On February 11, Victory Girls was one of over 4,500 websites that participated in a mass protest against NSA surveillance programs.  We are happy to report that approximately 187,000 emails and 90,000 phone calls were made to legislators that day.  We’re also sad to report that this barely scratched the surface.  Now comes the real work:

Every day, a document is circulated within each office and a hard copy of the document is placed on the legislator’s desk, as well as those of a number of key staffers. The document comprises world news articles, national news, state news, and any letters to the editor in the 5-10 biggest newspapers in the state that mention the legislator by name. The procedure may seem archaic—and to an extent, it is—but remember: people who vote, by and large, still read newspapers. And those people’s opinions are liable to be swayed by what they read in the newspaper. That is why legislatures make sure to have a finger on the pulse of the newspapers that their constituents are most likely to read.

What does this mean?  Simple.

The best way to get the attention of your legislators—unless, of course, you’re a wealthy donor—is to write a letter to the editor calling them out by name and to have it published in one of the 5-10 biggest newspapers in your state.

Maybe you’ve never done it because you’re not sure what to write.  Never fear, we’ve got you covered there too.  Here’s a sample that you can alter to meet your own needs (the author of this one believes the NSA should be dismantled but your mileage may vary).  For those who use reddit, there’s also a subreddit that just started, dealing with how to write letters to the editor.  You may find some resources and/or help there.  Point being, it’s all fine and good that people are writing to Congress, but you and I both know that they don’t really care unless they’re getting called out publicly.  (And sometimes not even then.)  For those who aren’t quite ready to kick tires and light fires, so to speak, this is about all you’ve got, so you need to get on it.  If you are ready to get the game on, stay tuned, because that part of the festivities will probably be forced upon us fairly soon as well.

While you’re thinking about what to write to your newspaper editor and how much ammo to stock for The Big Bang, check out our weekend links below the fold!

Pirate’s Cove points out the hypocrisy in Obama’s climate change agenda.

This Ain’t Hell is doing what they do best: exposing phony vets claiming phony service.

Jammie Wearing Fools (which should be on your daily read list, by the way, just like all the blogs on this list) has a must read article up about how Aspen shut down their airport on one of the busiest days of the year…because Moochelle was coming through on your dime.

Legal Insurrection is talking about the number of racial slurs on Twitter…you’ll never believe what the most-used one is (and it’s not the ‘N-word’).

Scott Horton has an interview with Patrick Toomey, the Staff Attorney in the ACLU’s National Security Project, discussing the PCLOB report on the NSA’s Shadow Database; limiting the NSA’s access to the “corporate store” of pooled American phone records; and the ACLU’s legal challenge of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008.

Last but certainly not least, here’s one more reason to get a VPN—it’ll get you around the nasty limits that your ISP puts on your Netflix.  Yes, they’re limiting your bandwidth based on what you’re doing.  Use a VPN, stick it to them, and get your money’s worth.

Have a great week!