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David Plouffe's Latest Digital Campaign

BY Nancy Scola | Thursday, May 19 2011

"President Barack Obama meets with Press Secretary Jay Carney, left, and Senior Advisor David Plouffe, center, before an interview with Ben Feller of the Associated Press, in Chicago, Ill., April 15, 2011;" ... Read More

Marshall Ganz on How Obama Failed to Lead

BY Micah L. Sifry | Wednesday, November 3 2010

Marshall Ganz, the man who devised Barack Obama's grassroots organizing model in 2008, and a master community organizer, has an eloquent statement in the LA Times on what went wrong for Obama between 2008 and 2010. His ... Read More

Big Donor, Small Donor, What Do I See?

BY Micah L. Sifry | Thursday, July 22 2010

The Washington Post says that the old Democratic Party circuit of intimate high-dollar fundraising events in the palatial apartments of a tight circle of New York City donors is dead, killed off by the White House's ... Read More

"Delivering Change"

BY Nancy Scola | Wednesday, April 7 2010

Organizing for America, the field wing of the Democratic National Committee, seems to be strategically reviving an organizing strategy that helped to power the Obama campaign's robust volunteer operation itself: make a ... Read More

Hope vs Power: The PhRMA Deal That Was and the OFA Campaign That Wasn't

BY Micah L. Sifry | Wednesday, February 24 2010

"These dudes are old school communications people. They're playing the game the way they know how because it's been lucrative for them. And they're destroying the whole promise of the Obama Administration in the ... Read More

Plouffe to OFA: Time to "Regroup, Refocus, and Re-engage" Around SOTU [UPDATED 2X]

BY Micah L. Sifry | Monday, January 25 2010

David Plouffe is out with an email to Organizing for America's massive list, calling on Obama supporters to "regroup, refocus, and re-engage on the vital work ahead." The focal point of his missive: to attend State of ... Read More

The Obama Disconnect: What Happens When Myth Meets Reality

BY Micah L. Sifry | Thursday, December 31 2009

"Collectively all of you, most of you whom are, I'm not sure, of drinking age, you've created the best political organization in America, and probably the best political organization that we've seen in the last 30, 40 ... Read More

Plouffe: "Little tolerance" for left's blog blowback

BY Nancy Scola | Thursday, December 17 2009

During a recent sit-down interview, techPresident contributor and Nation writer Ari Melber tested Obama campaign manager and ally David Plouffe for his reaction to the protests erupting on some segment of the liberal ... Read More

Can Obama's Army Convert to a Peacetime Force? Plouffe Responds

BY Nancy Scola | Wednesday, November 25 2009

"Thank you for prying yourselves away from Going Rouge." That was David Plouffe's way of welcoming us to a conference call to discuss his own version of a campaign memoir, the newly released The Audacity to ... Read More

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On Change.org, a Big-Name Call for Dimon's Ouster from New York Fed

The International Monetary Fund's former Chief Economist Simon Johnson is using Change.org to build support for his position that JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon must resign from the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Johnson, a British economist who's a longtime professor at MIT, established the petition on Wednesday. Since then, more than 3,000 people have signed on to support his position. GO

Howard Rheingold on Congress, Digital Literacy, and Making Political Movements

From Congress to the classroom, digital literacy is a key skill that's often sorely lacking, Howard Rheingold, author of the new book "Net Smart: How to Thrive Online," said on Thursday's Personal Democracy Plus call — but there are ways to change that.

Rheingold derided "the degree of technological ignorance" in government and in particular Congress. "It's worse than ignorance," he said. "It's know-nothingness ... it's so endemic." During the fight over the Stop Online Piracy Act, members of Congress could often be heard pleading their ignorance of the Internet and its inner workings even as debating legislation that some said would alter the structure of the global communications network.

The call, moderated by TechPresident editorial director Micah Sifry, was recorded and is available online here.

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Should U.N. Politics Affect the Internet?

A key U.S. House subcommittee plans on examining the implications of the U.S. ceding control of key aspects of the global Internet infrastructure next Thursday. The House Energy and Commerce's subcommittee on Communications and Technology announced Wednesday that it's going to hold a hearing on proposals at the United Nations' International Telecommunication Union to afford more control over Internet governance to countries other than the United States. GO

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This Isn't What Political Air Time Usually Means

MoveOn.org is asking supporters for $150,000 in donations to fly a plane above high-dollar fundraisers for Mitt Romney with "a message that reminds voters how he represents his corporate and 1% donors." MoveOn previously hired a plane to fly over Romney's Liberty University graduation speech with the message "GOP = HIGHER SCHOOL DEBT." GO

There's a New $200 Million Fund for Super-High-Speed Broadband Projects

An initiative to build and test gigabit-speed broadband networks is set to fund up to six next-generation Internet access projects across the country, fueled by a new $200 million broadband development funding program, Gigabit Squared and Gig.U announced this morning. GO

New Rice University Paper Chronicles Impact of the Internet On U.S. Foreign Policy

We all know that the Internet has transformed the way that the United States conducts diplomacy, and the way that it views national security, but where should we look to find evidence of this? This is the wide-ranging subject matter of a new paper published on Tuesday by Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. The paper provides a round-up of some of the major turns of events between 2005 and 2011 in the realms of Internet governance, the development of online public diplomacy at the State Department, the evolution of the Internet-fueled Arab Spring, and the establishment of the shadowy U.S. Cyber Command in Fort Meade, Maryland, among other things. GO

Messin' with Lamar Smith, Revisited

Remember that grassroots fundraising campaign to put a "Don't Mess with the Internet" billboard in the home district of Rep. Lamar Smith, Republican of Texas and sponsor of the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act? All of the money required came in, and Fight for the Future, the advocacy group opposing more stringent copyright protections online, writes that the billboard went up. GO

Republican National Convention Organizers Sever Ties With Becki Donatelli's Campaign Solutions

After eight years producing online content for the Republican National Convention, GOP web consultant Becki Donatelli's Campaign Solutions is off of the project. "Campaign Solutions was retained to help develop our convention website and digital strategy, but they are no longer involved in convention planning," James Davis, the convention's communications director, told techPresident Tuesday. It's unclear what precipitated the of the relationship between the convention organizers and Campaign Solutions, which has been producing the online component of the event since 2004. But Donatelli's name surfaced in a controversial anti-Obama ad pitch sent to a Super PAC backed by TD Ameritrade founder Joe Ricketts, which appeared in its entirety in the Times last week. Ricketts has since disavowed the proposal and Donatelli has denied any involvement. GO

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