Money Quote: “He who masters the Internet will not only level the playing field, he will also level the opposition,”
Another chapter in the saga of the "Rise of the Internet"
"The Hill"
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October 15, 2003
Grassroots growing fast in cyberspace
Web adds pressure on U.S. lawmakers
By Klaus Marre
“A few of them will get their clocks cleaned in 2004,” said Larry Purpuro, former deputy chief of staff at the Republican National Committee, referring to politicians too unimaginative to adapt to the Internet.
The Web already has helped raise millions of dollars in campaign contributions, aided grassroots efforts in legislative battles and is the tool used to build both large and small networks of activists.
The big remaining questions are not whether the Internet will change American politics, but who will utilize the new technology best, and when its full impact will become known.
Recently, grassroots campaigns have been credited with contributing to Democrats’ prevailing on two issues and setting Congress on a collision course with the White House.
Last month the Senate passed a joint resolution of disapproval in an effort to overturn the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) relaxed media ownership rules, an effort spearheaded by Sens. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) by addition, the House and Senate, where Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) led the initiative, have voted on language disapproving the Bush administration’s proposed changes to overtime rules.
That was especially significant in the House because earlier this year, lawmakers had voted to retain the Bush administration’s overtime rules. Many credited grassroots campaigning with getting several Republicans to switch their position on the issue to allow a nonbinding motion to instruct the conferees to pass.
Wes Boyd, a founder of the grassroots group MoveOn.org, said one of his organization’s greatest successes was its contribution on the Senate vote on the media ownership rules.
The vote involved an issue that people normally would not focus on but did when grassroots groups moved it into the spotlight and raised public awareness, he said.
Although more times than not the group does not reach its stated goals, such as preventing the war in Iraq, Boyd said MoveOn.org always gets something out of its campaigns.
“Win, lose or draw — we get stronger” because public awareness is raised and additional people join the organization, he said.
An industry source said organized labor’s grassroots campaign on the overtime vote was aided by the unions’ ability to set up a system in which a union member “only had to hit a button” to send an e-mail opposing the Bush administration’s proposed changes to the overtime regulations.
The source added that there is “no question” that the union’s grassroots effort had an effect on the overtime vote in the House because organized labor and other groups managed to flood members’ offices with e-mails and calls.
Meanwhile, Purpuro, the architect of the Republican Party’s year 2000 online initiative, the e.GOP Project, said the growing importance of the Internet in politics will be clear in November of next year.
“The Web will be revolutionary in this election cycle, but political pros are not as revolutionary in utilizing it,” he said. “Politicians and campaign pros are not known for innovation and risk-taking. Too many dumb politicians are wedded to the old ways [of campaigning].”
In 2001, Purpuro was declared one of “25 Who Are Changing the World” of Internet and politics by PoliticsOnline, Harvard University and the American Association of Political Consultants for his work for the RNC. He is also the founder of Web consulting firm Rightclick Strategies.
Purpuro’s message to his party this time around is that although Republicans outhustled Democrats online in the 2000 election cycle, the tide has shifted and the Democratic National Committee is “ahead in the game.”
Patrick G. Ryan
Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) after voting on FCC issues.
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Liberal Democratic presidential candidates are “showing a higher level of sophistication” in utilizing the Internet, he said, adding, “Left-of-center organizations are showing more energy, innovation and more strength in numbers.”
He cited MoveOn.org, EMILY’s List and gay rights groups as examples.
“I can’t think of a group on the right,” Purpuro said, adding, though, that they “have a lot of potential.”
Jim Moore, a senior fellow at Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society, agrees that left-of-center groups are “putting a lot of energy in this and are getting a lot of traction.”
Some of this is happening “out of necessity” because Republicans dominate direct mail efforts and talk radio, Moore explained.
“The Howard Dean phenomenon should be a wakeup call to all political operatives who think in 2004 it will be business as usual,” Purpuro added.
The former Vermont governor began his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in relative obscurity, but his anti-war views and the use of the Internet have helped to propel him to frontrunner status.
In the last two fundraising periods, Dean has raised half his contributions online, and his campaign has utilized the Internet to build a growing base of tens of thousands of active volunteers.
Moore said the Internet is “changing the culture of political fundraising” by allowing individuals “who never considered making a contribution” to give money.
Dean is the main beneficiary so far. While long-established candidates are getting the vast majority of their campaign funding from individuals giving at least $1,000, Dean gets his money from smaller contributions.
At the end of the June reporting cycle, President Bush received 69 percent of his funds from those giving the maximum contribution of $2,000, while Dean got less than 10 percent from such large donors.
Presidential candidates Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Rep. Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.) each received over 70 percent from those giving at least $1,000.
MoveOn.org’s Boyd said the political direction of the Internet and the relative success of the organizations using it would be more accurately described as inside/outside rather than left or right of center.
He argued that the Internet can capture the “roiling discontent” of those frustrated with current leaders and the political process.
