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Yes that Feinstein. Call her office and exert political pressure. All we do is complain on the Internet about it, then wonder why our politicians don't listen t
by jkelsey 10y ago
Yes that Feinstein. Call her office and exert political pressure. All we do is complain on the Internet about it, then wonder why our politicians don't listen to us. Feinstein doesn't read Hacker News.
- mhurron 10y ago> Call her office and exert political pressure I'd laugh if it wasn't so sad. Call and that's it. Your 'representatives' are not your representatives. There is no pressure that you can place on them.
- ColinDabritz 10y agoThey absolutely care if you call, if you show up to town hall meetings. It matters. They are elected officials, and they do ultimately care and worry that if they do unpopular things they will not get re-elected. There is an excellent write up of how this works and why it works from a former congressional aide: https://qz.com/836737/fomer-congressional-staffer-twitter-tips-on-how-to-get-congress-to-listen-to-you-went-viral/ https://qz.com/836737/fomer-congressional-staffer-twitter-ti... Take action! Write your senators numbers on a note by your desk, put them in your phone as contacts. Add your house representatives as well. When you hear about an important issue, make a quick call. Ask them to represent you on upcoming issues. Thank them for their position on issues you support, let them know you are disappointed in them for things you oppose.
- mhurron 10y ago> if they do unpopular things they will not get re-elected. An incumbent has over a 90% chance of being reelected until they decide not to run anymore. They literally do not need to care after they've told whatever lies they needed to tell to get elected the first time.
- richmarr 10y ago> An incumbent has over a 90% chance... You're assuming that public officials are automata that don't suffer from risk aversion, don't need to raise money in close races, and don't change their behaviour based on whether they have public opinion behind them. I wouldn't bet on that being true.
- mhurron 10y agoThey can read. They can see that they have a 90% reelection chance with their peers as a group having disgustingly low approval ratings. They can see that they still don't have problems raising money with those low approval ratings. They do not need to care about you. Talking about Feinstein in particular - * January 17, 2011 Approval rating measured at 43% * May 12, 2011, Feinstein co-sponsored PIPA * PIPA gets mass blow back * 2012 Reelected * 2013 moves to continue mass survailance * After the 2016 FBI–Apple encryption dispute, Feinstein, along with Richard Burr, sponsored a bill that would be likely to criminalize all forms of strong encryption * 2016 Reelected She knows she doesn't need to give a damn about your issues with mass surveillance.
- EGreg 10y agoThat's why representative democracy is a broken and inefficient system that can be easily rigged (gerrymandering, poor turnout, bought politicians, media ignoring a candidate, media covering a candidate nonstop, broken promises, pulling a fast one etc.) With today's advances in statistics and technology, people could be polled for their opinions on issues by hundreds of independent and transparent public polling companies. Just like jury duty but easier and on your phone. You can't buy all the people all the time. It's too expensive. But you can perpetuate the system that engulfs their representatives all of the time. http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=212 http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=212
- richmarr 10y agoIt's incredibly easy to be this casually cynical, but reality doesn't match this simple worldview. When you start to meet people in positions of power you realise that they're not a bunch of sleazy villains, they're complicated people who (for the most part) think they're doing the right thing in a difficult and often contradictory environment.
- swsieber 10y agoYes - but is that because they respond to calls from people who wouldn't vote for them next time? That is to say - may it's that high because they respond to people who call in.
- mladenkovacevic 10y agoThis is an easy one. No it's not
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- vkou 10y agoYou should tell that to all the moderate republican incumbents that lost their jobs to the Tea Party drones in 2010. Overnight, the party transformed from far-right conservative, to bonkers-cut-off-nose-to-spite-your-face lunacy.
- snerbles 10y agoCalifornia is effectively a single-party state, Feinstein (and whoever replaces her) is secure enough in her position to not care about most of her constituents.
- vkou 10y agoCalifornia may be a single-party state, but she can still be deposed in a primary. And if she's any good at surviving as a politician, that is the prospect that terrifies her. This mechanism - calling your congressperson, threats to replace them in the next primaries, showing up to townhalls, etc, is precisely how the Tea Party seized power. The republicans they didn't replace fell in line with their agenda. https://www.indivisibleguide.com/download-the-guide https://www.indivisibleguide.com/download-the-guide
- dangerbird2 10y agoIf you are a voting constituent of Senator Feinstein, you'd better believe she's going to listen to you,lest she put her or her sucessor's political career in Jeopardy. No good politician today is going to make Eric Cantor's mistake of ignoring activists in their own party, only to find themselves out of a job by the general election. Just don't expect elected officials to pay attention to you if you aren't a part of their voting district.
- vkou 10y agoI have no idea why you're being downvoted. Everything you say is true - politicians fear the primaries, they fear domestic outrage over their policies, and they don't care one whit for someone calling from the other side of the country to complain about them.
- jkelsey 10y agoLaugh or cry then, but get out of the way, and know that you did nothing for your country.
- mhurron 10y agoThe US is not my country. I just pay taxes here, but that doesn't make me blind.
- saiya-jin 10y agothe only time any politician cares about voters opinion is elections. after that, the choice was made and that's it. I mean, I like your enthusiasm, just wondering how come you didn't adjust it with reality of these days.
- ep103 10y agopoliticians absolutely pay attention to phone call numbers.
- derrickdirge 10y agoIsn't it interesting how only the elderly participate actively in politics in the US, and somehow the US political landscape is completely controlled by the elderly? What a weird coincidence. Someone should tell them that political activism is pointless.
- BlackjackCF 10y agoThe Tea Partiers were actually really effective in their tactics to continue to call their representatives, showing up for every election, and running their candidates for every single position in local government. Calling and showing up counts.
- DannyBee 10y agoSure there is. You call. You show up everywhere they talk. You run against them. etc The amount of apathy in america is impressive. "Eh, it'll never work" seems to be the rallying cry of today's america.
- maxerickson 10y agoThat's not really fair, the Tea Party (and a broadening coalition of conservatives) did an amazing job of using activism to increase their influence.
- tptacek 10y agoI think he agrees, and that's his point.
- maxerickson 10y agoAs written the comment doesn't consider them part of 'today's america'. I think government skeptical conservatives end up being a pretty big chunk of the electorate.
- mladenkovacevic 10y agoSo unless someone dedicates themselves full-time to holding every elected politician accountable they are considered apathetic? I'm sorry but that's not realistic, people have lives to live and survive through.
- ekianjo 10y agoand when do you do that when you have long working hours and kids at home too?
- DannyBee 10y agoAlso, are you really saying this after literally someone nobody thought had any chance for years, beat out an entire field of well-established candidates and a large favorite to become president?
- mhurron 10y agoYou're going to try to say that Trump was subject to the people when he actually lost the peoples vote. Trump is president because the US has an idiotic system that reduced the effectiveness of peoples votes for living in popular places. Besides, we were talking about representatives, the people do not vote for the President, states do.
- mladenkovacevic 10y agoOnly way to "exert political pressure" is to get big money out of politics by any means necessary.
- DannyBee 10y agoThis is so ridiculously false i don't know where to begin. It's mostly something people who are too lazy to try anything effective tell themselves to make them feel better about doing nothing. It's not all out of your hands and in the hands of "big money" or whatever boogeyman of the day is.
- mladenkovacevic 10y agoNot just big money but also dark money. We don't even know half of the organizations and individuals that our representatives are beholden to. But feel free to state your case for why outsized spending on political influence is a good and/or neutral thing for society.