By Gary Gillen
The story you didn’t hear
Depending on where you get your news, you might be aware that some immature millennials, some call them snowflakes, are still unable to cope with either the loss by Hillary Clinton or the win of the Presidency by Donald Trump. The courts have, yet again, blocked President Trump’s order to pause immigration from several countries, which, depending on your source of news, is either an effort to protect Americans from terrorism or a blatant anti-Muslim action. According to the liberal news, the Senate Democrats are bravely keeping President Trump’s cabinet nominees from undermining the Obama legacy or if you believe conservative sources, they are endangering Americans by blocking these appointees from assuming office and leaving entire Federal agencies under the control of Obama appointees.
However, there is another story you may not have heard about. It is a story the national media and particularly the liberal media hasn’t reported because it isn’t in New York, Washington,DC or California, not east or west coast. It’s a story about millennials who aren’t snowflakes. Young people who don’t need safe spaces, who don’t feel entitled. It’s about young people who help others without being asked. It’s about Americans in “flyover” country. People who work hard every day, go to church on Sunday, help their neighbors, pay their taxes and ask for nothing from the government. They don’t protest; they work. They don’t feel entitled; they appreciate the opportunities this nation offers them. They don’t demand government handouts; instead they help each other.
Two of them, 20 and 22 years old (millennials) died trying to open gates to allow cattle to escape a fast moving fire driven by 70 mile per hour winds. Any death is tragic, and the deaths of this young couple and others in the fires are no less so. Many have lost their entire herds of cattle, their homes, their barns and every living thing, plant or animal, on their ranches. This fire will end their way of life.
The scale of these fires is staggering and that makes the deafening silence of the media all the more unforgivable. Well over one million acres in the panhandle of Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado and Kansas have been devastated by these fast moving infernos.
Let me put this in perspective. Fort Bend County is comprised of 885 square miles. This fire is twice that size. The fire is larger than Rhode Island, larger than Delaware; it is the size of Connecticut. Lives have been lost as well as tens of thousands of cattle and hundreds of homes. The way of life of so many lost or altered forever, yet the media hasn’t cared enough to even report it.
Farmers and ranchers in flyover country have poured their generosity on this hard hit region. This is another story you aren’t hearing on the liberal airwaves. Ordinary, hard-working people are giving from the heart, sending food and money to the victims of this awful tragedy. GoFundMe accounts have been set up to pay for funerals. Caravans of trucks are transporting thousands of bales of hay to feed the surviving cattle.
The response to this tragedy is what makes America great. We are generous, we are caring and we step up in a time of need. But you wouldn’t know that if you watch the mainstream media.
Gary Gillen owns and operates Gillen Pest Control in Richmond. He is the only person in history to have served on both the Richmond City Commission and the Rosenberg City Council. He was the Chairman of the Republican Party of Fort Bend County 2006-2007. He can be reached at Gary@GaryGillen.com
