Clay Shirky on the last Internet campaign:
Those of us watching Dean thinking “This is it – the campaign we’ve been waiting for” were, in a way, correct. This is it, or rather that was it, before Dean decided that he could run a populist campaign without the support of the populous. The big surprise, to me and to many of us, is how little it mattered. Though Trippi said “It’s all about money”, they blew through $40M to surprisingly little effect.
I have a bad terrific case of schadenfreude about this: I am laughing about how paypal-tipping Deaniacs are still scratching their heads about how they’re still behind 0-9. The entire Dean campaign, with the “Internet constituency” as one of its most vocal (or is that blogarrific?) drivers, reminded me far too much of the second superpower meme floating around a while ago. That meme, like the energy behind the Deaniacs, fed on a vicious cycle of groupthink and faux bleeding-heart politics. At least the Deaniacs spent $40m of their own money to realize exactly where they stand — i.e., nowhere; which is more than can be said about the reflexive anti-war brigade.
