George Allen's former netroots coordinator - my counterpart on the Allen campaign, and now "new media director for the Republican Communications Office in the Senate" - is quoted today in the BBC News on the question, "Have the Democrats won the web war?" The answer, in short, is yes. According to Henke, "Republicans are late getting into the game.'" And, in Henke's opinion, this is unfortunate, because although "Blogs are not directly responsible [for deciding elections]," they "shape the media coverage."The BBC article points to the impact of the "macaca" video, writing that "Liberal bloggers picked up on his apparent racism and Democrat Jim Webb won the Virginia seat." That's an interesting, if oversimplified, analysis. Personally, I think there were a number of factors that led to Jim Webb's victory and George Allen's defeat last year. Still, the "macaca" incident played a huge role, no question.
It's also interesting to note how much criticism the right wing dished out against this blogger (and others) for pointing out Allen's blatantly obvious racist behavior - habitual use of the "n word," posing with members of the ultra-right-wing/racist CCC, nooses in his office, stories about a deer head stuffed in a black man's mailbox, and of course "macaca" itself. But, of course, that was all some sort of plot by the liberal "nutroots." Suuuuure it was! Yeah, like WE were the ones who forced the words "macaca" and the "n word" into George Allen's mouth?
Meanwhile, the mainstream media pretty much ignored all of this for many years, until a video and a bunch of bloggers - such as Ben Tribbett, aka "Not Larry Sabato" - came along. On the other side of the blogosphere (e.g., the so-called "A Team"), we got absurd assertions that Jim Webb was a racist, a misogynist, an anti-Semite (as opposed to George Allen, who said that being called Jewish was an "aspersion" upon him), even a pedophile (!!!). And the right-wing bloggers wonder why Democrats appear to have "won the web war?"