Second sight

[w4rma]

The template for successful presidential campaigns was established by James ("It's the economy, stupid") Carville and Karl (Boy Genius) Rove. Stay relentlessly on message, control the agenda. But Howard Dean thinks there is another way. The Dean campaign for the Democrats has enthusiastically surrendered control to the internet. The success of Dean, who now leads the polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, means other aspirant candidates are following his lead.

Nowhere is Dean's surrender more obvious than on the official Dean weblog, grandly named Blog for America. It is the creation of Mathew Gross, who in March flew to Dean's HQ in Burlington with the idea of creating a candidate blog. With no appointment, he wandered into campaign manager Joe Trippi's office to explain. Trippi said if he could get a blog up in 24 hours, he had a job.

Blog for America now has 35,000 readers and several thousand comments each day. "Wherever you are, you can participate in the campaign," says Gross. "Supporters feel as if they are in the room in Burlington HQ." One of the most successful Dean slogans - "people-powered Howard" - came from a comment on the blog.

"Our belief was you have to let control go," says Gross. "We truly are a grassroots campaign and if you build a command structure on top, you kill it. You have to have trust in the American people."
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Most of the candidates now have weblogs. On September 27, Wesley Clark's blog, Generally Speaking, was launched. It is run by veteran blogger Cameron Barrett, who says it has already proved its value.
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"The only way to defeat Bush is for everyone to become involved and to get engaged," says Gross. "Our entire web presence is moving out towards that. When you get to the point where you're fighting Karl Rove and $200m of advertising, that's what you're going to need."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1058507,00.html