not particularly worth reading, but here:

[tyrannosaurus vex]

A letter I just sent to about 25 different US Congress representatives because I'm bored:

Dear Representative _,

I understand how difficult it is to portray yourself as a servant of the people while working so hard to appease the political process and your main contributors to ensure you don't lose your next re-election. It must be incredibly frustrating to be constantly bombarded with requests like this one, from average citizens who have the gall to send you letters in good faith, so that one of your interns can reply with a generic-sounding form letter that probably has nothing to do with the request.

In times like these, members of the Congress are under constant stress, get very little sleep, and they must somehow seek to please their constituency without actually doing anything to help them. It really must be one of the most difficult jobs in the world.

This letter, although it is sure to be flatly ignored by your staff except for a canned reply that has been chosen even before I write this, is nevertheless the only means I have of contacting you. While I fully expect to be insulted by a fake response (if I get one at all), I have no choice but to try.

As a United States Representative, you are an heir to a noble legacy. More than two centuries ago, the Congress was filled with rebels and revolutionaries, who attended meetings wherever they could under continuous threat of mortal retribution from the existing governments in the Colonies. They were looked on as traitors by many people, some of whom went on to call themselves Americans because of what they did in the halls of Congress.

But today, those revolutionaries are dead, and Congress is filled with self-interested politicians with nothing to lose except re-election. Gone are the days when doing something tangible for the People was the driving force behind the office of Representative, or indeed anything at all beyond a talking point on the campaign trail. This is an unfortunate truth, especially in light of the fact that now more than ever before, the United States Congress is in a position to accomplish so much within our borders.

Congress today can act decisively to allow poor children in the United States the benefit of healthcare. This is more than a request for a few dollars so that some children might live who would otherwise die. This is more than the impoverished voice of a subdued People bereft of its former pre-eminance in American politics grovelling before your feet, begging the Government that was supposed to be Of, By, and For them to actually act on their behalf. It is a request for a stronger America -- a request for the Government to save some face with a People falling fast into apathy and despair.

I am not asking that you "socialize" children's healthecare, but that you act in some real way to postpone the final deadly descent of our Republic into a fractured society where the People are so alienated from their Government that we finally stop caring whether the founding principles of our system are even given a cursory glance before they are inevitably destroyed.

If even our children are spat on by our government, what hope is there for our rights? What hope is there for Liberty? What hope is there for the continued support of this government by a People it clearly despises?

Please -- act now to stave off this collapse which seems now to be so unavoidable. For the space of a single vote in the chambers of Congress, put what is desperately needed by millions of American children ahead of what is selfishly demanded by a few Americans. Brave the onslaught of reprisal as you might have done had you been among the ranks of Congressional representatives 230 years ago. Act as a human being with a conscience and the power to do some good, rather than as a dog with nothing better to do than obey a master he cannot understand.

[LMNO]

Wow.

[B_M_W]

They should heed this letter, it would be the only wise thing to do.

[That One Guy]

They should heed this letter, it would be the only wise thing to do.

And since it would be, we'll be lucky if an intern reads it, let alone anyone actually heeds it.   

[Cain]

Wouldn't it be just as good an idea to send letters to your Congressman full of praise and advancing more extreme policies?  Especially with fake signatories nicked off a local election register.  Eventually, the policies are going go that way anyway, provoking a backlash, and making them go at it faster and harder will more likely draw the attention of people to that trend as well.

Just a thought.

[Cramulus]

Very strongly worded, Vex. The first and third paragraph does a great job to ensure that whatever intern reads this may be unsettled enough to pass it along. Surely SOMETHING has to make it through.

Are you sending via e-mail or hard copy? It's a lot harder to ignore hard-copy.

[LMNO]

Wouldn't it be just as good an idea to send letters to your Congressman full of praise and advancing more extreme policies?  Especially with fake signatories nicked off a local election register.  Eventually, the policies are going go that way anyway, provoking a backlash, and making them go at it faster and harder will more likely draw the attention of people to that trend as well.

Just a thought.

That sounds a lot like the ECH politik plan to Tearing The Whole Fucking Thing Down.

[Cain]

Well...yes.  Its also been, historically, the best way to radicalize a population and force dangerous mistakes in a leadership.  And in keeping with the Aneristic Delusion.