New Record for Mt. Rainier?

Gandhi would have skinned up the road when the gate was closed and got arrested and then released from jail, gone skinning up the road again, arrested again and repeated it until somebody took notice. His example would have inspired others until there were 50 people skinning past the gate and getting arrested on a daily basis......or at least until litigation was filed.

Letter writing to your Senators is cathartic and in this modern society allows one to say" I'm doing something" and I suppose that's true. However, the reality is that any Senator wiling to make this a cause celeb in today's political climate would be out of their political and reelection campaign minds.

Given mandated budget cuts, possible cuts to Head Start and all the myriad of economic problems our state and country faces, even 100 letters from disgruntled backcountry skiers who can't access their recreational powder on a weekday and have to wait until the weekend ( The Horror!!!!!!) should I imagine, get no more than a passing glance or a feel good" we'll look into it" letter back.

That's reality....and don't get me wrong...I think the current situation terrible..but you gotta face reality rather than keep tilting at windmills via internet angst( Like what I'm doing).

You gotta organize, litigate and create a shit storm.....letter writing and internet angst is just the equivalent of" protest masturbation"....it feels good to you, but it doesn't really do much for anybody else or the main problem.

Hope I'm wrong ...but I don't think so.

Gandhi would have skinned up the road when the gate was closed and got arrested and then released from jail, gone skinning up the road again, arrested again and repeated it until somebody took notice. His example would have inspired others until there were 50 people skinning past the gate and getting arrested on a daily basis......or at least until litigation was filed.

Letter writing to your Senators is cathartic and in this modern society allows one to say" I'm doing something" and I suppose that's true. However, the reality is that any Senator wiling to make this a cause celeb in today's political climate would be out of their political and reelection campaign minds.

Given mandated budget cuts, possible cuts to Head Start and all the myriad of economic problems our state and country faces, even 100 letters from disgruntled backcountry skiers who can't access their recreational powder on a weekday and have to wait until the weekend ( The Horror!!!!!!) should I imagine, get no more than a passing glance or a feel good" we'll look into it" letter back.

That's reality....and don't get me wrong...I think the current situation terrible..but you gotta face reality rather than keep tilting at windmills via internet angst( Like what I'm doing).

You gotta organize, litigate and create a shit storm.....letter writing and internet angst is just the equivalent of" protest masturbation"....it feels good to you, but it doesn't really do much for anybody else or the main problem.

Hope I'm wrong ...but I don't think so.

It is very likely you are correct. The timing of this change in winter access obviously is related to all the Congressional squabbles and the serious socioeconomic consequences of them that kept responsible legislators focused; to say nothing of a couple of wars, massive widespread overseas adventurism, and a voracious military-industrial-congressional-societal complex.

I think the best civil disobedience would be a demonstration occupying the Nisqually Entrance on weekends, especially sunny days. But one person would be quickly arrested-sequestered-rendered and released on Tuesday or Wednesday. It would take enough people to numerically overwhelm the park LEO force--15 people chained together would work. We have had plenty examples of non-violent civil disobedience in the PNW; that is what it takes to get press-legislator-bureaucrat attention. Wearing a Disabled/Senior Citizen/Annual/Golden Beagle Pass and your 1040 would add to the drama. Occupy the Nisqually Entrance!

Nine out of ten:

Due to high avalanche danger, the road to Paradise at Longmire will not open today. forecast.weather.gov/showsigwx.php?warnz...t1=Avalanche+Warning … kdr

By my count the gate has been open for about six hours in the last 10 days.

occupation crew pretty slow right now so there could be some extras lurking.
b

occupation crew pretty slow right now so there could be some extras lurking.
b

It is an appropriate venue: we increasingly are being faced with supporting a huge MICS complex vs. meeting our basic social needs for education, health, and spiritual (bc skiing) well being.

Yes please tell which Senator. Can we get an email/mail list for all higher-ups? That would be a big help for passing on for those concerned and willing to express their discontent.

There are two - Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray.

www.cantwell.senate.gov/public/

www.murray.senate.gov/public/

Your representative in the house is determined by your district. Enter a zip code here to find out who your representative is and how to make contact:
house.gov/htbin/findrep ?

The President is in charge of MRNP, and you pay his salary:
www.whitehouse.gov/contact



I selected Cantwell because I know she's familiar with Paradise and the mountain, but Murray's a reasonable choice too.
mountrainierclimbing.blogspot.com/2007/10/maria-cantwell.html



When writing representatives, keep it constructive, thoughtful, and direct; your goal is to convince a staffer, and the representative, that the issue matters and impacts her constituents. If you check the "I'd like a response box", then you'll get a semi-personalized letter from a staffer a few weeks later, sometimes by mail. If sufficiently many letters (it doesn't take that many) arrive on a similar topic, the news will get bumped to the representative's attention.

Unique letters matter more than form letters. Physical letters count more than email. Handwritten may count even more. They're interested in earning your vote in the future, so let them know what you think!

I've had friends and family work as Congressional staffers - the letters really are read, and the information aggregated for the representative; it's not just cathartic. The volume of information they have to handle is tremendous, so most investigations are cursory, but others aren't. If a staffer gets interested, they have access to Library of Congress researchers who generate useful reports with impressive speed. The trick is to get the process started. Think of it like a lottery, one over which you have some influence. Staffers may be happy to have a problem that they actually can fix at the moment, compared with the sequester, which they probably can't.

I'm pretty sure Andrew Carey would tell everyone he knows that Maria Cantwell re-opened his beloved park if she took time to sort out this snafu. She knows that, but probably isn't aware that a problem exists.

The system isn't perfect, but it's ours. It's up to us to make it work.