Jim here. This is my last shout-out to you before the election. No, really, I mean it. This is it. The election is tomorrow. I’ve got to get back to all the things I put aside while reading and responding to your barrage of email messages.
Just in the last week I received five messages from you, five from Michelle and two from Joe. I’m sure you wanted to do better, but I know you all have been really busy. But you made up for it by having your various surrogates send 28 messages, including one from Will Ferrell saying he will eat underpants (didn’t say whose) if I vote for you. Now that’s pretty persuasive stuff. That’s 40 emails all together — an average of almost six a day.
I really appreciate that, despite the fact that you asked me for money each time, and notwithstanding that you never responded to any of my return messages explaining that I am a Romney supporter and that I have no intention of giving you even a thin dime.
Well, in a sense, I guess you did get my messages. Your people did accurately report, at least three times, that my total giving for the campaign was $0. And I guess I have to admire your hope that I would change my mind and pony up at least $3 or whatever I can afford.
But that’s all behind us now. Here’s the thing — as we both look to the future. If you are re-elected, which, for the sake of the country, I hope you are not, I’m wondering if you might try to be in touch once in a while about your plans for me and my family. I’m not suggesting six messages every day. I know you’ll be too busy for that. But maybe you could be in touch just once in a while, when you’re thinking about something really, really big.
You see, I don’t recall getting a single message from you back in 2009 or 2010 about your big plans for my health care. And I don’t recall a single communication from you about your plans to spend nearly $1 trillion of my and my fellow citizens’ hard-earned money on your big stimulus plan. Of course I understand that you must be as disappointed as I am that it didn’t work out. But what the heck, as Joe would say, it’s like investing in solar companies. Sometimes things don’t work out, and sometimes they just don’t work.
So that’s it. Nothing profound. Just saying we should stay in touch after the election, especially if you’re my president for another four years. Although you haven’t said much about your plans for the next four years, I suspect you might have some big ideas for my future. So I hope I’m not asking too much, what with you maybe being president and all.
And if I am being unreasonable here, maybe you could just stay in touch with our representatives in Congress. There are only 535 of them. And if even that’s too many for personal visits and phone calls, you could get your guys from the campaign to fix you up with a listserv so you could send group emails. I know they know how to do it. And they can even personalize the messages.
Or just be in touch with guys like John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Kevin McCarthy and Greg Walden. I know, they are all Republicans, but they are among the Republican leadership and happen to be the folks who generally represent my views. And anyway, didn’t you say something about bipartisanship way back in 2008?
So that’s it. No really. That’s it. Well, except that I’m wondering if you’re going to keep up the little lottery thing you’ve been running through the campaign. I’m still interested in a night or two in the Lincoln Bedroom.
Jim Huffman is the dean emeritus of Lewis & Clark Law School, the co-founder of Northwest Free Press and a member of the Hoover Institution’s De Nault Task Force on Property Rights, Freedom and Prosperity.