As the dust settles on the Democratic primary fight, I think more people are going to be turning their attention to understanding the significance of the new kind of political machine the Obama campaign has been building. Matt Stoller, one of my favorite netroots writers, has a great stab in this direction over on OpenLeft with a post he titled “Obama’s Consolidation of the Party.” I’m not sure I agree with all of his conclusions about Obama’s dominating and remaking the Democratic Party, but there’s surely huge potential in their blending of top-down message discipline, net-centric outreach, Alinsky-UFW-Ganz-inspired field work, Camp Obama trainings, Obama Organizing Fellows, and a new 50-state voter registration effort.
Whether Obama wins or loses in the fall, this network is going to be a game-changer. So I’m planning to spend more time digging in and writing about its internal dynamics, culture and leaders.
As the dust settles on the Democratic primary fight, I think more people are going to be turning their attention to understanding the significance of the new kind of political machine the Obama campaign has been building. Matt Stoller, one of my favorite netroots writers, has a great stab in this direction over on OpenLeft with a post he titled “Obama’s Consolidation of the Party.” I’m not sure I agree with all of his conclusions about Obama’s dominating and remaking the Democratic Party, but there’s surely huge potential in their blending of top-down message discipline, net-centric outreach, Alinsky-UFW-Ganz-inspired field work, Camp Obama trainings, Obama Organizing Fellows, and a new 50-state voter registration effort.
My sources inside the Obama campaign say they currently have more than 800,000 registered users on my.barackobama.com, the campaign’s custom-built social network platform, which has helped spawn the planning of more than 50,000 offline events and the creation of more than 10,000 local or themed groups in support of the campaign. They also claim more than 1.5 million individual donors (no, they didn’t give me a more exact number).
Whether Obama wins or loses in the fall, this network is going to be a game-changer. So I’m planning to spend more time digging in and writing about its internal dynamics, culture and leaders. People may not realize this enough, but presidential campaigns that bill themselves as movements often have a real movement element, and the seeds they plant and forces they unleash can have dramatic effects. The Goldwater campaign of 1964 was the spawning ground of the New Right. The McGovern campaign of 1972 brought a new generation of Democratic activists into national politics (including people like Bill and Hillary Clinton and Gary Hart, for starters). The Jesse Jackson campaigns of 1984 and 1988 helped propel African-Americans into power in cities all over America (think of the David Dinkins success in NYC in 1989). And the Howard Dean campaign of 2004 not only propelled him into his leadership position at the Democratic National Committee, but it also created a new wave of internet-savvy organizers who are everywhere in this cycle.
Will the Obama movement be a real movement that pushes its leader to keep his promises? Or will it be more of a personalized movement of followers attracted to a charismatic star? Will the network talk laterally and organize pressure upward? We don’t know the full answer yet.
At this point, I’m just collecting string. This comment on the Obama blog last night, which picked up on my post about the potential of the world live web, is pretty interesting:
After reading the late night open thread I had to go and visit Hillarys website. I do that from time to time to see what is going on over there. Frankly I find Hillarys site over stimulating and yet extremely boring. There is so much going on all of reminds me of a poorly constructed sales brochure. Hillblazer, FactHub, Hillary Hub, and a blog that is censored. It looks exciting but managages to disapoint. There are so many colors and flashing lights on that website you feel like you are at a carnival and you know you’re about to lose money or dignity.
Her website is not constantly changing and providing information up front. You have to search her site to find the delegate count because she does not want her supporters to care about that. She does not show the map of states because she does not want her supporters to see the drastic difference in the amount of contests won. Her blog does not have devoted regulars like lace, bahamasforobama, or SaSa. She is only on six web communities-obama is everywhere. We have blog posting comments often go into the the high hundreds, she rarely breakes 150 yes she has had more traffic in the past day or two because of the primary but check back on friday and you will see a significant drop off. There is no question that Obama gets significantly more comment postings.
This blog is streamlined and color coordinated, it is constantly updated and visually pleasing to the eye. It is consistant with the use of the logo, and entertaining. It allows it users to freely communicate with each other and the campaign. It is filled with information both from the campaign and the users. We dont censor, you can tell by the amount of trolls lurking throughout, some being very destructive.
Importantly this blog is filled with hope, encourage, a sense of community, we share and we are charitable to each other, and it is all played out on this blog. Yes, we are unique.
Guys I just came back from Indiana I drove thirteen hours each way. Things were so intense there I did not get a chance to blog while I was there. I did get to see our leader and next president in Indianapolis. I took some great pictures and I plan to post later when I write about the trip.
The “our leader” stuff always makes me wonder about the self-direction of the Obama movement. On the other hand, if the campaign isn’t censoring comments, that’s a good sign. Frankly, I don’t think we know the answers yet to the questions I raised above.
May 08, 2008