At around 8/11/06 1:31 pm, Doug Henwood wrote:
> On Nov 8, 2006, at 11:15 AM, ravi wrote:
>
>> The 'netroots' are claiming the Dem successes as [by and large] a
>> result of Internet activism.
>
> They would claim that, but their boy wonder, Lamont, lost pretty
> badly. Everything else was well within the paramaters of "normal"
> (i.e., pre-netroots) politics. Face to face campaigning matters,
> door-knocking matters, get out the vote operations matter, and most
> of that involves shoe leather and telephones.
>
I don't think the claim is that feet on the ground effort can be
dispensed with or is to be contrasted with netroots. A lot of netroots
efforts were in fact aimed at such groundwork. I cannot believe I am
defending the netroots, but: they helped keep the buzz alive, forgotten
news items active, provided a space for like-minded progressives to
convene, plan events, activities, GOTV drives, funding drives, etc.
Lamont was not only their poster-child but also capable of
self-financing his campaign. Nonetheless, the netroots deserves some
credit for his primary win and his arguably decent showing yesterday.
The "by and large" claim is just my (potentially unfair) summary of
their position, but the rest of the text of my message points out that
even if this were not entirely true, they deserve some credit.
As I noted in my response to MP, I do not think the Internet is the
solution... but it can (and should) be a very effective tool.
--ravi
