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How to be effective about contacting your senator: What Really Happens When You Call?
Let me first start with a disclaimer --- I haven't been on the Hill in coming up on 5 years, so some of what I have to say may be dated (as to Senate office treatments of emails and such), but I invite any Kossacks (That is the right term, yes? I'm new here.) who have more recent experience to please contribute their observations. That said, I thought I'd offer my 2 cents about what really happens when people contact a Senate office --- I spent the better part of a year answering the phones in the D.C. office of a prominent Democrat from a small state.
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http://dailykos.com/story/2005/2/10/144415/475