Facebook gets political

Kudos to the MHS girls track team

     Saturday morning, April 15, the Monticello Nursing and Rehabilitation Center hosted the community Easter egg hunt on their grounds. (They took over the event after the Monticello Jaycees disbanded.)

     The weather thankfully cooperated for the fun and games. Many kids and parents and grandparents showed up for the five-second event. (It’s literally over within minutes after the kids scramble to pick up every egg and piece of candy.)

     But, the shout-out of the day goes to the high school girls track team. They showed up early that morning to help the MNRC section off the grounds for the various age groups, scatted eggs and candy, and helped clean up at the end of the event. Good for you, girls!

     It is awesome to see our high school athletic teams lend a hand in the community, especially on the weekend, a holiday weekend no less. We have a community full of support here. The community supports our athletic teams during meets, games and matches; and in turn, the athletes help support the community.

     What a great lesson volunteerism, especially since next week is National Volunteer Week (April 23-29).

Facebook gets political

     Everything is political these days, despite the election being over and done with, and now Facebook has joined the club by creating its newest feature: “Town Hall.”

     This addition allows Facebook users to simply input their physical address and a list of state and national legislators comes up. Only those legislators connected to Facebook will be seen.

     For me, that includes: Rep. Lee Hein, Sen. Dan Zumbach, Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds, Gov. Terry Branstad, Congressman Rod Blum, Sen. Chuck Grassley, Sen. Joni Ernst, not to mention Vice President Mike Pence and President Donald Trump.

     The idea is to allow social media users to readily access their legislators at the click of a button. If you’re scrolling through their Facebook news feed and come across an article that angers you or just the opposite, you can quickly find your Congress members and contact them to let them know your thoughts and opinions.

     Before the concept of e-mailing and now connecting to their your legislators via social media, constituents used to pick up the phone and call their government officials. After numerous phone calls, some officials either didn’t return phone calls or han their phone lines tied up due to so many calls. Now, there is no excuse for not contacting your legislator and making your voice heard.

     Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been quoted in numerous publications as saying: “Building a civically-engaged community means building new tools to help people engage in a thoughtful and informed way,” Zuckerberg wrote at the time. “The starting point is knowing who represents you and how you can make your voice heard on the decisions that affect your life.”

     There is way too much fighting on social media when it comes to hot-button issues such as politics and religion. It separates families and friends, believe me! Hopefully using Town Hall gives people an outlet, good or bad, in which to express their opinions privately to their legislator versus airing dirty laundry for all to see. (Perhaps I need to take my own advice.)

     If you find that your representatives are not on Facebook, urge them to get on board and stay connected with the people who voted them into office. Government should be transparent, and what better way to accomplish that than through every avenue possible?