Obama-Clinton signals a massive change in political campaigns, writes Ron Brownstein:
“But now the ability to inspire large numbers of supporters to work on
your behalf—by contributing financially, participating in outreach
programs organized by the campaign, or informally talking to friends
and family—is joining and, perhaps, eclipsing those television-inspired
skills in importance. The change is still incipient, but the
unprecedented scale of the Clinton-Obama race suggests that
presidential politics may be moving from the television-based network
era to an Internet-based networked era in which candidates who can
attract and inspire vast networks of supporters will enjoy potentially
decisive advantages over those who cannot.”
UPDATE: I wanted to say something like this yesterday but was too rushed. Matt Yglesias is absolutely right about this: “Clinton and (even more so) Obama are improving on many models
and ideas that Howard Dean used in 2004 and were even to some extent
present in the McCain 2000 campaign.” Obama has taken it much further, but is not the first.
April 23rd, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Clinton’s 10-point win in the Pennsylvania primary highlights this issue. The older demographic went for Clinton, the young for Obama. As we move towards a “new politics,” or just the plain old politics of tomorrow, the internet will be a paramount tool that the young voters of today will use to make up their mind in a decade.
A little humor – I’m an internet savvy male in my 20s, and I support the Clinton collage – now that’s both counterparts of “Clinton,” – Bill AND Hillary. How does Brownstein explain that?