Hartford Courant: After Dean's Online Roll

[Larkspur]

He Now Must Turn Cyber-Success Into Votes
http://www.ctnow.com/news/custom/topnews/hc-dean0913.artsep13,1,5593807.story?coll=hc-headlines-topnews

WASHINGTON -- It is turning out to be the smartest $2,500 that campaign veteran Joe Trippi ever spent.

That's how much Trippi, who is managing former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean's run for the Democratic presidential nomination, shelled out six months ago to start promoting his candidate on the Meetup.com Internet site.

At the time, the move seemed a what-have-we-got-to-lose union between a startup company that used the Internet to organize local gatherings of people with shared interests, and an upstart candidate struggling for attention in a crowded Democratic field.

It now looks like a stroke of genius. The campaign has been so successful attracting young, white, politically motivated, liberal-leaning voters through Meetup.com and on its own heavily visited weblog that Dean has emerged as a front-runner.

Which means, now comes the hard part. Beyond harnessing the potential of the young and the Internet savvy, Trippi and company must, and are trying to, dig deeper into the ranks of the party faithful. Dean recently has been making a hard play for trade union endorsements, and in debates has tried to solidify his credentials with Hispanic and African American voters.
<SNIP>

I found the "whether the current Dean crew of young supporters turning out at rallies - he drew 3,700 in Maryland this week, 10,000 in Seattle over Labor Day weekend - will also show up to vote is a legitimate one. History, he says, suggests they won't" lazy journalism. I didn't attend the rallies, or the tour but my Meetups are mostly made up of adults 30 and over. We've had a few college students show up, but they were in the minority.

[w4rma]

1. This statement is so, so incorrect.

…
"A couple things motivate them - drinking age laws and college loans. Beyond those two, there's not much else that motivates them to vote," Wrighton said.
…

[Egnever]

2. I was just at a house party today

And I found the same thing I am 37 and most at the house party were my age or older. There are certainly a lot of young people suporting dean but to say its a majority of his suporters betrays everything my lying eyes have seen so far

[tsipple]

3. You Show Up for a Dean Rally in August, 2003...

...And then "Oh, I guess it's too much bother to go vote..."?!?!?!

The Courant is a fine newspaper generally, but talk about out to lunch!

[Cha]

4. What I've always liked about Dean is the Grassroots..

"This is all moving on a very grass-roots level," said Roger Atwood of Washington. "There's a feeling of movement here - not just a campaign, a political movement" :kick:

Thanks Larkspur!

[Nazgul35]

5. Here in Lansing Michigan....

we have grown exponentially....

When I went to the last meetup I could attend in June, we had 27 people at a coffee shop....in September we had 83 people, about half of whom hadn't been there before....as far as the young college students were concerned, they were about 25% of the crowd...most were in their mid 30s and older....

Can't wait till the next meetup....hoping to hit that 100 mark...