Actually important stuff. This site makes it really easy to be active, so there's not much of an excuse for not participating.

Good cause that needs to be acted upon.

"'They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.'"

''Il faut s'occuper de la politique, sinon elle s'occupera de nous''

"vive le Quebec libre"

"I was gonna clean my room, but then I got high"

If they aren't reading my e-mails I'd be greatly depressed. Help a fellow tf2'er out :p

PLEASE DAGGER WHY DO YOU ALWAYS BRING THIS BACK

I'd be pretty interested to read what you've written if you don't mind posting/pm'ing me :)

I don't know how every representative's office works, but most of the time constituent comments are sorted by staff into a large database. It means the constituents receive the most appropriate form letter within a timely fashion. However, I can't imagine representative's themselves look at the letters. And for good reason.

If the reps took the time to actually look at all the comments, they'd have no time for anything else. These offices get literally hundreds of letters, thousands of faxes, and a few hundred phone calls a day. Your closest shot to getting "your voice heard" through this would be if there's an overwhelming amount of mail on a certain topic, one of the staffers might mention it to the rep. But to be frank, I hope not. Because people are crazy, and usually its only the craziest people who call or write in. If legislation was based off of constituent demand, then electromagnetic fields would have been banned years ago (I wish I was joking, the office got a constant stream of complaints from the so-called "electrosensitive"). When you write emails, it makes you feel good about "taking action," but realistically it's not worth the effort.

On the other hand, keep in mind that no matter how low Congress as a whole is polling, its made up of some of the most educated people in America. You might disagree politically with your rep., but on a personal level I have never known any representative to be anything other than charming and kind (especially of note, because I was the lowest of the low on the totem pole). So if you want your voice to actually be heard, look up your representative's website to see when he or she will be holding an event in your town. Most of them fly back every weekend to "keep in touch" with the home district. Go to an event, and ask your question in a calm and polite manner. Don't make it overly political, don't shout, don't rage. State your grievance, how it's affecting you personally, bring up past votes that your representative might have taken that would support your cause. Be rational and personal, not angry and political. Because your representative is a person, and you should treat them as such, not some abstract political being.

I don't mean to claim that I know much about how anything goes on in DC. I don't. I can't tell you what works. But from my small, small, small, meaningless amount of experience, I can tell you what doesn't work. And from my longer experience as a human being, I can tell you a little bit about how they work.
Anyways. I've had this on my chest for a few years now. Internet activism is a funny beast.

I meant the NSA reading my emails - my representative is a tea partier so I wouldn't bother sending her anything since even the Republican establishment here dislikes her lol.

http://www.theverge.com/2014/2/11/5401398/nsa-hq-water-electricity-cut-off-maryland-bill

go go go maryland. you can do it!!!