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"Bloggers Back Obama's Agenda, Not His Strategy" (with video)

Ari Melber (The Nation), with video (06:38):

It's cool to be a liberal blogger again. Just ask Bill Clinton.

Speaking to the fourth annual Netroots Nation convention in Pittsburgh, where a slew of bloggers, online activists and traditional pols gathered this weekend, the former President heralded attendees for elevating "public discourse" and pushing their agenda with transparency and partisan vigor.

Bloggers take sides, Clinton said appreciatively, and they "don't have to pretend" that they are neutral. The line not only celebrated a netroots ethic--it implicitly rebuked the traditional media's claim to disinterested objectivity. Heated media criticism is a passion that the blogosphere and The Big Dog have always shared. On domestic policy, by contrast, there are more disagreements. Yet Clinton's appearance resonated more for his stature in the party than where he falls on the progressive axis. Campaign season has given way to an era of Democratic governance, when volunteer armies and small donors matter less, but the netroots can still draw some of the most powerful people in politics. The current White House sent one if its most sought-after emissaries, senior adviser and longtime Obama confidant Valerie Jarrett, for a keynote appearance. And that's only counting Democrats.

Netroots Nation also drew a rather unlikely guest: a life-long Republican senator who recently joined the Democratic Party because, as he told the bloggers, he "has a good job" and wants to keep it. Arlen Specter, the resilient, 79-year-old pol who has now managed to seriously rile the base of both political parties, took questions at a session focusing on his 2010 primary. I co-moderated the event, with Pennsylvania blogger Susie Madrak, and a companion session for his opponent, Rep. Joe Sestak.

Specter made a blunt, detailed and explicit case for netroots support. He ticked off his putative credentials, from current policies (pro-choice, public option, labor voting) to current alliances (Obama, Biden) to great moments in progressive pushback (voting down Robert Bork's Supreme Court nomination) to, yes, his ginger embrace of new technology. In under an hour, Specter asked attendees to join his text message program, huddled with bloggers so they could watch him make a promised cell phone call Sen. Chuck Grassley--to rebut misinformation about health care - and Specter capped it off by tweeting , typo and all, the happenings in real-time: "Called Senator Grassley to tell him to stop speading [sic] myths about health care reform and imaginary 'death panels.'"

While those moves could have been empty gimmickry--one politician simulates calling out another without actual dialogue--the 75-year-old Iowa senator also tweets. Back in June, Grassley made waves by tweeting that President Obama had "nerve" to chide Congress' timetable on health care when his colleagues were "even workinWKEND" -- suggesting his missives are drafted without staff filtering. And just one hour after Specter's salvo, Grassley packed a stern riposte into 140 characters:

"Specter got it all wrong that I ever used words 'death boards'. Even liberal press never accused me of that. So change ur last Tweet Arlen"

The fast fight drew coverage from ABC, MSNBC, Politico, The Hill, and UPI, among others, while the satirical blog Wonkette appraised the human costs: "Evil Liberal Bloggers Strain Grassley, Specter Friendship, On Twitter."

Sure, the messages are short and the stakes may seem small. Yet the exchange also demonstrates the utility of new media politics. Beyond his "position" on health care reform, I asked Specter about countering misinformation from his former allies because, once again, a big political debate has been hijacked by dishonest operatives, enabled by a (mostly) complicit press corps. In other words, the lies may count more than the votes. And bloggers in the audience yelled out for Specter to contact Grassley immediately based on two basic premises: our representatives should deal in public, and fact-checking is a communal, political activity that cannot be left to media gatekeepers.

As it happens, governing in the Obama era is starting to feel more like another desperate, frantic election campaign, where overheated symbols substitute for genuine policy discourse and feckless referees grant equal time to lies and facts alike. So it's really no wonder liberal bloggers are back. We need them.

"Sestak and Specter in Pittsburgh"

Booman may have begun a whole new format for blogging by putting his observations in the comments section. A reader helpfully posts full invitation details on the after party @ The Shadow Lounge. That's my kind of coverage.

Howard Dean tells Netroots health care bill will happen, but will be 'ugly process'

Louis Corsaro (Pittsburgh Business Times):

Howard Dean is confident a health care bill with a public option will eventually land on President Obama’s desk, but says getting there won’t be easy.

“It will be an ugly process,” he told a group of 2,000 people attending the 2009 Netroots Nation convention at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh on Friday.

Dean, former governor of Vermont, a 2004 presidential candidate and chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 2005 until his retirement earlier this year, expects that, when all is said and done, Sen. Max Baucus, a Democrat from Montana and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, knows he must deliver a bill to the president that includes the public option.

“The only piece of reform left (in the bill) worth doing is the public option,” Dean said. “We have already compromised.”

That compromise, he said, was leaving single-payer health care off the table from the beginning. Despite any disagreements within the Democratic Party, Dean said he believes a bill with the public option will survive and every Democrat will have to vote for it.

Some of those Democrats who have differed with Obama’s plan are the so-called “Blue Dogs,” a group of moderate and conservative congressmen. While the Blue Dogs have taken a lot of heat for their stance on health care reform, Dean commended them for getting the small-business opt-out into the bill. Any small business with a $500,000 or smaller payroll will be exempted from offering employees health care. While Dean said he would be in favor of making a $1 million or less payroll and/or a company with 50 or fewer employees exempt, he said the provision makes it a better bill.
The framing of the debate

Asked about the contentious town halls that have been held around the country, where lawmakers have been shouted down and, in some cases, faced threats, Dean said “the debate is over.”

“The town halls are not about health care,” he said. “They’re about being angry.”

It’s also about generational change, he said, indicating the majority of the protesters at the town halls were older people, and their group was getting smaller and smaller.

“They don’t look anything like the generation that voted for Obama,” Dean said. “These people feel threatened.”

He likened it to when he signed off on civil unions as governor of Vermont. When he went to neighborhoods where he normally would be treated with applause and gratitude, he would instead be greeted by people shouting at him. The key, he said, is some people are resistant to change, because “a certain set of things they could believe in” were taken away.

While many progressive Democrats have decried Obama’s insistence on a bipartisan bill, claiming it was a useless exercise, Dean said Obama was being a savvy politician.

As long as Obama is entering into understanding he’ll get no Republican support, Dean said, it is important for the president to show he is trying to reach out across the aisle. And if there is no bipartisanship to be had, “let the Republicans say that.”

He claimed Republicans are uninterested in supporting any health care reform and cannot vote for it because they’ll take too much heat from their party’s leadership and base supporters.

In the end, Dean emphasized the critical nature of the public option in health care reform, and urged people to call lawmakers who are holding up the health care bill. A calling station was set up for Netroots attendees immediately following Dean’s address.

Dean made several other points during the question-and-answer session:

* Cost control is a must, he said, because health care costs have risen at 2.5 times the rate of inflation for about the last 30 years.
* Despite the criticism heaped on the pharmaceutical industry for their advertisements and high prices, Dean noted that they take up a small percentage of the cost of health care, and deliver innovations critical to Americans.
* He said the U.S. must raise reimbursement for primary care and help young doctors deal with the debt they incur for their education. These steps, he said, would encourage more doctors to enter primary care.

mcjoan @ Netroots Nation: "Howard in the House!!"

mcjoan (daily kos):

We're ready for a barn-burner from the good doctor here at Netroots Nation, if his interview with Sam Stein yesterday is any indication.

"I do think there will be primaries as the result of all this, if the bill doesn't pass with a public option," Dean said, in a phone interview with the Huffington Post....

