Because I couldn't be bothered to pay attention in school, pretty
much everything I know about the way Washington, D.C., works comes from
Joan Didion's essay "Insider Baseball," a few key numbers from
Schoolhouse Rock, and seasons one through four of The West
Wing. Which is the same thing as saying I don't know anything about
the way Washington, D.C., works.
But raging ignorance and deep ambivalence didn't stop me from doing
a day's lobbying work last week, in actual Senate and House office
buildings, concerning an actual bill that's actually before the first
session of the actual 111th Congress and that actually affects me and
most musicians I know. And of course, by "affects me" I mean "promises
to earn me more money." The lobbying organization musicFIRST (Fairness
in Radio Starting Today), which is funded by the Recording Industry
Association of America, among other organizations not necessarily
associated with what you might call grassroots activism, paid for me
and more than 100 fellow musicians—including Sam Moore (of Sam
& Dave), Suzanne Vega, Cynthia Johnson (best known as the singer of
"Funkytown"), and at least one of the Four Tops (Abdul "Duke"
Fakir)—to travel to Washington. They put us up in reasonably nice
hotel rooms, briefed us, furnished us with just-in-case talking points,
and guided us to our meetings with the relevant aides to the relevant
senators and representatives. In my group's case, that meant stopping
by the offices of Democratic senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell,
Democratic representative Jay Inslee, and Republican representative
Dean Heller of Nevada.
The Political Education of the Self
The author takes a turn at lobbying for a day.