Getting involved makes all the difference

You are by now used to reading Carl's thoughs in this blog, but as Campaign Chair, I wanted to share some of my own ideas as well. Carl is in Washington D.C. today for the peace march on the mall. He took a bus from Providence last night with many other demonstrators from Rhode Island. Would his family rather have him home today to go to football practice or have a BBQ on one of the last nice weekends of the year? I'm pretty sure the answer is yes but he thought this was important. Over the past few weeks he has been out talking to so many people: Broad St. walk for health, a protest for worker's rights in Providence, a meeting with members of RI NOW and a talk to the Brown Univ. Democrats. It would be easy to say "Look at all the places I have been recently" but what is really important is all the people he has been able to listen to. Never has a candidate for office asked me what I thought needed to be fixed.

A good friend of mine sent me a copy of an email she sent to FEMA after seeing the pictures (pretty sure we've all seen them too) of the incredible parking lot that highways leading out of Houston had turned into as people tried desperately to stay one step ahead of Rita. The inbound lanes however, were empty like it was Sunday morning. She took the time to fire off a letter to FEMA asking why this couldn't be fixed? It seems like common sense would have prevented this problem, no?

I hope that the apathy that tends to follow a tragedy like these storms doesn't set it the way it seems to have with local politics. I found the following quote recently: Bad officials are elected by good citizens who do not vote.

Getting involved really does make all the difference.

Sara Pearson