Let's see what the griefers do with this: supporters of Barack Obama have constructed an apparently unofficial Obama HQ in Second Life. Right now it's rather sparsely decorated, and when I went this afternoon there was only one other avatar there.

Earlier this week Bill O’Reilly unleashed an attack on the Yearly Kos convention — calling Daily Kos “one of the worst examples of hatred America has to offer” after citing a handful of reader comments out of thousands. He then singled out JetBlue, one of the convention’s corporate sponsors, and chastised them for sponsoring the convention. While O’Reilly’s hyperbole isn’t surprising, it shows such a lack of understanding for how the blogosphere operates that even presidential candidates have come to Yearly Kos’ defense.

The Web on the Candidates -- Yearly Kos Edition

Byron York at the National Review concludes that since YearlyKos is attracting the Democratic establishment, its "Kossack" minions (the "Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy") have therefore become an important wing of the Democratic establishment. "The turnout in Chicago shows that the Kossacks and colleagues from other activist websites have taken their place as the newest wing of the establishment in Democratic-party politic," York writes. "They’re not exactly the new bosses; it’s not as if the unions and interest groups have disappeared, but it is true that the netroots now rank alongside them. A candidate who wants to win can no longer ignore the netroots, even if he or she would like to." True enough. A huge movement has been built over the last two years, one that has grown faster than the Goldwater-inspired Republican movement of yesteryear, and now all of the candidates need to pay heed to the netroots.

Jonthan Kaplan tells readers of the Hill about this Kos thing, explaining that "the three-day convention allows left-leaning political activists, policy entrepreneurs and citizen pundits who pay a $275 registration fee to strategize with Washington’s heavyweight pols and policy wonks and flaunt their power in front of the mainstream media." It's true; I'm currently watching a burly netroots blogger pump up his muscles in front of an unimpressed CNN exec... But seriously, it's really about the parties. "The party getting the lion’s share of the early attention as 'the place to be' is a Friday night bash sponsored by Time magazine." I admit it. All roads lead to the Swampland soiree. Sue me.

Representatives of the internet teams from the Dodd, Edwards, Obama and Richardson campaigns are presenting their approaches to a standing-room only crowd in a workshop at YearlyKos. Here's a live blog semi-transcript.

Is it possible that there are no workshops on the Iraq War at this year's YearlyKos?...Barack Obama is winning the armband poll among registered attendees...and what does Markos Moulitsas say about the DLC, Hillary Clinton's newfound respect for DailyKos and the chances for a Republican version of DailyKos?

Did Hillary Clinton just bug out of the YearlyKos presidential candidates' breakout sessions on Saturday, seriously alienating many of the Democratic activists attending, or was she never in in the first place? A small thing, perhaps, but it may portend a flare-up in relations between the netroots and the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination.

The Web on the Candidates -- Still at YearlyKos

Continuing the theme about YearlyKos becoming so big, so quickly (it's only in it's second year), Jose Antonio Vargas, writing at the Washington Post, articulates the paradox of Kos becoming a major player in Democratic politics, yet still existing outside the mainstream. No one figure illustrates this contradiction better than Hillary Clinton. Despite being the Democratic frontrunner, she consistently lags behind John Edwards and Barack Obama in DailyKos straw polls. But it's now mandatory that she pay heed to the netroots and attend YearlyKos, a fact that underscores the netroots' power. "Look, the fact all the major presidential candidates are attending means that the Net roots, in a very short time, has earned its seat on the big table," says Simon Rosenberg of the New Democrat Network (as Micah Sifry reports, Clinton will be participating in a Presidential candidates forum on Saturday but not in a "breakout" session immediately after. The news broke last night at the first keynote; the crowd booed loudly). Kos namesake Markos Moulitsas Zúniga is realistic about YearklyKos and DailyKos' effect on Democratic politics. "The fact is, the Net roots cannot win elections by ourselves," he says. "But we can be a key component to a winning Democratic strategy."

[UPDATE] Peter Daou, Clinton's Internet Director, has announced that Clinton will in fact attend the breakout session. "After seeing the mix-up, and knowing that the organizers have worked very hard to pull together a great event, Hillary asked her staff to rearrange her schedule and we have been working with the organizers since early this morning to work out the details," Daou writes.

I’m in Chicago for the second annual YearlyKos convention and since yesterday afternoon I’ve keep coming back to the same conclusion: I think, nearly three-and-a-half years after Dean for America collapsed in the wake of the Iowa caucus loss, that Howard Dean might have won the campaign.

A few random tidbits from Micah and I as the second day of YearlyKos winds down (well, as the sessions wind down…)

The YearlyKos Presidential Candidates forum has just ended and I want to get a quick post up as I wait for the Obama breakout to begin. Topline impressions: While the crowd was clearly most friendly to Edwards (no surprise given the baseline polling that DailyKos does of its readers), Obama gained the most. And we'll all win if the next inhabitant of the White House hires an official blogger...