I was inspired to write this by DarkSyde's recent post,
Are You Mad Enough Yet? He's got it dead right, in my opinion: expressing outrage on the Internet is easy; taking action to do something about it is a lot more difficult. I know I myself have been guilty of this many times, reading stories that anger me and then not doing anything substantive about them.
So, I have a suggestion.
Why couldn't this site have some sort of database where people who have written letters and placed phone calls to politicians, or otherwise taken action in response to something they've read here, could make a record of that fact? The database could show how much total action Kossacks have taken on any given issue, and each individual commenter and diarist could have their total activism count listed next to their name, similar to comment mojo. I think this could play a valuable role in encouraging members of the community to do more - I know it would be a help to me.
Anyone have any thoughts?