Joe Trippi should be the next head of the DNC

DEAN AND THE WEB. Tuesday's Wall Street Journal had one of the best, most comphrensive and most clued-in newspaper articles I've seen on the Dean campaign's inventive use of MeetUps, blogging and Internet fundraising to get an edge in the Democratic primary. Much of this will be familiar to people who've read my colleague Garance Franke-Ruta's recent Prospect cover story on the topic. But the Journal article, by Jeanne Cummings, definitely adds some value:
On March 5, the campaign held its first official meetup in New York. The Essex Restaurant was told to prepare for 200 people, but 500 mobbed it, with more in a line outside. Mr. Dean emerged from his taxi and froze. "I was just shocked, stunned," he recalls. "I didn't understand the implications of . Trippi understood it immediately."

The campaign still lacked money or manpower and had only one Internet expert. But virtual-world supporters soon showed up on the campaign's real-world doorstep.

Mathew Gross, a 31-year-old environmental activist living in Moab, Utah, had been praising Mr. Dean on blogs for months. In March, he quit his job serving burritos and flew east to join the Dean campaign -- without calling ahead.

http://www.prospect.org/weblog/

The guy is brilliant.

Imagine him in charge of elections for Senate and House Dems. We'll have the majorities back for sure!

and DNC chairman in 2012.

If the Chair's job is fundraising, Trippi's obviously the person to do it.

about how this all worked.

I still don't think this system would
have worked for every candidate running.
Dr. Dean was against the war, was early
to say it and caught the attention of
us, the political junkies, who made him
our own.

Maybe Trippi can head that one up.

Since he has run against them?

in his image, I guess. Or maybe Trippi should run for office, heck, who knows.

, and create something of his own? It isn't a necessary organization.

You Deanies must all be Chicago Cub fans.

in the way campaigning will conducted from this point forward.

If you doubt it, just tell us why Dean's campaign has been copied by Kerry, Clark, and many others. I understand even Chimpy has his own blog nowadays (of course, someone else has to write it for him).

"Whether or not Dean wins the nomination, the Democratic establishment in Washington would be smart to find a place for Joe Trippi -- either as head of the Democratic National Committee or in some senior post at the organization. (And as Harold Meyerson pointed out in this column, the Democrats should be thinking about ways to make sure the people Dean has drawn into the political process stay there.) For decades, the Democrats have lagged behind the Republicans in the area of party building. And while I think Terry McAuliffe has been vastly underrated in this department -- largely by shortsighted Democrats looking for an easy scapegoat after the '02 debacle -- Trippi is obviously a guy who can think outside the box.

And it's not unimportant that he has an intuitive feel for the technology. You'd be surprised by how many people in Washington don't. This anecdote, from the Cummings piece, is telling:

Boyd offered MoveOn's expertise to all the Democratic contenders. Only the Dean campaign accepted, paying MoveOn employee Zack Exley's salary for two weeks. Mr. Exley, 33, made the Dean Web site more user-friendly and preached about e-mail's organizing and fund-raising power."

:kick: I started way late on the computer but I love it and am so glad to be a part of Dean's Campaign!:kick:

Trippi scares me. I'm not sure he and Dean are on the same page.

Has anyone here ever sat down and talked strategy with him? Dean goes on Leno and says, "We're going to get a million people to donate $87, and that's how we're going to beat Bush."

Trippi doesn't think that can be done. In that, he doesn't think you can win with 1 million giving $87. He thinks we need 2 million giving $100.

I don't know. Some people from my town hung out with him for a while one night. He seemed to make people feel guilty for not giving enough (say, for instance if you're unemployed and gave $70, you're what's going wrong with the campaign). Maybe he was just off that night.

Don't know why success spooks you?

I think Dean's campaign was successful before Trippi came along. I don't credit Trippi for vbuilding the grassroots. I think lots of other people deserve that credit.

I think Trippi is consumed with money. And lets look at his track record. He worked for Gary Hart and then Gephardt (1988). Yeah, he must be a genius. Look at how well those presidential campaigns went.

Look, I'm not saying he sucks. I'm just saying he scares me a bit. Not because of success, but because he appears to want to transform "People Powered Howard" into "Dollar Powered Howard", and I think that the message will be lost if he succeeds.

you feel.

I see your point but I also know Dean will need every last Dollar and I know,too, they are Very Economical with their money.

So they are stretching what they have to help it go even further.

I think talking to Trippi about this would be a great...

and Trippi's primary job is to bring in money. If you don't have money, you don't win. Simple as that.

It's very odd that this spooks you. How do you propose Dean run a campaign without money?

. Taking donations from private citizens as Trippi does is completely different than taking it from corporate America.

Both money men.And DLC oriented. No thanks.

He would getting most of his money from corporate America if he were. Money isn't bad. It is where the money comes from that can be bad. Deans comes mostly from private citizens. DLC money comes from corporate America.

You're too good and too bright to spout ill-informed garbage like that. Really.

Eloriel