If you've been arguing for weeks for the Public Option, here are the persons you should be arguing with:

Contact info:

1. White House Comments (always busy, keep trying):

1-202-456-1111

website for emails: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

2. Secretary Sebelius' Comments:

(toll free) 1-877-696-6775

website for emails: http://www.hhs.gov/ContactUs.html

3. Dr. Dean's Petition (thanks -le_chat_rose!):

http://standwithdrdean.com/

You get a nice message from Dr. Dean after signing.

4. Speaker Pelosi's Comments:

http://speaker.house.gov/contact/

5. Your particular Senators and Representative:

Call both local AND Washington lines, and email

If you fight for the Public Option by actually using a voice instead of snark - and god forbid we don't get it - you actually get to scream "I Told You So!" as much as you want.

If you don't, you'll want to be very, very quiet.

I always like your posts, and admire your gumption in taking on some of the professional naysayers on these boards.

I wish what you and Carville suggest could happen. But if we can't get off our butts this week - NOW - to fight for a Public Option, and a good, strong bill.......how on earth are we gonna do it later?

Gingrich used the defeat of the Clinton health plan to engineer his 1994 takeover of Congress, which is exactly what the GOP is trying to do again. This loss would precede many more for Obama's full term. We haven't had this strong a hand for decades, and we may not for decades to come. 14,000 a day are losing coverage.

Now is the time.

"More than anything else, it's vital that this dynamic change. Such a change -- a shift in Beltway power dynamics -- would be far more consequential even than the specific health care policy issues at stake in this debate."

And the ONLY way this will change - EVER - is if we get off our online butts. Every post here that merely self-satisfies and doesn't lead to a simple phone call or email is empty gratification. Useless. It's like talking about the benefits of exercising muscles - political or otherwise. There's nothing beneficial about it till you do it.

And it feels good.

If this is the issue that makes us "own" our very real majority a little bit more, after being on the table for 60 years and counting, then we will have accomplished something very real during the Obama presidency - with or without Obama. They're not Kings you know. Call, email and then write about it. It's the original Democratic contact high.

Contact info:

1. White House Comments (always busy, keep trying):

1-202-456-1111

website for emails: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

2. Secretary Sebelius' Comments:

(toll free) 1-877-696-6775

website for emails: http://www.hhs.gov/ContactUs.html

3. Dr. Dean's Petition:

http://standwithdrdean.com/

4. Speaker Pelosi's Comments:

http://speaker.house.gov/contact/

5. Your particular Senators and Representative:

Call both local AND Washington lines, and email

Was in the neighborhood so I thought I'd say hi. Your posts are a real breath of fresh air. I'm beginning to feel like a bad Jerry Lewis Telethon - so few people seem to be calling their reps. You can tell the ones that do, cause they're all refreshed and positive.

Hear that folks - refreshed and positive! And we are making a difference, already.

You want to bet?

If you're someone who both posts thoughtful comments and calls their Congresspeople, then you're to be congratulated and thanked, and my post was not meant for you.

But I don't for a minute think that the majority, or even a small minority of the posts on these boards, or others, suggest that their makers are doing anything else than making themselves feel they've participated. It's why these online boards exist - to give people a virtual place to come to and converse about issues that seem beyond their control, and generate revenue in the process.

I might believe that about Common Dreams' commenters, or even some of the Huffington posters. But the sheer lavishness of the Salon letters - the erudition and finesse, or the often overwhelming tone of world-weariness, defeatism and "I told you so about Obama", tells me that most people here are NOT like you. Would that they were, or that the Salon writers themselves reminded their readers regularly to contact, contact, contact. Our power and majority is sleeping, as is its wont. How to wake it up?

Anybody who writes to the effect of "isn't it terrible what Obama is not doing" is very likely not involved in any meaningful way. How do you convince them that they're part of the problem? Those that are involved, like What the??? or CeliaInSF or Juliebird, wear their enthusiasm, or equanimity, or balanced delivery on their sleeves, as do you. By participating in government AS WELL AS salons, they know, as Lawrence of Arabia said, "Nothing is written in stone." And the pleasures of the E.M. Forster mantra,

"Only connect."