Let me engage with Paul’s post about Ron Paul’s fundraising day yesterday, which netted $4.2 million. When I said that his campaign is not “some wacko fringe campaign,” I wasn’t talking in the sense of the ideas Paul is putting forward, particularly the ones where he seeks to abolish every federal agency. It’s not a fringe campaign in the sense that it is better-funded and better-organized, at least online, than practically anything on the Republican side. Now, I do think that Paul’s online presence is magnified by two factors: 1) there are a lot more libertarians online than there are in the general population, 2) either the campaign or supporters of it are using illegal spambots to push out email messages. However, the fact that This November 5th, with almost no media attention outside of Paul blogs and forums, became the most successful online fundraiser in history, cannot be denied or dismissed.
There are a variety of reasons for this. The Paul campaign openly embraced a supporter-driven “flashmob fundraising” tactic, and encouraged a close relationship with its own grassroots like nobody else in the Presidential field. Whether that can translate into votes remains to be seen, but it absolutely is a brilliant model for any campaign that’s unafraid of “losing message discipline” and interested in empowering supporters.
There are certain things that mass emails do well. Something like this isn’t one of them. Things like this require a zeal and an intensity and an iterativeness that can only be found in trace amounts in any campaign-sponsored venue. Campaign emails can be successful if the response rate is tiny. Obama could send an email announcing his own fundraising day; a certain percentage will pledge, and a certain percentage of those will follow through. Because email is an inherently transactional medium, the numbers aren’t likely to be as high relative to the size of the campaign.
By doing this out in the wild you can communicate an offbeat idea like this better, and flesh it out more. You can find concentrations of intent where a willingness to donate is astronomical — and create enough energy to suck more mass into that energized core.
The second, and perhaps more important, explanation is that Paul filled a need in the Republican electorate, not only of opposition to the Iraq war, but of principled opinions, even if they may be vehemently opposed by large portions of the rank and file. In an age of Bush and the pretenders to the GOP throne, Paul has conviction and integrity. There is a generation of paleoconservatives who haven’t seen such an unconventional candidate who preferred to state his core beliefs – however distasteful some may find them – in some time. I would guess that accounts for his appeal online. And in so doing, it is in many ways a mirror image of Howard Dean’s unconventional 2004 campaign. He isn’t about to send me changing my registration, but I understand why others have flocked to the campaign, even if it relies a bit much on the “Great Man” theory of politics for my taste.
Paul shouldn’t be dismissed, but LEARNED from, as a model for how 21st-century campaign can leverage the Internet, not just as an ATM machine but as a partner.
5 Responses to “The Meaning Of Paul’s Flashmob Bonanza”
Fair enough, David — I am certainly impressed by the Paul campaign’s very innovative approach to building a historically notable campaign with extremely limited resources. And I’d tend to agree, given the rest of the 2008 GOP field, that Paul seems to represent one of the few Republican candidates with a clearly discernable and reliable set of principles.
On the other hand, I think Fred has a point — Paul may be skilled at generating enthusiasm, but when enthusiasm is detached from political reality (and reality in general), what good is it really?
Something to say?
I am willing to bet that most Paul fans won’t vote in the general election – after he loses the nomination and, more importantly, that the Ron Paul cult grows and is nourished in a parallel reality much the same way as Lyndon LaRouche’s fanboys have hounded suburban strip malls for decades.
Left by Fred Gooltz
November 6, 2007 at 8:28pm