on around town, naming names and poking fun at the phoniness and hyper-inflated egos of the CCA Party leadership. They call that “hate.”

For more cartoons by Mike Luckovich, click here.

But then that’s predictable from a group that loves the dark and secrecy and anonymity. Of course they would hate it when we violate their “dark government” protocol.

They may call it “hate,” but speaking for myself, I call it love of my town.

I recently saw a quote that asked "what would you do if you weren't afraid? That's a good question for Charlestown voters.

The CCA Party is counting on you to give into fear which is the only way they can be sure you will vote against your own self-interest. Prove them wrong.