Michael Golojuch Jr., chairman of the Demo­cratic Party’s gay caucus, brazenly declared himself the "new sheriff in town" after he initiated sanctions against 11 Demo­cratic legislators who proposed a constitutional amendment on traditional marriage.

This sheriff is making Demo­crats look like Barney Fife in going after lawmakers — many of them longtime party stalwarts — who were only doing their job of considering all sides of a contentious issue instead of listening to only one view.

It’s preposterous that a fringe player with an inflated ego like Golo­juch would presume to dictate to rock-solid Demo­crats such asSenate President Donna Mercado Kim and former House Speaker Calvin Say that they must legislate his way or else.

He’s been abetted by party leaders who have let the nonsense drag on under capricious and contradictory rules instead of providing sorely needed adult supervision.

A party investigative committee finally dropped charges against Kim, Say and seven others who co-sponsored the proposed constitutional amendment, but kept alive the case against the two primary sponsors, Sen. Mike Gabbard and Rep. Sharon Har.

Both are lawmakers from the Kapo­lei-Maka­kilo district with whom the Golo­juch family has feuded for years.

The sanctions are the latest sign of a power grab by local Demo­crats to tightly control who can vote, who can run for office and what doctrine they must support once elected.

Democrats are suing to close the party’s open primary elections and tried to prevent state Sen. Laura Thielen from running as a Demo­crat for no comprehensible reason.

Demands for absolute adherence to the party platform are more radical than even the Republican tea party enforces.

Tea partyers don’t expel from the GOP those who don’t always agree with them; they go after them at the ballot box, which is how it should be. Let voters decide public policy instead of controlling it from the back rooms of party headquarters.

There is a diverse range of thought within the Demo­cratic Party, but the platform is written largely by narrowly focused activists representing various interest groups.

Caucuses representing gays, Native Hawaiians, environmentalists and labor seem to be able to get whatever they want in the platform with little vetting from the party’s broad membership.

Then they force their will on elected officials with threatened sanctions that could ultimately bar them from running as Demo­crats.

This disrespects American political traditions and state constitutional provisions that encourage elected officials to exercise independent judgment and represent the public interest first, not their parties or any other special interests.

We often fall short of the ideal with special interests allowed to throw huge wads of campaign donations at lawmakers, but it’s an important principle to stand up for if our troubled democracy is ever to return to health.

———
Reach David Shapiro at volcanicash@gmail.com or blog.volcanicash.net.