As he has done before, Dean criticized talk of substituting a government run program with co-operative insurance plans, calling the latter a "fig leaf."

"This talk about co-ops is a political compromise it is not a policy compromise," he said, of the discussions currently underway in the Senate Finance Committee. "And I think most people, on both sides of the aisle know that co-ops won't work."

Asked about a column by long-time Democratic strategist Paul Begala, urging progressives not to shy away from tackling health care in a more incremental approach, Dean shot back: "The public option is incrementalism.... But there is no incrementalism without the public option." He explained: "If you don't have a public option this bill is not even incremental, in terms of adequate health care reform... Paul is not entirely wrong. It is just that the last shred of reform is the public option."

So follow along and I'll try to keep up here liveblogging. And of course, we're streaming it (the video is down below).

YEEEEEEEAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!

:::

Update: You can use Twitter to send in questions: #DeanNN

Update 2: Current system will not work to control costs--ever. Have to have public option simply to control those costs.

Update 3: On the "death panel." "These town hall meetings are not about health care." People angry for 3 reasons--Rs have been angry for 30 years and the leaders have exploited that--polling for anger points. Second--who is shouting their congresspeople down? Not the generation that elected Obama--these are the people who feel threatened. As they get smaller they get angrier. Third--a president they're not accustomed to seeing in the WH. Change is hard.

Update 4: Q on reproductive rights--will our reproductive rights/womens health care remain protected? A: Will only probably be relevant to public option--Congress not designing benefit package, but by separate panel. People who have injected this issue into the debate are the people trying to derail the bill. Debate we're now seeing ought to be handled not by putting in language to prevent reproductive health care, but to put it in the hands of the panel. We're much safer having this issue dealt with by people who aren't politically influenced.

Update 5: Q: have the politics changed enough to get it done this time? A: we know we're winning now by the desperation of the other side. Blue Dog positive influence because you have to have someone from the moderate/conservative side represented, since the Rs refuse to participate. The $500,000 exemption for small businesses good. Would be a "huge boost" to small business. "We're in good shape on this bill." There will be a good bill in the House with a strong public option, the Dodd bill is good. Thinks it will end up in reconciliation in the Senate.

Update 6: Q: why didn't the Dems start with single payer? Was it a strategic mistake? How do we make the public option the centrist option? A: It was a mistake. Leadership somehow thought single payer had become like the word "liberal" and that by taking it off the table we'd have a reasonable debate. Debate is done, Rs aren't interested regardless. SP is more efficient, controls administrative costs (4% overhead compared to upwards of 20%)--would have had a better, more comprehensive debate if it had been on the table.

Update 7: Q: How do we get more providers in the debate? A: AMA has endorsed E&C bill--great accomplishment. Significant majority of primary care docs support SP. Some docs are worried, but they're not dumb. They realize they're better off with real reform and that we need change.

Update 8: Q: What can be done to create economic incentives for more people to go into primary care? Is there anything in the existing bills will help? A: Ironically Blue Dogs helped because Medicare rates are too low. Need to raise reimbursement rates for primary care. Need to lower debt from med school, so that they're not attracted to specialties to make more money and pay their loans. Use qualified medical staff like nurse practitioners, physician assistants and get people used to going to them for primary care. And more federally qualified health care centers. (But DemFromCT says that they have limited hours and often have to send their patients on to ERs after hours).

Update 9: Q: How do I frame the hcr debate when I talk to my representative? A: First, who gets to choose? The people or Congress and the insurance companies? Second, American people have made very clear that they want choice, so ask your representative whether they represent you or the insurance companies, and remind them that you'll be having that discussion with them again in 2010. Follow-up: the public option will make the insurance companies honest. The problem is the insurance companies are just an extension of what's been going on on Wall St. They're in it for profit, not for health care.

Update 10: Q: How do we make this bill affordable for middle class as well as low-income people? A: The key is the public option. The stakes are so high for that that it's not worth fighting over anything else. The fee-for-service system needs to change, docs don't particularly like it. So there will be cost controls, and the public option will lead the way.

Update 11: Q: How do we keep medical innovation in reform? A: There is a critical role for private sector--we need to keep the extraordinary innovation of pharmaceuticals and med tech companies. The other role for the private sector is employers to encourage healthier lifestyles. That's an investment in prevention that works. We don't need to run away from what the private sector does right.

Update 12: Q: What about "bipartisanship"? Should he keep working with the Rs? A: The tactic of allowing the Rs to show their true colors to the American people is smart. BUT--bipartisanship shouldn't be the goal. A good bill needs to be the goal.

Update 13: Q: What about co-ops? A: They're a "waste." They're too small. We've already tried it (Blue Cross/Blue Shield) and they got eaten up by the big insurance companies. We don't want to do anything to help the insurance companies. We want them to serve us better. In the long term the co-ops will fail and be crushed. They are a political compromise that will not work.

Update 14: Q: How do we make sure that we have mental health parity in the reform? A: The brain is an organ that needs to be treated like any other organ. There should be no limits on mental health coverage. Hopes that the panel will do that.

Update 15: Q: How do we keep the message on the public option clear? A: We don't spend all our time refuting the BS. This debate is about two things: are we going to allow the American people to choose for themselves? Will they get a full range of choice, or does Congress and the insurance companies get to choose? The second part is who are you representing: are you standing up for the American people or the insurance companies.

Update 16: Q: If the public option passes, will it become the dumping ground for high risk, otherwise uninsurable people? A: No--because guaranteed issue and community rating will be in the bil--they have to let everybody in to private plans. There is a higher proportion of people in the uninsured pool who are higher risk, so uninsured pool might be more likely to sign up for public option and there might be more high risk people in it. But it won't make the public option fail because it has more room for increased risk because it's more efficient. But the reality now is that we're paying for it anyway because these people do need care now--in ERs and in public hospitals. We're paying for these people anyway, and the care will be must more rational in a public system.

Update 17: Q: On exempting small businesses from employer mandate--in 1993-4 there was backlash from medium and large business because of level of subsidies to small business. Will that happen again? A: Small business create 80% of new jobs in America, so this should be even more small business friendly. The large businesses will just have to deal.

If he was in charge? He'd give everybody under 30 for free, and not have mandates. You can't make the under 25 crowd do anything, so forcing them to have health insurance doesn't work. It's the hardest group to sign up for anything. For the over 55s, they could buy into Medicare. Wouldn't create a separate public option but open up Medicare to more people. Wouldn't do away with employer based insurance, even though it's not great. You can't change the system that drastically yet.

But Obama's bill gives us choice. Instead of trying to force everyone out of the system we already have, we need to let people choose what they want--including what they have now if they like it. Allows the pace of reform to go at the pace the American people is comfortable with.

Update 18: Q: How do we help? What does the netroots do to make this happen. A: Speaking as a paid consultant for DFA, go to DFA and take action there. Talk to your Dem Senators and remind them that we are supporting the Democratic President's plan, but only your Senators. Contact your friends in the states of the people who need to be pressured, and encourage them to call their reps.

Majority Dem caucus wants public option, Senate Finance will have to recognize that. We can be polite, but be firm. We've already made our compromise, and there will be no more. The Democratic Congress needs to support the Democratic President (and the crowd goes wild!).

Howie P.S.: Politico interviewed Dean yesterday in a bookstore where he was doing a book-signing: "Howard Dean responds to 'outlandish' health claims."

