Democracy works best with an informed citizenry, and when citizens care enough to make their thoughts known. It's tough for individual citizens, with their busy lives, to write letters about issues that they care about but are not actively pressing on their lives. Case in point, I got involved in raising awareness about sand mining in Texas, and no one really even knew about it. I (along with another nonprofit, Legacy Land Trust) got the river selected as an American Rivers "most endangered" in 06 which got it only a very small amount of media coverage. I wrote a few articles for nonprofit newsletters and wrote an article for Texas Parks & Wildlife magazine (Many Bayous, One River - http://www.tpwmagazine.com/archive/2006/dec/ed_3/). This got the attention of the TX Senate apparently and our Harris Ct Senator wrote up a bill to help protect the river from sand mining. It passed Senate but didn't get voted on in the House. Despite knowing about this bill, I had no idea when the houses were going to vote, and it all happened within like 48 hours - way too short notice to get people to contact their House Reps. The only way I had ANY idea what was going on was the LLT Director was in Austin finding out what was going on. Most people just do not have that amount of time, even when if they were aware of it, they care.
There's a similar situation with the Texas State Board of Education and their revision of the science standards that will affect textbooks and evolution education. This issue gets a lot of press so people are more aware, but not everyone, by far. Whatever we all think of the media, it's where most people get their info, and yet at the same time, activist groups seem to be the ones that motivate most people to write Congresspeople. There are all these limitations on who can do what that prevent a lot of citizens from knowing how to effectively make a difference, so they do nothing. Obama has set up a new transition website http://change.gov (Office of the President-Elect) where people can contact them I have no idea of whether they will actively read and respond. (Just redaing the 5 agenda items on the right side is inspiring: Revitalizing the Economy Ending the War in Iraq Providing Health Care for All Protecting America Renewing American Global Leadership Also I'm not really that familiar with what's called the "google for government" bill but from it sounds like a positive step. It remains to be seen whether we will truly see more openness in government but I am hopeful. For the first time in a long time! In fact the change.gov site says right on the front page "OPEN GOVERNMENT". Wendee ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Wendee Holtcamp, M.S. Wildlife Ecology Freelance Writer * Photographer * Bohemian http://www.wendeeholtcamp.com http://bohemianadventures.blogspot.com ~~6-wk Online Writing Courses Starts Nov 8~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 'Better to light a candle than curse the darkness' We're all likely aware that voting once every four years isn't a truly dedicated form of democratic action. And a complaint isn't very good unless possible solutions are offered along with said complaint. Thus, I'd pose a rhetorical question about the collective post-election state of mind: How often do we call, meet, write, e-mail our elected officials? I can answer from the personal level to say I've been derelict in doing so. Others have been shouldering that burden for too long and I've been procrastinating for no good reason. If two of the ideals of the Obama-Biden campaign were "hope" and "change", then it's a matter of following through and doing the things that are required of us as citizens. Gunter Grass said, The job of a citizen is to keep his mouth open." While it has often been regarded as a statement of dissent, it would seem in fact to be the true measure of participation. So, we have this fantastic tool (I.e.- ECOLOG-L) we use to share memes. Given that many
