Bradley in DC
07-27-2007, 06:32 AM
Paul Is King Of Meetups, But Will It Translate?
By Lee Howard Published on 7/27/2007
IT'S CALLED A MEETUP — ONE word, no hyphen — and it's the latest buzzword in grass-roots political organizing, not to be confused with hookup, the latest word in dating.
“You always have to have a new word for getting together,” laughs Christopher C. Healy, chairman of Connecticut's Republican Party.
“It's just a different spin on what we have been doing for some time,” says Nancy DiNardo, chairman of the state Democratic Party.
Meetups, small gatherings in private homes often arranged through the interactive Web site www.meetup.com, are not restricted to politics. People hold meetups on a range of topics and interests, including knitting, baseball and babies. But, with the political season heating up, meetups like one held this week in Groton Long Point will likely sprout up everywhere, supporting presidential candidates of both parties.
For now, though, the king of the meetup — in Connecticut and across the country — is a little-known GOP presidential candidate, a congressman from Texas named Ron Paul.
“Ron who?” you might ask.
Ron Paul may not take the spotlight from top GOP contenders Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and John McCain in the mainstream press, but he creates a buzz among the disaffected, the disheartened and, perhaps most important, the denizens of the World Wide Web. Paul has consistently triumphed in Internet polls following Republican debates, winning the sound-bite war with his denunciations of the conflict in Iraq and calls for more fiscal restraint.
Paul, a parsimonious spender with a $2.4 million war chest swelling as primary season nears, has six meetup groups working for his election in Connecticut, including the Groton contingent. Paul also boasts 581 groups nationwide, representing about 26,000 activists — more meetup organizations than all GOP contenders combined. Of all the other candidates, only Hillary Rodham Clinton has a local group registered at www.meetup.com.
At a meetup this week at the wood-paneled cottage of Peter and Liz Viering, a dozen backers of Paul, a 10-term congressman who ran a distant third nationwide as a Libertarian Party candidate for president in 1986, gathered to chew over campaign strategies and enjoy views of Long Island Sound. With waves lapping playfully on the beach, the group briefly mulled the possibility of dispatching corked bottles into the water with messages teasing Paul's candidacy before meandering into the mundane business of sign-painting and letter-writing.
Viering says she posted a notice on the Internet and, within 24 hours, had six members signed up.
“I thought, 'Wow, this Internet site stuff works well,' ” Viering recalls.
How well the Ron Paul meetups work down the road during primary season is the real test, though. Party chairmen Healy and DiNardo don't think Paul will make much of an impact; Healy expects Connecticut will go for Giuliani, Romney and McCain, in that order, during the Republican primary.
“Fringe campaigns can get dedicated people to work for them,” Healy says. “Whether that translates into votes is the question.”
Viering, however, bristles at the “longshot candidate” label. Perhaps, she suggests, the meetup has changed the election equation in favor of innovators like Paul.
“If he can harness the power of the Internet and do it wisely, I wouldn't rule him out,” she says. “Maybe the old axioms don't hold true anymore. Maybe it's a whole new ballgame.”
This is the opinion of Lee Howard.
By Lee Howard Published on 7/27/2007
IT'S CALLED A MEETUP — ONE word, no hyphen — and it's the latest buzzword in grass-roots political organizing, not to be confused with hookup, the latest word in dating.
“You always have to have a new word for getting together,” laughs Christopher C. Healy, chairman of Connecticut's Republican Party.
“It's just a different spin on what we have been doing for some time,” says Nancy DiNardo, chairman of the state Democratic Party.
Meetups, small gatherings in private homes often arranged through the interactive Web site www.meetup.com, are not restricted to politics. People hold meetups on a range of topics and interests, including knitting, baseball and babies. But, with the political season heating up, meetups like one held this week in Groton Long Point will likely sprout up everywhere, supporting presidential candidates of both parties.
For now, though, the king of the meetup — in Connecticut and across the country — is a little-known GOP presidential candidate, a congressman from Texas named Ron Paul.
“Ron who?” you might ask.
Ron Paul may not take the spotlight from top GOP contenders Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney and John McCain in the mainstream press, but he creates a buzz among the disaffected, the disheartened and, perhaps most important, the denizens of the World Wide Web. Paul has consistently triumphed in Internet polls following Republican debates, winning the sound-bite war with his denunciations of the conflict in Iraq and calls for more fiscal restraint.
Paul, a parsimonious spender with a $2.4 million war chest swelling as primary season nears, has six meetup groups working for his election in Connecticut, including the Groton contingent. Paul also boasts 581 groups nationwide, representing about 26,000 activists — more meetup organizations than all GOP contenders combined. Of all the other candidates, only Hillary Rodham Clinton has a local group registered at www.meetup.com.
At a meetup this week at the wood-paneled cottage of Peter and Liz Viering, a dozen backers of Paul, a 10-term congressman who ran a distant third nationwide as a Libertarian Party candidate for president in 1986, gathered to chew over campaign strategies and enjoy views of Long Island Sound. With waves lapping playfully on the beach, the group briefly mulled the possibility of dispatching corked bottles into the water with messages teasing Paul's candidacy before meandering into the mundane business of sign-painting and letter-writing.
Viering says she posted a notice on the Internet and, within 24 hours, had six members signed up.
“I thought, 'Wow, this Internet site stuff works well,' ” Viering recalls.
How well the Ron Paul meetups work down the road during primary season is the real test, though. Party chairmen Healy and DiNardo don't think Paul will make much of an impact; Healy expects Connecticut will go for Giuliani, Romney and McCain, in that order, during the Republican primary.
“Fringe campaigns can get dedicated people to work for them,” Healy says. “Whether that translates into votes is the question.”
Viering, however, bristles at the “longshot candidate” label. Perhaps, she suggests, the meetup has changed the election equation in favor of innovators like Paul.
“If he can harness the power of the Internet and do it wisely, I wouldn't rule him out,” she says. “Maybe the old axioms don't hold true anymore. Maybe it's a whole new ballgame.”
This is the opinion of Lee Howard.