Cross-posted on e.politics

Let's take a quick look at the campaign sites today while we're waiting for results (not as interesting as writing a haiku, but what the heck). First, check out the supporters on Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton's blogs. Intense emotion — more like a general election than a primary? Note that several of these extended online discussions are linked from Obama's site front page, along with that star-studded supporter video.

By contrast, nothing from supporters on MCain's front page (Rudy doesn't count) or Romney's. Huckabee has links to blog posts that feature extended discussion tucked down in the bottom right of his front page, and but there appears to be no conversation on Ron Paul's official site at all — no doubt one of those things the campaign didn't have to build, because the supporters did it for them on their own.

Though all the sites offer basic help-the-candidate tools — note McCain's guide to calling talk radio — the subtle differences between the sites of the Democrats and Mike Huckabee and those of the two Republican leaders are telling. All the sites front pages are predominantly top-down (campaign-driven) tools, but at least Obama and Huckabee's sites try to feature their supporters and their enthusiasm (and provide a public reporting system for voting problems). Hillary's site has discussion occurring on a blog, but the supporter messages aren't prominently featured on the site front page (the main "On The Blog" link goes to what is essentially a Mark Penn memo) and the limitations of the commenting tools make it hard to follow conversations. McCain's site prominently features party bigwig endorsements, no doubt to reassure conservatives (BTW, I had a friend describe himself as a "Movement Conservative" the other night; freaked me out almost as much as the intensity of the writers on Obama and Hillary's blogs, but not as much as the Ron Paul people do). Romney's site features a whole lotta Mitt, 'nuff said.

Now, back to intensely clicking around the Interweb.

– cpd