Today’s Downsizer-Dispatch . . .
We are so impressed by the quality of the email we got in response to yesterday’s message about U.S. foreign policy. We received an even mixture of support and criticism, but surprisingly little hate mail. This doesn’t mean the hate mail and un-subcribes won’t flow in once we launch our new campaign, but so-far-so-good.
We were equally impressed with both the positive and negative messages, but we want to take special note of the criticisms we received. Most of them were incredibility thoughtful and eloquent. They weren’t knee-jerk pro-war for the most part. Instead, people took the time to challenge our plan based on our own stated strategic and tactical principles. This was very gratifying. It shows that many people have been paying attention to what we’ve said about our overall strategy and actually understand it.
It is very encouraging to know that our words have made an impact. It is also encouraging to know that we have so many intelligent and eloquent supporters who would take the time to share their thoughts in such an even-handed way. It is especially gratifying, strange as it may seem, to have our own words used to disagree with us.
We would very much like to respond to these criticisms in detail. If possible, we will do so in a couple of days. It is also possible that we may not be able to do so. We purposely have a very small staff and constantly struggle to keep pace with the course of events. We will respond if we can, but if we don’t, please know this: every criticism we received is deeply respected and has been taken into account. We will continue to evaluate and criticize our own policy on this and other issues.
It bears repeating: we are so impressed by the quality of our supporters, and so grateful to have all of you on our team. We hope to prove worthy of your continued devotion to this cause.
Finally, we received about 30 contributions yesterday. There was a good mixture of micro-and-macro monthly credit card pledges, as well as small and large one-time donations. Thank you so much. More remains to be done to reach our goals and to prepare for the challenges ahead. If you would like to help with a donation or monthly credit card pledge you can do so here.
Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for being a DC Downsizer.
Jim Babka & Perry Willis
President & Communications Director
DownsizeDC.org, Inc.