Breaking: "Bill Clinton Heralds Blogs, Answers Heckler"

Ari Melber (The Nation):

Pittsburgh, PA

9:42pm 8/13/2009 President Clinton just took the stage at Netroots Nation, opening with a joke about how many Republicans think President Obama was born in the United States, teeing off earlier remarks by Rep. Brad Miller. Then he turned serious, crediting the netroots for playing a constructive role in American politics.

"I'd like to thank you for what you do and the contribution you have made to dramatically elevating of our public discourse and the base level of knowledge of people [in politics]," he said at the top of his speech. "I keep a file with me on economics and a file on energy," Clinton continued, "I was looking it through it the other day and was stunned at the number of articles that came from blog sites."

Clinton also credited bloggers for being candid about their policy and partisan preferences. Bloggers takes sides, he told the crowd, and "you don't have to pretend you're not [taking sides]."

The former president turned to a few general issues, saying he hoped to provide "grist" for the mills of the netroots. "It matters whether this Congress passes a comprehensive health care reform bill for this President to sign," Clinton said, to applause, and he later said he has always favored a public option for health care reform.

Clinton declared that the new era of progressive politics could last 30 to 40 years "if we do it right." He reminisced about his time working for Sen. William Fulbright, and noted that after 1968 Republicans managed to build a long-term coalition based on cultural division and corporate economics. Then, taking a page out of the Fox News playbook, Clinton jokingly hurled the c-word at one opponent, arguing that President Nixon looked like a "communist" compared to later, more conservative Republicans.

Then, ticking through recent politics, Clinton credited his successor, George W. Bush, for tapping a new mood in the country by promising compassionate conservatism and a more open, tolerant stance towards immigrants. (Clinton also took a moment to knock Bush v. Gore as "one of the five worst decisions" ever handed down by the Supreme Court.) "America is a different place today," Clinton continued, stressing that "the culture" is now with progressives, based on racial progress and global interdependence. The U.S. will have no "majority race" by 2050, Clinton added.

About 20 minutes into his address, Clinton was briefly interrupted by blogger Lane Hudson asking about a repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." First Clinton joked that the interruption sounded more like a health care town hall. Then he turned serious, answering the question by noting that at the time, Congress built a "veto-proof" majority that would reverse any attempt to admit gays in the military by executive order. The crowd interrupted several times to applaud Clinton's defense. Continuing the multi-point defense, Clinton pointed to the conversion of Gen. John Shalikashvili, who opposed gays in the military at the time, and has since reversed his position. Stressing the complexity of the issue, Clinton said he "hated" what happened and regretted that gays remain excluded from open service in the military.

"While we're at it," the former president continued, "let me say one thing about DOMA [Defense of Marriage Act]." Clinton defended the bill as a means to avoid an anti-gay constitutional amendment that, he argued, would have been worse for gay rights.

Turning back to his prepared remarks, Clinton urged attendees to continue their work on health care. He returned to discussing the blog posts he read, suggesting that some health care posts may be too technical to win over the general public. The former president emphasized that President Obama needed help to win the larger argument and moral imperative of health care reform, and that activists should be careful not to bog down in specifics. Clinton also credited the President for doing a great job at his New Hampshire town hall, and he touched on some of the conservative misinformation that has been percolating about health care reform. Finally, Clinton predicted that even if the public wavers on reform now, once a bill passes, it will draw significant public approval.

9:30pm 8/13/2009

The Big Dog is running late.

Organizers at Netroots Nation already pushed their first night schedule back to accommodate the late addition of President Bill Clinton, but now he's late for that, too. In the packed ballroom here, which is dotted with the most recent annual report from Clinton's foundation, people don't seem restless.

Attendees are cheering on Rep. Brad Miller, a dry speaker who still manages to be a netroots favorite. He just told the crowd that bipartisanship should not be prioritized in the Democrats' health care strategy, a gentle but clear rebuke to President Obama's tack, and is also knocking Republicans for comparing the President to Hitler. "I can't reach them all," he says, "you have to."

11:10am 8/13/2009

Netroots Nation, the official convention of the progressive blogosphere, kicked off its fourth annual gathering on Thursday, welcoming a slew of bloggers, activists, politicians and one former President to this industrial capital.

Bill Clinton is scheduled to give the keynote address on Thursday night. It is the first time that a former president has addressed the convention, which has previously featured Democratic leaders like Nancy Pelosi, Al Gore, Harry Reid, (then-Senator) Barack Obama and (then-Senator) Hillary Clinton.

On Friday, local politics will take center stage, as Sen. Arlen Specter and Rep. Joe Sestak are appearing to make their case to attendees. Specter, a recent convert to the Democratic Party, is fighting off a primary challenge from Sestak, who has drawn support from the netroots. Both politicians, however, hold positions that are largely to the right of the progressive blogosphere.

I am co-moderating their appearances on Friday -- along with Susie Madrak, a former reporter who blogs at Suburban Guerrilla -- and I'll be posting updates from the convention to this blog post. If you have question ideas, the conference is hosting a portal for people to submit and vote on questions for both candidates.

Update: Nation reader Mask replies: "Mr Melber, while you and the Technophiles are fighting it out in the 'blogosphere'... the real fight, for good or ill, is in town hall meetings."

I hear that, and Sen. Specter definitely held a lively town hall meeting this week. To be clear, though, this forum is also an in-person, town-hall style gathering -- though hopefully more civil than what went down in Lebanon, PA -- so it will be more physical than digital.

"Politics Online Conference" (video)

George Washington University's 11th Annual Politics Online Conference, with video from C-SPAN (60:00).

Howie P.S.: This session of the conference, "Elected and Connected: Uses, Dangers and Benefits of Being an Elected Official in a 2.0 World" featured elected incumbents talking about transparency and how they use the "new media" and how they see it being used in the future. Participants:

Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO)
Congresswoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R, WA-5)
Congressman Tim Ryan (D, OH-17)
Congressman Steve Israel (D, NY-2) (was delayed and joined the discussion in progress)

Ari Melber, The Nation's Net movement correspondent, moderated the discussion.

"Time Corrects Clinton Netroots Story"

Ari Melber (The Nation):

In response to my Nation pieces and a request from Markos Moulitsas, today Time issued a correction to its article about Netroots Nation:

The original version of this story said that Hillary Clinton's appearance at a 2007 Netroots Q&A session was greeted by boos. The writer confused that event with accounts of another Clinton appearance that had taken place earlier. Clinton was not booed at the Netroots event.

The corrected article removes the entire passage about Clinton. Meanwhile, today's Austin American-Statesman features an editor's note informing readers that the paper "compromised" its standards by running a front-page news article slamming Netroots Nation as a virtual "faint-in" for "marauding liberals" to honor a House Speaker so liberal she could represent China. The paper also removed the article from its website, as Rachel Weiner reported. Editor & Publisher's Greg Mitchell, (who spoke on a panel with me at the conference), posted a blog diary about the "snarky" article on DailyKos. Today Moulitsas discussed the process:

After Mitchell's diary unleashed ... a torrent of letters to the editor directed at the newspaper, the story disappeared from the paper's website, scrubbed clean of any traces of its existence. People emailing the author ... received responses that they just didn't get the hilarity of his humorous account.

The netroots activists' pushback on these articles effectively combines fact-checking and advocacy. Bloggers can lobby for fair treatment, demand accurate coverage, and show readers whether the press is accountable.

Howie P.S.: Another "correction," from Vanity Fair

"Time magazine stands by a discredited report on the netroots, while a Texas newspaper pulls back from liberal-bashing."

