Dear Mr. President,

I know it might seem odd that I am reaching out to you, but I am not sure who else to turn to. I feel as though there’s something wrong in Congress and am hoping that you’d be the right person to talk to about it. Getting right to the point since I know you’re busy, the members of Congress seem to fight a lot and not really like each other very much which doesn’t seem like a very good situation for getting your work done. I know it’s a job and all and maybe you don’t always love all of your co-workers, but their work environment feels particularly hostile. I think that’s a problem.

I’ve been taught that it’s not always helpful to just complain or point out problems without having some thoughts on what a possible solution might be, so I’ve put some thought into that and wanted to see what you think.

There’s a really cool process out there called conflict resolution. I am not an expert in it myself, but I found this online about it which says: ​​”Conflict resolution is a way for two or more parties to find a peaceful solution to a disagreement among them. The disagreement may be personal, financial, political, or emotional. When a dispute arises, often the best course of action is negotiation to resolve the disagreement.” It sounds sort of similar to mediation but less formal as in not legally binding so to speak. From what I understand though, it can help people who don’t agree learn to listen to one another better in order to have a better relationship and then hopefully agree about more things together. Sounds pretty cool to me. So that’s one thought.

There’s also this thing called team building. I know it’s mostly used in corporations, and of course, the government is not one, but it seems like it could still be useful since you have to work together, AND get things done at the same time, just like a corporation does. I think what would happen is that people who don’t always get along together would actually have to do some hard, and fun, things as a team in order to learn to work through problems together. I’ve done something like it once at an old job. We went white water rafting and had to work together to keep paddling and stay out of the really rough rapids and not flip over. We all liked each other so maybe it was a little different, but it still seems like a good idea. Maybe Congress would like to do something like that?

This next one is a little bit more “out there,” but I was thinking of something along the lines of couple’s counseling. I guess it doesn’t have to be couples counseling, I just know that couples can get awfully upset with each other, do some pretty mean things to each other, and come out of it with the help of counseling. It could also be something like family counseling since obviously the members of Congress are not romantically involved with one another, but I hope you get my point. Sometimes people don’t see eye to eye. They feel hurt, threatened, angry and disagree about things like how to manage money, raise kids, clean the house. So they go to a counselor who helps them understand the other’s needs better so that they can be in a healthier relationship and solve their problems more regularly. I sort of wish we could all go through couple’s counseling together, but that might get complicated.

I know you might be thinking I’m crazy, but I hope you can hear me out. We are in a desperate situation here. I just learned that this week one of the members made an animated video of himself killing another member. That seems very much against an employee code of conduct. What does Human Resources have to say about this? I would think there are even laws against this type of behavior. It’s worse than I thought!

I can’t help but feel like our government has turned into a sports league where everyone has their favorite team who they root for fanatically. Nothing against sports of course, but the problem is only one team can win. That certainly leaves out a large segment of the population to have a say in how we are governed. I know, I know. It’s complicated, you’re thinking. I don’t disagree. I am just saying that I think it would be worth the effort, or even the experiment, to see if we can’t solve some of the problems in Congress so that they can start solving the problems outside of Congress. I suppose it’s also possible that Congress is fighting because we ourselves are fighting. They are doing it on our behalf perhaps? I guess I don’t know which came first, but what I do know is that if we all stop fighting and learn to try to live with one another we’ll be a lot better off in the long run. Otherwise we’re just running up and down the field and listening for the cheers.

Sincerely,

Theresa Lyn Widmann

(Naivety and cheekiness intentionally included.)