I attended the “Town Hall” held by Congressman Mike Thompson last week and was struck by a singular fact that people were told to “resist” the alleged efforts of President Donald Trump to subvert democracy in the United States.

Response to the story was mixed, depending on whether you’re a conservative Republican or liberal Democrat.

One post on Facebook stated that “all of these left-wingers are out of their minds,” while another said people should remember the name of those elected officials attending the gathering at the next election because “they don’t care about Americans.”

Of course, those who oppose Trump were supportive and glad to see the number of people who turned out. Others stated that “all voters should get behind this. If you don’t, we probably won’t remain voters much longer.”

It occurred to me, however, that everyone was “missing the boat” in terms of their opposition or support of liberals and conservatives. What we need is a way out of the constant divisiveness.

I think the solution was actually put forth in the form of a joke petition that calls for Denmark to buy California. As of last week, the petition had more than 200,000 signatures. That’s not bad for an initial turnout.

Of course, the petition was circulated after Trump proposed buying or taking over Greenland, Canada and the Panama Canal.

“Have you ever looked at a map and thought, ‘You know what Denmark needs? More sunshine, palm trees, and roller skates,’” the petition asks. “Well, we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make that dream a reality.

“It is in the national interest to promote the extraordinary heritage of our Nation, so California will become New Denmark. Los Angeles? More like Løs Ångeles,” it says.

Xavier Dutoit, the petition’s organizer, got the idea in January while vacationing in the Philippines, because where else would someone from Denmark go on vacation? He said he overheard an American tourist loudly discussing Trump’s Greenland pitch.

Dutoit is Swiss-French, but he consulted a multi-national group of friends who are helping him, including Kenneth Haar, who is Danish and lives in Copenhagen.

What got my interest is that the AP writer did a bit of research and found — and this is not a joke — that Solvang was founded by three immigrants from Denmark in 1911 and is known as “the Danish capital of America.”

The city is popular with tourists, who come in droves for its aebleskiver’s, Scandinavian windmills, a main street called “Copenhagen Drive ” and a Hans Christian Andersen Museum to honor the famous Danish fairy tale author.

I ate aebleskiver’s growing up in Southern Idaho, where my grandmother made them nearly every weekend and miss them. I asked my wife to make them one time and she couldn’t do it.

Nonetheless, I think California getting bought by Denmark would solve a lot of problems. A number of people across the state want to secede from the United States and probably and equal number of people want Northwestern California to secede to a new state called “Greater Idaho.”

Becoming a part of Denmark might solve everyone’s problems because it’s already a pretty neutral country. Of course, we’d have to learn to speak Scandinavian, but it couldn’t be any harder than Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Russian or any of the other languages being spoken in California already.

Unfortunately, at the bottom of the petition is some fine print that reads: “Disclaimer: This campaign is 100% real … in our dreams.”

Well, I’ll keep dreaming — of aebleskiver’s.

Jim Smith is the former editor of The Daily Democrat, retiring in 2021 after a 27-year career at the paper.