Calaveras County, CA…“Tom’s World” is the 4th Congressional District of California stretching from Lake Tahoe in the North to Yosemite in the South, including most of the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada. It’s a reliably Red District where Donald Trump won 54% of all votes cast in 2016 and Tom won 63%. Tom won his first election in 2008 and has won four since. Tom’s World is a safe Republican seat in a state that elected Hillary Clinton by more than 4.5 million votes. I know Tom’s World rather well because unlike Tom, I actually live in the Congressional District that he represents.

During the recent Congressional Recess, more than a few Republicans returned to their home districts to hold Town Hall meetings with constituents. Those Republicans who chose to host Town Halls (many did not) were greeted by raucous and enthusiastic crowds that made it abundantly clear that there is a large segment of voters – tens of thousands of
people that they represent – who take issue with the legitimacy of President Trump’s election as well as the broader Republican policies around health insurance, environmental protection, immigration, discrimination, women’s reproductive rights and cabinet appointees from the billionaire class.

Scenes of the frenzied Town Halls flooded the media with dissent and outrage over the direction the country is moving. The energy and volume of those who showed up caught most politicians flatfooted. Of all the Republicans who were lost in the headlights of popular outrage, none seemed more dumbstruck than Tom.

Tom hosted his own Town Hall in Sonora on February 23. There were 526 people inside the high school auditorium (capacity) and another 400 waiting outside. This, in a town of just 5,000. By my unofficial estimate, 30% of those inside were Trump supporters. The rest were local ‘progressives’ who seem to have recently woken up to the fact Donald Trump is
dead serious about implementing policies that many in attendance considered unthinkable.

As he answered questions from the crowd, he provided his own guided tour of the lunaticfringe that is Tom’s World. On defunding Planned Parenthood he stated, “They pressure women into having abortions.” On global warming, “Sure, the planet is warming, as it has for the last 3 billion years, but there is no scientific evidence that it’s human caused.” On Russia meddling in the election, “I won’t support a Congressional investigation because I don’t want to delegitimize Donald Trump.” On selling off public lands for mining, drilling and logging, “The long overdue disposal of excess federal lands will free up resources for the federal government while providing much-needed opportunities for economic development in struggling rural communities.”

On and on it went, issue after issue for nearly three hours. 536 people who had never been to Tom’s World got the chance to shine a spotlight into its darkest corners. And although there were thundering objections that shook the room, Tom also delivered long, monotone passages where listeners simply looked at one another and shook their heads in disbelief. It was the first time they had entered Tom’s World and they could not believe their ears.

They didn’t realize that in addition to being a fervent Trump supporter, Tom is also a Tea Party darling. He’s a founding member of the so-called ‘Freedom Caucus.’ Tom was a leader of the shutdown that closed the Federal Government in 2013. That
was the same year that the catastrophic Rim Fire burned more than 250,000 acres in Tom’s District. The fire forced a month-long road closure that nearly bankrupted the ‘gateway’ businesses that rely upon Yosemite for their livelihood. In September,
Tom’s Government Shutdown closed Yosemite National Park for an additional two weeks. Only in Tom’s World is it okay to engineer a shutdown that inflicts extreme financial pain on his already suffering constituency.

I’m guessing that progressives aren’t the only voters in Tom’s World who have never seen what’s really there. Given that his District is more than 60% Republican, voters clearly don’t understand the (R) after Tom McClintock, doesn’t stand for Reasonable.

Hopefully, progressives and moderate Republicans alike will begin to see Tom’s World for what it really is; an unhinged parallel universe where there is no room for reason, science or critical thinking.

A world where only Tom can be happy.

A dystopian world run amok that hopefully, in November of 2018, will be reduced to a population of one.

David Vassar is a resident of Calaveras County and a freelance writer.