Joe Trippi, formerly Howard Dean's Jedi Master Campaign Manager, took a couple days off after he left Dean for America, went home, and started a blog. This was the guy widely seen as the force behind the unprecedented use of the internet at DFA. Now, without a candidate but still itching for real change in America, Trippi and some of his friends (including former Dean campaign staffers) have started
ChangeForAmerica.com, a blog to head up the "movement" started by the DFA web team. If you were interested in what Dean was doing with the web, but not so interested in Dean himself, this might be a site for you. It's already on my daily read list, despite its current state as a few weeks of getting their feet wet.
I am really fascinated by the juncture of the internet and political grassroots. Especially in a small state like RI, I can see a bright future for organization via the web, which would create a group and a message that would spread into the wider community.
I've been thinking about this lately, in relation to the now defunct Cool Moose Party (RI). When I first registered to vote, that was the group I registered with. The platform, as I understood it, was that the Republicans and Democrats were so caught up in idealogy and special interest whoredom that neither party could get any common sense, good for the people, legislation passed. Cool Moose candidates could be consensus builders and/or swing voters in various offices, and we'd all be better off. The party only had one real star, Robert Healey, who ran for Governor twice and Lt Gov in 2002 (his platform: abolish the office!), garnering 9% in 1994. The party languished and after the 2002 election I got a letter saying the party was no longer "official", and I'm now an Independent.
Anyway, I think it may be time for a resurgence of the party. With the lessons of the Dean Campaign and the scandals coming from the corrupt Democrats in the RI legislature, I think RI'ers would be receptive to real change. I'd run as a Cool Moose, but the party is in shambles, I guess. There is no web presence at all that I can find, which I could certainly help with. I can't even find Bob Healey's email address (assuming he has one), and
his website is nothing but a snarky frontpage. I'm hoping someone googles Cool Moose and contacts me. It's worked before...
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The Cool Moose party is defunct? Oh, my. Even though I’m not even 16 yet, I’ve always proclaimed my political affiliation as Cool Moose. People are far too wrapped up in Republican and Democrat to even take note of the candidates’ positions or platforms, and Cool Moose, in my opinion, is the antithesis of that. I wonder if there’s any way of getting CMP back on its feet? Probably not, but a girl can dream, right?
I still look back on the Cool Moose Party as a lost opportunity, and reading your post also tempts me to look at it as a uniquely Rhode Island foreshadowing of the Dean campaign, in that a lot of us felt at that time like the Democrats were representing a political center that left many people cold. The party appealed to people who were left of the democratic party but did not feel comfortable with the Green Party.
I remember attending the party’s first convention – it was at the U.R.I. campus – and taking part in the platform committee. I remember M. Charles Bakst covering the convention – mainly to make fun of us, and to make fun of Bob Healey’s hair. (Bakst really couldn’t get over Healey’s long hair. It was a weird fixation.)
There was a lot of creative energy and optimism; and for a while, we really were on the ballot. It is too bad that we didn’t front any candidates who found traction in their own right; the Cool Moose Party remained, in the public perception, a project of Robert Healey, Jr. – attorney, novelty candidate, and ice cream maven.
The void remains. What next?
i think that batman is the coolest moose in town. if only the character of “the joker” were more developed, he would kick bob healeys ass.