letters to Obama

Yesterday I came across to a link to a story in The New York Times Magazine published on January 17, 2017, To Obama With Love, and Hate, and Desperation. I started reading, and I just couldn't stop. It's the story of the organization in the Obama White House that read the daily mail from citizens to the president, the story of the people who wrote, the story of response.

"At the beginning of his first term, President Obama said he wanted to read his mail. He said he would like to see 10 letters a day. After that, the 10LADs, as they came to be called, were put in a purple folder and added to the back of the briefing book he took with him to the residence on the second floor of the White House each night." ---------------------------------------- "President Obama was the first to come up with a deliberate and explicit practice of 10 letters every day. If the president was home at the White House (he did not tend to mail when he traveled), he would be reading constituent mail, and everyone knew it, and systems were put in place to make sure it happened. The mail had currency. Some staff members called it “the letter underground.” Starting in 2010, all hard mail would be scanned and preserved. Starting in 2011, every email every day would be used to create a word cloud, its image distributed around the White House so policy makers and staff members alike could get a glimpse at what everyday Americans were writing in to say." quote from New York Times article

It's a long article, very interesting and so worth reading.

Click to read To Obama With Love, and Hate, and Desperation.