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Web spurs revolution in race for president
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Widespread Internet access is likely to fundamentally change the 2008 presidential race in fundraising, candidate interactions and, most importantly, the messages voters hear.
Just five years ago, only 17 percent of American households had broadband Internet connections. Now the figure is nearly half, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
Vastly more money will be raised and spent on the Internet this election. And the carefully scripted messages of political campaigns will now have to compete with freewheeling blogs, ads and videos created by individuals who don’t face the same rules about the messages and information they put out.
“There’s a real strong possibility most of what you remember of the `08 campaign is going to be created by voters,” said Michael Turk, Internet director for President Bush’s 2004 campaign.
Already, so-called user-generated content is roiling campaigns. Virginia Republican George Allen, a presidential hopeful who was running for re-election to the U.S. Senate last year, lost after widespread exposure of a videotape of him calling a staffer for his opponent “macaca.”
Two candidates have learned that an unguarded moment can now be seen by millions: YouTube has a video of New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton singing the “Star-Spangled Banner” painfully off-key. And fellow Democrat John Edwards brushes his hair at length in a video set to the tune “I Feel Pretty.”
An ad with the big-brother theme of 1984 promoting Democratic Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois over Clinton is likely the first of many that will captivate millions. The ad was posted on YouTube anonymously, raising an issue about how political discourse could have fewer limits in the Internet era.
Television ads, which will still make up the bulk of the 2008 campaign, must disclose who paid for them and meet content standards because broadcast airwaves are publicly owned and regulated.
But the Internet is different.
“We have a shake-up time ahead of us to figure out what’s appropriate,” said Karen Jagoda, president of the E-Voter Institute in California, a trade group for Web publishers and political consultants who deal with the Internet. “I think a lot of people are going to test the limits. They’re going to put inflammatory messages out there because they can.”
The anti-Clinton-ad creator was outed by a Web site and then tied to the Obama campaign, which had previously disavowed a connection. It turned out it was made by an employee of one of the Obama campaign’s contractors.
That’s a lesson in how the “blogosphere” can be self-policing, even though the Internet doesn’t face the traditional limits on appropriate content, said Jeff Jarvis, a journalism teacher and blogger whose site, PrezVid.com, tracks places such
as YouTube.
The rise of the Internet means a loss of message control for both parties, but that’s especially scary for Republicans because they have tightly controlled it in the past, said Turk, a Republican who has not joined a campaign this year.
So far, the Republican candidates aren’t taking advantage of the Internet as much as Democrats. “The Republicans seem to not be getting it online,” he said. “There’s a feeling they don’t want to tinker with the formula and become the New Coke.”
That lack of control over message is wonderful, said David Weinberger, a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School. The Internet, through blogs, YouTube, interactive town meetings and communication among like-minded citizens gives voters more say, said Weinberger, who was Howard Dean’s senior Internet
adviser and now helps the Edwards campaign. “It’s a better representation of what democracy is supposed to be.”
Candidates are embracing the Internet with various methods and levels of enthusiasm. People who track Internet politics say Obama has generated a lot of buzz through his use of social-networking sites such as MySpace, where about 100,000 “friends” are linked to him and venues such as YouTube. He also has used the Internet to raise money and organize people.
Many candidates are welcoming bloggers to their campaign sites and even blogging themselves. Clinton and others announced their candidacies on the Web first. And many are following the trail blazed by the 2000 John McCain campaign to raise large sums of money quickly.
This time, candidates will need to use the Internet for money and advertising as well as mobilizing support, Turk said.
TAMARA LYTLE
The Orlando Sentinel