Ari Melber (The Nation):

Markos Moulitsas responds to my Nation article about the Netroots Nation convention, which discussed how Time erroneously reported that Hillary Clinton was booed in a Q&A session last year:

It was clear that some narratives have set and won't be changed no matter what. I already fired off an email to Time asking for corrections to that [Clinton error] and several other glaring errors in that terrible piece. But as we've learned with Joe Klein, Time considers itself and its writers infallible, so there's slim chance of any corrections.

As I explained on Monday -- and last year -- Clinton was not booed in her Q&A session. I have now dug up a 42-minute audio recording of her entire Q&A appearance, which Time editors are welcome to review. (There is also extensive press coverage available from the event, corroborating the fact that Clinton was not booed during the session. She was booed during a much larger presidential candidate debate held on the same day.)

Yet two days since the story was posted, Time has not issued a correction, despite an irrefutable record and requests from a major figure involved in the story. Moulitsas has even been profiled by the magazine, albeit under the headline "Inside the Cult of Kos." Now this may seem like a minor error, but it fits with a recurring tendency to slant coverage of the progressive netroots, even stretching to the point of blatant inaccuracy, while avoiding the most basic corrections required by journalistic standards. And it's bigger than one magazine article.

Back in Texas, the Tuesday edition of the Austin American-Statesman features an editor's note informing readers that the paper "compromised" its standards by running a front-page news article slamming Netroots Nation as a virtual "faint-in" for "marauding liberals" to honor a House Speaker so liberal she could represent China. Editor & Publisher's Greg Mitchell, (who spoke on a panel with me at the conference), reported on Monday night that the paper removed the article from its website after local and national bloggers flagged the article's odd tone and misleading references.

Time should take the Texas route on this one, too.

An editor's note could even make a decent post on their Swampland blog.

Howie P.S.: You might want to take a look at "How many wrong narratives can the media spin?" that Markos posted yesterday and that Ari linked to in the above.

"Netroots Nation Reckons With Life After the Revolution"

Jason Horowitz (The New York Observer):

By Sunday morning, most of the speakers and bloggers attending the Netroots Nation convention had gone home. In preparation for the convention's final key note—a plenary on "eco-equality"—volunteers in the convention center's gaping main exhibit hall distributed leaflets against various outrages ("No Forced Vaccination" or "Put Impeachment Back on the Table.") Ed Madej, a digital cartographer who blogs on the Daily Kos under the name Ed in Montana, sat alone at one of the tables blanketed with such fliers, checking weather maps on his laptop for any possible disturbances on his way home to Helena.

Under jumbo screens featuring freeze-framed poses of panelists talking about "marketing and monetizing your blog" or taking "online engagement to offline activism," or Howard Dean lecturing in an open-collared shirt and tan jacket, Madej offered his own impression of this year's convention.

"The first YearlyKos, it was like 'Holy Heck, we can actually organize ourselves, this is astonishing,'" said Madej, 55, using the convention's original name. "The second year, the candidates came and we realized we had a voice in picking the nominee." This third year, he said, had a less rollicking mood, as the bloggers, now "cautiously optimistic" that Barack Obama would win the White House, began to contemplate the burden of power. As Madej put it, "How do we govern with a Democratic majority?"

This year's convention marked the maturation of the Netroots. Their national convention between July 17 and 20 felt more like an assembly of middle-management professionals – say, dentists or data-entry technicians—than the science-fiction forum of years past, in which activists with names like OrangeClouds reveled in their collective role as thorn in the left flank of the Democratic Party. (It should be noted that OrangeClouds, who blogs about food issues, did attend again, and managed to extract an admission from Al Gore that he eats too much meat.)

The convention attracted its share of marquee names. D.N.C. chair Howard Dean, a beloved founding father, delivered an opening keynote address and Gore, who was sustained by the Netroots support in the rough years after the 2000 election, made a surprise appearance, plugging his book, Web site and bi-partisan anti-global warming commission. House speaker Nancy Pelosi, who is unpopular with many of the bloggers because they hold her partially responsible for Congress' inability to end the war in Iraq, sat for an uncomfortable question-and-answer session on Saturday morning in which she essentially blamed Senate Democrats for the party's legislative shortcomings and promised that everything would be just fine if they just elected Obama. The bloggers in the crowd were asked to act like grown-ups and limit their grievance-airing to an allotted ten-second boo-hiss session before Pelosi took the stage.

"Are we going to be nice to Nancy this morning or are we going to tell her what we really think?" one blogger asked his table before she came on. Like most everyone else he politely listened to Pelosi's remarks. (Even the anti-war Code Pink protesters, dressed up in superhero costumes with the words "Use Your Super Powers to End the War" written on their capes, were mostly quiet.)

But the main question in the days leading up to the conference was how attendees would react to Obama, who has irked the liberal bloggers with what they perceive as his centrist creep. Again, the media build-up – despite assurances beforehand from conference-goers that they really like Obama—turned out to have been vastly overdone.

Obama's deputy campaign manager, Steve Hildebrand, was treated like a hero, with people waiting to shake his hand after a panel discussion.

Obama himself sent in a lengthy video address, in which he recognized differences in opinion on government wiretapping, but called on the bloggers to help build a "progressive movement for years to come" and rallied the attendees to concentrate their writing to the greater cause of beating John McCain in the general election. "I'm asking for your help in the fight that lies ahead," he said.

Hardly anybody refused.

The bloggers were content to focus on their workshops and panels, including "Taking the Populist Uprising to the States," "Insanely Useful Tools You Can Use to Keep Track of Congress and State Lawmakers" and "Time for Acton: How the Netroots Can Lead on Health Care Reform." They ate their lunches out of cardboard clamshells and debated whether Obama's site was sufficiently democratic and whether they had any real impact in determining his policy platform.

At night, they also partied.

On Friday evening, the bloggers, immediately identifiable by the orange straps hanging from their necks, crowded into Champions, the bar in the lobby of the Marriott Courtyard, for a post-panel game of trivia. A man in a Phillies baseball cap acted as the M.C. and announced into a microphone the next round's topic: "Who's the Boss?"

"Woohoo!" was the reaction of one blogger seated in front of a bowl of nachos.

But knowledge about Angela, Danza, Mona and Alyssa would prove useless in the Netroots version of the game.

"Question one," said the man in the Phillies cap. "Who is the chairman of the House Franking Committee?"

The man in front of the nachos groaned.

Other questions included: Who is the boss of the Senate Select Committee on Aging? Who is the governor of Delaware? The mayor of Pittsburgh? Name the executive director of Emily's List. Who is the president of the Communications Workers of America? (This prompted approving screams of "union" from a table in the corner where bloggers drank beer under a signed Nolan Ryan Astros jersey.)

As the teams filled in their answers, waiters and waitresses wearing their own orange shirts ("The two most important sports in Texas are Football and Football") delivered more ales to the bloggers, some of whom surreptitiously stole glances at their i-Phones for clues. Other bloggers stood off to the side, going about the more standard convention business of flirting with colleagues.

"I'm in the MSM of the blogosphere," said one man in glasses to a girl who leaned against the wall with a beer in her hand.

The M.C. asked for a ten-second countdown and the teams raced up to the front of the bar with their answer sheets. Looking at one of the pieces of paper, he made a Gore joke. "This card is folded," he said. "I can't count it."

The bloggers chuckled. They had learned to laugh even about the most hurtful topics.

