Scott Brown disintermediation: The replacement of political parties by internet enthusiasts

Look, Ma. We're featured in the totally awesome Chris Muir's Day by Day: "Zed, new media RULED on Brown --  SISU, Legal Insurrection, Ace of Spades ..."

"There was a lot of some internet-based disintermediation going on" in the runup to the Scott Brown victory in the Massachusetts Senatorial election, Glenn Reynolds suggested to Michael Barone in a must-see PJM "Instavision" interview, "MASS UPHEAVAL: The Dems' Super Majority Is Gone, and Michael Barone Says It's Only the Beginning":

Reynolds: One thing that struck me about the Scott Brown campaign was that he really didn't seem to be getting a lot of support from the RNC, and there was a lot of some internet-based disintermediation going on. People who supported Scott Brown went directly to the campaign, he ran the Moneybomb that raised a million dollars a day for the whole week before the election, he brought in thousands of volunteers who came in from out of state, who came in on the internet, and this seems to me to be another step in sort of the replacement of political parties by internet enthusiasts ... Am I overreading this, is this my notorious internet enthusiasm, or is there really something to this?

Barone: No. I think you've got an institutional position to defend as the proprietor of Instapundit.com, but I think you're dead-on right about this. The fact is that Scott Brown was able to use the internet as a means of communication with voters across the country ...There's a larger point here than just campaign malpractice though. The only places that Martha Coakley, the Democrat, carried were a few old mill towns [and] what David Brooks called in a NYT column a couple of weeks ago the "educated class" ... some of the affluent suburbs west of Boston. But the fact is there are more town folks than gown folks in Massachusetts.

 "What advice would you give people in the Tea Party movement about what to do next?" asked Reynolds:

Barone: Go around and search out candidates, and find some people locally. One of the fascinating things about this Massachusetts race is that I, the co-author of The Almanac of American Politics, never heard of Scott Brown two months ago ... He was not high on my radar screen. Now he's a major national figure, and that victory speech he gave last night, which was terrific, was almost in the nature of a State of the Union Address ... I think Scott Brown set the parameters for where this country wants policy to be headed ... We've got an awful lot of talented, bright, energetic people out there that people like me have never heard of. The Tea Partiers have got an opportunity, I think, to coalesce around some of these people ... The Tea Party People can make their voices heard ... Compare the Obama enthusiasts of 2008 with the Tea Partiers of 2009 and 2010. The Obama enthusiasts were entranced by style . . . the Tea Party People are concerned about substance. 

We noticed that former Hillary sparring partner Rick Lazio is following the Brown disintermediation-by-the-internet playbook,* having learned via Twitter that some of Brown's former advisors are advising Lazio in his run for Governor of New York. Are these the same Romney advisors who helped orchestrate Brown's Perfect-Storm campaign? Is it all part of a larger Romney strategy for Oval Office 2012?

Update: We were wondering about the parallel understory -- the Shakespeareanesque play within a play? -- of Chris Muir's cartoon, too, all those teabagging references. Sounds like something the boys at Red Eye would have served up. Not exactly our cuppa, but good for a few laughs, again in the Shakespearean sense of the buffoonish foil? And as with Shakespeare, all part of the great tragic-comic "world's a stage."

Update to the update from Chris Muir himself:

I would say rather more in the Chaucer/Canterbury Tales buffoonery!

Quite a rude Tale, when one reads Chaucer ...

:)

Update II: No time to say more now, but Prof. William Jacobson of Legal Insurrection nails it:

While Facebook and blogs were important to fundraising and messaging, Twitter is what allowed pro-Brown activists to stay in contact with each other, to feed each other news links, and generally to keep up each other's spirits at a time when the radar was showing that Brown had no chance,

I don't think it is an exaggeration to say that this was the first American Twitter revolution.

Update: Dan Riehl links: "We be intermediatin' anyway! heh!"

*We picked up on Lazio's Brown advisors via Twitter, started following Lazio, and shortly thereafter found that we were being followed by Lazio, who direct messaged us a welcome aboard: "Thank you for being part of our movement. Please consider taking a moment to sign up."

Comments

[goomp]

The mainstream media was taken over by the so-called educated class. Many of these educated people are ignorant of what makes for a free and prosperous society. Freedom to pursue honest goals by dint of hard work is essential. The role of government has to be to enforce the rules which are laid down to prevent the corruption which always appears when some develop too much power. As we must remember "power corrupts"whether it be political or economic or intellectual. The Blogs and twitter are rectifying this failing of the MSM.

[Kelly]

You're in the big time now, Sissie! Glad to see that your tireless and creative blogging support for Brown was recognized. You were a significant part of this perfect storm of an election.

[Alt-Con]

Probably the most vulnerable politician in the state after Gov. Patrick is 2nd district House Rep. Richard Neal (D-MA).

[Gayle Miller]

I am reminded of something that I encountered in the mid-90s. I was visiting California, staying with Sis and her then-fiance. He fancied himself quite the expert on all things involving wines and liquors - he was a functioning alcoholic in my view - but one story he told me was hilarious. It seems that there is a winery in California that takes all the miscellaneous overages from its various wine vats and combines them into a wine they call "Chateau de Cash Flow" and which they sell for a quite modest price. My sister's fiance bought some bottles, covered the labels and took them to some fancy-schmancy wine tasting where everyone became quite excited about this new vintage! He took great pleasure in revealing his deception to the wine snobs in attendance.

The two coasts of our nation and the IVY league snooty-britches gang are afflicted with the same malaise as those wine snobs. They do not and cannot recognize that we in flyover country are just as smart and far more practical and sensible than they are. They must, at all costs, cling to their mistaken sense of superiority because, at the end of the day, that is absolutely ALL they have! They mostly don't have personality, they don't have much sense or the ability to deal with day-to-day realities (excusing their inability to balance a checkbook as being beneath their lofty selves) but they do have massive egos that are based on their own perceptions of their superiority. And in the depths of their squinchy little souls, they know they have nothing to offer!

[pam]

Congratulations; you earned the accolades!

[Connecticut Yankee]

I can haz photo of Tiny with a Brown campaign sign or one of those wonderful "People's Seat" T-shirts?

[Teresa]

We can say "We knew her when..."

Actually more than anything I think it's soooo cool you got a panel in Day By Day! I love it!

[clay barham]

America, founded on individual freedom, had local government no more than one day’s horseback ride from the governed. 19th century Democrats ran on individual and state’s sovereignty. Laws on behavior moved to the Federal government away from local and state government. The tradition of local control was never lost, from the town hall meetings to Vigilante movements were citizens concerned with the way they were governed and took action to right the wrongs. The Tea Party Movement is an example of citizen participation against governing elite far from people. However, 20th century Democrats declared Tea Parties vigilante mobs. America’s founding traditions are cited in The Changing Face of Democrats, Our Lost Libertarian Roots, on claysamerica.com.

[ScottBrownPres]

This book deal is just the beginning my friends. In keeping with the Obama "path to the White house", Scott Brown will run for president and win. Get your free Scott Brown for President bumper sticker (while supplies last) at http://ScottBrownForPresident.com and help make history!