A lot of Glen Rose Medical Center affiliated people clearly do not believe in democracy, not democratic elections. When I was in school and took civics class, I was told that when a person decided to run for office, and if that person got enough votes and WON, that person was then elected to whatever the position was. Occasionally in my life, someone I voted for won, like President Barack Obama, and sometimes people I didn't vote for won, like Rick Perry or Sid Miller. I consider that I still have the right to speak my opinion to them, even if I know they are diametrically opposed, and my remedy is to wait till the next election cycle and hope someone I like better and better fits my own values runs for office. 

Not so with the Glen Rose Medical Center Cult. Right from the start, some were unhappy that the entire board wasn't a bunch of Yes Men sycophants that would uncritically pass over hard-earned tax money without any discussion. Disgruntled, one of the newly elected board members told a doctor he would be too busy fighting other board members to help out with health care. Ron Hankins had apparently made a decision to personally attack a couple of the other board members using innuendos and 0hoods, including during board meetings. He also involved himself in a civil lawsuit Darrell Best initiated by putting in a "I can see the future" affadavit based not on fact but something in his head that he imagined might happen, that a judge denied. And Darrell Best's frivolous lawsuit was started with the intention of trumping up baloney complaints against Paul Harper, to try to get him off the board. A civil (repeat CIVIL NOT CRIMINAL)  court judge ruled about this, saying that the plaintiffs had not proven their case after they presented ALL their complaints.

 Judge Cooke, on Jan 20, 2015, said “I do not believe the state has met its burden to remove him from office. The most important thing we have in this country is the election of our citizens, whether we agree with what Mr Harper does or does not do, the voters voted and put him on the board”. 

Is this REALLY how democracy is supposed to work, that,  rather than having democratic elections, one files lawsuits to try to get one's own way ?? I may be naive, and it's been a long time since my civics class, but it's pretty disgusting to me that pushing a 0 lawsuit is not only something a citizen considered as a solution for his unhappiness at someone winning an election, but that others in the community are not actively pressing Best (and Hankins too)  to prove this manure is 1. Oh, that's right, a judge already said it wasn't proven. I question the motives of anyone pushing such swill and wonder if those who hear it simply accept lies without question or push back to say "Show Me". 

If citizens actually want an appointed hospital board with cronyism and puppetry, wouldn't they have been better off NOT to vote in an elected governmental board, where who wins a seat on that board represents the people who vote and not those a few WISH won? Perhaps, extrapolating from that, those same citizens wish for a United States dictatorship without elections, flawed as those elections might be, with only the moneyed and powerful able to put into office those that will do their bidding. When GRMC had been taken over by Somervell County Commissioners Court, the court appointed a board to run things that answered, ultimately to the commissioners court. The commissioners chose people they wanted to be on the board after those people applied. That's far different than an election, but if that's what people WANT, then they don't want democracy and elections. Oh, except then there isn't tax money up for grabs. Can't have it both ways. Another differnce here is that elected people have to run AGAIN for office after 2 years. IF it's really, as Gary Marks said, that it takes 2-3 years for people to gain enough experience to be good at it, then he again does NOT believe in democratic elections and instead, we should ALL want to have a private hospital, such as Glen Rose Medical Center once was not too many years before, INSTEAD of a public hospital where democracy is a basic underlying principle, protecting and accounting for taxpayer money.

At one of the meetings in which there was an orchestrated turnout to get people to turn out for Ray Reynolds, one person made a public comment to the effect that there weren't others there that had an opposite or even different viewpoint. Probably didn't occur to that person that, first, when a person wins an election, the people that DID vote for that person expect that person to represent them whether they are in attendance at a meeting or not, and second, just like internet polls, who attends a meeting on the basis of a publicity stunt from one point of view won't necessarily include others who weren't fired up from 0 propaganda to show up also. That includes voters who, legitimately, can be FOR a hospital but AGAINST a hospital district. 

At one of the Somervell County Hospital Board meetings, a self-appointed leader stood up to say that, although she herself has not lived here her entire life, others should have to prove that they will live here forever till they die, and implied that  their involvement in the community is something that she and others should be able to approve and monitor. I had a mental picture of her standing on Hwy 67 by a checkpoint building with a gate that anyone coming in would have to stop at, armed with a loyalty oath that wanna-bes would have to sign according to the goals she personally has, while the song "Hotel California" plays in the background "You can check out but you can never leave".  What about those whose ancestors didn't come here in the 1860s and 1870s? Oh, tacitly, these people are not REAL Somervell County residents, but she didn't stand up to trash the people who said they had come here in the last few years to live, but presumably we know what she thinks about that. No, instead, her point was that that this cultish anti-democratic group should have the right to decide, despite elections, who got to be on a board.