Later, in a restaurant called Rio Grande, The Nation magazine held a small gathering in a backroom. To make introductions more entertaining, Ari Melber, who covers the Netroots for the publication, asked people to say who they were and then who they wished they were. Over sips of salt-rimmed margaritas, one guest said she wanted to be either Arianna Huffington or Oprah. Another blogger said he wanted to be John McCain's teleprompter. "I'm Greg Bloom and the answer is the same since I've been a kid. Spiderman." Zephyr Teachout, the former director of online organizing for the Dean campaign, said she'd like to be with Jeff Goldblum but be James Agee. The entrance of the New Yorker's Hendrik Hertzberg, dressed in a white jean shirt and white jean pants, prompted a different question from Melber. "Favorite New Yorker cover." Topical!

Hertzberg ignored that question and said he'd like to be Hoagy Carmichael.

Introductions gave way to serious discussions. The hot topic among several bloggers and net activists was what Obama could do with the enormous network and database of supporters his campaign had amassed once he became president. Could he legally send emails to those supporters from his office? Would he have to cede the list to the DNC? Could local organizers get their hands on the data to help elect state senators, public advocates, community board members? Would he hoard it all to himself or was he serious about building a lasting Democratic majority? And if the Democrats built and nourished their army of activists, where would the competition come from, the right or corporate America, who had their own massive e-mail lists and marketing savvy?

As Nation staffers sought to collect $10 from each of the guests to cover the $400 of drinks and chips consumed, some of the guests walked over to an upscale barbeque restaurant called Lamberts to a "BBQ and Booze" party thrown by GQ Magazine and the Huffington Post. GQ covers of JFK, LBJ and Obama hung on the walls. Chefs dressed in sauce-stained white aprons fed a steady stream of pulled pork sandwiches, deviled eggs and baby ribs to the guests, who spilled outside or climbed the stairs, where a DJ played records and waitress served more of the same food and poured more of the same top-shelf alcohol and imported beers.

Samantha Power, Obama's former foreign policy adviser, made an appearance. Jonathan Tasini, who mounted a protest challenge to Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary for Senate in 2006, danced next to the steps. A bunch of guys wore shirts that said "Crawford" to advertise their movie, which they had shown at the convention and which told the story of the administration from the point of view of people living in the president's home town. The editor of the film, Matt Naylor, 24, said he hoped showing it here would create enough buzz for it to get onto HBO or Showtime. The Netroots Nation was now a place to get a movie optioned.

After getting their fill of brisket sliders, some of the bloggers headed downtown to the party thrown by the movement's patriarch, Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, whose Daily Kos blog is the touchstone of the blogging left. They walked away from the expensive restaurants, past the homeless black men sleeping in front of a building with the sign "State of Texas General Land Office, No Trespassing" on the window and towards 6th street, once a farm-to-market road that now was the ATM-lined main artery of Austin night life.

The bloggers, orange straps still hanging around their necks, walked past the young women in short shorts and wet-suit-tight short skirts in front of the Thirsty Nickel. They avoided the stumbling white frat boys with their collars lopsidedly popped and the black guys in tank tops revving motorcycles. On a block with a food stand called "The Best Wurst," a souvenir store called "Midnight Cowboy Modeling and Oriental Massage," and a tattoo parlor where the sound of ink drills could be heard above the din, was Maggie Mae's, the site of the Kos party. Inside, a video of Bill O'Reilly's "Fuck It, We're Doing It Live" freakout played in a loop. Bowls of sour cream, guacamole and salsa sat on a table around a sombrero filled with chips and guests drank free beer and margaritas.

Upstairs, a conga line formed behind a man playing a washboard on his chest, and snaked around Arjun Jaikumar, a contributing editor to Daily Kos, and Katherine Haenschen, an Austin-based blogger. Jaikumar, sipping form a can of Corona, wore a Hillary Clinton t-shirt, and joked that he wanted to wear it to see if he "would get any dirty looks."

On Saturday night, the last night of the convention, after the Obama video was played, the Netroots Nation executive director, Gina Cooper, called the convention the "best ever" and said "I am inspired by you." Then she announced that she would be moving on and that next year's convention would be held in Pittsburgh. The following morning, as Madej checked his laptop for troublesome weather systems, he said he wasn't sure if it would be worth attending the next convention.

"Pittsburgh's my home town and I've been avoiding it for 25 years," he said. "It would take a lot of gumption."

Howie P.S.: My answer to Ari's question is "I don't know, but I wish I did."

"Netroots Nation: MSM Still Don't Get It" (with video)

Ari Melber (The Nation), with video (06:14):

Champion's, a typical sports bar in Austin, Texas, ran a curious greeting on its scoreboard all weekend: "Welcome, Netroots!" The pulsing light bulbs faced a giant convention center hosting Netroots Nation, an annual conference for the Internet Left, which grew out of volunteer brainstorming sessions on DailyKos over three years ago.

Then, web activists were undeniable outcasts in Democratic politics and no bar outside of Berkeley could spell "netroots." Now, this net movement has an open line to every player in the party; the conference's speakers included Nancy Pelosi, Howard Dean, DLC head Harold Ford, several Obama aides and an array of candidates, wonks, operatives, writers and progressive stars, from Paul Krugman to Samantha Power to Wes Clark. (I also moderated a panel, and Nation writers Chris Hayes and Jeremy Scahill spoke at the conference.) The gathering's 2,000 paid attendees were drawn from bloggers, blog commenters and even "lurkers"--the silent majority of visitors who scour online conversations without participating--all focused on electing Obama, stopping the war, restoring the Constitution and calcifying the frail backbone of the Democratic Congress.

In a lively plenary session called "Ask The Speaker," organizers pressed Nancy Pelosi with questions that activists had written and selected through an online community portal. It was basically a cross between a town hall and a Digg vote. The top questions, which drew hundreds of votes each, were about impeachment, subpoenas for Bush Administration officials, campaign finance reform and abstinence education, followed by several queries on restoring the rule of law.

Pelosi seemed defensive most of the time. She blamed seventeen Democratic Senators for backing the President's surveillance bill--which the netroots strongly opposed--and repeatedly offered the weak riposte that soon Bush's term would be over. Despite sharp policy differences, however, the audience was largely warm and respectful. Some attendees held up copies of the Constitution in protest, and a few costumed, antiwar activists from Code Pink briefly disrupted her remarks. Then Pelosi's interview was mercifully truncated by Al Gore, who made a surprise appearance that wowed the conference and drew several standing ovations. (Here's my blog report.)

Attendees seemed very enthusiastic about Obama, who recently responded to widespread criticism within the movement for backing the FISA bill. For the conference, he recorded a special YouTube address, stressing his foreign policy differences with John McCain, appealing to activists for support, and reiterating his commitment to an open dialogue. "We've had some disagreements in the past," he says in the six-minute video, seated in front of an American flag and a royal blue curtain. "I promise to continue to listen to your concerns, take them seriously, and discuss them respectfully -- and work to earn your ongoing support."

After discussing his Iraq policy, Obama's video heralded the power of grassroots organizing. "While I can't be there with you in person, I want to thank you all for your hard work and sacrifices so far," he told attendees, linking his campaign to the Dean/netroots fifty-state strategy. And Obama touted the way his campaign has empowered "supporters to self-organize" through a social network portal, MyBo, which recently hosted the surveillance bill protests. The site has generated over 1 million volunteers, 70,000 offline events and--as Obama wryly noted--"formed thousands of grassroots advocacy groups, including one you might have heard about recently." One of the campaign aides who oversees MyBo, Facebook co-founder and whiz kid Chris Hughes, also conducted a workshop at the conference.

Reflecting on the conference, Obama spokesperson Hari Sevugan told The Nation that the "netroots community is an important voice in our public discourse." An effective "grassroots movement" will not only help victory in November, he added, but also "help keep people involved after the election." At this point, the alliance between Obama and the netroots is strong, though not fawning in either direction; and open, as both sides are transparent in their expectations and disappointments.

