Sending a letter to The White House
Housekeeping
I disagree with President Obama. About what?
Anything! Everything! Does it matter?
Who cares? Does even he care if
I, an ordinary, average citizen disagree with whether he signs off on increasing
the minimum wage? Is it going to cause
the President of the United States of America
to rethink his policies on Syria
if I disagree with him? I don’t think it
will, but there is more at stake here.
It is not if I agree or disagree with him, it is how I disagree with him
that seems to make the most impact.
Briefly, let’s look at 2 things.
What do we disagree with the leader of the free world, and how do we
make it known. Why do we want to this? Well, if we can put together an approach to
letting the leader of our country know that we are dissatisfied with a given
policy, or his stance on an important issue, then it should be a piece of cake
to send a message to a member of the House of Representatives (Congress or
Senate), or to a Cabinet Secretary. Or,
if you have really an important issue, maybe to the First Lady, let her know that
you don’t like eating your greens, and don’t appreciate her forcing them on
you.
The point here is that President Obama and the First Lady,
Mrs Obama, are people. They are
adults. They have endured the taunts,
the insults and the question of their competence from every level of our
society. Many of their most unflattering
comments were no doubt made through hecklers, letters to the White House
directly, emails, and maybe even a tweet or two. From the moment Mr. Obama stepped out of the
expected protocol of intervening in an arrest for a former colleague in
Cambridge Massachussetts,[1] to
his position on raising the minimum wage,[2] or
his patented, signature legislation, the Affordable Healthcare Act of 2013,[3] or
as it is affectionately referred to: OBAMACARE, there have been no shortage of
us who disagree with some aspect of his administration.
An important point to make here, is that to disagree is not
to hate, or dislike the president. That
seems to be a common misperception. Not
only politically, but personally among the many of us. It is unfortunate that we cannot distinguish
our disagreements from our personal affections with one another. To be clear, nothing here shall be presumed
to suggest that there is any dislike, or lack of love for the President and his
wife, Michelle Obama. We owe it to
ourselves to be civil in all of our disagreements, and look forward to a win-win
approach that benefits all.
What’s the Walk Away
Here?
Hopefully, the expected walk away here is that with the
remainder of his time in office, for those of us who have a disagreement with
the President, we will not resort to the under-the-breath complaints about what
is wrong in our government, particularly under President Obama’s leadership. Nor, in our disgust, should we depend on the
hope that President Obama will “do the right thing”. Government is interactive. President Obama is not perfect, and will not
necessarily act perfectly according to everyone’s wishes. With that said, President Obama is possibly
one of the most approachable leaders we will ever have. Will he respond directly, I think that he will. I believe that President Obama will send a
response to a constructively-worded inquiry, or constructively-worded criticism
of his position(s) on healthcare, or the decision to keep troops in Afghanistan
past 2014.[4] I believe that President Obama is willing to
hear that we disapprove of how he works, or fails to work with Congress[5] by
continuing to previously extend the budgets in a piece-meal approach (until
this year 2013). The question is, what
message are you willing to send to the President? And, are you prepared to make your thoughts
known? If you are, here are suggested
ways of getting your message to him, as suggested by the White House’s website:
©
The White House
What are your thoughts
about your country?
Now that you have a way to contact to President Obama, what
are you prepared to say to the President of the United States ?
Are you willing to send a message, telling him how much you
disagree with:
The Affordable Healthcare Act (Obamacare)?[6]
Raising the Minimum Wage?[7]
Drones over the United States ?[8]
Or,
Or his relationship with Congress?
Whatever you decide to focus on, remember it is just a briefly
worded message (2500 words or less) stating your position on an issue of value to not only you, but
to your family and community as well.
While you may know what to say, it would help if you involved a trusted
friend or family member to preview your message. If we happened to be a little bitter in our
address, we may come on as too strong. We
always want to appear respective of not only the Office of the President of the
United States, but the President, himself.
The point is to get a message across, with possibly a solution. It makes no sense to voice a discontent if
one does not contain a solution that you believe could work. Remember, there is no need to look for
positive feedback if the message coming across is negative.