Gary Marks made some unfounded comments about Paul Harper based on nothing at that same public meeting. He said he had read Harper specifically saying he was going to close the hospital. NO ONE CHALLENGED THIS OR ASKED WHERE HE SUPPOSEDLY SAW IT.

Do these audience members swallow anything anybody says uncritically without proof? Apparently so. Maybe the next time somebody should ask him exactly WHERE he has seen this in print and have him cough it up. I hope to goodness he's not talking about anything that *I*, (salon, FEMALE)  wrote about how I believe that spending tax money from OUR district in Hood County's district to fund Pecan Family Medical Center is WRONG. If so, then he's not a good enough reader to attribute opinions correctly, even with a photo, but, again, I think people should say "Pony Up, I'll believe it when you PROVE it".  I personally, as a ciizen, believe we need a hospital and am not for closing it, but I sure don't have a problem with changing the way it operates. I like what Gary Marks said some years back when GRMC was a PRIVATE hospital and he was asked about what would occur if someone did an RFP, should GRMC be part of a hospital district, to lease it out to avoid having to have taxpayers pay for it. He said that would be up to the elected board to discuss and he hoped they might CONTRACT with Glen Rose Medical Foundation to run it.

Was he simply saying that in order to try to get the district passed so that GRMC could get tax money? 

Paul Harper's agenda has been on the internet almost continuously for a very long time on a page he created, since before the election, including as well  in the Glen Rose Reporter newspaper. No one has to guess, except for the lazy or those who are purposely trying to subvert the truth. Is it that he, unlike some others, has been very clear about what his positions are and hasn't changed them? I know of at least one board member that has changed positions, and another that never even told WHAT his positions were in the first place. Harper (who is my husband)  got more votes than Ron Hankins did. It's amusing to me that there are so many people, myself included, who gripe about when you don't know WHAT someone's position is, or gripe when that person changes positions. But here is an elected official who has been consistent, vocal and public about what he stands for, got elected on the basis of it, and The Cult of Glen Rose Medical Center wants to lie about it. It's bizarre. 

This cult, including some women that should know better, treat women as if they are second hand citizens that are not entitled to the same freedom of speech protections as men are. They have treated me non-seriously, including making a 0 claim that I did not, under my own steam, write my own opinion about GRMC contracts (As if women are not capable people who can have strong, independent political opinions). Even after the judge in that specious court case said, after an hour and half of MY testimony, that these sexist bullies had NOT proven their case, Ron Hankins and Alan Sumners have continued to spout hypocritcal , ignorant, and sexist 0hoods. Anyone with any sense wonders why they're doing this, especially when it makes them look so foolish. In my world, women are also United States citizens, and it's absurd that there are ANY men (or any women) in 2015 that have retrograde attitudes that women should be subservient to men, cannot speak for themselves without an insinuation that they are controlled, or are less intelligent, and less deserving of equal protections.  

This cult acts as if people who are employed in ANY position by the government can NEVER be evaluated and/or replaced. That includes the hospital administrator, in the same way that a school board administrator is a hired employee. The Glen Rose Medical Center cult completely ignore any type of decorum and respect at public meetings and lobs groundless accusations and personal attacks without one shred of proof at board members, including threatening board member's livelihood, That INCLUDES Ron Hankins whose favorite thing to do is insinuate that one of the other board members is doing something underhanded, to the extent of regularly haranguing Paul Harper without the board president Chip Harrison stepping in to require respectful communications. One man at a recent board meeting made a public comment that he'd never seen such a dysfunctional board. Me too. There is NO elected governmental board in Somervell County or the City of Glen Rose that is as dysfunctional as the Somervell County Hospital District board, but anyone that wants to make an opinion as to why needs to WATCH or LISTEN to the board meetings to find out why rather than listen, uncritically, to gossip. 

I was asked a while back if I would ever consider running for political office and I said NO WAY, especially when there are such vengeful and spiteful people associated with the Somervell County Hospital District and Glen Rose Medical Center.  I am puzzled why anyone wants to be seen this way, or why these Glen Rose Medical Center and some of the associated board members want to be publicly identified as people whom you can't trust, aren't professional,  and don't check their facts.

I love my husband, am proud of him for standing up against these undemocratic wanna be bullies. It's probably juicier gossip to pass on unsubtantiated rumours that aren't 1. But would be nice for people to simply say "Hey, PROVE IT" before listening to any more of this garbage, and that includes the cult members.