That reality is obscured, however, by some narratives in the traditional press. Coverage of this weekend's conference often carried an edge. The New York Times reviewedObama's clashes with bloggers and declared that "the netroots can be reflexively confrontational and demand ideological purity." The Washington Post opted for an oddly competitive analysis: "The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee has less need to court this crowd, having proven himself a better organizer than they--and on a far grander scale." And Time drew an ominous scene for Pelosi's visit:

Criticism of her appearance in the blogosphere had been so high in the lead up to the event that [a moderator] preceded her introduction of the Speaker with a warning against any agitation. It can get pretty hostile at Netroots Nation. Last year, Hillary Clinton nearly backed off from attending the conference; after a small uproar from the blogger community, she finally showed up but the Q&A session she headlined was met with boos. For Pelosi, the potential for trouble at her Q&A session at the Austin Convention Center was everywhere....

Actually, Clinton was not met with any boos at her session last year. As I wrote at the time: "Clinton's breakout session drew repeated applause and no boos. (She was booed lightly during the larger candidate forum.)" And the moderator's reference to "agitation" was not addressing "criticism of [Pelosi's] appearance in the blogopshere," which actually welcomed the visit, but the Code Pink members, who are known for protesting from city halls to congressional hearings.

These may sound like relatively minor distortions, but they also reflect a resilient mischaracterization of the netroots as an angry, radical and combustible bunch. It's a rather silly gloss for a well-educated, text and technology-based activist corps that wields influence via web fundraising, e-mail lobbying, social networking and, yes, traditional gatherings offline.

Barack Obama

"Liberal Bloggers Brace for Victory"

WaPo (page one):

Obama's Prospects Pose New Concerns for Netroots--"Yep, the way it's looking, we might actually win this thing . . ."

That's Markos Moulitsas talking, a.k.a. "Kos" to everyone here at Netroots Nation, the four-day liberal blogapalooza that ended Sunday at the Austin Convention Center. He's got a head cold, which explains his hoarse, strained voice, and by "we," he means the Netroots and their candidate of choice, Sen. Barack Obama. If the Netroots can be compared to high school -- still maturing, somewhat cliquish but definitely a community -- then Obama, as the presumptive nominee, had been voted Most Likely to Succeed.

Hardest Worker and Best Dressed honors went to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who kicked off Saturday morning's program with a freewheeling 40-minute "Ask the Speaker" session. ("Damn, Nancy looks grrreat in that pantsuit," a blogger was overheard saying.) Most Popular would go to Al Gore, who brought the crowd of more than 2,000 conventioneers to its feet with his surprise appearance, repeatedly asking bloggers to visit WeCanSolveIt.org, home to his new group, the Alliance for Climate Protection.

But Obama, who leads Sen. John McCain in recent national polls, is Topic A among the Netroots, his fate somewhat married to theirs. Five years ago liberal bloggers made a name for themselves at a time of defeat; Republicans controlled not just the White House but both houses in Congress. They craved a fight, and President Bush was their punching bag.

But these are changing times, and Obama, in his calls for getting past blue vs. red America, and in his recent positions on issues such as telecom immunity, is somewhat of an enigma. With the Dems taking back Congress in 2006 and the prospect of an Obama victory come November, many in the influential Netroots are left in a precarious, ambiguous position. The question is, who needs whom: Does Obama need the Netroots, or vice versa?

Kos, never one to mince words, is blunt.

"It's not a question of who needs whom. Fact is, the Netroots are not going to be the decisive factor," Kos says, fidgeting with his iPhone as he sits on a lounge chair at the Hilton, across the street from the convention center. "But having said that, we're an activist set of people: We're engaged, we give money, we put boots on the ground. That's why when many of us had a genuine disagreement with Obama on FISA" -- Obama voted for a bill that provided retroactive immunity to telecom companies -- "we let him know about it."

Though his site, Daily Kos, is arguably the liberal blogosphere's most popular hub, Kos is not the Netroots. He's just at the center of the quad, with other blogs filling the rest of the always packed, often clangorous hallways. And with each passing year, the crowd gets bigger, the tent wider.

At the first confab, then called YearlyKos and held in Las Vegas, some 1,200 attended, most of them blog jockeys who knew each other only by their online names. Last year at least 1,500 attendees made the trek to Chicago, including all but one of the eight Democratic presidential candidates, who sat down for a 90-minute forum. Among those present were bloggers, pols and their minions, policy analysts and think tank reps.

This past weekend, those same types showed up, plus tech firms such as Wired for Change, hawking an online product called Salsa that helps groups engage people through e-mail lists. There's no denying that the gathering has crossed the mainstream threshold when swag bags, complete with El Sabroso Salsita salsa chips, were handed out alongside condoms from the Center for Constitutional Rights.

As in any community, as in many high schools, Netroots can appear both self-segregating -- black bloggers at one table, Latinos at another and gays at the next -- and not diverse enough. After the Q&A session with Pelosi, in which the first questions asked were about impeaching President Bush and Vice President Cheney, the FISA bill and abstinence-only education, some black bloggers complained that they weren't enough questions about rising gas and food prices.

"It reflects a bit of skew," Cheryl Contee, a member of the convention's advisory board, says of the questions to Pelosi. Contee, who is black, runs Fission, a social media consulting firm. "Folks in the convention have to keep in mind that not everyone who considers themselves a part of the Netroots is here, and many of them aren't as concerned about, say, FISA or impeachment. They want jobs."

Obama's standing here, especially with big-name bloggers such as Matt Stoller of OpenLeft, has proved complicated. Two years ago, frustrated by bloggers' reaction to two Democratic senators who voted to confirm John Roberts as chief justice, Obama wrote a posting on Daily Kos:

"According to the storyline that drives many advocacy groups and Democratic activists -- a storyline often reflected in comments on this blog -- we are up against a sharply partisan, radically conservative, take-no-prisoners Republican party," wrote Obama, who voted no on the Roberts confirmation.

Last year, at the height of the primary campaign, Obama often placed second behind former senator John Edwards in the monthly and unscientific Daily Kos straw polls. In October, he fell third behind Edwards and Sen. Chris Dodd. When Obama examined former president Ronald Reagan's legacy earlier this year and said it "changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not," a blizzard of comments hit blogs, many of them critical.

A few weeks ago, after Obama's upcoming vote for the FISA bill provoked angry comments on his own social networking site, My.BarackObama.com, Obama posted an explanation on his blog. "Democracy cannot exist without strong differences. And going forward, some of you may decide that my FISA position is a deal breaker," Obama wrote.

"Think about it: Netroots was born at a time when the Democrats were in opposition, and it's learning how to be a force of good when the Democrats are in power -- and could have more power next year," says Simon Rosenberg of the New Democrat Network. A speaker at the confab, Rosenberg is a bridge of sorts between Official Washington (he worked in the first Clinton White House) and New Washington (he wrote the foreword to "Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics," which Kos co-authored).

Adds Andrew Rasiej, also a speaker at the convention and founder of Personal Democracy Forum, an online think tank that analyzes how the Internet affects politics: "For most everyone in the Netroots, the main goal right now is get Obama elected. Period. Now how the Netroots and Obama move forward after November, if he is elected, is another issue."

The mood between Obama and the Netroots has warmed in the past few months. Obama, who's on his first overseas tour since becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee, sent a 10-minute video greeting to the conventioneers.

