Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2017/06/17/republicans-are-trying-to-pass.html
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You’d think they’d realize that if you have to do something in secret, because you’re worried about what your constituents might think, then you should probably not pass that bill.
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Which constituents? The voters that need to be suppressed/scared into the desired outcome or the corporate contributors who they are actually working for?
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It is bad advice to call senators that don’t represent you. It gives them cover to say the opposition is all out of state.
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Corporations? Corporations are small fry now. The 10-20 richest Americans hold all the power.
Health care and even insurance companies hate Trumpcare.
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Not much of a secret then really now is it?
Except that it could be identical to the bill as it left the House or completely rewritten so that there’s not a single sentence maintained - or something in between. In other words, we have no idea at all what’s in it, which is pretty much the definition of a secret.
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The content may not be known but the headline claim and the fact that they are working on the bill is not a secret.
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Trying for the pedant title, are you?
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Well, technically we don’t even know that - especially now that they’ve kicked out reporters from the halls of congress - for all we know, they’re actually watching goat porn.
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Or perhaps shedding those uncomfortable human skin outfits so roam the halls of government freely as their lizard selves!
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Clearly, they are trying to hide this from the voters, which is who I meant. They endlessly complain about the raucous turn outs at town hall meetings and some are refusing to hold them now (including Loudermilk in my state, though not my district) so that they don’t have to hear criticism. We are their real constituents, not corporations, even though they are working for them at this point and I’m sure getting all kinds of advice from them.
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Gosh golly by gum you’re right!!! That headline is misleading. The fact that we know that they are working in secret on a health bill is all we need to know! They are our friends and know better than we do about what’s good for us!
Thank you for pointing that out.
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Are you all hip to Resistbot? https://resistbot.io/
It makes it easy to fax or mail your senators or congresspeople.
You do it by texting RESIST to 50409. The bot asks you questions to figure out where you are and then gives you a series of prompts. The more you use it, the more features you unlock.
I’ve sent tons of faxes this way. Does it help anything? Dunno. Maybe?
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Have you received any kind of correspondence back from any of your congressional reps as a result from doing this? I would think that they would be less inclined to take it seriously as they would from other methods.
From what I’ve read, the order of constituent actions that garner attention, from lesser to greater is something like this:
online petition < online form letter < email < phone call < letter < visit to office < huge donation from your super pac < huge donation from your huge corporation.
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You know, it’s pretty easy to be flippant about people’s genuine concerns when you don’t have a stake in what’s happening here.
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I am still a US citizen, I do still pay taxes and vote and am still subject to US law in all kinds of ways.
Note also that I’m an equal opportunity deflator of hyperbole headlines regardless of political position.
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I haven’t gotten any responses. I haven’t asked for any responses. But I’m not sure what you mean by them taking this method less seriously. It sends them a fax. A fax comes out of their machine with my message, my name, my address, and even my signature on it. (They won’t know it originated from my phone, and I don’t know why they’d care.)
And you can also use Resistbot to sent physical letters-in-envelopes to their offices.
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