Live in a Blue State? Write your Reps NOW

For the entire tenure of President Obama, Congressional Republicans worked to block or undo every action he undertook. In response, instead of pushing back hard, President Obama and Congressional Democrats worked to compromise on every issue, watering down positions and bills to please the GOP.

If you still have a US Representative or Senator that's a member of the Democratic Party, it's time for you to write them and tell them what you expect them to do in the face of the coming onslaught of legislation and rollbacks.  

Here is the text of my November 13, 2016 letter now on its way via postal mail to the Honorable Jeff Merkley, the Honorable Ron Wyden, and the Honorable Suzanne Bonamici, my Congressional representatives as a voter and citizen of Washington County, Oregon. I encourage you to write a similar letter to your reps if you, too, live in a Blue State:

Representative Bonamici and Senators Merkley and Wyden,

I hope that, by now, you have realized that voters for Donald Trump were not voting for more jobs. They were not voting for more employment opportunities for people that pay fair, living wages. If you didn't already, I hope you realize these people were, in fact voting

• for the elimination of civil rights gained by LGBTQ people over the last five years
• in support of a ban the entry of Muslims into the USA and of aggressively surveilling any Muslim already here
• to stop women from accessing abortion and birth control services and to punish women for accessing abortion services
• to fully militarize and otherwise empower police to enforce “law and order” regarding Black and Latino Americans and other racial minorities
• against science, including climate change, evolutionary biology and human reproductive health
• to support anti-science myths about vaccine safety, such as that it causes autism
• for the elimination of the Affordable Health Care act, which they believe will make insurance premiums cheaper
• and against all foreign aid.

These are the policies that got the loudest, wildest cheers at Trump's rallies. These are the policies that got his voters out to the polls, despite the Trump campaign having such a pitifully, shockingly small grass roots/on-the-ground get-out-the-vote operation compared to the Clinton campaign or any campaign of the last 20 years. These are the policies that got Trump elected and the ones that a majority in Congress now feel emboldened to pursue.

A majority of Americans may support this man, but a majority of Oregonians do not. So long as you represent this majority in Oregon, you have an obligation and a mandate to stand against these policies. Oregonians, including myself, elected you for this role. We do not want you to “come together” or “unite” with people who openly support or try to downplay nativism, authoritarianism, misogyny and racism. We do not want to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with deplorables nor with apologists for such. This is the time to stand tall and to stand firm, to say no to bigotry and the rolling back of hard-won civil rights gains. History is watching. We are watching. The members of Congress from blue states like Oregon are our country's only hope. Please don't let us down.