"We've had some disagreements in the past, and we'll have some disagreements in the future," Obama says in the video. "I promise to continue to listen to your concerns, take them seriously and discuss them respectfully."

The audience claps warmly, and among those watching are Edmundo Rocha, of Houston, and Manuel Guzman, of Tucson, Ariz., Latino bloggers who recently launched The Sanctuary, a site written by a multi-ethnic group of bloggers concerned about migrant rights and immigration reform. The group sent a list of detailed, pointed questions to Obama. They're still waiting to get adequate responses, they add.

"I've been waiting to see just how much he's going to involve the Netroots in the way he thinks about policies," says Guzman, who voted for Obama during the primaries but says he was "disappointed" with Obama's FISA vote.

"The Netroots are not going away. It's only going to get bigger," Guzman continues. "We're all learning to live with each other."

Howie P.S.: If the Beltway can be compared to The Company, the WaPo is the in-house mouthpiece.
Barack Obama

"Hildebrand: Massive 3-Day Voter Registration Drive Set for Labor Day Weekend"

Al Giordano:

Steve Hildebrand (in the photo above), deputy campaign manager for the Obama campaign, just announced at the Netroots Nation convention a "three-day massive voter registration drive for Labor Day weekend, after the Democratic National Convention."

"Thousands upon thousands of volunteers will go register millions of people that weekend alone," said Hildebrand, a key architect of the 2007 "Walk for Change" strategy that spurred the Obama organization in states throughout the country before the campaign had even a single staff member in most of them.

Hildebrand, speaking at the Organizing for Change: An Inside Look at Obama for America's Grassroots Strategy panel this morning at the Austin Convention Center, called 2008 "an historic opportunity to build a truly dominant Democratic Party and forget, once and for all, about this concept of red states and blue states."

Hildebrand said that the goal is to target "people who have been disenchanted" with electoral politics, and "people who thought their votes didn't make a difference."

The suggestion is that the "bully pulpit" of the widely televised Democratic National Convention August 25-28 will be used to prod viewers and supporters into participating in the registration drive the following weekend.

Developing...

Update (from the panel, still going on): In response to a question by The Field, Ohio General Election Director for the Obama campaign, Jeremy Bird, noted that as the Obama Fellows program winds down next week, the campaign will be hiring many of those newly trained and field-tested community organizers as field staff, and that the campaign will hold "huge statewide and regional trainings" as the next step.

Volunteers will be trained to register voters and "to take ownership over your turf," said Bird, "giving people the skills to register, persuade and turn out voters, so when we go to doors and when we talk to people on the phone, it won't just be reading from script, but forming relationships."

Hildebrand added that he considers the grassroots field organization and bloggers to be vital in beating back rumors and smears: "Every single day there is an attack. In a 24-hour news cycle, we need immediate response, we need help, and we can't do it on our own. Make sure that people who are reading your sites know the truth."

Barack Obama

"Al Gore Makes Surprise Visit to Netroots Nation" (UPDATED)

UPDATE: MORE details from Andrew @ the NPI Advocate.

Ari Melber (The Nation):

Al Gore made a surprise appearance at the Netroots Nation conference in Texas on Saturday, joining Speaker Nancy Pelosi on stage to address progressive activists. "I feel right at home here!" he said as he took the stage, while Pelosi and conference director Gina Cooper looked on. Organizers kept the visit secret all weekend, guarding details as if it were Obama's Middle Eastern CODEL. Rumors only leaked hours before Gore's speech -- and the New York Times Caucus blog picked up chatter on the visit from Twitter updates sent by the tech-savvy crowd.

Gore thanked the several thousand attendees for creating a "movement" that can "reclaim the integrity of American democracy" by fostering a "well-informed citizenry that is involved and engaged." Drawing on the critique of the media and democratic discourse from his book, The Assault on Reason, Gore contrasted the netroots' fact-driven writing and activism with the "malignant manifestation of hunger for power" among corrupt leaders on the right.

Gore devoted the bulk of his remarks to his crusade against global warming, casting it as a moral, economic and security imperative for the United States. He drew several standing ovations from the energetic crowd. Gore urged activists to join his bipartisan campaign at WeCanSolveIt.org. The effort has drawn 1.3 million supporters, he said, with a goal of ten million. "You speak to and influence and connect with so many millions of people," he said to the gathered bloggers, asking for their help in recruiting more bipartisan support for the climate movement.

Gore took open questions from the floor, which focused on climate change, alternative fuels, and the prospect of serving in an Obama administration. He respectfully demurred on the hypothetical of returning to government service, saying "I want to convey my respect for the idea...I really feel the highest and best use of whatever talents and experiences I've gained in my life is to focus on trying to enlarge the political space within which elected officials and cabinet members address this climate crisis." On the other hand, it's hard to imagine a more influential platform to advance those goals than serving as Secretary of State in an Obama administration, where Gore could prioritize climate change in the international portfolio and apply his NSC and VP experience to help end the war responsibly.

Gore also advised against proposals to use coal for automobiles, which would "vastly increase" CO2, in response to a question, drawing more enthusiastic cheers for his wonkery. Pelosi heralded Gore's early work on technology in Congress, saying "without him there would be no Netroots Nation."

Anti-war activists also briefly protested during her remarks, saying she should be held accountable for not using her power to end the war.

Howie P.S.: If Nancy thought appearing with The Goreacle would eliminate the pushback, I guess she was wrong. Avi Zenilman has more details about Gore's remarks.

"Netroots Summit Grapples with Bipartisan Attacks on Rule of Law"

Ari Melber (The Nation):

Politicians, legal experts and progressive activists grappled with Republican abuses of power at the third annual netroots convention on Friday, debating how an Obama administration might restore the rule of law. Cass Sunstein, an adviser to Barack Obama from the University of Chicago Law School, cautioned against prosecuting criminal conduct from the current administration. Prosecuting government officials risks a "cycle" of criminalizing public service, he argued, and Democrats should avoid replicating retributive efforts like the impeachment of President Clinton -- or even the "slight appearance" of it.

"Give me a break," responded former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, when told about Sunstein's advice during an interview with The Nation. Siegelman took a court-sanctioned trip to tell attendees about his conviction for corruption, currently on appeal, which he says was motivated by a malicious Republican effort to destroy his career. Discussing alleged White House abuse of the Justice Department, which led to Alberto Gonzales' resignation, Siegelman said "what Karl Rove has been accused of doing would make Watergate look like child's play." The former governor also urged activists to press Congress to hold Rove in contempt for defying a House subpoena in a related investigation. His supporters have launched an Internet campaign, ContemptforRove.org, to advance the cause. Noting that Rove's potential testimony "could not impact" his appeal, Siegelman said he was still pressing the issue because it was fundamental to "restoring justice and preserving our democracy." He learned how blogs were scrutinizing the Republican corruption at the Justice Department when supporters sent him print-outs from TalkingPointsMemo while he was serving the first 9 months of his prison sentence.

Attendees and bloggers are disappointed with the emerging, bipartisan consensus in Washington that the lawlessness of the Bush era can largely go unpunished. After emphasizing more investigations over actual accountability, Sunstein and John Dean faced pointed questioning at a packed panel on "The Next President and the Law." Mike Stark, a blogger who helped organize the spying protests within Obama's social network, asked why politicians should ever be above the law. And Hunter, a popular "front-page poster" on DailyKos, captured the mood in a long post kicking off the conference:

It seems evident, at this point, that there will be no comeuppance as a result of the excesses of the Bush administration. There will be investigations; they will investigate. There will be subpoenas; they will simply be refused...We know misrepresentations were made that led us, apparently inexorably, into war. In the end, we are as a nation (public, press, and government) not particularly interested in hearing the particulars of how or why; the truth is that we were aching for a good war, and the rationale was an afterthought not just for the Bush administration, but for most of their audience.


