November 29, 2003
PREACHING TO THE VIRTUIAL CHOIR:
New giant on Dems' stage (Martin Sieff, 11/29/2003, UPI)
Suddenly MoveOn.org is everywhere. And as Gore's choice of its venue to delivering his blistering Nov. 9 attack on Bush shows -- in a development that may come to signal his eventual availability as a "stop Howard Dean" candidate for the Democratic right -- the upstart Web-based Internet organization has suddenly become the market place for aspiring Democratic national leaders to hawk their wares and reach out to the party grass roots.It is quite a leap for a group that was founded half a decade ago. But MoveOn.org, started in 1998 by Silicon Valley entrepreneurs Joan Blades and Wes Boyd, has come a long way fast by flouting conventional wisdom and making visionary leaps that so far have paid off amazingly often.
The group seeks to revive liberal fortunes by marrying middle-class, baby-boom yuppie frustration, and even horror, at the repeated political triumphs of President George W. Bush and the conservative Republicans with the wonders of Internet technology and it has swept the high-tech, suburban middle-class Web-surfers like a tidal wave.
Once you've got the liberal "high-tech, suburban middle-class Web-surfers" on your side, it only takes another 45% of America to get to 50. Posted by Orrin Judd at November 29, 2003 11:41 AM
Here's what always ticked me off about MoveOn.org: they were formed to defend Clinton against impeachment on the premise that sex isn't important, we just need to move on and do what's best for the country, blah blah blah. I didn't agree, but it was a defensible position.
Then, after all that ended, what's the next big task for MoveOn.org? Why, it's working to defeat Republican impeachment managers in Congress, of course! None of that "let's move on for the good of the country" stuff, let's get revenge!
Posted by: PapayaSF at November 29, 2003 2:29 PMThe Movers.on that I know are not middleclass, at least only barely, not suburbanites.
They are either little old ladies in tennis shoes or young idealists without much knowledge of the world.
But its only a small sample.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at November 29, 2003 3:19 PMI live in a community of "high-tech, suburban middle-class Web-surfers" -- hell, I AM a high-tech, suburban middle-class Web-surfer -- and I don't know of many around here who would be favorably disposed to MoveOn.org's message.
Admittedly a small, unscientific sample, but still . . . makes you wonder if they really know what their membership is, or even if they want to intentionally misrepresent it.
Posted by: Mike Morley at November 29, 2003 6:45 PMHeh. I'm a member of MoveOn.org. I signed up (twice!) back when they were sending floods of antiwar messages to congress to tie up their communication lines. Not a few of us, though, discovered that you could just change the words of your message and suddenly, voila! You could send free pro-war messages to congress all you liked.
I still get their emails, and find it useful to watch what they're up in arms about. And to mess with their polls.
The best thing about MoveOn.org is their nearly unbroken list of failures since the impeachment went their way.
Posted by: Timothy at November 29, 2003 9:11 PMGore? Save us.
Posted by: genecis at November 30, 2003 10:48 AMYou really think they got 5%. I doubt it.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at December 1, 2003 1:27 AM