Dean wants you to write a letter to the editor

In a mass email from the Democratic party, Howard Dean says "The most effective thing you can do right now is send a letter to the editor of your local paper about escalation, and let them know that you demand a vote on any troop increase. Writing your letter to the editor is simple using our PartyBuilder advocacy tools. Just click here to get started"

I did it and it's easy. I sent a email letter to the SF Chronicle and the NY Times in one stroke. Afterwards the site prompted me to email the link to ten friends.

This feels more productive than writing representatives somehow. Perhaps because it seems that it's a new thing and the newspapers might respond to hundreds of thousands of letters even if they don't print the one you send.

What's the best way to bring the troops home?

Bush announced an escalation of the war in Iraq on Wednesday night.

For the first time in a long time it feels like history is hanging in balance and that an expression of popular opinion might tip it in positive direction.

I'm ready to email my friends and ask them to join in effort to counter Bush's plan for more troops and email their friends as well. But it's not clear to me what's the best action to suggest.

(Edit on 1-9 - One thing seems clear to me. One person acting won't make any difference. The only way to defeat this is if you contact your friends as well.)

There is Moveon.org's petition . It automatically sends the petition to your particular representative. You can also make a contribution there to pay for advertising. I signed a personalized note and contributed $25.

(Edit on 1-9 - I also found Care2's petition and signed it. Very easy. The plus is that you get to see the comments from the people who preceeded you. Plus you can see that there is a new one every 15 sec. That helps.

These efforts are important because I can imagine someone saying "well, we never saw that many signatures so quickly from that group, there must be something going on."

I encourage you to take advantage of these petitions since they are set up to do this sort of thing at the moment. But I realize that that any message filtered through these groups is suspect from the POV of many recipients of the message. So...)

I'm looking for additional actions to take and to recommend to others. What would best get the attention of the people who might stand up and vote down the escalation? I appreciate your ideas.

(Edit 1-9 - My smart, connected friend (who shall go nameless since she terminated our IM session to take a call) says to focus on Kennedy's effort and use phone calls, faxes, and letters to key representatives, especially those other than Pelosi and the California Senators. So, here's a site of the contact info for Senators. And another for Congress.)

Here and here are earlier thoughts about getting out of Iraq.

(Edit 1-9 - if you act based on this post, please add a short comment - that helps move the thing along.)

Bush asks for bigger army

Bush announced he wants to increase the number of troops in the army and marines over the long term. This is a smart move on his part and clearly paves the way for his surge proposal.

I think it's a very bad idea because more troops allow the president to get us into more situations like Iraq when we should at least be relying on UN actions. It does somewhat address the problem of troops having to extend their stay in Iraq so it will have public support.

The bright side is that this gives the Democrats a way to prove they are in support of the troops if they should decide to cut funding for Iraq. In that case I think the trade off would be worth it and the "more troops in the long term" decision will backfire on Bush.