We know the rule of law itself was politicized, made into an apparatus of partisan advantage, a weapon for the ruling party to use against opponents. We know who did it, and we know it was not just unethical, but illegal. But to push it farther than that would require taking the last step -- from investigation, to prosecution -- and that step seems illusory, at best.... There will be reconciliation, and reconciliation will be defined by the conservative punditry as letting bygones be bygones -- anything but that will be unacceptable and partisan, in itself.

The conference continues through Sunday, with addresses by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, netroots favorite Donna Edwards, columnist Paul Krugman, DLC head Harold Ford, blogger Markos Moulitsas and a host of writers and policy wonks. (I'm moderating a panel on "War Pundits.") Barack Obama, who attended last year's conference, sent several aides in his place this time. Campaign spokesperson Hari Sevugan told The Nation that the "netroots community is an important voice in our public discourse" that can impact policy and "help keep people involved after the election."

Howie P.S.: Goldy gives us own take on the doings in Texas: "ExhAustin."

"Blogfather sees Netroots' growing clout"

Markos Moulitsas (Kos) in the middle, Nate Silver (Poblano) of 538 on your right, and Al Giordano (The Field)

Mike Allen (Politico):

AUSTIN, Texas — Markos Moulitsas, the founder of the Daily Kos political blog, told a huge annual gathering of online activists that they have shown their power and must continue pushing Democratic politicians to remain progressive.

"We’re not still at capacity — we’re not at our peak,” Moulitsas said to applause from the crowd of just over 2,000 at the Austin Convention Center. “We’re the mainstream. … What we really don’t like are Democrats who are afraid to be Democrats.”

Moulitsas said he disagrees with the many reporters who have called him for stories about Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) moving to the center in his presidential campaign.

“I swear, what I say — [in] one ear, out the other,” he said. “They’ve got their narrative set, and it doesn’t matter. Here’s what I said: There may have been some grumbling, … but they were really muted — there wasn’t mass discontent.”

The annual convention, "Netroots Nation: Changing the face of progressive politics,” began as Yearly Kos, drawing 1,500 people to Las Vegas two years ago and 2,200 to Chicago last summer.

The gathering was renamed Netroots Nation in an effort to be more inclusive, because it has grown beyond the Daily Kos community and now is one of the most important annual gatherings of the American left.

But the event remains very much Moulitsas’ crowd. Two prime tables down front were reserved for “SF Kossacks — San Francisco Bay Readers of the Daily Kos.”

Moulitsas appeared on a luncheon keynote panel with Harold Ford Jr., the former congressman from Tennessee and chairman of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, recreating a legendary debate they held on NBC’s “Meet the Press” last August.

Ford drew applause from the skeptical crowd when he declared that “whatever differences may be, and I think the differences are … overstated, … I don’t think they have any comparison to magnitude, caliber, character at all, to the differences we may have if Barack Obama’s opponent in this presidential race wins.”

“Sen. Obama is probably going to attract a lot of Republicans — the people who voted for George Bush twice,” Ford continued. “As a matter of fact, if that does not happen, Barack won’t win.

“But he’s going to have to find people who are Republicans, who probably won’t … proclaim themselves as proud Democrats, but will proudly vote for Sen. Obama. So the real challenge is actually to develop an agenda that mirrors the passion, excitement and the desires of people across the country.”

Moulitsas told the enthusiastic crowd — many typing away on laptops — that it “never ceases to amaze me what we’ve been able to accomplish in so little time.”

“It’s been about four years — but in blog years, it’s like three millennia,” he said. “Remember, when I started Daily Kos, and when so many of you were starting your blogs and looking for information, about 2002, there was no strong, unapologetic, muscular, progressive voices in the media landscape. …

“God knows, if you’re a conservative, you’ve got a whole buffet to choose from. But if you were a strong progressive, you had nothing. So I started Daily Kos not because I had a grand vision, but because I was frustrated with the way my politics were going. And I found out very, very quickly that there was a lot of people like me — all over the country, also frustrated.

“And I know conservatives hate to hear this, but when people ask why Daily Kos was successful and why the blogosphere has grown the way it is, it is because there’s a market niche.”

Moulitsas said the progressives are “going to win again in 2008.”

“We’re not looking for ideological purity,” he continued. “Whether they’re opportunity or they’re investing in our country — whatever those values are, those are American values. They’re not left, right, center — they’re American values. And we’ve abandoned them out of fear, and we’ve got to stop doing that.”

Moulitsas drew hearty applause when he warned: “In 2010, we’re going to have some Democrats we’re going to pay some visits to in some primaries. … Too many Democrats in D.C. have lost touch. ...

“They still think this is a conservative country. And therefore, we’re going to have to remind them. And this is very helpful for them — we’re doing it for their own good. They’re going to realize that they can actually be who they want to be, because the people are ready for a progressive America.”

Barack Obama

"LIVE from Austin: Howard Dean - Democracy for America with Vote for Change" (with videos)

The NPI Advocate is providing live coverage from Austin as is Daily Kos, with videos and TPM as well as the live video from Ustream. Many others are there and we will post what we find, as we find it.

"C-Span Is In the House"

Al Giordano:

As I was heading home from tonight's Field Hands extravaganza in beautiful downtown Austin, where about one-out-of-every six Netroots Nations attendees (the ones that got here today) attended, ate, drank, and conspired together (I'm sure that some of the lucky Field Hands who were at the party tonight will weigh in and tell you how totally awesome the event was, and how proud we are to have co-hosted it), I was hauling a box of books past the Hilton Hotel, which is ground zero for the convention, and, lo' and behold, lookie what what is parked outside: The C-Span "Road to the White House" bus.

You heard it here first: Netroots Nation, which officially opens on Thursday, will hit the national cable airwaves, too.

NETROOTS NATION Live on Ustream.tv

usstream.tv:

Over the last few years, the internet has become a widely used tool within the political landscape. Moreover, the VOICE of the internet has risen as powerful force in shaping the direction of this country.

When Ustream.TV launched in early 2007, we had the opportunity to broadcast live a 3-day event at the time known as the YearlyKos. This group of “grassroots, hardcore bloggers” met in Chicago to discuss the issues of the day affecting our country and the world. It’s impact was powerful. It was such a success that it garnered the attention of the Democratic party’s most influential, culminating in a live presidential debate with all the Democratic Presidential candidates.

Well, its a new year and they have a new name. Netroots Nation, founded in 2006, will be broadcasting live on Ustream this weekend its 3rd annual conference from Austin TX. Broadcasts start Thursday and go through Sunday.

The list of speakers is pretty impressive: General Wesley Clark (a member of the Ustream advisory board), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Governor Howard Dean.

We will have wall to wall coverage of the event with 5-6 different feeds of all the breakout sessions. You can see a full list of the speakers here: http://www.netrootsnation.org/agenda-2008

For all the different feeds, check out the Netroots/Ustream pages below:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/exhibit-hall-4

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ballroom-e

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ballroom-f

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ballroom-g

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/room-12

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/room-19

Howie P.S.: TPM will have coverage, also. Ari Melber (Seattle native and my favorite writer at The Nation) reminds me that his panel "The War Pundits" with mcjoan, Samantha Power, Greg Mitchel and Mark Danner will be airing @8:30 am Pacific on Saturday.