I disagree with
President Obama
Below, is the approximate text of a message I send to
President Obama today (12/16/13). I sent
it through the White House.gov’s site.
While I do expect a response, it will most likely come after January 20,
2014, after his State of the Union address.
Anytime sooner, would be a big surprise to me. But in any event, I wanted to send a message
and hope that you too will be inspired to send a positive message to the
President to let him know your feelings on issues of importance to you.
Here is what I sent relating to the Federal Minimum Wage:
Subject: Raising the Minimum Wage[9]
President Barack Obama
The White House
Re: The Federal Minimum Wage
Dear Mr. President,
I hope this letter finds you and your family in the best of
health. I am sending this letter to let
you know that I believe that your support for an increase in the Federal
Minimum Wage without a savings plan is counter-productive.
I agree with you, Mr. President, a decent living wage should be paid to
everyone. But, I can only agree to the
point that increasing the minimum wage should not be without providing a
government-backed savings plan to help those in low-paying jobs build wealth
for themselves and their families.
Mr. President, there are not enough training facilities in our
communities. In New Orleans New Orleans
Can we have both? It’s possible,
but small businesses should not be punished.
Minimum wage earners can’t continue to depend on jobs that are going to
be gone in the next 10 years, and then have no skills to fall back on. This is the foreseeable future, and it is
important that if the government can make an impact, this is that opportunity. Please provide training facilities to help
prepare our communities with sustainable skills and jobs.
I hope that you will give this great consideration, Mr. President.
Your time is greatly appreciated.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you, the First Lady, Sasha and
Malia.
Sincerely,
Wayne D. Lewis, Sr.
The above letter was recently submitted to the White
House. While many of you may not agree
with the sentiments (send me a note), I hope that if you have a position on
this or any other matter of a political nature, that you will forward it to the
White House, or your Congressman or Senator.
I hope that you will begin to make it known to many of your respective
representatives that you are either
pleased, dissatisfied, or confused about matters that affect you, your families
and your communities. The days of
allowing your representatives to operate on cruise control should be coming to
an end, fairly soon.
In the upcoming elections of 2014, and beyond, there will be
a groundswell of voices, letters, emails, tweets, and facebook posts, just to
name just a few means of communications, that will rise to the occasion for our
fellow citizens to be heard. If we have been paying attention, we know that
voices are being suppressed, citizens are being denied, and the
constitutionality of what is to come may never come to be challenged in a court
of law because of the number of challenges on so many fronts for each of us as
citizens. But thanks to American
technology, Americans are no longer
going to sit down and allow political leaders to dictate to them who and what to vote
for. It is extremely important that each
of us realize that our votes, as well as our voices need no longer be hushed,
or silenced. We need to speak up, and
let the world know that we are in this, full bore, because we are all American
citizens.
Each of us owe it to ourselves and the future of all that we
hold dear, to speak out, to say what we want, and to say to our
representatives, “I disagree with you on this issue: …..”, and here is why, and
here is what I hope you will take into consideration. Whether our representatives will respond is a matter altogether different. But until,
or unless we speak out by whatever means available, the future that could be,
won’t be, because too many of us will have chosen to be silent, and hoped that
our representatives will have done the right thing. Good luck with that.
I disagree with
President Obama is perhaps an first chance opportunity for each of us to
realize how important our voices are. I
can only hope that President Obama responds early next year to my letter. When he does, I will share it with you in a
future post. But more importantly, I
hope that you will have response as well to share. I hope that you send a letter to your
respective representative and let them know that you are watching them on the
matter of the Troops in Afghanistan ;
that you are watching them on the passage of the unemployment insurance, or
that you are watching them on how the Affordable Healthcare Program is going,
and that you want results. Send your
letters. Follow your representatives on
Twitter,[10] on
Facebook,[11] or on
LinkedIn[12]. No longer take for granted that any of our
representatives are going to do the right thing.
Merry Christmas to you and yours.
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Disclaimer:
Information provided is here an opinion and subject to your
feedback. Please feel free to add your
comments. Information here should not be considered professional advise. Please consult with your respective
professional regarding any personal matters that you maybe having.
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