As opposed to television and radio, the Internet is not a tool for narrative but rather for conversation, Boyd said, adding that MoveOn.org selects the issues it get involved in by listening to its participants and looking “to where the energy is.”
After deciding to become involved in an issue, MoveOn.org, which has 1.7 million participants in the United States, tries to be “civil” and “get people to use their brain,” he said. “If politics at the dinner table means getting screamed at by your uncle,” people will stay away from the process, Boyd said.
An effective political campaign includes organization, fundraising and communication, Purpuro argued, stating that “the Web represents the most cost-effective, high-impact tool a campaign can use.”
“Howard Dean’s success should erase the doubts from the greatest cynics,” he said.
Purpuro calls the Internet “the great equalizer in politics” that propelled Dean from an “asterisk” to a frontrunner for the Democratic nomination. Dean’s organization has used the Internet “beautifully,” especially by giving people the chance to become actively involved in the campaign, Purpuro said.
Dean Campaign Manager Joe Trippi made this year’s list of “25 Who Are Changing the World.”
“Advantages of the medium allow for the easy collection of small donations but more importantly the participation of small donors [in the campaign],” Purpuro said.
Moore said he believes the Internet is an effective political tool because it gives people the chances to become involved by building activism “from the ground up.” People are not limited to listening and watching, as in radio or television, Moore said, but also can communicate with others and take action, such as attending or staging political events or donating money.
The impact of the Web is not limited to Dean’s campaign and will be evident in the election, Purpuro said. “Web-driven Davids will take down well-funded Goliaths,” he predicts.
Boyd also said the Internet is most valuable in political campaigning when not seen as just another source for money. “Leaders … need to see the Internet as a way to engage people,” he said.
Boyd argued that the Internet would help candidates tap into small donors online and said he hopes that groups such as MoveOn.org would “decrease the importance of ‘big money’ [in the political process].”
One of the events that led to a surge in support for Dean was his placing first in a MoveOn.org online primary. Tens of thousands of MoveOn.org participants allowed the organization to pass on their contact information to the campaigns.
Boyd said the possibility of retaining people’s contact information is one thing that sets the Internet apart from other forms of grassroots activism. “At an antiwar march, at the end of the day everybody goes home” but the organizers do not get everybody’s address. The Internet, however, enables organizers to mobilize large numbers of people instantly in the future, he said.
AFL-CIO Legislative Director Bill Samuel said MoveOn.org began a new kind of grassroots movement that complements union efforts.
Samuel said organized labor had been effective in get-out-the-vote efforts in election fights but had not done as well in legislative battles. He credits groups such as MoveOn.org with having helped to change lawmakers’ minds on the overtime issue.
The industry source who commented on the overtime vote said more people now get involved than before because it takes less effort to send a form e-mail to Congress. “In the old days, a businessman or a worker had to write a letter, which took much more time,” the source said, adding that in the future, “a written letter will mean much more.”
Dennis Johnson, associate dean of the Graduate School of Political Management at George Washington University, agreed, saying that one problem faced by those launching online grassroots campaigns is that e-mail does not have as much weight in congressional offices as letters do.
He said it is “a lot cheaper to mobilize people faster” through the Web. However, Johnson said that once everybody is using the Internet as a tool for grassroots operations “it will dull the impact” of each campaign.
Although Johnson said that the importance of the Internet on politics will increase, he called the impact of MoveOn.org’s involvement in the overtime vote “relatively minor,” adding, “MoveOn was not the reason” for how the vote turned out.
Johnson, the principal investigator for the Congress Online Project, which analyzes congressional websites, said that to be most effective, the Internet has to be used as “one of many tools.”
Johnson argued that merely sending out thousands of e-mails would not equal an effective grassroots campaign. He believes a good understanding of politics has to be a staple for successful Internet lobbying campaigns.
“Strength in numbers and getting the right message out at the right time to the right member” is important to succeed but tricky to accomplish, Johnson said.
However, Purpuro said times are changing and lobbyists will have to adapt to the tools of a new generation, adding that e-mail could replace the personal contacts lobbyists currently tout.
“Eighty-five percent of Hill staffers are under 35, and they are online all the time,” he said.
Further evidence of the importance of the Internet in politics is that lawmakers are making more use of the medium and becoming more skillful at it, Johnson said.
In its second year of analyzing congressional homepages, the Congress Online Project identified more good websites than it had the year before.
He added that currently House Republicans and Senate Democrats are doing a better job with their websites than their respective counterparts.
However, challengers may be doing an even better job with the Internet as they build their own grassroots campaigns to unseat incumbents.
Many experts say there will be a watershed moment in the future that will show how powerful the Internet has become. While they do not want to predict when this day will come, it could be Nov. 2, 2004 — Election Day.
“He who masters the Internet will not only level the playing field, he will also level the opposition,” Purpuro said. |
