Uniting Irreconcilable Parties Fiscal Restraint, Budget Transparency Will Mold 21st Century Texas

Three groups seem at constant odds with each other, sometimes respectfully but too often less so:
local elected officials (especially county commissioners and county judges);
state legislators; and
the rest of the taxpayers. I say “the rest of the taxpayers” since all three groups pay taxes and must live with the many decisions we each make.
Why do we disagree? Perhaps I’m oversimplifying the matter, but here is my feeble attempt to summarize the status quo and suggest a way forward.
Legislators must run our state, the world’s eighth-largest economy, while responding to never-ending federal mandates, unfunded and otherwise. They must balance those staggering and conflicting demands. Too often state lawmakers pass their frustrations down to their “brothers in arms” at the county level in the form of the same unfunded mandates, which frustrate us as much as they do them.
We, in turn, at the grassroots level try not to pass the cost to the taxpayer, but inevitably we must do so. The taxpayer, in turn, is frustrated by rising burdens