Ask HN: What is the best way to get involved in (US) politics? - iamjk
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a3n
Are you an American? Do you want to be a politician, or something a bit less
"in the game," or just "know more about it?"

As an American in his sixties, my opinion is that the best way to get involved
in US politics is to move to Ireland and watch it from afar.

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_ah
If you want to _feel_ involved: Join a city or state-level campaign (cold
calls, knocking on doors, publicity events, etc).

If you want to _be_ involved: Run for a local office (like maybe a city
council seat), preferably an uncontested race where a write-in campaign can be
effective with minimal ad spending.

If you want to _learn_ : Join the local chapter for a national campaign. Try
to get yourself nominated as a delegate.

If you want to cause a specific impact: Be wealthy and donate significant
amounts of money to causes you care about.

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matt_s
#1 way: vote. Pay attention to issues that you care about and research where
candidates stand on these. Research can be done a day or two before voting
(primary or general) read up on them.

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bjourne
I heard the Bernie Sanders presidential campaign needs volunteers.
[https://berniesanders.com/](https://berniesanders.com/)

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louis_pasteur
Bash Donald Trump!

But if you are serious about it, you'll have to learn about what are the major
issues your country is facing. Politics is always done on people's problems or
issues, they could be social or economics related or both. Everyone have a
different perspective too, labor has a different one than tories, democrats
have a different one than republicans.

But at the end of the day, remember that power is all that matters for
politicians, they never take ideologies or issues as seriously as we plebeians
do! For example, in the elections of the Indian state of Maharashtra recently,
a political party called Shiv-Sena joined hands with another one called NCP
(their ideals are as wide apart as republicans and democrats, or tories and
labor!).

So, as a plebeian or citizen, you should call for more transparency and
betterment of systems. You should also ensure that you don't hand too much
power to one single guy or party because you know, power corrupts!

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akulbe
Don't.

