

List of 61 senators refusing to meet and discuss PIPA/SOPA - nextparadigms
http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/oe3mf/these_61_senators_are_refusing_to_meet_with_their/

======
ImprovedSilence
I think the top comment on Reddit deserves a re-post here:

"As a former Senate staffer and redditor, I will tell you that the most
effective course of action in this situation is to call the DC offices of only
your own Senators directly. Speak to the staff assistant, who will take down
your comments and log them into a tracking system. Make it clear to the
staffer that you are calling in opposition to SOPA. In the briefing prior to
the vote, the staffer assigned to SOPA will inform the Senator of the
aggregate constituent sentiment as reflected by phone calls and letters. Their
vote recommendation will be, in part, based on constituent sentiment. Most
senators will make up their minds based on the information provided to them by
their briefing staff.

The more phone calls this issue receives, the clearer constituent sentiment
will be to these Senators. Take the time to call a few times a day if
possible. This is by far the best way to make an impact. In person meetings
will have the same result"

Take action people.

~~~
drewem
As a Democratic political consultant who lived and worked in DC for years and
has many friends who work on the Hill, I will tell you that this is exactly
right.

Lobbyists do the same thing (target the staff), they just do it over coffee,
lunch, drinks and/or briefing materials on a desk. 20- & 30-somethings run
most of DC.

~~~
electromagnetic
It's also worth noting that paper and phone calls are a lot more hassle than
email. All those 'email your councillor/senator/mayor/whatever' campaigns are
ineffective because the people who take the time to call or mail in a letter
are likely to be 10 times more pissed off (and express it) than those that
simply email.

Also, remember. Paper builds up. If you've got friends who oppose the bill
then get them to write at the same time. Get a stack of letters and mail them
together.

Emails can be deleted, and phone calls can be ignored. 100 letters being
dropped off by the mail man, that's gonna be a problem.

~~~
2arrs2ells
Thanks to the anthrax scare a while back, mail takes forever to get to
senators/reps these days. I think a phone call is more effective at this
point.

------
twakefield
I just called my senators in CA and was kind of shocked to get a real person.
Of course, they didn't patch me through to the Senator but hopefully they are
getting bombarded by anti PIPA calls and can relay this to their bosses.

So have a quick blurb ready to convey to a real person. I'm sure they are
overwhelmed juggling calls. Also, be polite. Being rude undermines the effort.

------
ajays
I'm in California. Here are the numbers of our two senators:

Boxer: tel:1-202-224-3553p3

Feinstein: tel:1-202-224-3841

("p" is pause)

Please call, and call often.

------
timc3
This has probably been asked in many of the other SOPA threads, but what can
someone from outside of the States do?

I mean it sounds like the senators are not going to want to hear from someone
living in Sweden, but SOPA potentially effects the whole world

~~~
seagreen
There's social networking for one thing if you have friends in the US. A FB
link to a blog post might be effective, especially since a certain segment of
Americans are very sensitive to foreign opinion.

If you're up for a larger time commitment you could help with research and
improving anti-SOPA websites.

Come to think of it, there really should be an "Anti-SOPA activities for
people outside the US" list, but I don't know of one. Researching that and
posting it might not be a bad way to contribute:)

------
matthodan
Not as good as a call, but here are links to their Facebook pages (most have
public posts enabled):

[moved to its own thread] <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3458653>

~~~
seagreen
Does anyone know how a FB comment compares to a phone call in
effectiveness/time commitment? Is it something worth doing after at all, or
maybe just after you've made all the calls you feel are reasonable? I really
need to find a guide that covers this sort of thing.

~~~
chimeracoder
Honestly, it does next to nothing. It's probably better than _literally_
nothing, but if you can spare the 2 minutes to make a phone call, it's a much
better use of your time.

I posted this a while back:

>Congress uses multipliers to figure out how predictive each piece of
communication is (ie, how likely it is that a certain piece of communication
will result in a change in voting behavior).

> I don't remember the exact numbers, but the hierarchy goes (in descending
> order): in-person visit to DC office, in-person visit to local office,
> physical handwritten letter, physical typed letter, phone call, email. The
> multiplier attached to email is close to zero. (The exact method varies by
> congressman/senator, but the relative rankings are the same throughout).

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3264561>

~~~
seagreen
Perfect. Thanks very much.

------
tzs
Aren't Senators fairly good at detecting people spam? I wonder if it actually
productive to have a bunch of people who don't understand the bill or its
risks and/or benefits showing up to just regurgitate what they read on the
internet.

Wouldn't it be better to have a small number of people who ACTUALLY understand
the bill go and offer independent arguments?

I know if I were in a decision making position the latter would impress me a
lot more than the former.

~~~
there
_I wonder if it actually productive to have a bunch of people who don't
understand the bill or its risks and/or benefits showing up to just
regurgitate what they read on the internet._

senators and congresspersons probably don't understand many of the bills they
vote on, either.

do you really think most of those lawmakers suddenly decided that copyright
infringement was a problem and banded together to create SOPA and PIPA on
their own? organizations lobbied them to form an opinion. if nobody challenges
those opinions, they just vote how the money tells them to.

if enough constituents tell them to change their opinion, they probably will.
not because they really care personally, but because it will look favorable to
the people that are in charge of reelecting them, and that will allow them to
continue getting money from lobbyists over issues like SOPA and PIPA.

godaddy was in favor of SOPA for whatever reason, and only when they started
losing money from it did they suddenly reverse their position and come out
against it. lawmakers will do the same exact thing for the same exact reason
if enough people call them about it.

~~~
mattdawson
This.

I worked in DC at a PAC for 3 years, and I can confirm that, without a doubt,
lawmakers in Washington vote where either a) the money leads or b) the most
ruckus gets stirred up, at least 90% of the time. Every congressperson has
their pet causes (the other 10%) but for the rest, they're voting in large
part based on those two factors. How could they not? There's simply too much
going on to really learn about every issue that comes across their desk.

The ruckus matters.

