In lieu of a first post:

A few weeks ago, I sent copies of this letter to my senators. I have decided to make it a public letter. I expect no change in response (namely, none), but I suppose I will feel better knowing it exists as documented sentiment somewhere and has not been merely swept into the waste basket of an intern without fanfare or even being opened.

Monday, February 3, 2025

Via Hand Delivery from a Concerned Constituent

Mr. Alex Padilla / Mr. Adam Schiff

Re: That nasty bug going around

Dear Alex/Adam,

How are you? Are you well?

I ask because your spine seems to be missing in action in recent weeks and I suppose that could be quite debilitating in the exercise of your duties as one of California's only two senatorial representatives.

I suppose that I should catch you up on what you've clearly missed in the interim.

Firstly, did you know that, when you return from your convalescence, you will be faced with a truly staggering number of highly unqualified nominees for various incredibly important roles in the proper functioning of the State? It's true! From the center of our entire intelligence apparatus appearing to be primed to operate as an uniquely American iteration of the SS or Kremlin, to the potential to flush our entire hobbled healthcare system down the crapper and embrace pre-modern diseases and snake oils with the full enthusiastic backing of the federal government at the behest of a crackpot who happens to have a famous last name. And that's not even bringing up the rogue's gallery of potential Cabinet members! Crazy, right? But I just know you and the other Dems will circle the proverbial wagons and develop a coordinated plan to send these crooks packing. There's really not any other reasonable option, is there? No, no, there isn't.

And speaking of cretins! Did you know that an entirely unelected, narcissistic, eugenics-obsessed sex pest now has control of the national purse because nobody seemed to conceive of ways to stop that from happening? It seems thousands of career employees were left to twist in the wind as the Office of Personnel Management, General Services Administration, and others were taken over by that same sex pest's business cronies. It would be truly unconscionable if this unelected Apartheid Nazi ™, who bought a presidency and the apparent ability to run riot with no legal authority to access our government's sensitive data or to control who receives their benefits, were not met with forceful – and perhaps even inventive – resistance, the aim of which would be to fully remove him from access to any hall of power he sniffs at. That would be the right thing to do, don't you agree?

But there's more! I personally am worried about the immigrants and minorities in our country, now that the rhetoric has become, not just aggressive and conspiratorial anymore, but gleeful in a sort of hand-rubbing Snidely Whiplash premeditation on the infliction of violence and suffering on one's neighbors. My worry is that there seems to have been some confusion among the Dem commentariat on the prospect of there being expendable Americans. Call me naïve or radical (ha!), but I don't ever remember that when I recited the Pledge of Allegiance in elementary school, hand over my heart and facing the classroom's American flag, that we were directed to be specific about who was included in "liberty and justice for all." Indeed, I remember that it was a time when integration was still on people's minds in Texas, and that we were encouraged to be, if anything, patriotically protective of the rights of our peers, whatever their identity. Certainly, you must agree that that is the only way to feel about the rights of Americans and immigrants in this country, toiling away as one nation together.

As a sovereign nation, I think you'll also agree that we must put these strange degradations of our sister nations, trading partners, and international peers quite decidedly to bed. Whether it's the odd notion that we might simply take over another sovereign nation or the economically ruinous strategy of bullying our allies with ridiculous tariffs to get our way, these adolescent notions simply must be categorically stopped. Really, it's just embarrassing. If we keep carrying on in this manner, it will be no wonder if our peers begin to shun us or shut us out entirely. And we will have deserved it, I dare say, though it will – as always – hit the least deserving first as it ruins supply chains that have only just recovered or puts those lower on the ladder out of work while the cost of living keeps rising and rising.

And having said that, I know the popular fad of the moment is to view the country as a business, but you and I both know that the country is no more a business than it is a monarchy – our America was always meant to operate in service of its people, not try to execute a hostile takeover or manipulate the markets, or restructure to squeeze every last drop of economy from a citizen, or levy taxes for the personal gain of any one person. You know, it's almost like these conservatives want to drive us back into a system of indentured servitude – serfdom, even! – so enamored of the ever-growing divide between haves and have-nots as they seem to be. I've never seen anything like it! Well, I have, as you know – I've been voting for decades now, haven't I? – but it's all so flagrant now, as though no one can even be bothered to pretend that they care what constituents think. Positively shocking.

Of course, I don't have to tell you about the dangers of this national abortion ban conservatives have been floating around. You know, the H.R. 722 one? They really have just no shame, do they? All that talk about leaving it up to the states, but here they are, ready to send women back to the dark ages. Did I ever tell you that my great-great-grandmother died of an abortion gone wrong? She really did, and it was illegal at the time, so I can't imagine what she went through, taking her life in her hands because she knew she couldn't keep a sixth child fed, not with a drunkard husband and no social safety net. I used to think, well, we don't have the safety net, but at least we have safe abortions. And now? It's like I'm shaking hands with her, that immigrant woman trying to make ends meet, across the hundred plus years that separate us, contemplating the return of illegal abortions coupled with the end of no fault divorce and the government wanting back into people's bedrooms in general. I don't think I ever did tell you about that little family story, but it's what made the women in my family so determined, I think, to have our own lives on our own terms. I'd hate to see that lost for all the girls still coming up in my family – I just know you feel the same way.

I've circled us right back to that "liberty and justice for all" line again, haven't I? I suppose it really stuck with me – a "core memory" as my little cousins would say. On the whole, I think that's a rather good concept to frame up as core to your life.

That's put me in mind of another old yarn of mine, if you'll let me natter on just a little more. When I was about eight, one of my classmate's parents, Mr. Brooks, gave my mom two tickets to go to see the speaking tour Miep Gies was giving in connection with the release of her book and the documentary about her life. I got to meet her at the very end of the evening, if you can believe it, and my mother and I spoke with her for several minutes. And I've never forgotten what she said about seeing a child come to the talk: that adults come and feel sad, but then go home and have their lives already full of things to do and so do nothing new about injustice in the world, but that children internalize the message and add it into their lives, expanding the fight against injustice further.

It's a harsh criticism of adults, isn’t it? That they don't shake themselves loose of what's habit, even in the face of evidence of great injustice in the world, because they feel like they already have too much on their plates. I think about that when I see people like David Hogg or Greta Thunberg out there, fighting for what they believe in. Their lives, from the outside, are derailed from the norm because of their fight against injustice, but maybe it's better to look at it Miep's way, that the fight against injustice is just common sense and that it is no interruption, no imposition, no herculean task to be taken on begrudgingly, because the fight for each other is the most important thing we will ever do, at the end of the day.

Well, look at me, just going on and on at you, when I'm sure your recovery from spine reinsertion has you worn out, you poor thing. You take care of those nerves of yours – I'll be rooting for you!

Your concerned constituent,                        

Helen Doremus                                              

P.S. (In the immortal words of American hero as survivor of both original recipe Nazis and the Allied firebombing of Dresden, Kurt Vonnegut: "There is no reason why good cannot triumph as often as evil. The triumph of anything is a matter of organization. If there are such things as angels, I hope that they are organized along the lines of the Mafia." Just something to consider.)