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OluwafemiMorohunfolaPaperOne 2 - 16 Nov 2008 - Main.OluwafemiMorohunfola
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> | Why The Internet Chose Barack Obama | | | | |
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> | The Internet Chose President-Elect Barack Obama | | | | |
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> | The 2008 Presidential Election in the United States was an historical election for many reasons. A lot of focus has been on the fact that America elected its first black president. This election also marks the first time since my birth that a presidential election was won by someone not named Bush or Clinton. This election was like nothing that had happened in American politics in the last twenty years, and it was made possible by the Internet. | | | | |
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> | Many news gathering organizations have reported the game-changing effect that new technology had on the 2008 election. Writing for the BBC, Steve Schifferes stated, “[T]he more nimble use of the internet by the Obama campaign in its early stages helped him overcome the huge initial lead of Hillary Clinton.” Time magazine credits Obama’s use of the Internet for his campaign’s unbelievable ability to shatter previous fundraising records. The New York Times and ABC News have also published articles analyzing the Obama campaign’s groundbreaking use of the Internet. | | | | |
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> | That the Internet played a crucial role in the election of Barack Obama seems clear. The more interesting questions are How and Why. | | | | |
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> | The Obama Campaign Used The Internet Better | | | | |
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> | The sometimes unsung heroes of the Obama Campaign were given due credit by the President-Elect as he spoke at the end of the election. It was “the best campaign team ever assembled” that made his innovative use of the Internet possible. Joe Trippi, who attempted to use the Internet in novel ways while working for the Howard Dean campaign, congratulated the Obama Campaign for having, “used the Internet to organize his supporters in a way that would have in the past required an army of volunteers and paid organizers on the ground.” | | | | |
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> | Time magazine discussed in detail how Obama raised money in a completely new way by using the Internet. Getting low number donations from hundreds of thousands of supporters did not just enable Obama to raise more money than ever before, it also gave his campaign a constant flow of money. As Karen Tumulty writes for Time magazine, the internet made it possible to set up “systems by which donors can have their credit cards billed automatically in easy-to-budget monthly amounts of as little as $20.” This could basically ensure a steady flow of campaign money. | | | | |
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> | What Obama’s campaign did with the Internet is not the entirety of how the Internet affected this campaign. There were a number of unique benefits that Obama derived from the Internet because of who he was.
Barack Obama Was Uniquely Suited To Campaign In The Era Of The Internet
The masterful use of a brand new medium of communication is one of the many ways in which Obama’s campaign echoed that of John F. Kennedy. Kennedy was uniquely suited to television because of his youth and good looks. The effectiveness of Obama’s brilliant rhetoric was exponentially magnified by Youtube and online news websites. Supporters and undecided voters could watch his moving speeches again and again and he benefitted from what Time magazine estimates was the equivalent of millions of hours of free advertizing. The less eloquent Senator McCain? could not derive the same benefit.
The Internet also caters to authenticity. Claire Miller writes for the New York Times, “As Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s incendiary words kept surfacing, people could re-watch Mr. Obama’s speech on race. To date, 6.7 million people have watched the 37-minute speech on YouTube? .” The Fact-checking value of the Internet was also a danger. Throughout the campaign, millions of people watched McCain? ’s comments about spending a hundred years in Iraq and other obvious blunders. Gavin Newsom, mayor of San Francisco, put it best. “There will be a lot of collateral damage coming to grips with the fact that we’re in a reality TV series, ‘Politics 24/7.” In a world where everything you do and say leaves its indelible mark on the Internet, Barack Obama’s consistency and temperament truly paid off.
The timing of Barack Obama’s decision to run for president was also of great benefit to him. He entered a political climate of complete disillusionment, and promised something very different than the status quo. Obviously, his rhetoric helped him spread the message of change, but his youth, his race, and his political outsider status all helped him to embody the image of change in a way that McCain? could not. Rallying the youth vote was essential to Obama’s victory and they responded both to what he said and to who he was. The BBC article describes how social networking sites like Myspace and Facebook allowed Obama supporters to demonstrate their support in a very public way. An ABC News article discusses how Obama is already beginning to use the internet to make millions of supporters feel like they are involved in his presidency in the same way they felt that they were involved in his candidacy. Obama did an excellent job of making a disillusioned electorate feel like they finally getting control of their government back.
Why Did The Internet Choose Barack Obama?
The clearest statement of how much the Internet helped Barack Obama has probably come from Arianna Huffington, editor in chief of The Huffington Post. At a Web 2.0 panel, she unequivocally stated, “Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not be president. Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not have been the nominee.” As clear as that is to many Americans, there is a second element that is equally true even if potentially less clear. Barack Obama did not win solely because his campaign used the Internet better than his adversaries. He won because he is uniquely suited to being a politician in the new era of Internet campaigns. He did not buy the presidency, and he did not innovate his way into the White House. The Internet chose Barack Obama because of who he is. Only time will tell if it chose right. | | | -- OluwafemiMorohunfola - 06 Nov 2008 |
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