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technoratiTechnology and the Internet are changing democracy in America. Personal Democracy Forum is a hub for the exciting conversation underway between political professionals, technologists, and anyone else invigorated by the remarkable potential of technology to engage citizens in the democratic process.
The Web on the Candidates
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Now that we're down to two major party presidential candidates -- John McCain and Barack Obama -- do partisan voters and activists have any hope of holding their nominee accountable before election day? Open Left's Mike Lux doesn't think so, writing that the time has passed for the netroots to try to influence Obama's trajectory. Says Mike: "[T]his is a place where the old-school politico in me takes over: I see no choice other than to be totally, thoroughly in the tank for the Democratic Presidential nominee in the five months."
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Of course, there are those not so ready to give up the ghost. Example one: MyBarackObama.com, Obama's own social networking site, is teaching the campaign what it feels like when your machines turn against you. A new group called "Senator Obama - Please Vote Against FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act]" is sporting 450 members and counting. MyBO was set up to facilitate self-organization in support of the Obama, but here it's being used to instruct the candidate on how to do his day job in the Senate. Of course, give your core community a stake in your campaign 2.0 and they may well expect to have some input in how you govern 2.0. Mike Stark has the details. (Thx Brett Schenker)
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And example two: United by their commitment to civil liberties, Ron Paul's online supporters and some high-profile bloggers on the left, including Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher, are teaming up to coordinate an online "money bomb" around the upcoming FISA vote, reports the Wall Street Journal's Amy Schatz. According to Accountability Now, the bi-partisan PAC set up to organize the effort around "a defense of our basic constitutional framework [and] restoring core political liberties," the money will go, in part, to challenging candidates who "trample upon those values" and supporting those who defend them.
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The Next Right's Patrick Ruffini tells fellow conservatives that they need to start seeing all this messing around on the Internet as a both play and work.
The Candidates on the Web
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John McCain is keeping up a focus on energy policy, and a new web ad from the McCain camp casts Obama as "Dr. No" when it comes to that space -- no on offshore drilling, no on nuclear energy dependence, no on a gas tax "holiday." But Dick Cheney's favorite web resource FactCheck.org from the Annenberg Public Policy Center finds the ad misleading, particularly where it implies that Obama has stood in the way of innovation on the energy front. (FactCheck adds an quirky footnote about how the plot of the 1962 "Dr. No" film staring Sean Connery involved a nuclear reactor meltdown.)
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Writing about a new study just out from the PR firm Waggener Edstrom Worldwide, Jose Antonio Vargas says that, when it comes to young voters, "it's the medium, not the messenger."
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Baraculture watch: This outdoor mural by the artist Koolhats in Denver's Sante Fe art district has been viewed on Flickr more than 87,000 times. (Via BallotVox)
TechCongress and Beyond
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Speaking of Denver, LatinoPundit reports that the Democratic National Convention in the Mile High City this August will be simul-webcast in Spanish.
In Case You Missed It...
Writing about Personal Democracy Forum 2008, Deanna Zandt makes the point that conferences --tech and otherwise -- are like genetic pools: they need diversity to thrive.
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Libertarians Barr and Root ...
will make historically high numbers in November .
Altho there is virtually nothing Obama could do to lose to McCain , Bob Barr and his running mate Wayne Allyn Root , inheriting Ron Paul's libertarian awakening , will make embarrassingly high ( for the Republicans ) numbers in many states perhaps denying McCain any electoral votes and solidifying the Libertarian Party as the country's only effective third political voice .
Whether the Libertarians with their broadband-ready philosophy of voluntary relations between independent peers as opposed to the use of force by a political class will in the end replace the Republican Party as they did the Whigs with the advent of the telegraph and railroad will take a few election cycles to tell . However , when you look at the extent to which the ruling duopoly has coalesced in its support for wars both foreign and domestic and the sheer destructive irrationality on such topics as energy , the Libertarians offer the only hope of escape from a terribly bleak future .
-- www.CoSy.com --